BASRA, 31 March 2003 — President Saddam Hussein’s grip on Iraq’s second largest city, Basra, remains as tight as ever over a week into a virtual siege there by US and British troops, residents said yesterday.
“Nothing has really changed in Basra. The government is in full control. They still completely rule,” said Abu Jawad, standing near British tanks at a checkpoint outside the southern city.
“People see this as an occupation. If the government gives us weapons we will fight the Americans and the British.”
Basra, home to around 1.5 million people, has been bombed by fighter planes and come under shell fire since US and British troops invaded Iraq 11 days ago to topple Saddam. The attacks appear only to be enraging civilians, who are rallying around the Iraqi president even though they live in fear of his secret police.
Western tanks yesterday controlled roads around the city but had not penetrated the center where, residents say, life goes on as normal under the firm rule of Saddam loyalists.
According to the inhabitants, police are deployed throughout the urban area and traffic police keep rickety cars flowing as clouds of black smoke drift over the city, shells explode and gunfire crackles.
Even some restaurants remain open, serving fish and lamb in this city overlooking green water flowing from the Shatt Al-Arab waterway.
The ruling Baath party headquarters has been shelled but Saddam’s supporters have resumed their activities in other buildings, including armed resistance to the Americans and British.
Iraqi Army units still operate and tanks are present, residents said. Militias armed with rifles show no sign of caving in to Western military firepower.
“Everything is normal. It is sometimes difficult for government workers to maintain their shifts because of the shelling but otherwise the state is in control,” said Muhammad. “Basra is stable.”
The situation is in sharp contrast to Western expectations. Many thought the Shiite people in the south would repeat their 1991 revolt against Saddam’s largely Sunni leadership. Their revolt then was brutally put down.
Instead, the people of Basra are focusing their fury on the US and British soldiers ringing their homes.
“They came here and they bombed innocent families,” said one man, looking toward crude cement houses in one city slum.
British troops manning a road into Basra abandoned efforts yesterday to control the flow of Iraqis into the southern city after an angry tide of 2,000 people threatened to overwhelm their checkpoint.
A line of Irish Guards, backed by four tanks, had tried to block men of fighting age from entering the city.
But faced with growing anger from people demanding they be allowed to take food to their hungry families, they appeared on the verge of losing control.
“Keep back,” shouted one soldier manning the checkpoint on the two-lane highway, about one km south of a bridge crossing into Basra, hurling a volley of expletives at the crowd.
“I want to go to Basra. There is no food in Basra. We want to take food into Basra,” said Karim, a 29-year-old bringing a donkey and cart laden with tomatoes to his wife and three-month-old baby inside the city.
He was speaking just before the soldiers gave up their increasingly chaotic attempts to hold back the pressing crowd and allowed a flood of people, cars, trucks, taxis and carts to surge toward the bridge.
Water supplies are running low so Iraqis are digging up dirty wells. The prices of tomatoes and other vegetables are rocketing.
But the Iraqis are not blaming the Baath party. “The Americans and British fired their weapons at our electricity pylons. They cut off fresh water supplies from near the airport,” said Osama. “Why?”
“The government brought back the electricity two days ago. It is turned off a few hours a day but the service is back.”
Life doesn’t seem so normal on the edge of the city. The debris of war lies beside a bridge, bullets are scattered on the dirt near an abandoned Iraqi tank.
Hundreds of people queue in long lines to get into Basra each day to sell vegetables at the local market. Or they simply go home after visiting relatives in nearby towns.
“Basra is Iraqi. It will always belong to the government,” said one Iraqi man.
