In the January 17, 2008, issue of the New York Review of Books, Michael Massing published a very good piece on the “Inside Iraq” blog maintained by correspondents for the McClatchy Newspapers. Since this media company has no outlets in Washington, Massing wrote, the firm can operate “outside the glare of the nation’s political and media elite, and this has freed it to follow its own path.”
“Inside Iraq” is one example. McClatchy’s Iraqi staffers post frequently to the blog and focus on how Iraqis experience the war. They have to post anonymously; to do otherwise would put their lives at even greater risk than simply living in Iraq implies. In the words of the McClatchy bureau chief, Leila Fadel, this is an opportunity “for Iraqis to talk directly to an American audience.”
The posts are fascinating, heartbreaking, outraged and, startlingly, hopeful. But they also convey something that most American coverage misses — what Iraq looks like to the people who actually have to live through these terrible times.
Today, for instance, Sahar posted this story about a journey most of us take for granted — delivering our children to school in the morning (the English is in the original):
After I made sure that my daughter was only shocked and dazed, but unhurt, I leaned back to take a breath.
Her transport had to take his car to the fitter for some minor repairs and I was giving her a lift to school. One checkpoint after another all the way to a central main road where we could relax a little from the bumper-to-bumper lines of cars. As we sped along (50km/hr) feeling the freedom, suddenly an American convoy emerged from a side street at full speed. Terrified of getting too close, the first car braked so hard it swirved; the second slammed into it; I was the third … and there were two more.
There we stood, each driver with a look of frustration on his face – who to blame?? Who to shout at to relieve the tention?? Who to haggle with for repair money?
We looked at each other, and at our smashed cars – and started laughing uncontrollably until the tears started to flow, “Alhamdu lillah assalama (thank God for your safety)” was all we could manage to say.
By that time the convoy was long gone.
Close calls are comforting — but they are not the norm. As Massing reported, Sahar and five other Iraqi women reporters traveled to the US last October to receive the Courage in Journalism Award from the International Women’s Media Foundation. Today, the other five have all left the bureau because of death threats, violence and, in one case, “the murder of a husband, daughter, and mother-in-law by other Iraqis.”
Sahar herself has had a son killed.
The risks, in other words, are incalculable. Out of the 124 journalists killed in Iraq since the start of the war, 102 were Iraqis according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. For the fifth straight year, Iraq in 2007 was the most dangerous country in the world for journalists.
Jenan, another “Inside Iraq” blogger, posted this message on the day of the Iowa caucus:
We hope you will think of our future as much as you will think of yours, that we became part of your future. Please, be careful remember all Iraqis’ tragedies that happens here because the harmful policy. Also I’d like to inform you that we are waiting your election as if it is our election and may be more because your choice will determine the main lines for our life … Yes your choice will change our life for good or for bad.