Bitter Smile

Unlike everyday, I started my day looking at a picture of a beautiful Iraqi woman wearing a traditional Iraqi dress. As usual, Iraqis start their days with pictures of explosions, people running, a woman weeping, a child crying, a group of people shot dead and so on. This morning was different; they started the day with this beautiful smile which they miss a lot.
The picture showed a young Iraqi model putting on a beautiful Arabic traditional dress, Galabiya, with golden decorations. This model’s picture was taken yesterday during the opening of the Iraqi folkloric fashion show sponsored by the Iraqi culture ministry. “Wow! It’s weird. I thought I will see either a picture of a bombing or something like that,” I said to O. I cheered up and was so delighted to see a picture of a woman with a beautiful smile, a smile that is almost missing due to the daily suffering in an occupied and destroyed country.

I have to say that the daily pictures I see everyday makes me so sad and increase my pain to watch my country destroyed. But today, this picture changed my mood. I kept staring at it and thought about how we are far from happiness and smile to the extent I found this picture strange.

Now, back to reality!

Before the U.S.-led invasion, media in Iraq was not free. Newspapers, TV channels and radio stations flourished since then. Journalists become free to express reality of the situation without praising a leader or a specific party. However, these journalists did not expect their job to be one of the most dangerous and did not expect their newly “liberated” country would be the most dangerous.

Since 2005 to the meantime, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), a New York-based nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to defending press freedom worldwide, published the names of the journalists who were killed since the invasion in 2003. The CPJ said that the number of the Iraqi journalists killed in 2005 and 2006 reached 23, 22 in 2005 and 1 in 2006. Anchors, cameramen, reporters, editors, news producers and directors are all subjected to the danger of the US forces and the widespread insurgents who do not believe in freedom of writing.

As a reporter, I’ve been at risk in Baghdad and other provinces several times. Working for an Iraqi media means something but working for US media means something else! As an Iraqi reporter working with a US media, I am considered a “spy”, “collaborator” or sometimes an “infidel” in the eyes of the insurgents who said have the “right” to kill me as I broke the rule of “true Islam” and become a “spy to the infidels”, which is nonsense.

At any scene, nothing is guaranteed. The journalist, whether foreigner or Iraqi, is subjected to different kinds of danger. U.S. and Iraqi forces are always hostile to journalists at scenes, mostly those of explosions. They have the “right” to shoot you in the head if they just “suspect” you. For instance, Waleed Khalid, 35, a soundman for Reuters, was shot by U.S. forces several times in the head and chest as he drove with cameraman Haidar Kadhem to investigate a report of clashes between armed men and police in Baghdad's al-Adil neighborhood, Reuters reported. However, I believe the main danger facing journalists in Iraq comes from insurgents. Iraqi journalists fall victims to revenge attacks by insurgents, mostly Sunni groups who do not let Iraqis work with foreigners, especially with Western news media. And those who murder journalists usually go unpunished.

So far, I haven’t heard any journalist was killed by Iraqi police. They just do not cooperate with journalists at scenes. Once, I was covering an explosion targeted a Church in Baghdad, I was shooting some photos and taking notes form the scene. Suddenly, an Iraqi policeman yelled at me and then he and other policemen handcuffed me despite my screams that I am a journalist. They did not care and were about to confiscate my camera till I convinced them to release me by deleting the pictures I’ve got.

Since I started working, I have been so cautious in telling people where I work. No one in my neighborhood knows what I do. If so, I would be finished in a minute as I live in a very dangerous neighborhood where three young men were killed just because insurgents discovered where they worked. When I leave my house, I look right and left to make sure no stranger is following me or monitoring me from distance. The same thing happens when I go back, which is always late at night. I said it previously that I had told my parents not to open the door if someone comes late. Instead, I go and open it incase someone wants to shoot me. I’d rather be killed instead of watching my parents be killed in front of me. Also, people started to ask. My neighbors are bothering my family by asking about me and why I don’t show up in the neighborhood as I used to be. My barber noticed that I did not show up for a month and a half. Well, of course, I was in the US at that time but do I dare to tell him this? I have to say that I am being cautious, but the question is: is this enough?!

Is that it? Of course, not. I have to mention that it is not only the journalist who faces danger; it is his driver, his interpreter and even his cook as well! Several drivers and interpreters of journalists were either threatened or killed just because they work for journalists. Few days ago, a driver working for a western media was shot dead in the middle of the street near his house in Baghdad. The security situation is getting worse day after day. No serious efforts are made to maintain security in the country. I know Iraqi police and army are doing their utmost efforts to control the situation, but this is not enough. People should cooperate with them to get rid of the dirty things that entered and destroyed our beautiful country. Journalists should be backed up not left unsecured. They have to speak out the truth that some people in the outside world don’t want to listen to it.