If Iraqs new elected leaders want to bring peace and security to their country, its people like these they will have to win over.
This amateur video was shot on the first day of one of the biggest festivals in the Muslim year. But instead of buying new clothes for their children and visiting family and friends, the men of Falluja are digging graves.
Their town has been under devastating assault by US Marines and Iraqi government forces for a week. These images, just brought out of Iraq, are some of the only pictures taken from the townspeoples point of view the only journalists there were embedded with the Americans.A local relief committee has just succeeded in collecting the first 22 bodies of people killed in the fighting and trucking them out for burial. The men erupt in anger and grief.
02:4302:5403:18 Crowd of men standing over line of black body bags on groundMen carrying body bag through crowdMen hand body bag down to men in trenchMen shoveling sand into trench with their hands Falluja is the heartland of Iraqs minority Sunni Muslims, in power since the country was created in the 1920s but now feeling victimised by the American occupation and marginalised by Iraqs new, supposedly democratic, politics.The Americans and the interim Iraqi government led by Ayad Allawi attacked the town because they saw it as the headquarters of an insurgency that had come to control much of central Iraq nationalists battling to drive out the Americans and foreign Islamists such as the Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi fighting to stop Iraqs majority Shiite Muslims from taking power.The men of Falluja saw the attack as naked aggression on people who were simply defending their town against an illegal occupation.
03:30 FS man standing by minibus at side of road Man (gesturing with arm): So someone defending his land, his mother, his sister, his honour, they call him a terrorist. This is a Crusader war agreed by America and Israel against Islam, to break Iraq and especially Falluja.
03:4403:53 Pan L across body bagsMS hand opening body bag to show relatively undamaged head and shoulders of young man.MS torso with blue ammunition belt.Man in white cap crouching on ground, holding spectacles from dead body. Very few of the bodies can be identified. They are bloated, blackened and rotting, and have been eaten by dogs.Most appear to be men, and one is wearing an ammunition belt. But others are women and one is a child.
04:02 Upsot man in white cap Man in white cap: Among the bodies brought to this cemetery were two women and a child. The child was 10 years old. Was that child a terrorist? Were these women terrorists? The American forces killed them inside their own house. May God accept them (as martyrs). Where is their conscience? Where are the human rights which the United States claims to uphold?
04:29 MS man wailing on ground, restrained by friendMS relief worker unzips body bag as man wails The grief is real and deep.
04:44 Move forward across mounds of sand marked with numbersPan R/tilt up to group of men This video, taken by the Relief Committee which collected the bodies, was brought out of Iraq by a doctor from Falluja
04:5205:01 SOURCE: SALAM ISMAELWS lecture theatre empty except for Salam, sitting in second row in suit and tieCU row of empty fold-up green chairs Salam Ismael.Salam went back to Iraq just before the elections in January after spending six months in Britain lobbying politicians and raising donations to help his town.
05:0305:12 MS Salam walks up to chalkboard and writesMove forward to glass doors stuck with tape against bomb blasts, empty lobby beyond/Pan R and move towards noticeboard He went looking for old friends at the medical school where he studied in Baghdad and stayed with his family in Adhamiya, a mainly Sunni Muslim area of Baghdad. Everywhere he went, he found stories of sadness and suffering.
05:2005:25 CU Printed notice with photo of studentBCU notice This medical student was riding a minibus when shooting broke out and he saw a man injured. Salam says he rushed to help, and was shot dead by American troops.
05:3005:39 LS Salam walking down corridorMS former detainee Elsewhere in the big teaching hospital, Salam finds a friend who was locked up by the Americans for seven and a half months because a sniffer dog barked during a search of his car.
05:42 Upsot former detainee Former detainee: They searched the whole car and found nothing. Then they brought a dog and said there were traces of explosives on the steering wheel, the gear stick and the dashboard. Then they searched my house and found nothing. They charged me with possessing materials to make explosives.
06:03 WS small mosque in blue early morning light, through window of Salams house in AdhamiyaLS people walking down streetLS people walking through mosque gateWS mosque in daylight Its the first day of another big Muslim festival, the Feast of the Sacrifice marking the end of the annual pilgrimage to Mecca. Salams neighbours in Adhamiya are going to pray. He records a video diary for a friend in Britain.
06:26 MS Salam in house, looking to camera Salam PTC: Well, I am now in the first day of the Eid, the feasting day here in Iraq. Believe me, Michael, everything here is sad. Everything is hopeless. Every one of the Iraqis is concerned about daily difficulties high prices of goods, and at the same time no electricity, there is no fuel. And now in Iraq, the land of the two rivers, there is no water. You can imagine. For the last four days there is no water.
