26
Defiance
A Crisis and a Key
(1956)
ALTHOUGH NURI PASHA AL-SAID was not continuously in office as Prime Minister during the 1950s, he came to represent the official face of Iraqi politics for many. Despite his background as a privileged member of the Sunni elite and a supporter of pan-Arabism, Nuri understood that Iraq’s complexity and ethnic composition set it apart from the rest of the predominantly Sunni Arab world. (After all, a third of the Iraqi population were Kurds, who had continued their campaign for autonomy ever since the creation of Iraq in 1921.) He also realized that the Shi’a needed to be granted their share of political power. A generation of educated and able men had already emerged among them and served in the highest posts, including Prime Ministers such as Saleh Jabr and Fadhil Jamali.
To achieve his goal and to secure protection from the growing Communist threat from the Soviet Union, Nuri turned to Iraq’s non-Arab neighbours, first to Turkey, then Iran. Turkey was a member of NATO and enjoyed a close relationship with the US, and Nuri made positive inroads with the country’s charismatic Prime Minister Adnan Menderes, who had won Turkey’s first free election in 1950. Together they agreed on a joint cooperative aggression pact in the event of attack.
Signed in 1955, the agreement became known as the Baghdad Pact. In due course, with full British support but the more reserved blessing of America, membership of the Pact was expanded to include Iran and Pakistan, as well as Britain. The creation of a powerful political and economic bloc, which included Arabs and non-Arabs as well as Muslims of both sects, suggested a new way forward for the region and potentially a dynamic new political order, whose raison d’être was not solely defined by opposition to the West. The Central Treaty Organization (CENTO, as it became known) did not have a unified military command structure like NATO; however, it was connected with NATO via Turkey’s and Britain’s memberships, and to SEATO through Pakistan.
The Pact boosted morale amongst the political elite in Iraq, many of whom welcomed the rapprochement with Turkey and felt that the Pact offered protection from Nasser’s continuing aggression. However, these sentiments did not trickle down to the people, who remained vehemently pro-Arab, and continued to identify strongly with Nasser. Moreover, some sections of the Iraqi population perceived the Pact as a last-ditch attempt by Britain to continue to exert its influence over the region.
Hadi’s reception in Turkey, while on an official visit as acting head of the Iraqi Senate, after the signing of the Baghdad Pact in 1955.
As part of Menderes’s liberalization policy, several delegations of Iraqi government officials were invited to Turkey. The Speaker of the Parliament and Hadi, who was then the acting President of the Senate, led one group of ministers on a tour of Turkey’s new industrial and commercial projects. Bibi was very disappointed that she could not join them, as she would have loved to have been fêted with official pomp and style. However, she was later relieved to have been spared an experience that nearly killed her husband and her son-in-law, Raifa’s husband Abdul Amir. The delegation were on a flight from Ankara to some textile factories in Adana when their plane was caught in a violent storm that nearly caused it to crash. Menderes welcomed the rattled Iraqis back at Ankara, and told them they would only travel on trains from then on, or he would be accused of trying to get them assassinated.
The Suez Crisis of 1956 inflamed the political tensions that were already smouldering within the region. When the United States and Britain refused to finance his mammoth Aswân Dam project in Egypt, in retaliation Nasser declared the nationalization of the Suez Canal and the Suez Canal Company. Anthony Eden, the British Prime Minister, was outraged by this attack on a vital British economic asset. A few months later, having failed to reach an agreement directly with Nasser or through the UN, Britain attacked the Canal with the support of France and Israel.
American President Dwight D. Eisenhower condemned this action and demanded a ceasefire from the attacking forces. Humiliated, the French, British and Israelis retreated. The public showdown forced Eden’s resignation, and represented a crushing demonstration of the decline of Britain’s power.
