Iraqi chronicles Baghdad under attack on Web

Salam, who writes in English, is the only resident of Iraq known to be filing accounts of the war directly to the Web. He has spoken against the invasion but clearly has no great love for Iraq’s Baathist leaders.

‘‘Freaks. Hurling abuse at the world is the only thing left for them to do,’’ he said last week. But he does not like seeing his city bombed either. ‘‘The only thing I could think of was ‘Why does this have to happen to Baghdad’. As a building I really love went up in an explosion, I was close to tears,’’ he wrote on Saturday.

Salam and his family have been out on reconnaissance missions to inspect the damage and they report the bombing has been accurate but dangerous to civilians.

‘‘Today before noon I went out with my cousin to take a look at the city. Two things. 1) The attacks are precise. 2) They are attacking targets which are too close to civilian areas in Baghdad,’’ he wrote on Sunday.

‘‘My cousin came and told me he saw police cars standing by one and setting it on fire. Now you can see the columns of smoke all over the city,’’ he wrote.

Salam reports that the streets of Baghdad are busy but few shops are open. Vegetable prices shot up in the first days of the war but by Sunday they had fallen back to normal.

Initially, Salam gave the impression of resignation but his tone changed on Sunday when Iraqi resistance surfaced and casualties rose.

‘‘If Um Qasar (the Port of Umm Qasr in the South) is so difficult to control what will happen when they get to Baghdad? It will turn uglier and this is very worrying,’’ he wrote.

‘‘There are no waving masses of people welcoming the Americans nor are they surrendering by the thousands. People are sitting in their homes hoping that a bomb doesn’t fall on them.’’ (Reuters)