On my way home, a priest was standing next to me on the tram. He was talking in an American accent to another man, whom I couldn’t see from where I was sitting.
I didn’t really pay attention to their conversation until I heard the phrase „I worked for the US Army“.
Now their talk had my full attention. From what I heard, it seemed to me that the man behind me had been in the US Army for some time.
A strange feeling came over me and I thought, what if we had met before in a completely different situation. He, flying a plane full of bombs over Iraq, and I, lying in the bad, holding my children as close as I could, praying that the pilot would not drop bombs on us.
My body began to shake, I had to take a deep breath and I turned around to look at his face. I was relieved. He was too young to have fought in 1991 or even 2003.
This short scene brought back a memory and a feeling I hadn’t felt in years.
I remembered a cold March day when I was sitting on the terrace of my in-laws‘ modest village house, washing our clothes in a plastic washtub. My hands were sore from the cold water. I was in a hurry to finish the laundry because my children were playing in the house and I was afraid that the next air raid would start while I was away from them.
There was a distant plane in the sky. But it seemed to be heading for Baghdad. I followed it with my eyes, calculating the distance, if it would change direction, and the time I would need to run inside to my children.
But it kept moving away.
I wondered how the pilot felt. Coming from a country as far away as the United States, knowing nothing about Iraq except what he thought he knew. And it seems that he believed that every single person under his plane deserved to be killed by the bombs he was about to drop.
He may even have believed that he was a hero. Superman in the sky, killing all the bad people with the push of a magic button.
What would he do if he knew us personally? If he had eaten with us at the same table or danced with us to the same music? What would he do if he knew our names, if he played UNO or backgammon with us? Would he still push the button?
What kind of people does he think we are?
Can he even imagine how we suffered during the years of the embargo?
How broken and depressed we were?
Would he go home and tell everyone, „I did so well. You must be proud of me. I killed about 50 Iraqis a day just by flying my plane and pushing a button. I didn’t care who they were or how old they were. They were the evil ones and they deserved death.“
Everyone around him would be impressed, and they might raise a glass and toast his bravery.
I felt hatred, yes, I hated with all the intensity of that word. I hated this man who crossed the world to drop bombs on us, a man who controls our destiny from above, who could kill my children or make them orphans. I wished his plane would burn up in the sky and turn him to ashes before he could drop a single bomb. I wished he would never return to the United States and be celebrated for killing Iraqi people. My weakness before his power filled me with this ugly feeling of hatred. The worst feeling a human being can have for another human being.
I did not have the power he had, but in my mind I wanted to destroy him as much as he could destroy us.
His plane disappeared from view.
My focus returned to the laundry. I missed my washing machine, the electricity, and our home in Baghdad.
I hung the clothes on the ropes hanging between the palm trees and ran into the house where my children were playing. I sat down on the floor and joined them.
The priest and the young US Army man stopped talking about the Army and the Marines and started arguing about the way and their next tourist spot in Vienna. I stuck my headphones in, turned the music on and started writing this story.
