Iraqi Voices From Beirut | Iraq Update

Today’s update gives more details on activities being planned around the 4,000 US soldier death, Nearly 4,000 US Soldier Deaths

Dreams of reaching Europe grind to a halt in Beirut ghetto

Rabi'a, an Iraqi refugee, is cooking in the narrow, filthy corridor that doubles as a makeshift kitchen in his tiny apartment in eastern Beirut. There is a gas burner, a sink, a cupboard and a small plastic bucket overflowing with garbage and potato peelings. At one end of the room a door leads to a reeking toilet. The heavy smell of urine mixes with that of the months-old oil he is pushing round the frying pan.

"I fry the best tomatoes in the world, the most delicious dish," he tells me. "You must have some with us." In Iraq they used to call this dish the "dinner of the sanctions", after the decade-long economic blockade imposed on the country in the 1990s.

Click here to watch the Winter Soldier hearings organized by the Iraq Veterans Against the War.