Themes & quotes:

A theme throughout Riverbends writing is females rights, because of the war Iraqis woman's rights have been stripped away and now have little to live for. Women are forced to wear hijabs, cover up, have bodygaurds, drop out of school etc...

1. "Females can no longer leave their homes alone. Each time I go out, E. and either a father or uncle or cousin has to accompany me. it feels like we've gone back 50 years ever since the beginning of the occupation. A woman or girl  out alone risks anything from insults to abduction" pg 16.

2. "Over a month ago, a prominent electrical engineer names Henna Aziz was assassinated in front of her family- two daughters and her husband. She was threatened by some fundamentalists from  Badir's Army and told to stay at home because she was a woman, she shouldn't be in charge." pg 24.

3. "His eyes stayed glued at A.'s face as he told him that females weren't welcome right now- especially females who "couldn't be protected. He finally turned to me and told me, in so many words, to go home because "they" refused to be responsible for what might happen to me." pg 24.

4. "She claimed she knew nothing about any extremist belonging to Al Sadar and Al Hakim coming into schools during the exams, pulling "safirat" (girls without hijab) out of tests and threatening that they wouldn't be allowed to come back to school anymore if they didn't wear their hijab." pg 66.

5. "the worst part of the whole show was when they showed a mortician in Baghdad claiming he hardly ever saw any rape victims! ...women are too ashamed to make rape public, and why bother when you just *know* the person will never be caught when no one is going to bother to look for the aggressor?" pg "68.

6. Referring to Akila who is a member of the council and was shot and sent to the hospital "Its also depressing because of what it signifies that no female is safe, no matter how high up she is..." pg 75.

7.  "Ever since the occupation there have been 400 females abducted in Baghdad alone and that is only the number of recorded abductions. Most families don't go to the Americans to tell about an abduction because they know its useless." pg 37.

welcome

"Bush was wrong when he said "you are either with us or against us." The world isnt black or white there are plenty of people who were against this war but also against Saddam."

"all faces look the same when they are witnessing the death of loved ones."