‘Human flesh all over’
Iraqi village grieves youthful victims of suicide bomber
The suicide bomber who blew up a youth soccer match late last month left barely a dent in the hard, dry earth, a faint scorch on a concrete wall nearby.
But he gouged a chasm of grief in the heart of the small community that lost more than two dozen of its sons in a single moment, at 6:15 on the evening of March 25.
A total of 43 people died — 29 of them boys younger than 17 who had either been participating in the match or were watching their friends play.
The bomber also was a teenager, no more than 15 or 16. The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant claimed responsibility, saying the target was a gathering of the Shiite paramilitaries.
For the boys of the impoverished, mixed Sunni- Shiite village of Asriya, 60 kilometres south of Baghdad, soccer isn’t a pastime. It is a passion and a purpose, offering the dream of escape from the grim monotony of life in one of Iraq’s more neglected communities.
One such boy was Mohaned Khazaal, 10, who lived for the sake of Real Madrid, his favourite team, and his idol, the team’s star striker Cristiano Ronaldo, said his brother, Ahmed, 12.
They both played for a local team, which did not qualify for the final of the youth league tournament. But they attended the match nonetheless, with an older brother, Farouq, 20, and almost all the other boys living in the soccer- crazed community.
The final took place between a team called Ahli and a team called Salam, which means peace. Officials watched from plastic chairs on a small podium erected at one edge of the field. The spectators, most of them boys, stood around the perimeter of the field.
Hardly anyone seemed to notice one of the boys watching the game was wearing a thick jacket on a warm spring evening while all the other boys were dressed in T- shirts. Anmar al- Janabi, 12, who was standing near the oddly dressed boy, said he did notice, although he didn’t think to say anything to the adults at the match.
“He was a little tall with long hair and he looked different. He was wearing a thick jacket and it was hot,” he recalled. “He spoke to us. He said, “It’s a good game, isn’t it?’ “
When the match ended, the boy in the jacket joined the scramble of boys converging on the podium to watch the awarding of the trophy and the medals, said Anmar, who was there with his brother, Walid, 13, and a group of friends.
“Then he blew himself up, and I felt a fire hit my face,” Anmar said. “And then I ran away.”
Few parents had accompanied their sons to the match that day. Why would they? Most lived within a couple of hundred metres from the pitch, and boys gathered there every day, for matches or just to kick a ball around.
Abbas Ali al-Idani did, however, hope to attend. Earlier in the afternoon, he had received an excited phone call at work from his son, Karrar, 13, who had just found out he would be playing in goal for the Peace team.
“He told me he was going to be a goalkeeper for the first time, and he asked me to bring him some gloves,” recalled Idani, a security guard. “But I was working, and I couldn’t leave.”
As soon as Idani’s shift ended, he rushed to a store to buy the gloves. He heard the explosion as he stepped out of the store. Smoke was rising from the direction of the soccer field. Idani jumped into his car with a sense of dread.
Other people also were racing toward the field from their homes — parents, brothers, uncles, grand- parents — all roused by the force of the blast. They arrived to find a tangled mess of broken children, body parts and blood.
“We found pieces of children. There was human flesh all over the ground,” said Ibtisam Hamid, whose 16- year- old son, Walid, was among the dead. “It was like the end of the world.”
Anmar’s brother Bilal died in his uncle’s car on the way to hospital.
Mohaned Khazaal, the 10- yearold Real Madrid fan, died instantly, said Ahmed, who escaped with a shrapnel wound to his face. Farouq was badly burned and is in hospital.
By the time Idani reached the soccer pitch, Karrar had been taken to hospital. He died before his father arrived.
“What can we say? We can only thank God,” Idani said.
Two weeks later, the entire village is still in shock. The wall beside the spot where the bombing occurred has been turned into a shrine, strung with photos of the dead, the bloodied remnants of their shirts and soccer balls. Black banners announcing the deaths hang on the walls of the many homes that lost sons.
Bilal, Anmar’s brother, was a star student who graduated top of his class in Grade 6 and was an ace soccer player, said his grandfather, Hamid al- Janabi. “His teachers came to visit us, and they were crying,” he said. “He was always near the top of his class.”
Forgotten by almost all of those who survived the carnage was the outcome of the match. Among those interviewed, only Ahmed remembered the score. The team called Peace won, 1- 0.