Traditional Songs Acquire Nationalist Flavour

The ceremony began in the traditional fashion for Um Ahmed al-Duriya, a 66-year-old mula, or singer, who specialises in performing for women gathered to commemorate births, deaths, weddings and other occasions.

While her two white-clad assistants beat time on drums, Um Ahmed started to sing songs of praise for the Prophet Muhammed.

But she soon put a new twist on the old tradition - she called upon the Prophet and venerated Iraqi imams like Abu Hanifa and Abdel Qader al-Gailany to witness what is happening today.

"The voice of Fallujah and Ramadi calls, and Adhamiya asks where are the holy masters?" she said, referring to centres of resistance against foreign forces in Iraq.

Um Ahmed's audience, a gathering of mostly upper-class Sunni women who'd come to mourn the wife of a senior judge, wept with emotion.

Since the US-led invasion of Iraq, and particularly the April siege of Fallujah, formerly traditional religious songs associated with Sufi mysticism have adopted a nationalist flavour.

In the time of Saddam Hussein, such songs were apolitical as singing about politics could often get one into trouble with the regime.

But today those songs call on resistance fighters to use mortars and rockets against the Americans.

"God is Great. The airplanes fly over Iraq. Strike these harbingers of evil!" Um Ahmed sang.

"The events of Fallujah affected all Iraqis. To sing about Fallujah and its tragedies evoked sadness in the mourners' hearts," Um Ahmed explained after the ceremony.

"Previously we sang only religious chants, known as the dhikr. They talked about the Prophet Muhammad and the noble imams. Today we sing songs of religious devotion along with patriotic folk songs," she said.

"I do not mean to be provocative, but I feel oppressed and angry because of the occupation," she said. "My revolutionary love for Iraq goads me to rebel against this situation."

Um Ahmed's audience has no qualms in agreeing with that view.

"I love these songs. We sing them on happy and sad occasions," said Hala Mahmoud, 21, a student in the collage of administration and management at Baghdad University who has attended many of the ceremonies.

"I remember when I was in one of the ceremonies, and the mullah started chanting about the resistance and the inhabitants of Fallujah, and their strong weapons which bring down the American fighters, and about wounded Baghdad, under occupation," Mahmoud said.

"The cries and weeping of the women grew louder, and when she finished her singing, the women started cursing the Americans and praying against them, wishing they'd leave the country, because they destroyed [it] and separated lovers and families."

Zainab Naji is an IWPR trainee in Baghdad.