Rehabilitating Sadr City

Jamila market had become an abandoned dusty lot as the blasts of missiles, mortars and gunfire rattled the surrounding buildings in Baghdad's Sadr City. That was two months ago, at the height of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's military campaign in the fiercely hostile Sadr City district of Baghdad. Today, Jamila Market is teeming with life. Vendor after vendor hawks piles of watermelons, cabbages, tomatoes, mint leaves and other foods. Shops along the walls behind the market sit with doors swung open, their display windows inviting shoppers to buy suits, purses, shoes, and cosmetics.

The dense and impoverished neighborhood, which houses an estimated 3 million people was easily Iraq's most devastated locale during the seven weeks of fighting that wracked the area as U.S.-backed government forces confronted the Mahdi Army militia of radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. According to Nasser Hashem al-Saadi, a member of parliament aligned with al-Sadr, some 25,000 residents fled the area during that time.

But when Maliki and Sadr, for whom Sadr City has long been a political stronghold, struck a peace agreement in mid-May, the situation took a turn for the better. Under the deal, Iraqi forces were allowed to enter the district to pursue wanted criminals, so long as they abstained from "random" arrests, and the U.S. military stayed on the outskirts. In return, Sadr asked his Mahdi Army to lay down their weapons.

So far, it seems the cease-fire is working; rocket attacks on Baghdad's Green Zone have ground to a halt and the Mahdi Army seems to have been reined in. Saadi says the majority of the residents who fled have also started to trickle back, citing renewed security. Those who can afford it are rebuilding their destroyed homes. "We're not popping the champagne cork," says Major Mark Cheadle, a U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad. "But are we seeing positive trends? Absolutely."

American and Iraqi efforts over the past two months have already removed sewage from Jamila market and improved electricity in the lower fifth of the city through the opening of a power sub-station, Cheadle says. The U.S. military has also provided compensation for home damage to 112 Sadr City families who filed claims — totalling $200,000.

Still, these are small steps considering the vastness of a neighborhood so thoroughly devastated. Among the poorest and most marginalized sections of Baghdad, the Sadr stronghold has suffered neglect and disrepair since the days of Saddam Hussein. After the fighting in April and May, that damage is now exponentially higher. Indeed, rebuilding Sadr City will be a crucial test for Maliki if he is to succeed in consolidating his divided and war-ravaged country.

To do that, he'll have to win over the residents. Saadi says attitudes towards the government have soured since the clashes, even for a neighborhood that has traditionally viewed the government with suspicion. "After what happened," he says, "people have started to hate everything that is connected to the government . . . People here see Maliki as the same as Saddam."

One Sadr City resident, Najim Kitam Kadem, head of a nine-person household that suffered two injuries during the fighting, says he is uneasy with the Iraqi troops now patrolling his streets. "The Iraqi army has done nothing good. They call you in the street, and if you don't hear them, they start jumping on you and they slap you in the face," he says.

Residents are also frustrated by what they see as continued government neglect after American air strikes toppled houses, charred ambulances, and turned school buildings to rubble. In a dusty alley in sector 10, Badria Imrais, 54, stands in the pile of cement rubble and broken furniture that used to be her home. "I applied for compensation, but of course there is nothing. I go [to the Iraqi troops] but there is nothing," she told TIME. The American air strike, which brought down Imrais' house and part of a neighbor's, killing her son, came after a man fired on the helicopter with an AK-47, Saadi says. The U.S. military accused militia fighters of using civilian homes and side streets to launch rockets and mortars, thus making Sadr City residents vulnerable to U.S. attacks.

"We applied for help 50 days ago, and we still have gotten no response," says a neighbor, Salim Kareem, whose home was sprayed with shrapnel from the same air strike. His children, 11-year old Zeinab Kareem and six-year-old Abbas Kareem have jagged scars on their legs and torsos from where they were cut by shards of flying metal.

As Saadi moves through the neighborhood, men and women approach him, pleading with him to bring help, and to take their cases before parliament. "People expect a lot from me because I'm from this area," says Saadi. "What is the fault of all these people? What have they done to warrant this bombing? Of course I'm under pressure to do something about it."

The government is doing the best it can, insists Tahsin al-Sheikhli, the civilian spokesman for the Baghdad security plan, which manages the expansion of checkpoints and development projects in the city. Sheikhli says projects are being implemented to double the number of hospital beds in Sadr City, rehabilitate 51 schools, and provide basic services. Officials at the al-Shaheed al-Sadr hospital, one of two main hospitals in the district, say that government money has already bought them much-needed drugs and other supplies. Hospital electricity has been restored, out of a combination of city power and generators, to 24 hours a day — up from just six hours of generator power at the height of the fighting. Doctors say the water supply is being repaired in the area, but not quickly enough to stop a summer spike in water-borne diseases, such as typhoid.

"Yes, it is slow," Sheikhli says of the rehabilitation efforts. "But we need time to do it the proper way. At the maximum, two or three years from now people will start to feel the benefits." But as to how many people in Sadr City's streets will respond to the government's current pace remains in question. For two straight blocks in sector 11, where over a dozen buildings in a row look as if they have been hit by a wrecking ball, residents are not so hopeful. Saadi warns: "The government has misjudged the situation in Sadr City. They do not know how to deal with it." With reporting by Mazin Ezzat