Najaf's underground haven of Iraqi history and fond memories

0 Comments | AFP, February, 2008

NAJAF, Iraq (AFP) — Whenever Saadiyah Ahmed is overcome by the torrid heat of Iraq's Najaf desert in the summer or when she is chilled by the glacial nights in winter, she disappears underground.

The family cellar, one of thousands of elaborate excavations beneath the Shiite shrine city in central Iraq, holds fond memories for 60-year-old Ahmed.

"It was a place to play when we were children, as well as a living room," she recalls. "My grandmother and mother used to arrange the cellar while I would help clean it."

But the labyrinth of tunnels beneath Najaf's old city have been used for far more than simply an escape from the harshness of the climate.

Faced with Wahhabite invaders, British guns, Saddam Hussein's forces or US helicopters, residents of...