As usual there was much traffic on mainstreet, but now everyone wanted to be away from there. My companion told me that i had to go back inside the house. With a bad grace?i re-entered. A couple of minutes later we ran back outside. We could see better now: 300 metres away from us stood the US-army in battle tanks. A married couple hurried home, I guess. Some people collected glass fragments of their?broken windows. Older people were lost in this chaos:? some were spontaneously given help.? It was around 6 o'clock.? After a while we went back inside.? Now I saw that it was 7 o'clock, I would have to be home actually. I told the others that I'd like to go home [would have to], because they feel worried when I come after 7 o'clock.

One of the people told me he would accompany me. So we walked directly?in the direction the exploded bomb.?When I saw the?tanks of the US army, I asked him whether it would'nt be better to turn around: he understood nothing and continued. There were US-soldiers with all kinds of weapons. We went on between the tanks.

Now we saw the place:?it was the Syrian Catholic Church. I knew it, because?in my daily walks, it was a recognizable landmark with her oversized cross. The ambulances came and went away, but we did not stop. My companion continued with a decided step. All windows of a hotel were gone. Still perhaps 100 meters and we reached the house, where I live. With a certain ease I was at?home, so to say.

But there were many people. A window had been broken by the explosion. Again pieces of broken glass. There have been many people on the road, the US-soldiers closed it for traffic. Helicopters circled above our heads. Journalists were?not allowed?to come nearer to the scene.

Then one of my friends wanted to take a walk on that street and record with my video-camera. The others were against this, because he was in such a risky mood. I decided to deny him my camera. However he went out without my camera but with another friend. From the balcony I saw them walking towards the US-soldiers. I really worried: but not the others, using the argument: that's his way of being. I lost my view on him. Sunlight slowly switched to dawn.
The US soldiers urged the people of the road. Suddenly we saw smoke at another place. My friend told me that he was about to come home, then again?it exploded.? With his digital camera he went to the church. Ten minutes after the first explosion there was another weaker explosion: to kill?as many people as possible. He is very anxious: it is the first time that churches were attacked. What does that mean for the future?? It's still too early to provide an analysis, but it is bad.? Some Islamic groups do not want the religious war, but the Baghdadis do not want it however. Finally the friend returned, it now totally darkened. He brought something to eat and told us that many churches were attacked, all at the same time. Incoming phonecalls confirmed: it was a concentrated action against churches on Sunday, when people go to church. An action to kill many people.

It's hot, there's no electricity, we eat, due to the heat we move to the balcony. But its full of pieces of glass, one guy cut his foot and bleeds. We try to stop the blood. But the injured is insane: such a beautiful shirt, but we insist?and?can convince him that his foot is more important. Not seeing the pieces of glass we re-enter the room. We eat in the dark, but tendency becomes calmer. After the meal they start to sing old songs [really very old]: I feel the centurie's pain of this population. It makes me cry [A cry out somehow]...

After a couple of hours the US-soldiers take off. The traffic jam goes on rolling. We try to sleep, but it's impossible, we move from one of the balconies, where there are no pieces of glass around, to the room and vice versa. Everyone tries a new place, but the strained situation, traffic, sometimes helicopters, howling police's sirenes and generators: it's impossible to sleep. Suddenly there's a shot, rather near: then?another. The police yet comes with howling sirenes?into the street. After a while they take off again. We have to get up at 5 o'clock, because some friends want to go to Basra. We go for a breakfast with an iraqi friend and do especially enjoy the cold water, because we don't have that at home. My friend gets off for work. He meets a friend of the organisation of political prisoners. I ask him if I may accompany him and he sais yes, but in a side street i get into a checkpoint. He obviously did not understand what I wanted and moves on and I have to return: the guards armed with Kalashnikovs dont't understand what's up. But I tell them that I go back and they say: 'OK, no problem'.

I decided to give a a visit to a christian friend. I contacted him before and I liked the thought of visiting him, especially now. He really feels lucky to see me. Like always he tells me to leave Iraq. He wants out, but where to go? He tells me that six churches would have been attacked, calls more than one thousand dead people. Until now I don't know excactly what, how and where that happened: there's always a discrepance between being here and the informations coming so directly, there's no overview... He asks me if I could intervene in Switzerland. I will go to the embassy: he reminds me in a talk I had right at the start of my arrival: they demanded from european countries to open the borders for refugees.

Jawoll, let's open borders.

Let's accuse politics of the islamistic groups killing people indiscriminately.

War is no solution.

Away with occupation.

(Translation by David, thanks)

the above translation is also transmitted to a better sounding english than my one
by Cecile, Amsterdam
she forgot to post.