The gunmen appear to be loyal to their individual mosques and they are in no mood yet to take on the

The gunmen appear to be loyal to their individual mosques and they are in no mood, yet, to take on the Americans. “We have security now in our area and we must have rebuilding and our people must have work,” Sheikh Aref says. “The Americans say they came to free us and we are happy for that. But when will we have electricity back and water for our people? If the Americans want to help us, who don’t they restore these things? America is a very powerful country and they can do what they want.”Sheikh Aref and his fellow imams are prepared to share the US desire to see the Arab “volunteers” expelled from Iraq “America says it wants to fight terrorism – so do we. But do they really want to liberate us and free us? Well, the future will tell.”The slums of Sadr City are oral libraries of pain and torture. Just ask any man where Saddam’s main underground torture centre was and he will tell you it was the complex at Baladiat or the Istiqbal centre beside Aqadmia.Outside the Baladiat compound – it contained six entire residential blocks for its secret policemen and their families – two men plead for information A brother and a father were taken there 20 years ago. Are they still there now?Alas, only the Americans are now inside, complete with a spokesman who recites lectures on the connections between Saddam Hussein and “Palestinian terrorism”.He says he has found a photograph of Abu Abbas – the leader of the so-called Palestine Liberation Front, which handed out cash to all Palestinians killed by Israeli troops – shaking hands with an Iraqi Republican Guard officer and a Palestinian flag coloured red, white, black and green And this was the American’s proof “Terrorism is terrorism,” he announced.

But weren’t the Palestinians fighting an occupation army? “I wouldn’t look to discuss that,” he replied.But the whole point is that the Shias of Sadr City support the Palestinians in their struggle against Israel, and while no one vouchsafes support for Iran – Sheikh Aref was educated in Baghdad and in the holy city of Najaf – most listen to the Arabic service of Iranian radio and realise how close Iran came to victory in its 1980-88 war against Iraq.For the moment, however, Sadr City smiles at the West. “We want this democracy that you speak of,” Sheikh Aref says. “Our definition of democracy? To give a person all the freedoms in all ways, on condition these are according to moral values.”Another religious man – not an imam but an electrical management worker – interrupts “When you British came here, we had to make you go. Now the Americans have come, but we don’t want them to stay here.”
More from Robert Fisk. Iraq’s scavengers have thieved and destroyed what they have been allowed to loot and burn by the Americans – and a two-hour drive around Baghdad shows clearly what the US intends to protect. After days of arson and pillage, here’s a short but revealing scorecard. US troops have sat back and allowed mobs to wreck and then burn the Ministry of Planning, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Irrigation, the Ministry of Trade, the Ministry of Industry, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Information.

They did nothing to prevent looters from destroying priceless treasures of Iraq’s history in the Baghdad Archaeological Museum and in the museum in the northern city of Mosul, or from looting three hospitals. And which ministries proved to be so important for the Americans? Why, the Ministry of Interior, of course – with its vast wealth of intelligence information on Iraq – and the Ministry of Oil. The archives and files of Iraq’s most valuable asset – its oilfields and, even more important, its massive reserves – are safe and sound, sealed off from the mobs and looters, and safe to be shared, as Washington almost certainly intends, with American oil companies.It casts an interesting reflection on America’s supposed war aims. Anxious to “liberate” Iraq, it allows its people to destroy the infrastructure of government as well as the private property of Saddam’s henchmen. Americans insist that the oil ministry is a vital part of Iraq’s inheritance, that the oilfields are to be held in trust “for the Iraqi people”. But is the Ministry of Trade – relit yesterday by an enterprising arsonist – not vital to the future of Iraq? Are the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Irrigation – still burning fiercely – not of critical importance to the next government? The Americans could spare 2,000 soldiers to protect the Kirkuk oilfields but couldn’t even invest 200 to protect the Mosul museum from attack. US engineers were confidently predicting that the Kirkuk oilfield will be capable of pumping again “within weeks”.There was much talk of a “new posture” from the Americans yesterday.

Armoured and infantry patrols suddenly appeared on the middle-class streets of the capital, ordering young men hauling fridges, furniture and television sets to deposit their loot on the pavement if they could not prove ownership It was pitiful. After billions of dollars of government buildings, computers and archives have been destroyed, the Americans are stopping teens driving mule-drawn carts loaded with second-hand chairs
More from Robert Fisk. It is not so much bad news that stock markets fear, but uncertainty. At least bad news can be measured, its impact assessed and adjustments made. Uncertainty is just that: what should one do? When this uneasy state of mind persists in the financial community, it leads to a steady erosion of share prices and a liking for safe assets such as cash, or government securities – or gold, still seen as the ultimate store of value in times of crisis. Would a war break out in Iraq? Would it be short or long? What would happen to the price of oil in various scenarios? And even without a Middle East crisis, how serious were the troubles of the leading economies? Would Germany follow Japan into deflation?On Christmas Eve I sold all my investments and put the proceeds on deposit.