BAGHDAD, 25 March 2003 — On the streets of Baghdad, the pictures of dead and captured US soldiers — and the reports of fierce resistance to the US-led attack — have left Iraqis standing tall and proud. “I was never so proud to be Iraqi,” said a taxi driver on Baghdad’s central Saadoun Street, which was busy yesterday despite another night of intensive bombings in the US-led war to oust Saddam Hussein.
“Our army is scoring success after success against the world’s sole superpower with its mighty military coalition,” Abu Jassem said. Like virtually all Iraqis, he gathered Sunday with his family to watch footage of charred and bloodied bodies which Iraq said were US soldiers killed in battle.
State television also aired images and interviews of five obviously frightened American soldiers, two of them wounded and one a woman.
The United States and Britain criticized Iraq for broadcasting the pictures, which were shown worldwide on Qatar’s Al-Jazeera television, but there was nothing of the sort heard here.
“The pictures are obviously gruesome, but not as much as pictures of Iraqi children victim of the depleted uranium used by the American troops in the 1991 Gulf War or the victims of 13 years of sanctions,” said dentist Ahmad Shalabi.
On a sidewalk nearby, a group of men sat on small wooden chairs, lazily smoking water pipes. “We are proud to have humbled the US pride in front of the whole world,” said Kazem Mohamad, who said he fought in both the 1980-1988 war with Iran and the 1991 Gulf War led by US President George W. Bush’s father. “Did you see the American soldiers?” his neighbor asked the others.
“I thought they looked like Rambo, like tough fighters, but all we saw are a bunch of nice-looking urban people,” said Mohsen Ahmad, who owns an exchange shop in the center. Ahmad opened his hands in wonder, at a loss over the interview with one of the five US soldiers, who looked bewildered.
“When the soldier was asked why he was in Iraq, he did not know what to respond. He said he was just obeying orders,” Ahmad said. “How can soldiers fight without a cause? They are on foreign land, they don’t even know what Iraq is like. But we will teach them in no time, because our soldiers are fighting with everything they have: their arms and souls.”
Ali Hussein, a grocer from the city of Karbala, said: “It does not matter where you stand in Iraqi politics, it is clear that all Iraqis stand against foreign invaders and are extremely happy to see the images of humiliated American invaders.”
“Even today, the television aired pictures of an American helicopter that was shot down in Karbala by tribesmen who have rallied to help the regular army,” he said. “Airing these pictures will also make the American people aware that their leadership is lying to them. No foreign country should be allowed to invade another,” he said.
One souvenir shop owner was even more exuberant. “The image of Iraq in the world is children dying in hospitals. I wish I could change these postcards of our country’s touristic wealth into our new treasure: the captured enemy soldiers.”
Abu Iman, an elderly man wearing a red and white Arab checkered headdress, noted that several of the captured soldiers came from the US state of Texas. “This is the state of US President George W. Bush. Our only hope is to capture all people from Texas who attack us, including Bush and his father,” he said.
