Embedded in a cocon

At 3am at night a hundred Iraqi and American special forces attack the house in Tal Afar, a city in the north of Iraq not far from Mosul. Its pitch dark, no streetlights, no moon. I borrowed a night vision binocular from one of the soldiers. I need it to find my way and I need it to shot pictures through it. It looks graphic.

The forces are looking for a man they suspect to produce carbombs and IED's (improvised explosive devices). I am embedded with the special forces, it feels like being in a cocoon. My only contact with ordinary Iraqi's is that night. Children cry, women scream, I feel uncomfortable, I am being seen as part of the enemy. The man is arrested and taken, he will probably won't come home for a long time.
February 2011

Kadir van Lohuizen