Despite Nuri’s support of Egypt in the crisis – he even broke off diplomatic relations with France – the outcome had serious ramifications domestically. In the eyes of his Iraqi detractors, Nuri was still seen to be in a security alliance with Britain and America, although it was not formulated as a proper treaty. There were demonstrations throughout the country, including in the shrine city of Najaf, which suggested that even the religious establishment was beginning to stir. As leading Shi’a figures, Hadi and his fellow politician Abdul Wahab Murjan went to the city to pacify the situation. Throughout his political career, Hadi had paid close attention to the Shi’a religious establishment, and he continued to be relied upon by the government and monarchy to help smooth the way for their own dealings with the clerics.
During his time in office, Rushdi attended very carefully to the rumours of growing discontent within the army; some units held strong Arab nationalist sentiments, were pro-Nasser and vehemently anti-monarchy. One small group known as the Free Officers had been formed by a man called Hajji Sirri, who belonged to the officers’ engineering corps. They had begun to agitate for a mutiny similar to that which had propelled Nasser to power in Egypt, although by all accounts they weren’t taken very seriously.
From left, King Faisal II, Crown Prince Abdul Ilah, Hadi and Rushdi in the Sif garden, late 1950s.
Rushdi had witnessed the polarization between Nuri and Crown Prince Abdul Ilah, with both men and their associates incessantly working to undermine each other. He wondered if they were aware of the potential danger, and the subject began to torment him. At a family lunch one day he was so emphatic about the threat posed by the military and their intense dislike – if not outright hatred – of the Crown Prince that his father decided to pay Abdul Ilah an informal visit at Qasr al-Rihab Palace.
Hadi relayed to the Crown Prince the rumours and his own opinions of them. As he was preparing to take his leave, he hinted that perhaps His Royal Highness might consider making some provisions in case of a possible attempted coup. The Prince laughed and jovially replied, ‘Don’t you worry, old fellow! There’s nothing in the least to be concerned about – at least 60 per cent of the military is behind me, or I’d be the first to pack my bags and hotfoot it!’ He laid his hand on Hadi’s shoulder as he escorted him to the door. ‘That said, never can be too careful. Always a good idea to have a bit put by overseas, just in case. Could you or Rushdi fix that, d’you reckon?’
A few days later, a soldier arrived at the house and presented Hadi with a large metal key. He was followed shortly by another soldier, who delivered a wooden box. Inside it was the equivalent of £100,000, for Hadi to deposit offshore.
27
Revolution
Slaughter of a Family
(1958)
‘INQILAB, INQILAB, wake up, inqilab!’ Jawad cried.
‘What?’
‘Wake up, get up! Come on!’
‘What? Who died?’
‘There’s been a coup. The army’s stormed the Palace.’
Bibi was instantly shaken from her deep sleep into a state of absolute terror.
‘Where’s Rushdi?’
‘He’s at home.’
Bibi knew that, as Ministers for the Economy and Health respectively, Rushdi and his brother-in-law Abdul Amir were meant to be going to the airport to see off King Faisal II. The King was travelling to Istanbul to meet the Muslim leaders of the Baghdad Pact and also to formalize his engagement to Fazileh, a princess of the Ottoman royal family. Rushdi had just returned from London where, at Nuri’s behest, he had led a delegation to negotiate an increase in Iraq’s oil share from the Iraqi Petroleum Company to 80 per cent. Hassan’s immediate thoughts were of his father, who was out of the country on official business as head of the Senate. He was relieved by Hadi’s absence, as it meant there was no
immediate concern for his physical safety.
The phone soon started to ring. The first to call was Thamina, startled by the sound of bullets raining over her house from the opposite bank of the river. Nuri Pasha al-Said’s house was two houses down from hers. Across the river lay Qasr al-Rihab, the Royal Palace. Having spent the hot night on the roof, Thamina and her family had been woken by the shots and had come down into the house.
Worried about her friend Princess Badiya, the Crown Prince’s sister, who lived near the Palace, Thamina asked her husband, Saleh Bassam, to phone her house. When he got through, Princess Badiya’s husband, Sharif Hussein, told them they were worried about their children, and wanted help in taking them to a safer place. Saleh Bassam froze. Thamina took the receiver from his hand and asked the Sharif to tell her what was going on. They had barely exchanged any words before it was clear to Thamina that they had to help rescue the Princess’s children. She ran into her dressing room and threw on a light summer dress.
