Residents now vent their fury on U.S. troops, accusing the military of turning their neighborhood into a big prison.
Cars are not allowed to enter or leave these areas making it difficult for patients to visit hospitals and shop owners to replenish supplies.
Residents have now to walk for long distances to reach bus terminals and it is impossible for ambulances and cars to drive patients in acute conditions to hospitals.
Um Mohammed, a house wife, said conditions in Dora were deteriorating with every passing day. “We have become almost like detainees in a prison camp. There is no water and there is no electricity and no fuel to run the standby generators,” she said.
Mohammed Salem blamed the government for Dora’s predicament. He said even before the Americans besieged certain areas the government had failed to provide residents with food rations, fuel and other public utilities.
Dora is already ringed by fences and walls but it is the first time U.S. troops separate its parts with concrete slabs.
Adnan Ahmed urged Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and the parliament to order a halt to U.S. building of walls in Dora. Whether it's called ethnic cleansing, partition, apartheid, political separation, it's all the same thing: segregation of warring parties.
BTW, I’m in favor of partition of Iraq into politically independent provinces with a national assembly. A national army will never work, too many militias that will never disarm. Iraq is too tribal and sectarian. It’s time to smell the coffee.