Death threats usually come over the phone, but Abu Tayba's opponents have been unable to reach him. The driver of the "Tok Talk" vehicle lost his phone a few days ago, after being shot, while trying to pull a seriously injured man out of the tension zone. So he received a warning, and a threat under his door, saying he would be killed if he continued.

And in that Abu Tayba (34 years) says: "Let them go ahead and try."

This driver is part of the most strange group in the mass protests that rocked Baghdad and other large Iraqi cities during the recent period. He is a "tuk tuk" driver, among the thousands of slums in Baghdad, transporting people across the capital on his three-wheeled vehicle.

At least, this is what they did until October, when hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets, first in Baghdad, then in dozens of other cities. Everyone is angry at the greed of their leaders, and they protest against having to live in a corrupt country, where the government earns billions of dollars of its oil exports, while the masses live in poverty.

There are "Tok Tok" drivers in the squares, parks, and bridges occupied by the protesters, and they bring the injured from the front lines to the field hospitals in the back, then they return with water and concrete blocks to the barriers.

Stand without fear

The vehicles are fast and small, suitable for maneuvering in narrow streets. Sometimes, tuk-tuk drivers intervene to evacuate the wounded and injured in record time, amid extreme caution before the security forces begin shooting at the crowds. Almost two weeks ago, the Iraqi Parliamentary Commission for Human Rights said that 319 people had been killed since the protests began in October, but there were no official figures. Meanwhile, doctors say, the Ministry of Health has ordered government hospitals to refrain from providing information. But almost every day a number of protesters lose their lives in Baghdad, Karbala, Basra or Nasiriyah. But people do not give up.

In a sense, the "tuk tuk", which was imported from India and first appeared in the streets of Iraq, about four or five years ago, symbolizes the slow decline of Iraq to the status of a developing country, where only the rich can ride an air-conditioned car; while the Ordinary people ride a "tuk tuk". Now, this modest car has turned from a taxi of the poor to the symbol "Knights of the Revolution"; the phrase that was written on the walls in Tahrir Square, accompanied by a picture of a winged "tuk tuk". Even the newspaper that is published by those who occupied the scene is called "tuk tuk".

Over the course of a few weeks, in an area of ​​a few square kilometers, the demonstrators managed to create something that the Iraqi government has failed to establish in the country in recent years: a highly organized community in which various committees responsible for the different needs of citizens, such as electricity, drinking water, food, and toilets, participate. Ropes supervisors use ramps to create pathways to evacuate the wounded, while in a deserted high area - where snipers were expelled in late October - there are residences, a library, and a mosque.

Spearhead

If the "tuk tuk" are the automatic units of the Iraqi October Revolution, as activists call it, then Abu Tiba is the spearhead. The entirety of his car, except for the passenger seat, is covered with sheet metal brought from a scrap dealer. Instead of windshield, which was shattered by snipers, he made a screen made of wire mesh and the back of a refrigerator, ideal for repelling tear gas cylinders. Abu Tiba was working every night, and was moving forward toward the darkness due to the clashes, which can only be seen through a green flash of laser pointers used by the demonstrators. Abu Taiba is not surprised that he has become the target of death threats. He has spent years fighting in militias controlled by Iran. These units known as the “Popular Mobilization Units” were formed in 2014, in response to the widespread panic caused by the expansion of ISIS. But their situation was a problem from the beginning; even when they were receiving salaries and recognition by the Iraqi state, they were under the control of Tehran. It is precisely the members of these disguised militias, who do not wear the slogans of identification, who are spreading death and terror in the ranks of the demonstrators by shooting protesters. That is why Abu Taibah decided to change his position and position, saying: "enough of them are overflowing."

Even after weeks of protest, the government has nothing to offer protesters other than insults and violence. Soon after the movement began, the resigned Prime Minister, Adel Abdul Mahdi, closed the internet across the country; then he claimed that the security forces had not opened fire on the demonstrators, despite the presence of more than 100 bodies proving otherwise. Finally, the government promised to refrain from using "deadly weapons." Since then, security forces have released 40-mm tear gas cartridges, which are much larger than regular cartridges. According to eyewitnesses, security forces tend to target the protesters' heads and chest, rather than firing cartridges in the air.

There are horrific videos circulating with injured people. They show what happens when someone is hit in the head, from close range by metal cartridges, as tear gas can be seen coming out of the scalp. According to figures compiled by several doctors working in hospitals in the city, 31 people were killed in less than two weeks by tear gas.

