Goodbye to Baghdad

Ένα συγκλονιστικό χρονογράφημα της Caroline Hawley, ανταποκρίτριας του BBC στη Βαγδάτη. Απλά διαβάστε το. Αλλά προσοχή είναι λίγο μεγάλο και πολλοί βαριούνται να διαβάσουν κάτι που ξεπερνά τις πέντε γραμμές...

Μερικά αποσπάσματα...

The civilian administrators, who had followed the soldiers in, were ill-equipped. One senior coalition official admitted to me: "We can't even organise ourselves let alone a country."

But on the streets outside, American soldiers were increasingly being targeted and when they hit back, Iraqi civilians were often killed.

I remember in May last year standing in the rubble of a house in Falluja, where I was told 36 members of one family - including five children - had been killed during an air bombardment.

They had been crushed to death and you could still smell the decomposing bodies as a neighbour shouted: "Is this George Bush's freedom?"

But American soldiers have been dying here, too, and been horribly maimed.

At a field hospital north of Baghdad I saw a 19-year-old brought in with half his face blown off - the day after his birthday.

Over the past couple of years, when I have been away on holiday, I have jumped out of my skin when I have heard thunder or fireworks, even doors slamming.

Imagine what it is all doing to the collective nerves of Iraqis who cannot get out of the country.

There was a different kind of determination on display at polling stations on Thursday, as Iraqis voted for their first proper parliament since Saddam Hussein was overthrown.

I watched as an old man with an artificial leg shuffled in on crutches. A heavily pregnant Iraqi dentist called Suraa told me the elections would draw a line between the suffering of the past and the good life that must be coming.

For her sake, and the sake of her baby, I hope she is right.

The parting words to me from an Iraqi friend were: "Pray for us."