07:07 WS girl watching TVPan R to TVCU girls eyesCU TV screen showing woman being interviewed shot changes to photo of US woman soldier dragging Iraqi detainee on a dog leash For a Sunni family like Salams, the occupation is to blame for everything. It is a daily humiliation that seeps into every aspect of life. On the first day of the festival, his 11-year-old sister sat glued to the television. But it wasnt a holiday film. The Arab satellite channel al Jazeera was showing a documentary about American abuse of prisoners in Abu Ghraib jail.
07:30 Pan R across elderly VW beetle in car porch to woman in headscarf opening metal gate to street. Salams father arrives holding car keys.MS Salams sisters in back seat of delapidated car. The family cram themselves in the old car which Salams father refuses to change, and visit relatives for the festival.
Upsot elder sister The car stinks of petrol!
07:4107:48 WS Salams father, sister, niece and aunt in living roomMS aunt in pink dress and white headscarf turns to cameraCU Man with red keffiya on head The holiday chit chat is all about the occupation. This is Salams cousin, Abu Mohammed.
Pan L to Salams father listening Cousin: I was standing there I told you about the explosion. A convoy comes along. Right next to it the explosion goes off. They opened fire on us da da da da right at the cars.
CU Salams sisterCU Man with red keffiya Abu Mohammed, like many Sunnis, is deeply suspicious of the Shiite Muslim religious leaders such as Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, whose followers were clearly going to win power in the elections.
08:22 Upsot man with red keffiya, Salams cousin Cousin: When Sistani came back from London, he put the two photos next to each other and what do you think? The media was asking questions. Salams father (off camera): It wasnt him?Cousin: It wasnt him.
08:37 MS Two small children on sofa Salam visits his aunts family. Salam (off camera): Are you afraid of the Americans?Girl: YesSalams aunt (off camera): Were not afraid of the Americans. We kill them!Girl: We kill them
08:54 Fast pan L to woman in white headscarf and brown jumper on chair in front of windw with lace curtains Salaam: Will you vote?Aunt: No, no we wont vote. The Americans are occupying us. We cant go and vote.Salaam: And Ayad Allawi?Aunt: We dont have anything to do with any of those people.
09:06 Driving shot through windscreen of car, Baghdad streetCU Salam in carPan L across balcony of Mother of Cities (formerly Mother of Battles) mosque, showing pool and poster of Palestinian Hamas leader Shaykh Ahmad Yassin.Relief Coordinator handing boxes to colleagueColleague hands box out through door Salam is in Baghdad to deliver aid to refugees from Falluja, paid for with donations from British Muslims.He checks on the state of the refugees with the Relief Coordinator of the Association of Muslim Scholars. This is a Sunni group which opposes the occupation and boycotted the elections, but has been negotiating a role for Sunnis in drafting Iraqs new constitution.
09:30 Two-shot of Relief Coordinator and Salam sitting at desk Shaykh Hassan al Dahnaki: We just want to get our vehicles in there so that we can look after our refugees. This is a humanitarian disaster caused by the Americans.
09:42 Front of truck with banner in Arabic Association of Doctors for IraqPan L to front of larger truck, man taping Iraqi flag to top of cab.CU man taping flag.Driving shot through windscreen of minivan to back of truck loaded with green cartons.Driving shot through side window of minivan to trucks driving up sliproad on highwayDriving shot through windscreen of queue of cars on bridge over highwayDriving shot of queue of cars stretching alongside highway Salams convoy sets out for Falluja.More than two months after the assault on the town, most of its residents tens of thousands of men, women and children, are refugees.Just to get in to check damage to your house means waiting for hours for an intensive search at the American checkpoints that seal the town.
10:03 MS Salams colleague in minivanWS Three colleagues in back of vanWS Three colleagues, different angle For Salam, an important part of his aid mission is to show Iraqis that people in Britain care about them, even if their government sent troops to join the American invasion.
Upsot Salam Salam: The first people to defend us are who? The ordinary British, and the Muslims of Britain.
10:20 MCU from above man unloading carton from back of truckPan R and tilt up to show man taking carton and heading for door of storeroomInterior storeroom, man puts carton on stackMove forward through doorway into courtyard hung with washing. Salams group, Doctors for Iraq, delivers heaters, blankets and medical supplies to a mosque just outside Falluja.Refugee families are squatting in a nearby school.