Her children’s nanny, Fahima, was preparing milk for Thamina’s youngest, still a baby. Fahima was a trustworthy Chaldean woman who had been with Thamina for over ten years and was devoted to her children. Thamina told her that she had to take the children straight away to their paternal uncle Sadiq’s house down the road, where they would be safe. There was no time for talk.
Princess Badiya (centre), King Faisal’s aunt and the only surviving member of the royal family, flanked by Thamina and Raifa in England, 1961.
Next, she put out her husband’s clothes for him. Snapping out of his fear, Saleh rushed to get dressed. Then Thamina remembered that their eldest son, Mahdi, was sleeping over at her sister Raifa’s house. She called Raifa and told her that she was sending their driver to pick him up.
She and her husband drove in the direction of Princess Badiya’s house, which lay in the Mansour district on the other side of the river. The city already looked and smelt different; there was a heaviness in the air. Except for a few fishermen, who drifted on the glittering water in their little boats, seemingly impervious to life beyond the river’s cycles, the Tigris was empty.
As Thamina and Saleh Bassam approached a roundabout they were confronted by a huge mob of shouting men. It was clear that most of them were from the sarifas, the shanty town that lay to the east of the city. Migrants from the south, these men lived in makeshift reed huts without water or electricity; they were poor and angry; their legitimate grievances had been channelled into frenzied action by pro-Nasser slogans and speeches that preached class hatred, and anti-monarchy and anti-British sentiments. A cry went up among them: Allahu akbar, allahu akbar. Al mawt lil malik, al mawt li ’Abdul Ilah! ‘Death to the King, Death to Abdul Ilah!’ There were soldiers from the mutinous army units amongst the mob. They were still wearing their khaki uniforms. Although many of them weren’t wearing their black berets, they brandished their rifles in their hands.
Thamina saw a body being dragged along the street by a rope. One of its arms was missing. She looked again. It was Abdul Ilah, the former Regent and Crown Prince. She was sure of it.
Suddenly, she found herself circled by men thumping on the car’s roof and windows, jumping on the bonnet. Faces pressed up against the glass, shouting, spitting, blocking out the light. She and her husband were trapped. Cowering with her arms over her head, she was afraid the windshield would shatter over her.
Through the car’s open windows, dark arms started to reach in, catching hold of her and pulling her out. Tugging at her sleeves, the men tore her dress, exposing her chest. Although she was desperate for air, all Thamina could think about was covering her body with her free hand. She cried out for her husband, who was still in the car.
Someone started screaming: ‘This is the daughter of Abdul Hadi Chalabi the traitor! This is his daughter!’
As she struggled to cover herself, Thamina heard a shout above the other voices: ‘Leave them alone! Move away!’ A man grabbed her, then opened the car door, pushed Saleh Bassam out of the driver’s seat and took the steering wheel. With Thamina beside him, he reversed and drove away from the crowd, back towards the river.
As they drove through empty streets, the man explained that although he was dressed in civilian clothing, he was an army officer. Wiping the sweat from his brow, he explained that he had recognized Dr Saleh Bassam through the windscreen. The doctor had treated his wife a few years earlier, saving her pregnancy, and he had not forgotten.
A random twist of fate had spared Thamina and her husband from death that morning.
In A’zamiya, the family was in uproar. As Hadi’s house overlooked the main road and was relatively vulnerable to attack, the family had decamped to Jawad’s home, on a quieter stretch of Taha Street. Within the house, news and hearsay were rapidly exchanged as hysteria mounted. The army had broken into the Royal Palace; the cabinet ministers would surely be their next target.
The family’s fears were confirmed by a radio broadcast in which Abdul Salam Arif, the officer in charge of the army’s 3rd Division and a staunch supporter of Nasser, announced that all ministers were to be shot.
