Saturday, January 21, 2023

Iraq

Sinan Mahmoud (THE NATIONAL) reports:

Iraq’s national football team were given a heroes' welcome upon their return to Baghdad on Friday, a day after winning the Arabian Gulf Cup in the southern city of Basra.

Thousands of Iraqis packed the main streets of the capital, mainly along the motorway linking Baghdad International Airport to the city centre, to greet the Lions of Mesopotamia.

After their plane landed, the team were received on a red carpet as the Iraq National Band for Musical Heritage danced and sang, waving Iraqi flags.







THE NEW ARAB notes:

Following a cruise on Friday afternoon on the Shatt Al-Arab river, where fans from Basra province greeted the players and staff, the Iraqi team headed to Baghdad.

From Baghdad airport to the Grand Festivities Square, the side was welcomed by fans along the side of the road, which extends for around 16 miles (26 kilometres).

Iraq Football Association President Adnan Dirjal and other officials were first to ascend the podium in the square before the players and staff joined them.

In addition, Iraqi foreign ministry spokesperson Ahmed Al-Sahhaf said Minister of Foreign Affairs Fuad Hussein ordered diplomatic passports to be given to the members of the national side in recognition of their win, official news agency INA reported.

The 25th edition of the Arabian Gulf Cup ran from 6 to 19 January 2023. The tournament takes place every other year.


Members of the winning team include: Fahad Talib, Jalal Hassan, Ahmed Basil, Manaf Younis, Zaid Tahseen, Mustafa Nadhim, Ali Faez, Alai Ghasem, Dhurgham Ismail, Hussein Ammar, Hussein Ali, Ibrahim Bavesh, Hassan Abdulkareem, Sherko Karim, Rewan Amin, Amjad Attwan, Amir al_Ammari, Mohammed Ali Abboud, Hussein Jabbar, Moammel Abdul-Ridha, Alaa Abbas, Aymen Hussein and Aso Rostam.

 


In other news, Hadani Ditmars (THE ART NEWSPAPER) reports:

Just in time for Iraq’s football victory at the Arabian Gulf Cup in Basra that drew thousands of fans to the Southern port town, the Basrah Museum has initiated a new project highlighting Iraqi cultural patrimony. Director Qahtan al Abeed has just launched the first part of a planned “Garden of Civilization” project in the courtyard of the museum.

Funded by the local governorate, a copy of the famous Lion of Babylon and the Assyrian Lamassu from the Iraqi Museum in Baghdad have been installed. Subject to further funding, plans are afoot for a copy of the Ziggurat of Ur and Babylon’s Ishtar gate to be installed in the garden.

“There are many Iraqis who can’t afford to visit their own heritage,” says Abeed. “This garden will allow them to ‘travel’ across Iraq and experience their country’s patrimony.”



The Garden of Civilization.  Iraq is the birthplace for many historical moments and innovations.


Suffer not Your neighbor's afflictionSuffer not Your neighbor's paralysisBut extend your hand Extend your handLest you vanish in the city And be but a traceJust a vanished ghost And your legacyAll the things you knew Science, mathematics, thoughtSeverely weakened Like irrigation systemsIn the tired veins forming From the Tigris and EuphratesIn the realm of peace All the world revolvedAll the world revolved Around a perfect circleCity of Baghdad City of scholarsEmpirical humble Center of the worldCity in ashes City of BaghdadCity of Baghdad Abrasive aloof
Oh, in Mesopotamia Aloofness ran deepDeep in the veins of the great riversThat form the base Of EdenAnd the tree The tree of knowledgeHeld up its arms To the skyAll the branches of knowledge All the branches of knowledgeCradling CradlingCivilization In the realm of peaceAll the world revolved Around a perfect circleOh Baghdad Center of the worldCity of ashes With its great mosquesErupting from the mouth of god Rising from the ashes likea speckled bird Splayed against the mosaic skyOh, clouds around We created the zeroBut we mean nothing to you You would believeThat we are just some mystical tale We are just a swollen bellyThat gave birth to Sinbad, Scheherazade We gave birthOh, oh, to the zero The perfect numberWe invented the zero And we mean nothing to youOur children run through the streetsAnd you sent your flames Your shooting starsShock and awe Shock and aweLike some, some Imagined warrior productionTwenty-first century No chivalry involvedNo Bushido
-- "Radio Baghdad," written by Patti Smith and Oliver Ray, first appears on her TRAMPIN'



So many artifacts have been stolen from Iraq.  The country's been plundered over and over and people seem to think that if they made it out of Iraq -- for example, Rukmini Callimachi -- that whatever they took is now their own.  "They're robbing the cradle of civilization," Patti sings in "Radio Baghdad." And that's been true forever. 

Matthew Weaver (GUARDIAN) reports:

The Iraqi-American artist Michael Rakowitz has proposed in a letter to the British Museum that it return one of its ancient Assyrian treasures to Iraq in exchange for the donation of his fourth plinth sculpture to the UK.

Rakowitz’s contemporary interpretation of an Assyrian winged bull, known as a lamassu, decorated in tins of date syrup, appeared on the plinth in Trafalgar Square from 2018 to 2020.

He has tentatively agreed to gift the sculpture to Tate Modern on the basis that it shares custody with Iraq. But, as part of the deal, he said that the British Museum should return one of its two Assyrian lamassu sculptures, which were discovered in Nineveh by the Victorian archaeologist Sir Austen Henry Layard.

Rakowitz said returning one of these treasures would help replace a 700BC lamassu, which had stood at the Nergal Gate in Nineveh. It was left in place by Layard but deliberately destroyed by Islamic State fighters in a raid on Mosul Museum in 2015. Rakowitz’s proposal is expected to be on the agenda of a visit to London next month by Iraq’s new minister of culture, Ahmed Fakkak, when he is expected to be given a tour of the British Museum.


RUETIR notes:

In 1938, the German archaeologist Wilhelm Kรถnig found a clay jar at Khujut Rabu, just outside the Iraqi city of Baghdad. The jar was covered with an asphalt plug and is believed to be around 2,000 years old.

But the curious thing about the whole thing and what amazes the world is what they found inside: an iron bar inside a copper cylinder. This made some wonder: could it be an old battery?

Kรถnig was the first to suggest that the vessel was used as a battery, 18 centuries before the first real battery was invented. Although the idea was certainly somewhat impossible, the jar would actually work as a battery.

After World War II, engineer Willard Gray took a replica of the Baghdad Battery, he filled it with grape juice and was capable of producing between 1.5 and 2 volts of electricity. In other words, in ancient Iraq they were capable of producing electricity, more than a thousand years ahead of other countries.


While there is debate over what the discovery noted above was used for,  ARAB AMERICA explains Iraq is responsible for inventing the wheel, the world's first written code of law, the written word, boats to transport, maps, the concept of time, math and much more.  Iraq has given and given and the world has taken and taken.  



The following sites updated:



Posted by at