10:34 WS Salam and man (headmaster of school) walk towards tents, past satellite dish on bare ground propped up with bricks.Children in tentMove forward under tent flap to reveal teacher at chalkboard. Children chant word on board: Dada Teachers are struggling to run classes for the refugees children and their usual students.
10:46 MS Woman with black veiled face and small boy on sofa The refugees tell Salam horrific stories of civilian casualties in Falluja.
Huda Fawzi left it too late to get out of the town before the Marines attacked. She, two sisters, her father and a guest were asleep in their house when the Americans banged on the door.
Huda: Dad said, were a family. They shouldnt hurt us. He got up to let them in. But they broke the door down and started shooting at us, all of them. I saw Dad had been hit. I ran away.
Her father and their guest died immediately. Her sister bled to death three hours later.
11:2611:39 WS four men on grass by tent, one helping another (Eyad Naji Latif) on with jacket.WS Men walking towards cameraMS Eyad Naji Latif on sofa On the 12th of November, four days after the assault began, Eyad Naji Latif and eight members of his family heard the Iraqi National Guard, the new Iraqi army, ordering people through loudspeakers to come out of their houses and leave the town.Out in the street, holding white flags, Eyad says the group came under fire from snipers in three directions. Five of the nine of them were killed, including his mother, his father, one of his brothers, and a baby.
Upsot Eyad Eyad: The snipers targetted all of us. If there was any movement, they shot. At the start I was not hit, but I tried to raise the white flag and was hit.
The survivors lay bleeding in the street until nightfall, then crawled to the nearest house where they survived on scraps of food for eight days while the fighting raged.
12:2012:4012:48 WS Line of men praying on sandy ground of cemetery.Closer shot men praying, tractor in fgMen handing body bag down into trenchWider shot men handing body bag downWS long line of mounds of filled-in graves marked with numbers. Man kneeling at third grave.Slow zoom into kneeling man.Man wipes eyes with handkerchief. Do Iraqs Sunni Muslims support the armed insurgency? Some Iraqis are clearly fighting alongside the foreign Islamists, with their agenda of videoed executions and suicide bombings that kill far more Iraqis than American troops.Many more Sunnis probably support attacks on American troops.But the lesson of Falluja is that using the overwhelming might of the American military against the insurgency stores up a terrible legacy of grief and anger. It could tear the country apart. Sunnis like Salam are hoping their new elected rulers will now try negotiations, before Iraq slips into a civil war that nobody wants.
13:07 ends
This amateur video was shot on the first day of one of the biggest festivals in the Muslim year. But instead of buying new clothes for their children and visiting family and friends, the men of Falluja are digging graves.
Their town has been under devastating assault by US Marines and Iraqi government forces for a week. These images, just brought out of Iraq, are some of the only pictures taken from the townspeoples point of view the only journalists there were embedded with the Americans.A local relief committee has just succeeded in collecting the first 22 bodies of people killed in the fighting and trucking them out for burial. The men erupt in anger and grief.
02:4302:5403:18 Crowd of men standing over line of black body bags on groundMen carrying body bag through crowdMen hand body bag down to men in trenchMen shoveling sand into trench with their hands Falluja is the heartland of Iraqs minority Sunni Muslims, in power since the country was created in the 1920s but now feeling victimised by the American occupation and marginalised by Iraqs new, supposedly democratic, politics.The Americans and the interim Iraqi government led by Ayad Allawi attacked the town because they saw it as the headquarters of an insurgency that had come to control much of central Iraq nationalists battling to drive out the Americans and foreign Islamists such as the Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi fighting to stop Iraqs majority Shiite Muslims from taking power.The men of Falluja saw the attack as naked aggression on people who were simply defending their town against an illegal occupation.
03:30 FS man standing by minibus at side of road Man (gesturing with arm): So someone defending his land, his mother, his sister, his honour, they call him a terrorist. This is a Crusader war agreed by America and Israel against Islam, to break Iraq and especially Falluja.
03:4403:53 Pan L across body bagsMS hand opening body bag to show relatively undamaged head and shoulders of young man.MS torso with blue ammunition belt.Man in white cap crouching on ground, holding spectacles from dead body. Very few of the bodies can be identified. They are bloated, blackened and rotting, and have been eaten by dogs.Most appear to be men, and one is wearing an ammunition belt. But others are women and one is a child.
04:02 Upsot man in white cap Man in white cap: Among the bodies brought to this cemetery were two women and a child. The child was 10 years old. Was that child a terrorist? Were these women terrorists? The American forces killed them inside their own house. May God accept them (as martyrs). Where is their conscience? Where are the human rights which the United States claims to uphold?
04:29 MS man wailing on ground, restrained by friendMS relief worker unzips body bag as man wails The grief is real and deep.
