March 27, 2003	Thursday	Muharram 23, 1424

LONDON, March 26: As US and British forces bear down on Baghdad, international peace observers report that far from “shock and awe”, Iraqi civilians feel bewildered and confused.

“People just ask why? They stress the point that they are not criminals and never wanted to attack the United States. It doesn’t make logical sense to them,” said Kathy Kelly, head of a group of activists who have been in Baghdad since October.

Speaking by telephone, she said ordinary Iraqi’s were struggling to understand Washington’s talk of liberating Iraq, given the “viciousness” of the strikes, now in their seventh day.

Kelly, twice nominated for the Nobel peace prize, is head of the Iraq Peace Team, a group of 26 mostly American and Canadian activists.

They are staying in Baghdad as observers to report the affects of the war on the civilian population through the media and anti-war groups, but they stress they are not human shields.

“I came here because I was so dismayed,” said Cathy Breen, 54, a New York nurse. “It was the only way I knew how to say ‘no’ to this slaughter,” she told Reuters.

The observers, who are staying in hotels and have access to a bomb shelter in the centre of Baghdad, visit hospitals and meet families affected by the war.

“We met one woman last night who was so distraught, she had to be restrained,” Breen said. “She had just lost one daughter and her three other children were in hospital. It is a fearful situation.”

On Wednesday, a correspondent reported seeing 15 burnt corpses in a poor residential part of Baghdad following a US air raid.

But the activists said Iraqi civilians were determined to continue with their everyday lives.

Kelly said the group had been welcomed by people in Baghdad.

“It wasn’t a tough decision to stay,” she said. “It is not a good idea to draw close to people and to then walk away from them when the situation becomes most difficult.”

Breen said she took hope from the Iraqi people’s “indomitable spirit”.

“They have become like family to me and it is all the more inconceivable that we could be doing this to them,” she said. “Especially now, it becomes increasingly hard to face these people who look so imploringly at me and just ask why this is happening.

“More than the bombs, I fear more for the soul of my own country and what we are doing as a nation. This is the time to turn around what is happening and change the course of history.”

MISERY: Tawfiq Radi Farhan, a street vendor, said he watched them slaughtered before his very own eyes.

“I was sitting outside when the missile hit,” he said, still shaken. “Cars caught fire and I myself saw people martyred and wounded. Thank God I didn’t get hurt.”

This working-class Baghdad neighbourhood known as “the city of the people” was picking up the pieces, in grief and in rage, after a US-led bombing raid smashed into apartment blocks Wednesday, killing 14 people and wounding 30.

Piles of rubble lay in the street, as a dull rain watered down the pools of blood. Something far heavier than the debris weighed on people’s hearts.

“They say they only aim at military targets,” shouted Ali Sami, who said he was a loyal supporter of Saddam Hussein’s Baath party. “And then they launch bombs on our women and children.”

US President George W. Bush “will be crushed under our boots!” one man wailed.

Friends and neighbours pitched in to try to salvage the remaining belongings of those who lived, and console the relatives of those who didn’t.

Seif Jamal, a 20-year-old student, rushed down his narrow stairway carrying a charred television on his shoulder.

“A missile landed on the sidewalk and the shrapnel flew into our house,” he said. “My other electronic equipment is burnt, and lots of furniture.”

The devastation came just before midday. Abdul Jabbar Ali, a mechanic, said he was with his family when the attack pounded the apartments, wiping out his garage on the ground floor.

“Miraculously, we lived. Whole sections of walls were crashing down around me, doors and windows were demolished,” said Ali, who escaped with bruises. His wife and daughter-in-law were taken to hospital wounded, and his son had a bandaged eye.

Ali said he saw innocent people incinerated in their cars, and two men killed who were having lunch in the cafe next door.

Far away, US commanders shrugged off responsibility.

“I don’t know those (missiles) were ours,” Brigadier General Vincent Brooks told reporters. “Can’t say we had anything to do with it.”—AFP