News Flash, shopping has broken out in Baghdad!
On Yasser Arafat Street, one of Baghdadâs busiest shopping areas, the shops are open and shopkeepers are scrubbing the street and sidewalks outside them. Fruit and vegetable markets are bustling, and families are out promenading with smiles on their faces. The local barbers, too, are open for business and Arab News walked in on Mohammed Al-Saâali, who was enjoying his first haircut since the war started. âIâm getting my haircut to celebrate Saddamâs demise and the beginning of a new era,â he declared. Ironically, a picture of the former Iraqi dictator was still hanging on the wall a few meters away from him.
In the Abu Ghorab district on the outskirts of Baghdad, the mother of all flea markets has been set up, and those who looted the capitalâs government and other buildings are selling their booty â cigarettes, furniture, sportswear lingerie â at knockdown prices. Nike sneakers were being sold for $2. There is also a huge black market in gasoline. Saddamâs army had massive gasoline reserves and in some areas of Baghdad locals are filling their containers with it and selling it at massively inflated prices. In the Rumadi area 120 miles west of Baghdad, a group of the townâs imams, led by Imam Ali Zeleami, came to a cease-fire agreement with coalition troops, whereby the troops will occupy only the outskirts of the mostly calm area. Security at the Palestine Hotel in central Baghdad has been beefed up in reaction to an ambush staged two days ago by four Iraqi sympathizers of Saddam Hussein. At 6 a.m. yesterday, a fleet of helicopters circled above in what the US military described as âa routine security operationâ. Cars are no longer allowed to park near the hotel, which is home to most of the foreign journalists in the capital, and US Marines are redirecting the ocean of human traffic away from it.
The capital still lacked power, water and medical care yesterday, and troops were turning their attention to that as well as the question of law and order. A group calling itself the Gathering for Democracy issued printed statements urging fellow Iraqis to stop looting public facilities. Groups of Marines were on foot patrol in some neighborhoods, some with children tagging along, and as many as 1,000 Iraqi policemen showed up for joint Iraqi-US patrols. Dressed in full uniform, the Iraqi police are patrolling the city in 10 different fleets in groups of four. Sixteen of them are helping the US military with security at Al-Andalus Square. âMost are concerned about the looting and the security of the neighborhoods,â officer Yusuf Al-Qubasi told Arab News. âWe are understaffed, but it is our duty to try and bring order back to Baghdad.â When asked if he and his fellow officers would fight Saddamâs Fedayeen alongside the US military, he said that he had not yet been asked to do so, but depending on the circumstances âI might have toâ.
| Yusuf, thugs with guns are a police responsibility, unless you happen to need artillery support... |
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