04:44 Move forward across mounds of sand marked with numbersPan R/tilt up to group of men This video, taken by the Relief Committee which collected the bodies, was brought out of Iraq by a doctor from Falluja
04:5205:01 SOURCE: SALAM ISMAELWS lecture theatre empty except for Salam, sitting in second row in suit and tieCU row of empty fold-up green chairs Salam Ismael.Salam went back to Iraq just before the elections in January after spending six months in Britain lobbying politicians and raising donations to help his town.
05:0305:12 MS Salam walks up to chalkboard and writesMove forward to glass doors stuck with tape against bomb blasts, empty lobby beyond/Pan R and move towards noticeboard He went looking for old friends at the medical school where he studied in Baghdad and stayed with his family in Adhamiya, a mainly Sunni Muslim area of Baghdad. Everywhere he went, he found stories of sadness and suffering.
05:2005:25 CU Printed notice with photo of studentBCU notice This medical student was riding a minibus when shooting broke out and he saw a man injured. Salam says he rushed to help, and was shot dead by American troops.
05:3005:39 LS Salam walking down corridorMS former detainee Elsewhere in the big teaching hospital, Salam finds a friend who was locked up by the Americans for seven and a half months because a sniffer dog barked during a search of his car.
05:42 Upsot former detainee Former detainee: They searched the whole car and found nothing. Then they brought a dog and said there were traces of explosives on the steering wheel, the gear stick and the dashboard. Then they searched my house and found nothing. They charged me with possessing materials to make explosives.
06:03 WS small mosque in blue early morning light, through window of Salams house in AdhamiyaLS people walking down streetLS people walking through mosque gateWS mosque in daylight Its the first day of another big Muslim festival, the Feast of the Sacrifice marking the end of the annual pilgrimage to Mecca. Salams neighbours in Adhamiya are going to pray. He records a video diary for a friend in Britain.
06:26 MS Salam in house, looking to camera Salam PTC: Well, I am now in the first day of the Eid, the feasting day here in Iraq. Believe me, Michael, everything here is sad. Everything is hopeless. Every one of the Iraqis is concerned about daily difficulties high prices of goods, and at the same time no electricity, there is no fuel. And now in Iraq, the land of the two rivers, there is no water. You can imagine. For the last four days there is no water.
07:07 WS girl watching TVPan R to TVCU girls eyesCU TV screen showing woman being interviewed shot changes to photo of US woman soldier dragging Iraqi detainee on a dog leash For a Sunni family like Salams, the occupation is to blame for everything. It is a daily humiliation that seeps into every aspect of life. On the first day of the festival, his 11-year-old sister sat glued to the television. But it wasnt a holiday film. The Arab satellite channel al Jazeera was showing a documentary about American abuse of prisoners in Abu Ghraib jail.
07:30 Pan R across elderly VW beetle in car porch to woman in headscarf opening metal gate to street. Salams father arrives holding car keys.MS Salams sisters in back seat of delapidated car. The family cram themselves in the old car which Salams father refuses to change, and visit relatives for the festival.
Upsot elder sister The car stinks of petrol!
07:4107:48 WS Salams father, sister, niece and aunt in living roomMS aunt in pink dress and white headscarf turns to cameraCU Man with red keffiya on head The holiday chit chat is all about the occupation. This is Salams cousin, Abu Mohammed.
Pan L to Salams father listening Cousin: I was standing there I told you about the explosion. A convoy comes along. Right next to it the explosion goes off. They opened fire on us da da da da right at the cars.
CU Salams sisterCU Man with red keffiya Abu Mohammed, like many Sunnis, is deeply suspicious of the Shiite Muslim religious leaders such as Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, whose followers were clearly going to win power in the elections.
08:22 Upsot man with red keffiya, Salams cousin Cousin: When Sistani came back from London, he put the two photos next to each other and what do you think? The media was asking questions. Salams father (off camera): It wasnt him?Cousin: It wasnt him.
08:37 MS Two small children on sofa Salam visits his aunts family. Salam (off camera): Are you afraid of the Americans?Girl: YesSalams aunt (off camera): Were not afraid of the Americans. We kill them!Girl: We kill them
08:54 Fast pan L to woman in white headscarf and brown jumper on chair in front of windw with lace curtains Salaam: Will you vote?Aunt: No, no we wont vote. The Americans are occupying us. We cant go and vote.Salaam: And Ayad Allawi?Aunt: We dont have anything to do with any of those people.