Ear-splitting martial music followed this broadcast, punctuated by lurid declarations of war and death. Bibi listened, her throat dry, as a popular Egyptian song was played again and again:
Allahu akbar fawqa kaydi al mu’tadi,
Wallahi lil mathloum khairu mu’ayidi …
ana bil yakin wa bil silah sawfa aftadi.
– ya arab qulu, qulu ma’ai
allahu allahu allahu akbar,
allahau fawqa kul mu’tadi.
God is Greater above every aggressor.
To the mistreated God is a support …
I will fight with arms and the truth.
Oh Arabs, say with me, say with me,
God is, God is above every aggressor.
Mahdi was on his way home from his aunt Raifa’s house. He hadn’t wanted to wait for his father’s car to arrive, so Raifa had put him in a car with one of her husband’s drivers. It was a mistake.
At the corner of Rashid Street, Mahdi saw an enormous crowd of uniformed soldiers, traditionally-robed men and women in abayas. The driver stopped the car and got out to watch. The mob were dragging a corpse. Mahdi recognized the Prince’s battered face. The driver cheered. People were swarming over Abdul Ilah’s body, hacking at it with knives. One man bit off a piece of flesh and tossed it to the crowd. The look of frenzied delight on their faces was unlike anything Mahdi had ever seen.
Some of the mob broke away from the rest, and were heading towards the car. The driver called out: ‘There is a Chalabi boy here! I have a Chalabi boy here, do you want him?’
Seeing the knives shining in the mob’s hands, Mahdi quickly slipped from view, then carefully opened the car door and crawled out in the opposite direction, towards the bridge. No one noticed him. By the time the group had arrived at the car there was no Chalabi boy to be had. Angry, they turned on the driver and started to beat him for lying to them; he shook them off and ran away.
The Salhiya Bridge had disappeared beneath the sea of people surging across it. Mahdi ran down to the riverbank and jumped into the water, allowing the current to carry him south, away from hell.
Nuri Pasha al-Said was in a deep sleep when the baking woman knocked on his bedroom door. She came to the house early every morning to bake fresh bread, which he enjoyed for breakfast, but this time she was not alone.
Under orders from the leaders of the coup, Nuri’s former assistant had come to arrest Nuri in person. He convinced his unit to wait outside while he delivered the news, thinking that in this way he would be able to safeguard himself against the Pasha’s reprisals in the event of the coup’s failure. He ordered the frightened baker woman to wake her master up. Breathlessly, she knocked on Nuri’s bedroom door, woke him and told him what had happened. Nuri immediately took two pistols from his bedside cabinet, told the woman to try to delay the soldiers, then, still dressed in his pyjamas and slippers, slipped out of the
house to the levee below.
At the waterside, Nuri frantically waved a nearby fisherman over, jumped into the boat and asked the man to take him to the opposite bank as quickly as possible. The fisherman was a humble man, and it didn’t occur to him to refuse Nuri’s request. Nuri lay flat on his stomach, pressed against the bottom of the boat and hidden under a thick net. Just before they reached the opposite shore, they heard the sounds of a radio coming from someone’s house. The voice of Abdul Salam Arif announced the new regime’s Proclamation No. 1:
Noble people of Iraq: trusting in God and with the aid of the loyal sons of the people and the national armed forces, we have undertaken to liberate our beloved homeland from the corrupt crew that imperialism installed …
Brethren, the army is of you and for you and has carried out what you desired … Your duty is to support it … in the wrath that is pouring on the Rihab Palace and the house of Nuri Said … We appeal to you, therefore, to report to the authorities all offenders, traitors, and corrupt people so that they can be uprooted, and we ask you to be one hand in purging those individuals and eliminating their evil.
We have taken an oath to sacrifice our blood and everything we hold dear for your sake.
Panic-stricken, Nuri asked the fisherman to turn the boat around. He couldn’t risk walking through the streets; he was a wanted man. Unsure of where to go next, he remembered that his neighbour on the riverfront, Thamina, was the daughter of Abdul Hadi Chalabi, his friend and ally. He told the fisherman to row towards her house.
Late for Tea at the Deer Palace: The Lost Dreams of My Iraqi Family Page 29