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Cover photo: Iraqi rescue workers dig through the rubble for bodies after the attack on

Andrew Stern is a documentary photographer who is co-author of the book "We Are Everywhere: the irresistible rise of global anticapitalism." www.andrewstern.net

y partner and I had been in Baghdad for only a few hours when the the Mount Lebanon Hotel. Baghdad, Iraq. March 17, 2004. first bomb hit. We had come in on the Airserve flight from Amman, and before the flight our pilot gave a cheery speech about how the corkscrew descent pattern was very effective in evading surface to air missiles- "so sit back ladies and gentlemen, fasten your seatbelts because I wouldn’t want anyone to become a projectile themselves, and enjoy the flight." It was quite a ride. When we arrived, a miscommunication meant that we were dropped off at an isolated coalition checkpoint on one of the most dangerous roads in Baghdad with no car to meet us. So we hitchhiked to our hotel and met with our friends, feeling quite proud that we had managed to make it unscathed from no man’s land to our hotel on our own devices. We had just started to discuss how we could research the corporatization of Iraq and not just get stuck chasing explosions when WHOOSH. I had the distinct slow motion thought "incoming”—and BOOM. The whole room filled with a cloud of dust. We all stood up in a state of shaky shock and one of us managed weakly, "That was close." We moved around aimlessly not knowing which direction to move in quite yet. "Downstairs," someone said, and that snapped us out of it enough to get out of the room. The lobby was a mass of confusion, but one of the hotel staff was already cleaning up the glass from the windows that had shattered from the force of the blast. My friend, a British filmmaker who I hadn’t seen since the last time I was here in July, said "Welcome back—do you want to go?" She handed me her camera and disappeared upstairs to get more tapes. I thought about it in a disoriented way, would I rush off with all the other journalists to shoot? Inside I already knew the answer. There was no room in their car but I jumped into a cab with another friend minutes later and sped through the streets to the scene of the bombing that I later learned was the Mount Lebanon Hotel.

It was a nightmare. It was everything that you don’t see on the news. It was the mangled bloody bodies. It was the innocent and wasted lives. It was the raw screaming pain of the ones left behind- family members still alive and writhing with the agony of loss. It was the angry and panicked creating community and networks of mutual aid and solidarity.

The war against people has never been more globalized. But we have these moments, spaces that are created seemingly from nowhere, but actually are the result of extremely committed people’s visions and determination. Spain just ousted a right wing government in one decisive collective move. The trick is to believe that it’s possible. As Seth Tobocman phrased it so succinctly in one of his cartoons, "We are the city—we can shut it down." Or to bring it back to Iraq. "We are time bombs at the call of the honorable Hawza," said Al Araji, a cleric who is calling for a non-violent Jihad, referring to a Shia religious school in Najef. "Once they order us to destroy the U.S. occupation, we will do so."

Children playing at the Al-Huda squatters camp, where many families have taken over the abandoned Police Athletic League building and converted it to living units. March 19, 2004. Baghdad, Iraq.

Banners calling for an end to the occupation and state sponsored terrrorism. March 19, 2004. Baghdad, Iraq.

Iraqi police trying to save people and keep order with the flames raging behind them. It was the useless American soldiers so incompetent that their tanks were blocking the path of the Iraqi emergency vehicles. It was the swarm of bloodthirsty journalists smothering the cries of mothers and sisters whose loved ones were ripped from them—shooting in a frenzy and then rushing back to their hotels in the race to be the first to file the carnage. It was Baghdad, three days before the one-year anniversary of the invasion, a little more than eleven months since the war "ended." For the first time in my life, I couldn’t shoot. I witnessed, cried a little, and then walked away with my friend into the night with the buildings still burning behind me. Happy anniversary, Iraq.

The U.S.-led invasion has taken what was already a nightmare and turned it into a catastrophe where everyone seems numb and shell-shocked. Thirty-five years of a brutally repressive dictatorship, 11 years of crippling sanctions, and two invasions in the past decade have warped this country into the bloody hellhole that it is today. Iraq is the ultimate confluence of the three types of warfare: military, economic, and psychological. Fear has become normalized. Security is little more than superstition because there is nowhere that is really safe. The conspiracy theories about who is behind the attacks crackle on the streets. Many Iraqis seem quite convinced that the Americans are somehow involved. In many ways it does seem like the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign is being run from Iraq. Directly after the attack on the Mt. Lebanon Hotel, Cheney ominously appeared on CNN for a previously scheduled speech and they aired split screen coverage of bodies being removed from the wreckage in Baghdad on one side, and on the other, Cheney’s speech proclaiming Iraq to be a key front in the war on terror and attacking Senator John Kerry’s record on the issue.

Regardless of whether its true that the United States is directly involved in orchestrating the attacks as many Iraqis contend, its clear that the United States is directly responsible for the loss of thousands upon thousands of lives, by turning Iraq into a pit of despair—and for the worst of reasons, cold hard cash, and lots of it. The Economist referred to the economic reforms being imposed here as turning Iraq into a "capitalist’s dream" economy, and the amount of dollars to be looted here is immeasurable. But of course it’s not just the US government that stands to gain from the occupation in of Iraq. It’s whom they represent, companies like Halliburton and the scores of multi-nationals all clamoring to get their hands in the grand cookie jar that is Iraq.

And then there is the resistance. On March 20, there were protests around the world sending a resounding message to the Bush administration that the world rejects their lethal policies. In at least 575 cities spanning five continents, millions of people came out into the streets to show solidarity with the Iraqi people. And yet there was virtually no coverage of the protests in the place where it matters most: Baghdad. On March 19, thousands of Shia and Sunni Iraqis marched from opposite sides of the Tigris River to join together in a powerful show of unity between the two religious groups. Emotions ran high as the two groups converged, and people >During the protests, Sunni men from surrounding neighborhoods provided security for the march. March 19, 2004. Baghdad, Iraq.

cried to see this happening before their eyes. "Some Iraqis see what

happened to Iraq as liberation, yet the majority see this as occupation,"

said Hazem al-Araji, a speaker at the demonstration. "What have Iraqis

gained when many streets are blocked to Iraqis and clerics are arrested or

assassinated?" "Its not Sunni or Shia, but an Islamic unity," said one of the

banners.

Resistance means many things to different people. In Iraq it is a word you

say quietly because it has come to be associated with armed resistance. But

its not only about bombs and guns. People resist in many ways, and in Iraq

just like everywhere else, some of the most powerful examples we have

come from our daily experiences rather than big protests. In Buenos Aires

it’s the piqueteros in Argentina baking bread in the barrios, making sure their children get enough to eat. In Baghdad, it’s groups in the impoverished Sad’r City region taking a collection up from the community to create useful jobs for the unemployed, despite the fact that none of the billions being spent on "reconstruction" have reached them. Resistance is talking to your neighbors. Resistance is organizing, whether for militant actions or for