Life During Wartime

teh
I hadn’t been checking in with Riverbend, the Iraqi blogger living in Baghdad, in recent months but when things began to melt down there last week I revisited her blog. As usual her posts were very revealing.

First, this post seems to suggest, from her perspective, Iraq may not be poised for all-out civil war. She lives in a mixed neighborhood (Shiites, Sunnis and Christians) and doesn’t sense a lot of hostility between her neighbors. Now, this may be the situation across Iraq or, by virtue of the fact her neighborhood is mixed and therefore more tolerant, it may be an anomaly. Let’s hope for the former.

Second, she has an amazing account of what it is like to face nighttime raids by the military in search of insurgents. In this case it was a sweep being conducted by Iraqi forces. But the fear her family experienced, even though they had nothing to hide, is vividly portrayed. Amazing. And heartbreaking.