By Baghdadhope *
Everything is over today. Hopefully. The first Sunday after the massacre of the church of Our Lady of Salvation was spent in anxiety and amid tight security measures. Many of the faithful, however, stayed at home for fear. It was predictable.
The web shows many videos about that cursed night, the special forces’ break-in, the dismay of those who, out of that church which resembles a ship, waited for their loved ones to get out. Among the videos one strikes for its harshness, almost 20 minutes that carve in the mind of the watcher the image of terror.
The terror painted on the faces of the survivors of the massacre. Women, men, guys who walk in the central nave of the church while the Iraqi soldiers video them.
"Take heart," one of them shouts to those people who alone or supported by some other survivor move toward the exit. Most of them do not look around.
There is the urgent need to leave that place of pain but also not to see the body of the priest at the foot of the altar, the Kalashikov magazines next to a crucifix on the ground, the human remains on the benches, the dismembered bodies as half puppets.
A boy smiles as he says his name to the soldier with the camera, maybe it's relief, maybe it's the shock, a woman holds her handbag, a man cries, a girl screams, many of the survivors leave the church squeezing each other as if they had still to defend themselves, someone carries a child in his arms, someone else is taken away on a stretcher, many lift up their hands no one knows whom to invoke.
A man crouched in a corner slowly moves his head, a woman seems about to faint, another seems to walk on tiptoe, as if not to trample on the blood, the glasses, the remains of the horror, a soldier’s retch can be heard, the image of the Virgin is there, above the altar, in the dim light of the flashlights the hidden corners are searched, the stretcher is back to take away a wounded or a dead, who knows, machine-gun cartridges are on the benches.
And blood, blood everywhere, stains on the floor, rests on the walls, the altar, the ceiling.
The man crouched in the corner does not move anymore.
The radio withdraws the soldiers out.
"Take heart," shouted one of them.
Those people will need a lot of heart to survive their own death, met on the evening of October 31, 2010 in the church of Our Lady of Salvation.
In Baghdad.
Watch the video: The attack against Saydet Al Najat church in Baghdad
by clicking here
