March 7, 2009

By Philip ForgitBAGHDAD, IraqRaad Hassan’s feet handle the soccer ball as a jug-

gler might with his hands. A quick movement of thefoot and the ball is in the air, Raad heading it to hisfriend Sayf Juwad.

Both are members of a youth team, Dynamo Egelatin the Kadamiyah hayy or district of Baghdad.

The field they play on is in poor condition but, likeprogress in Iraq, that is relative. The field, once littered

with garbage, strewn with moundsof rubble, is now a level field ofgrass, albeit parched.

The lockers rooms, filled with thestench of urine and trash, sport afresh coat of paint.

As for security, the boysacknowledge that it has improved inthe last year, but that too is relativeas blocks away, just days before,Shia pilgrims to the KadamiyahShrine were murdered by a suicidebomber.

Still, this field is progress and the presence of youngmen playing soccer, who a year ago may have stayedindoors or worse, dug holes for IEDs or spotted for theJaiysh Al Mahdi militia, is evident.

In Baghdad, more than $207,000 of American recon-struction money has renovated several fields. As a tenta-tive peace begins to break out, so too do soccer matches.

At the Kadamiyah Sports Club in the Kadamiyahhayy, the Basra Originals and the Kadamiyah Sons ofMousa play a friendly game.

A semi-professional league in the second tier of soc-cer in Iraq, they play a 20-game season. The winners ofeach half-season playing one another for the title. Thefield is in better condition than Kadamiyah‘s.

The U.S. Army is here, not for the game, but to checkon Improvised Rocket Assisted Mortar threats. Theseare poor-man rocket launchers. Three rockets fell justshort of a U.S. Army compound three days before. Thefield is suspected as the launch site, but the athleticdirector has seen nothing.

The sprawling athletic complex instead echoes thestirring of normalcy in Baghdad as workers build a vol-leyball court in one section. In another, waiters ready anoutdoor restaurant overlooking the various fields, settingout plastic chairs and tables and turningon brightly colored patio lights for the young coupleswho will gather for dates and the men who will come toargue sports and smoke the hooka.

Southwest of Kadamiyah, in the Kharkh hayy, agame played between a Rhamaniyah all-hayy team andone from Kharkh showcases an integrated squad ofSunni and Shia boys. The game is played in the shadowof the Zaura Stadium and its crumbling façade.

On the main field, a professional team, Melab al-Zaura is playing a friendly against a National Policeteam. The boys from Kharkh and Rhamaniyah on thepractice field next to the stadium dream of playing forZaura or any of the 24 teams in the top league in Iraq,but today they are here because of CPT Guillory of U.S.Army 442 Forward Support Company, Golf Troop andOperation Soccer Jersey(OSJ).

His parents, andbusinesses likeYanceys’ CherishedMemories, Flowers andGifts in the captain’shometown of De Soto,Missouri have boughtover 200 jerseys and 60soccer balls to outfit thetwenty teams in thesehayys.

The event plays asmetaphor for theimproving situation inBaghdad. Officialsdemonstrate Iraqi hos-pitality distributingsodas and cakes.

CPT Guillory and DeSoto, Missouri showthe compassion ofAmericans and theirsoldiers. Security istight, the field ringedwith American andIraqi Army and Police.Dignitaries make theirspeeches lauding theprogress.

Meanwhile, several soldiers of the Iraqi Army engagein the culture of corruption that now threatens Iraq asmuch as terrorism, stealing boxes of jerseys and balls toload on to their transports.

American troops “liberate” the boxes in time to bedistributed. Despite this, Operation Soccer Jersey is asuccess with Kharkh winning 1-0 and Sunni and Shiaplaying together without serious penalty.

Omar, a Sunni, says, “We are friends; We are Sunni

and Shia. We play together, thereis no difference between us.”Muntadar, a Shia chimes in, “Weare friends, we are brothers.Makoo mushkela (no problem)!Muhammad, a Shia says that hisparents let him play with hisfriends because nobody fights.

These three are fromRamaniyah. When asked aboutsecurity they said it improved inthe last year but before, “at thetime of the Haifa Street War, wedidn’t go out, we just stayedinside.” Two and three yearsago, Haifa Street was an openair morgue, bodies lay in thestreet. Buildings bare the pockmarked evidence of street tostreet fighting between militias.

Ayad credits the relativepeace in his Kharkh hayy to theIraqi Army and cooperation bythe residents. When asked, theirprediction for Iraq’s future, theywere hopeful, “for the best”.

At the end of the game, agroup of boys, gathered at the

fence, do as most Iraqi children do when they seeAmericans — beg, with the plaintive cry of…”Mister?Mister?”

Among the boys, is one that is startling in appear-ance, carrying in his features a recessive gene of the lastWestern occupation of Iraq, that of the British Empire.

The boy with flaming orange hair and freckles sticksout in a crowd of Iraqi boys who call him “English”. Hesmiles, asks me to take his picture and says, “Mister,Mister, Gimme football.”

The beautiful gameSoccer is booming in Iraq thanks to American influence

Photos by Philip Forgit

Soccer players Tariq (left), Muntadar, Omar, have benefitted from the growth of youth soccer.

IIRRAAQQII VVOOIICCEESS Former Rawls

Byrd ElementarySchool teacherPhilip Forgit isembedded withU.S. troops in Iraq,filming how thewar has affectedthe Iraqi people.Fourth in a series.

A boy nicknamed “English,” due to his red hair andfreckles, has adopted qualities of Americans.

Philip Forgit

Iraquis haveembraced thesport of soccer,thanks in largepart to OperationSoccery Jersey,which brought200 jerseys and60 soccer balls tothe area.