MOSUL’S RESIDENTS FIND RECOVERY STILL A BRIDGE TOO FAR
▶ Relief after ISIL’s defeat is clear on the faces of those crossing the Tigris each day, but so is fear for the future
Residents of Mosul cross back and forth on a pontoon connecting the city’s east and west, trying to rebuild their lives from the rubble left by ISIL.
The temporary structure, known as the Victory Bridge, is their only crossing over the Tigris River.
Others, including the landmark Iron Bridge, were wrecked in nine months of war, with Iraqi troops fighting the militants house by house.
With Mosul back in government hands, hundreds of people stream over Victory Bridge each day to check homes in the devastated west side, salvage belongings or find a place to stay in the east.
All have tales of hardship and suffering under three years of ISIL rule. And despite their relief that ISIL has been expelled, now they are worried about the present and the future.
Many people from west Mosul, where whole neighbourhoods were flattened in air and artillery strikes by the US-led coalition, are struggling to pay rent in temporary accommodation. Often they have no work and are running out of funds.
One man crossing the bridge spent his morning seeking help for a particularly alarming problem – his home had been booby-trapped by ISIL.
“Two bombs attached to each other with wire. If you hit it with your leg, it will explode,” said Safwan Al Habar, 48, whose home is in Al Zinjili area.
“Do you know anyone who can remove it? Every day I go to the military and every day they say come back tomorrow. I am in a mess. I’m paying rent but I want to go home.”
Civilians must walk across the bridge, which was built for military purposes. Taxis taking residents there from the east side of the city must halt about 500 metres away for soldiers to check papers.
Residents must walk past the ruins of the Nineveh Hotel, once a luxury hangout for Iraqi generals, and down a slope to the pontoon where more soldiers lounge in the sun. On the other side of the bridge, taxis wait on a patch of open ground.
In the cavalcade coming the other way, from west Mosul, people toted TVs, cookers, bags of clothes and other items retrieved from wrecked homes. One man had notebooks and an English-Arabic dictionary that he carried in a plastic bag.
Another man, Mirsur Hassan, 53, said his house had been destroyed in an air strike.
“I don’t have a salary. I need help to rebuild it,” Mr Hassan said.
He was living in rented accommodation with his wife, five daughters and son in the east but their landlord had just increased the rent from US$100 (Dh367) a month to $200.
They said life was miserable under ISIL which seized Mosul in July 2014.
“It was living hell,” said Mohamad Zuhair, 31. “Daesh denied you everything. You did not have the right to have a phone or wear jeans. I had to have a long beard.”
There were beatings and executions for transgressions. As the fighting worsened, gunmen opened fire on people trying to escape.
Mr Zuhair’s children were traumatised by the experience.
“They stayed in a basement for two weeks and are still afraid,” he said.
Yasser, 27, used to be a taxi driver in the Old City of west Mosul. But three months ago, the militants burnt his car.
“That was the only way I could make money,” he said. “I don’t know who to turn to. Is there someone who can help me?”
Faras Mohamed, 33, was heading back from east Mosul to Badoush with his wife and four daughters. His house was still standing but they had come over two days earlier because his wife Inassalem needed to see the doctor.
“There is no doctor, no pharmacy over there,” Mr Mohamed said.
Firas Abbas, 31, walked over the bridge with his wife, Asma, 25. They moved to a refugee camp after their home in Nablus was damaged but returned so Asma could resume classes at Mosul University.
She was studying chemistry when ISIL moved in. “There was no university, nothing. I lost three years,” Asma said.
She was travelling to the university, which is in east Mosul, to check it out. The campus is a bombed-out ruin. ISIL had used it as a headquarters, making it a target for coalition air strikes.
But she said: “I’m optimistic.”