Today, 650,000 Iraqi civilians rest in peace inside their graves, liberated at last, since the US occupation of their country in March 2003. This figure comes from an article published on the website of the British medical journal The Lancet.
According to estimates by American public health experts in Baghdad, a previous report by the same journal, published in October 2004, stated that 100,000 Iraqi civilians had been killed in battles linked to the invasion between March 2003 and September 2004. The mortality rate had surged from 5.5 per 1,000 people annually before the American invasion to 13.3 per 1,000 during the occupation.
This death rate may seem typical for wartime. However, ‘the duration of this international conflict, combined with the sheer scale of those affected—some 27 million people—has made it one of the most dangerous conflicts of the 20th and 21st centuries,’ the report’s authors noted.
Yes, long live America—the beacon of freedom—practising its ideals in the style of the film Independence Day, or what is more accurately known as a scorched-earth policy. Congratulations to every Iraqi who lost their life to a missile that struck their home, their mosque, or the hospital where they desperately tried to save their children. Or perhaps they perished under torture in Abu Ghraib while struggling to deny an alleged connection to al-Qaida—one they never understood. If only they had confessed!
But let us be grateful for the blessing of freedom, for it is a blessing indeed. Every Iraqi citizen now has the right to an air-conditioned American cemetery, clad in fine Arab marble on the outside and lined within with the highest-quality ceramics and specially imported preservatives. After all, it would not be fitting for the stench of death to emanate from those basking in the warmth of freedom.
Each fallen Iraqi can take pride in the free Iraqi economy, where all these cemeteries are funded by the revenues of national oil.
So, congratulations to the people of Iraq on their new, free homeland and their lavish graves.
And congratulations to every American who championed this great achievement, hoisting the flag of democracy high over the ruins of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.
But above all, immense pride goes to every Arab who left their mark on this glorious victory, their hearts filled with hope that the remaining 27 million Iraqis may soon attain full freedom—until the day comes when they, too, are forced to drink from the cup of American democracy before being laid to rest in the Cemetery of Freedom.
This article is originally published by Caravan in Arabic and later AI-translated by South Push.