Some time after 9pm, a crowd of about 100 demonstrators descended on a school that had been taken over by about 100 American soldiers four days earlier.
The ostensible reason for the march, which was unusually late in the evening, was to demand that the troops depart because the people wanted the school to reopen. But there were also wild rumours going around that the Americans had been peering into their homes � and at their women � with night-vision goggles.
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The American claim that there were 25 guns in the crowd would also indicate that the demonstrators had had a death wish or were stupid. Iraqis have learnt in the past few weeks that if they fail to stop their cars quickly enough at an American-manned checkpoint, they may well be shot.
To walk, at night, up to a US army outpost brandishing guns and chanting anti-American slogans would have been an act of madness.
But these facts � all of which point to a frightened, panicked and trigger-happy force that opened fire because it did not feel its base was safe � matter less than the larger political implications of the event.
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The occupiers of Iraq are running into trouble. Last week, six Iraqis were shot dead in Mosul by US troops. Every such incident deepens the bedrock of Iraqi public sympathy for armed resistance against the troops.Leaving the scene of this mayhem yesterday, one person's words were unforgettable. They came, not from a protester or a gunman, but from the headmaster of the school where this bloodshed happened. Many of his students were among the protesters...
Phil Reeves 30 April 2003 Independent UK
