.Then and Now: A New Chapter for Baghdad Book Market
BAGHDAD — Mutanabi Street has long been the intellectual center of the Iraqi capital. But when a car bomb exploded here in March 2007 killing at 26 people the neighborhood was emptied. Blast walls blocked off the area to traffic and members of Awakening Councils, groups made up largely of former insurgents, opened checkpoints to monitor people entering the neighborhood. Resurrecting this area and breathing life back into the cafes and book stores here has long been a pet project for the Iraqi leadership.
Each step of that resurrection comes with added risks. In September 2007, a curfew was lifted allowing foot traffic to enter the book market. Would a suicide bomber walk back into the cafes? In September 2008, blast walls blocking off the street were taken down. Would a car bomb detonate outside the newly repaved walkway? With each step, more and more shoppers returned to the market. And finally, on Thursday, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Malaki officially reopened the street.
Many writers and their books were banned from Iraq under Saddam Hussein. In the violence that followed the U.S. military invasion in 2003, insurgents again targeted Iraq’s intellectuals. Protecting this community is seen as a test of Iraq’s ability to shore up tenuous security gains made since the 2007 bombing.
I first visited the Mutanabi book market in October with the Fourth Brigade, Tenth Mountain Division. Blast walls had just been removed at one end of the street and the shops were still largely empty. A few men sat in front of stores smoking pipes. At night they would gather in the streets to play dominoes and backgammon. Solar lights had been installed on the street lamps and tiles were lined up to lay over the concrete road.
Now storefronts have been repaired, new water and sewage lines have been installed and the tiles have been put in place. However, the government has made some concessions to the continuing danger inside Iraq — the site of the 2007 car bomb attack in Mutanabi book market is now only open to pedestrian traffic.
Baghdad Buraeu
Each step of that resurrection comes with added risks. In September 2007, a curfew was lifted allowing foot traffic to enter the book market. Would a suicide bomber walk back into the cafes? In September 2008, blast walls blocking off the street were taken down. Would a car bomb detonate outside the newly repaved walkway? With each step, more and more shoppers returned to the market. And finally, on Thursday, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Malaki officially reopened the street.
Many writers and their books were banned from Iraq under Saddam Hussein. In the violence that followed the U.S. military invasion in 2003, insurgents again targeted Iraq’s intellectuals. Protecting this community is seen as a test of Iraq’s ability to shore up tenuous security gains made since the 2007 bombing.
I first visited the Mutanabi book market in October with the Fourth Brigade, Tenth Mountain Division. Blast walls had just been removed at one end of the street and the shops were still largely empty. A few men sat in front of stores smoking pipes. At night they would gather in the streets to play dominoes and backgammon. Solar lights had been installed on the street lamps and tiles were lined up to lay over the concrete road.
Now storefronts have been repaired, new water and sewage lines have been installed and the tiles have been put in place. However, the government has made some concessions to the continuing danger inside Iraq — the site of the 2007 car bomb attack in Mutanabi book market is now only open to pedestrian traffic.
Baghdad Buraeu
posted by madtom at 6:39 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home