CPTnet
5 Aug 2008
IRAQ: Through the children's eyes

by Peggy Gish 

Seven year old Ghazan* pointed to images drawn on his paper. "This is the bomb, next to our house, and this is me. I'm running away." Pointing at her drawing, Zinaz said. "This is the fire coming down from the bomb. These are cars taking us away." Another child added, "We saw airplanes and bombs-lots of bombs."

About twelve children gathered around us as we sat on a sandy area near their tent homes in the Zharawa IDP (Internally Displaced Person) camp just above the shallow river between the mountains near the Iranian border. We asked them about life in their village and their move to the camp after Turkish and Iranian forces repeatedly bombed their villages.

One of the boys recalled that his village was bombed five or six times before his family fled and came to the camp. "Turkey is attacking by plane and Iran by mortars," he said. Another child said, "They think PKK and PJAK (Kurdish rebel groups) are there, but they are not in our village. Maybe they just want to get rid of our villages." Another said, "The bombs are always coming-morning, day, and night. They start around the village and then come inside." Several said that they would run to caves when the bombing started. Some families left their villages by foot (about a forty-five minute to one hour walk), car, and tractor to get to the current camp.

Even from the camp, the children said that they can hear the bombing continuing in the areas of their villages. "When that happens we get so scared that we get sick," one boy admitted soberly. "Last week our families left the camp when we heard the bombs, because we were afraid the planes would also come and bomb us here."

The children all agreed that life was much harder here in the IDP camp. "We cannot eat or sleep because of the heat." "There is no clean water since the spring dried up." "We helped our parents with the work (farming and tending the animals), but here we have nothing to do."

When we asked them what they would want to say to the governments involved, Mohamed, eighteen, said, "Stop the bombing. We want to go back. Winter here will be very difficult." "If we cannot go back to our villages, then we want houses to live in, but not here," said Hamid (fourteen). Sherene (twelve) added, "When I go home I want a school and clinic in my village." Only one young five-year old said, "I like it here-It's nice."

After saying good-bye, we waded through a shallow place in the river to go back to the truck. Words of the children echoed in my mind. In particular, I could not forget the words of a young girl, "We want a nice life-like other people have."

*All children's names have been changed