09:06 Driving shot through windscreen of car, Baghdad streetCU Salam in carPan L across balcony of Mother of Cities (formerly Mother of Battles) mosque, showing pool and poster of Palestinian Hamas leader Shaykh Ahmad Yassin.Relief Coordinator handing boxes to colleagueColleague hands box out through door Salam is in Baghdad to deliver aid to refugees from Falluja, paid for with donations from British Muslims.He checks on the state of the refugees with the Relief Coordinator of the Association of Muslim Scholars. This is a Sunni group which opposes the occupation and boycotted the elections, but has been negotiating a role for Sunnis in drafting Iraqs new constitution.
09:30 Two-shot of Relief Coordinator and Salam sitting at desk Shaykh Hassan al Dahnaki: We just want to get our vehicles in there so that we can look after our refugees. This is a humanitarian disaster caused by the Americans.
09:42 Front of truck with banner in Arabic Association of Doctors for IraqPan L to front of larger truck, man taping Iraqi flag to top of cab.CU man taping flag.Driving shot through windscreen of minivan to back of truck loaded with green cartons.Driving shot through side window of minivan to trucks driving up sliproad on highwayDriving shot through windscreen of queue of cars on bridge over highwayDriving shot of queue of cars stretching alongside highway Salams convoy sets out for Falluja.More than two months after the assault on the town, most of its residents tens of thousands of men, women and children, are refugees.Just to get in to check damage to your house means waiting for hours for an intensive search at the American checkpoints that seal the town.
10:03 MS Salams colleague in minivanWS Three colleagues in back of vanWS Three colleagues, different angle For Salam, an important part of his aid mission is to show Iraqis that people in Britain care about them, even if their government sent troops to join the American invasion.
Upsot Salam Salam: The first people to defend us are who? The ordinary British, and the Muslims of Britain.
10:20 MCU from above man unloading carton from back of truckPan R and tilt up to show man taking carton and heading for door of storeroomInterior storeroom, man puts carton on stackMove forward through doorway into courtyard hung with washing. Salams group, Doctors for Iraq, delivers heaters, blankets and medical supplies to a mosque just outside Falluja.Refugee families are squatting in a nearby school.
10:34 WS Salam and man (headmaster of school) walk towards tents, past satellite dish on bare ground propped up with bricks.Children in tentMove forward under tent flap to reveal teacher at chalkboard. Children chant word on board: Dada Teachers are struggling to run classes for the refugees children and their usual students.
10:46 MS Woman with black veiled face and small boy on sofa The refugees tell Salam horrific stories of civilian casualties in Falluja.
Huda Fawzi left it too late to get out of the town before the Marines attacked. She, two sisters, her father and a guest were asleep in their house when the Americans banged on the door.
Huda: Dad said, were a family. They shouldnt hurt us. He got up to let them in. But they broke the door down and started shooting at us, all of them. I saw Dad had been hit. I ran away.
Her father and their guest died immediately. Her sister bled to death three hours later.
11:2611:39 WS four men on grass by tent, one helping another (Eyad Naji Latif) on with jacket.WS Men walking towards cameraMS Eyad Naji Latif on sofa On the 12th of November, four days after the assault began, Eyad Naji Latif and eight members of his family heard the Iraqi National Guard, the new Iraqi army, ordering people through loudspeakers to come out of their houses and leave the town.Out in the street, holding white flags, Eyad says the group came under fire from snipers in three directions. Five of the nine of them were killed, including his mother, his father, one of his brothers, and a baby.
Upsot Eyad Eyad: The snipers targetted all of us. If there was any movement, they shot. At the start I was not hit, but I tried to raise the white flag and was hit.
The survivors lay bleeding in the street until nightfall, then crawled to the nearest house where they survived on scraps of food for eight days while the fighting raged.
12:2012:4012:48 WS Line of men praying on sandy ground of cemetery.Closer shot men praying, tractor in fgMen handing body bag down into trenchWider shot men handing body bag downWS long line of mounds of filled-in graves marked with numbers. Man kneeling at third grave.Slow zoom into kneeling man.Man wipes eyes with handkerchief. Do Iraqs Sunni Muslims support the armed insurgency? Some Iraqis are clearly fighting alongside the foreign Islamists, with their agenda of videoed executions and suicide bombings that kill far more Iraqis than American troops.Many more Sunnis probably support attacks on American troops.But the lesson of Falluja is that using the overwhelming might of the American military against the insurgency stores up a terrible legacy of grief and anger. It could tear the country apart. Sunnis like Salam are hoping their new elected rulers will now try negotiations, before Iraq slips into a civil war that nobody wants.
13:07 ends