Brake the barriers

The state will always have an advantage when it comes to how much force it can use against demonstrators. But without their knowledge, Iraqi leaders are on their way to losing a different battle, over the meaning of symbols. People are arrested just because they hold the Iraqi flag. Even the resigning prime minister's claim that young protesters were reenacting the popular online video game "The Land of Famous Battles" was used for ridicule and turned against the government. And some demonstrators began wearing their clothes as game characters, as they wandered around in clouds of tear gas, in Baghdad, wearing special clothes, as they crossed them from a fantasy world to reality.

And because there are those who are interested in defending their authority and their billions of revenues, the senior politicians gathered two weeks ago, alongside one of the most important clerics, to meet with the maker of the king of Iraqi governments: Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and the leader of the militias in Iraq. He wanted to make sure everyone still complied with his plans, that is, to end the protests in any way.

Violent resistance

During the meeting, former Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, who was sacked last year, made clear his opposition to this approach. The main question, however, is whether the brutal crackdown strategy will actually succeed. Or whether it will turn the protests into a violent resistance movement.

Abu Al-Taibeh, the brave "Tok Tok" driver, believes there is little chance of a reasonable solution. In spite of this, the most urgent question, at the present time, seems different, which is how to pay the hospital bill for his two-year-old daughter, in addition to the accumulated debt, saying: “I have not yet paid the last three installments of the Tok Tok, And estimated at about 75 thousand dinars », equivalent to 630 dollars.

• 40 millimeters, caliber tear gas cartridges, released by the security forces.

The "Tok Tok", which first appeared on the streets of Iraq about 5 years ago, symbolizes the slow decline of Iraq to the status of a developing country.

Possible stalking

Iraqi protesters say that ambulances either did not have access to the victims in crowded streets, or were targets of snipers. That is why the "tuk tuk" vehicles, whose owners earn a living by transporting passengers, filled the ambulance vacuum, and took to the streets to transport the victims.

As the protesters flee amid tear gas fire, drivers of "tuk tuk" vehicles enter the heart of the place, while bullets are ringing nearby. One of the owners of these cars said the vehicles transport the wounded and help the protesters. He added that the forces fire on the protesters, and that the vehicles transport them to hospitals.

The three-wheeled "tuk tuk" carriages make their way among the protesters, while the bullets are heard in the air, and black smoke rises on the horizon. It is an emergency rescue tool, during an uprising that turned Iraqi streets into a battleground. Most owners of these carriages have cars that are less than 25 years old, and this means of passenger transport is their only daily source of income.

But that did not prevent them from volunteering to transport the injured during the protests, according to one of them saying: “We do not charge any wages for what we do in the demonstrations, and we mobilize all our efforts and energies to transport the wounded and suffocated, and we also deliver food to the trapped, and demonstrators tried to collect donations of money for us, But we refused. ”

He continued: «We are 500 volunteers with (tuk-tuk), or more, we participate periodically in providing support and assistance, when the demonstrators are exposed to intense gas and live bullets. "There is a prosecution from the security authorities, because of our position." Since the protests began, the Abdul Mahdi government has adopted several reform packages in multiple sectors, but it has not satisfied the protesters, who insist on changing the political class.

• "Tok Tok" is an emergency rescue means during an uprising that turned the Iraqi streets into a battleground.

Tuk-tuk trolleys enter the heart of the place to transport the injured. Archive

Newspaper against blackout

The front cover of a newspaper published by protesters in Baghdad displays pictures of protesters waving flags, challenging the crackdown launched by the authorities during weeks of deadly unrest that rocked the country after two years of relative calm after the defeat of ISIS. The newspaper bears the name "tuk tuk" and has become a symbol of the protests in Iraq, as it transferred injured protesters to temporary medical tents.

The newspaper "Tok Talk" started as an attempt to circumvent the media blackout, by the authorities who closed the internet for weeks in a row, and this newspaper crystallizes the demands of the protests that invaded Baghdad and southern Iraq. The activists with a background in spreading news online are behind the project. They write articles, edit the newspaper, print it at local print shops, and distribute about 2,000 copies to protest camps in Baghdad several times a week.

"It is one of the few ways in which street protesters can obtain real and reliable reports from the protests taking place in the country," said editor Ahmed al-Sheikh Majid, who was sitting in a cafe in Baghdad displaying articles on his laptop.

The newspaper features articles written by local activists, and translations of international media reports on Iraq. The demonstrators are distributing copies of the "Tok Tok" in Tahrir Square, the main protest camp in the capital. "It's great, because it publishes accurate news," says one of the protesters, reading a copy of the newspaper: "We don't know exactly where to write or print, and this is probably the best for the editors, to avoid arrest."

The paper newspaper came in response to the cutoff of the Internet service. Archive