Yet, the US Led UN sanctions left Iraq with very little means to even feed its own population. And now, Iraq is one of the poorest spots on earth. Almost every day new problems and statistics pour from everywhere to tell one horrifying fact. Even with the sanctions lifted, Iraq's problems will not find an easy resolution any time soon. The Iraqi Press in London recently reported that at least 30 percent of Iraqi children had to drop out of schools to work in streets jobs to provide some income for their families.
Homelessness is now of one of the countries greatest challenges.
These numbers and statistics come to life once you walk in the streets of Baghdad and once you wander in its impoverished markets. Statistics regarding homelessness can never draw the same picture that the groups of begging Iraqi children can draw. On Haifa Street, I witnessed a nearly 20-member gang of Iraqi children between the ages of 5 and 10 approach a foreign journalist. A child asked for money to buy food. He pointed at his mouth and belly as a sign of hunger.