Thousands of residents have fled Fallujah

"I cannot find my friends anywhere, I'm feeling like I'm the only child in my town, alone, with my parents and God," Muhammad al-Rabya, a seven-year-old in the city of Fallujah, 60 km from Baghdad, told IRIN. Muhammad is just one of the children from a minority of families who have stayed in Fallujah after news of an imminent US troop offensive reached them. On Monday it was reported that thousands of US troops had positioned themselves on the outskirts of the city as Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi gave the go ahead for a major attack to flush out insurgents. Out of a population of 290,000 people the city is now home to around 30,000, Fadhel Youssef, a spokesman for the local governorate, told IRIN. Most of those left are men who have sent women and children to places of safety. "Families fled day and night as a way of saving their lives to escape from what is being considered the biggest disaster Iraq will see in the next few days," Youssef added, before he set off to leave the city. Families in the town told IRIN they had no food or clean water and did not have time to store enough to hold out through the impending battle. The city is deserted, shops are closed and there are no people on the streets. The main city hospital was reportedly hit by a US air strike on Sunday morning and 10 houses were damaged, media reports said. Medical officials said that they didn't have any choice but to treat the injured in their homes or in the poorly equipped emergency room prepared at the main Hadra'a mosque. Doctor Rafa'ah al-Iyssaue, director of the main hospital in Fallujah had already been complaining for some time that they were short of medicine. They have now appealed for antibiotics, surgical items and intravenous drugs needed for post-operative care, he said. He also said that the government had not sent any kind of support to the hospital and US troops had prevented the entrance of aid sent by the Islamic Relief NGO from reaching the hospital. "What they want is to make us beg for their help. I don't think we are going to do that, all we can do is wait for NGOs to deliver aid that can guarantee a minimum of safety for those who are going to be injured," al-Iyssaue added. Al-Iyssaue said there had been nearly 20 deaths and 43 injured people in smaller strikes over the past two weeks. He added that the approach of the winter season was already causing a deterioration in the health of thousands of people. Intensive dysentery and children’s diseases have also been on the rise at a time when there is a shortage of medicine. Those left in the city have taken refuge in the local mosque, abandoned schools, open camps and the local chicken farm, in unhygienic conditions. In one of these schools, each room hosts more than three families but people are now thinking of leaving the building after a recent air strike targeted buildings nearby. Salah Mustafa, 10, chased chickens on the farm where they have taken temporary refuge as his mother washed crockery and pans in dirty water. "I just want to survive and protect my son, but I don't have anywhere to go," mother Fadia Sinan, told IRIN. The al-Habanya area on the outskirts of Fallujah is now home to nearly 2,000 families, a number that has doubled in the last few weeks with some 250 tents erected. A spokeswoman for Iraqi Red Crescent Society (IRCS), Ferdous Al-Abadi, told IRIN that they have been delivering water and food to the area and that more supplies would arrive in the next few days. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) told IRIN that they haven't been given authorisation to deliver supplies to the city and that the US have blocked delivery. But they have been informed that the refugees around the town are in need of water, food and medicine. Lt-Col T.V. Johnson spokesman for the US marines, told IRIN that for security reasons the delivery of those supplies should be delayed for a few days until they have taken control of the situation in the city. But Iraqis believe that it won’t be such an easy task. Fallujah has been a centre of anti-US activity since last year's war to oust Saddam Hussein. US officials in Fallujah say the city has become the base of the Jordanian-born militant Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi, who has assumed responsibility for car bombings, kidnappings and murders in Iraq. The Iraqi government and the Coalition forces regard control of Fallujah as critical to the restoration of security but insurgents from the town claim the opposite. "Not even Allawi has the power to stop what have been started," an insurgent who calls himself of Abu-Mustafa told IRIN. For thousands of ordinary people, this latest offensive is now just another sign of growing insecurity. "I will pray day and night for God's blessing for those who can flee in time," Rana Abdul, 34, a civilian who has already fled the city, told IRIN in floods of tears.