Monday, March 29, 2004

Days I do not want to forget.

The 28th of March 2003.
The American president says that the justice day will follow the freedom day and that all the war criminals who terrorized the Iraqi people, will be judged.
Rumsfeld says “remember the faces of your oppressors, we will need your testimony”
I really wish that. Our freedom will not be complete without justice being served and the criminals should be judged for every crime and every atrocity, so that what happened will not happen again.

Today a direct strike was launched at the Ba’athists in Basra. One of the raids targeted a place where about 200 members of the Ba’ath party were holding a meeting. It seems that the intelligence of the coalition is doing its job in Basra and it seems that they are getting some help. The important thing is that we got rid of some of the criminals and we will not have to remember their faces Mr. Rumsfeld, they got their share before the justice day.

Another successful raid to the coalition targets a convoy of the republican guards and destroys it entirely.
Today the evil propaganda center was hit also (the ministry of lies and stupidity).
The 1st British ship carrying humanitarian aids reach the port of Om Qasir.
Bombing continues all around the clock in Baghdad.

A friend of mine asked me today to help him in setting up a satellite dish receiver. He said he couldn’t stay away from the events as the local radio channels blind one even more. We agreed to do that after sunset so that we can do that without being noticed by the neighbors. I went with another friend (Ahmed) to my friend’s house soon as it was dark. We asked our friend to bring a TV device to the roof to help us knowing the correct direction and catch the signal. The dish was the fixed type, without a motor to move it and it was easy to direct it towards Arab sat. After about 15 minutes from start, a heavy bombing started. We were looking at the sky and the fires of the anti-aircraft weapons right above our heads lightened it. This usually tells us about the direction of the missiles or airplanes as these weapons follow them and send signals to the other batteries depending on mere vision. Ok, it seems that the missiles are heading in our direction. Suddenly we heard a strong whirr. This was the 1st time I hear a missile passing directly and this low above my head. This should mean that it’s just about to land somewhere very near. All this passed in our minds in a fraction of a second. We threw ourselves to the ground and put our hands above our heads. These were truly scary moments. A bright red light flashed in the sky lightening the whole area and the night turned to what looks like a day light followed immediately by an enormous blast and a shocking wave that we felt through the ground and in the air. The whole house shook violently for a second. We stood up to see the fire that was coming from the area that was hit by the missile. It was the nearby switch. Our eyes were wide open and my friend’s family was screaming at us telling their son to bring us inside the house immediately. Just before deciding to do that, we heard a similar whirr at the same distance. We threw ourselves to the ground again. There was no time to go inside. I closed my eyes waiting for the sound of the explosion. You can never get used to these sounds. Another huge blast and a shock wave, followed by a 3rd missile passing at the same distance. We were confused and didn’t know how to act. We saw the fire and parts of the building that was hit fly in the air before falling as small fireballs. Our host forgot about us and ran as fast as he could to go inside the house, leaving us there, but he was surprised to see that his parents had locked the door that leads to the house!! He stood there knocking at the door, but no one opened, they were paralyzed by fear. Despite all the fear and how scared we were, we laughed from our hearts. “See Ahmed what fear can do? They abandoned their own son!” laughing at ourselves is the only weapon we have at such times to overcome our fears!

The raid was still going on targeting places near to our location. We ran and tried to hide under a window type air conditioner that was extending outside for about 30-cm. We glued ourselves to the wall beside it and pushed our heads beneath it. With all our bodies, except our heads exposed, our host turned to us after losing hope in his parents, and now it was his turn to burst out laughing at our position.
The raid finally stopped and we finished our job, still laughing at each other and at ourselves. Fear made us act like children.

-By Mohammed.

No comments: