Dancing in the No-fly Zone: A Woman's Journey Through Iraq (Paperback)

by Hadani Ditmars (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
There is a place where a non-profit agency arranges for homeless people to live in an abandoned swimming pool, where a 12-year-old diabetic boy works in a shoe factory to buy insulin, where a woman who was once an engineer now defends her property with a Kalashnikov, and where a musician continues playing Beethoven's Sonata in G-minor while missile strikes light up the night. Canadian journalist Ditmars toured these and other lesser-known quotidian realms of post-invasion Iraq in 2003, and in this book shuttles back and forth between her pre-and post-invasion reporting trips to create a portrait of a land that is now more dangerous than ever, especially for Iraqi women. Ditmars does not flinch in the face of irony, nor is she shy about her politics and anti-American perspective as she presents a persuasive and sympathetic case for her point of view, but the book would be richer if these stories were better balanced and anchored to a deeper historical-political context. A reader who is already familiar with the complexities of contemporary Iraq will reap the greatest benefit. Nonetheless, the world Ditmars reveals to general readers is both fascinating and heart wrenching, adding often overlooked human stories to the war in Iraq. Photos.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Iraqi teenagers have never known a time without war; the present conflict is the third war the country has been subjected to in 20 years. Furthermore, a report to the United Nations reveals the bitter truth: children were better off under the rule of Saddam Hussein, and one-fourth of Iraqi children under age five are now chronically malnourished. As Canadian journalist Ditmars relates her experiences in Iraq then and in 2003, she reminds us of the consequences of years of sanctions and now of war. On an almost regular basis, parents are forced to sell precious art and family heirlooms to buy medicine for their children, some women are forced to prostitute themselves in order to feed their families, and others are abducted and never heard from again. It seems that women, like children, actually fared better under Saddam. Although artists still create and musicians still perform, these are desperate times for the Iraqi people, and Ditmars portrays their plight with great sensitivity and respect. Pamela Crossland
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Paperback: 263 pages
• Publisher: Olive Branch Press (September 30, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566566347
• ISBN-13: 978-1566566346
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #828,505 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Tell me and tell me the truth, April 10, 2006

By	ndib (Montana) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Dancing in the No-Fly Zone: A Woman's Journey Through Iraq (Paperback)

"Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last, but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature - that baby beating its breast with its fist, for instance - and to found that edifice on its unavenged tears, would you consent to be the architect on those conditions? Tell me, and tell the truth?"
- Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Brothers Karamazov

Early in Dancing in the No Fly zone, Hidani Ditmars cites Madeleine Albright's famous reply when asked about UNICEF's estimate that 500,000 children died during the sanctions on Iraq: "I think it is worth the price." Dancing in the No fly Zone provides a chilling look at exactly what that price is.

Ditmars visits Iraq in 2003 and reports on life in the streets of Iraq, strewn with garbage and washed by raw sewerage. She tells her story through visits with Iraqis: business men, artists, press handlers, and mothers. And she tells it without apology.

She is at her best when telling the stories of mothers trying to hold her families together, alientated husbands and starving children.

As one Iraqi says near the end of the book, Iraq has gone steadily down hill since Saddam came to power in 1968. She does niether glorifies nor demonizes. She simply tells us how Iraqi people fared under sanctions, and she lets Iraqi ambibvalence about the American overthrow of Saddam and our subsequent occupation of Iraq speak for itself. Above all she toasts the spirit of the people she clearly loves.

We hear on the news about the utter lawlessness in Iraq, about the lack of medicine, the lack of electricity and clean water. No matter what one thinks of our intent in removing Saddam, one must admit that we have not delivered on our promise to the Iraqi people. I never really knew what life under sanctions were like. Children suffered, maybe fewer than 500,000 but certainly more than 1. Does it really matter who is most responsible for their suffering?

As to the previous reviewer, Michael Rubin is mouthpiece-for-hire, a consultant to the infamous Pentagon propagandists the Lincoln Group. His is an Iraq of 3.5 million cell phones, political debate, and Internet cafes in dusty hamlets. Ditmars Iraq is an Iraq of a long-suffering people who when asked to choose between the past and the present choose the future.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars unique, November 7, 2006

By	Farrah Karapetian - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

there aren't any other books on iraq like this, nor are there any other books like this on war or women... hadani ditmars has written a complicated account of her experience in a country whose culture she appreciates. she writes in a way that does not "other" the iraqis or emphasize the foreign nature of their being, but rather describes their situation in terms that are flatly human and contemporary. the book is both serious and fun, written with an almost conversational voice. she manages to communicate facts of the iraqi predicament that include both the everyday and the bureaucratic, oscillating in tone between ironic detachment and real grief.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is about the real people of Iraq., September 21, 2006

By	Reynold Orchard (Portland, OR USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This is a fine book. Ditmars took me on a tour of her experiences as a Canadian journalist, culling on 7 years of assignments in Iraq. With the exception of the front page of today's Oregonian, "Life and Death in Baghdad", I have seen nothing else in my reading of the news, and my favorite magazines, that comes close to showing how the everyday life of Iraqis is affected by the occupation, and previous sanctions. Everywhere else I see journalists dealing in abstractions, without a shred of cultural understanding and true compassion. With courage and aplomb,the author is able to use a variety of connections and disguises to connect with artists, musicians, intellectuals, laborers, prison keepers, health care givers, a suspected undercover agent, and even a "king in waiting". She is sensitive also to the women and children of Iraq, in these very trying times. We need more good books and reports about life on the ground in that distressed country.