Lure of Babylon is powerful draw
Iraq, U.N. undertake project to restore city, transform it into
center for cultural tourism.
Jeffrey Gettleman / New York Times
April 27, 2006
BABYLON, Iraq -- In this ancient city, it is hard to tell what are
ruins and what is just ruined.
Crumbling brick buildings, some 2,500 years old, look like smashed
sand castles at the beach. Famous sites, like the Tower of Babel
and the Hanging Gardens, are swallowed up by river reeds. Signs of
military occupation are everywhere, including trenches, bullet
casings, shiny coils of razor wire and blast walls stamped, "This
side Scud protection."
Babylon, the mud-brick city with the million-dollar name, has paid
the price of war. It has been ransacked, looted, torn up, paved
over, neglected and roughly occupied. Archaeologists said American
soldiers even used soil thick with priceless artifacts to stuff
sandbags.
But Iraqi leaders and U.N. officials are not giving up. They are
working assiduously to restore Babylon and turn it into a cultural
center and possibly even an Iraqi theme park. No one is saying this
is going to happen any time soon, but what makes the project even
conceivable is that the area around Babylon is one of the safest in
Iraq -- a beacon of civilization, once again, in a land of
chaos.
Ancient Babylon, celebrated as a fount of law, writing and urban
living, sits just outside the modern-day city of Hilla, about 60
miles south of Baghdad.
Hilla is neither haunted by Sunni insurgents nor overwhelmed by
Shiite militias, and though it has a mix of Shiites and Sunnis, it
has not been afflicted by the sectarian violence that has paralyzed
so many other parts of Iraq. Factories are churning, Iraqi security
forces are patrolling and the streets pulsate with life -- children
bounding to school, crowds wading into markets, taxis gliding
by.
Emad Lafta al-Bayati, Hilla's mayor, has big plans for Babylon. "I
want restaurants, gift shops, long parking lots," he said. God
willing, he added, maybe even a Holiday Inn.
The U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is
pumping millions of dollars into protecting and restoring Babylon
and a handful of other ancient ruins in Iraq. UNESCO has even
printed up a snazzy brochure, with Babylon listed as the premier
destination, to hand out to wealthy donors.
"Cultural tourism could become Iraq's second-biggest industry,
after oil," said Philippe Delanghe, a U.N. official helping with
the project. But before Iraq becomes the next Egypt, he said wryly,
"a few little things have to happen."
One of those, of course, is better security. The American military
still maintains bases near Babylon, but next month, in a sign of
how relatively stable the area has become, most troops will pull
out and head north to Baghdad, where they are needed more.
Many Iraqis said it was about time. Occupying forces have been
blamed for much of Babylon's recent demise.
Donny George, head of Iraq's board of antiquities, said Polish
troops dug trenches through an ancient temple and American
contractors paved over ruins to make a helicopter landing
pad.
"How are we supposed to get rid of the helipad now?" George asked.
"With jackhammers? Can you imagine taking a jackhammer to the
remains of one of the most important cities in the history of
mankind? I mean, come on, this is Babylon."
Babylon. Its name has had a magical ring since Hammurabi, the
Babylonian king who ruled from 1792 to 1750 B.C. and is credited
with handing down one of the first sets of codified law.
After Hammurabi, the city flourished again under King
Nebuchadnezzar II, who ruled from around 605 to 562 B.C. and is
best known for the hanging gardens he supposedly built for his
wife.
