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Friday, August 13

A game is won, but the war continues

PATRAS, Greece -- The soccer team from Iraq had just scored the go-ahead goal, and in section 108, they were bouncing up and down to celebrate.

``I must call my brother,'' said Muhammad Bilal, reaching for his cell phone. ``He is watching in Iraq.''

Back home, the killing goes on. The bodies stack up. The blood still runs deep -- U.S. Marines were in a heavy assault against insurgents in Najaf this very day -- and nobody sees peace soon. But Thursday night was for soccer.

In a 2,500-year-old town on the shore of Patraikos Gulf, Iraq spoke to the world with a game. These were the Olympics. And Iraq was not only here, but beating Portugal 4-2. A victory that meant as much to the winners as any medal will mean to anyone over the next 17 days.

``Now everybody in Iraq forgets their problems,'' coach Adnan Hamad said. ``Everybody in Iraq stayed up tonight to watch.

``We try to make happiness for our people. That is very, very important for all our players.''

His players are young men caught in the middle of a maelstrom. They had only two pre-Olympic practices back home because of the war, and several players didn't get to those. Some used bodyguards to make it. They needed protection from the Australian Air Force to leave Baghdad for the Olympics, and now live a dream while their families try to survive among the bullets and bombs and shells. They are not here in a vacuum. They know more people died Thursday in Iraq.

``No one is happy now in Iraq,'' Hamad said. ``Everyone is afraid. You are afraid when you are in the street, you are afraid when your children walk to school.''

And yet they did not play alone Thursday night. The fans came by the thousands, wearing Iraqi shirts, draped in Iraqi flags, flying Iraqi signs from their cars driving down the coastal highway.

Pampeloponnisiako Stadium is 130 miles west of Athens, huddled between the sea and the Panachaikon Mountains, in a city founded by a Spartan. It was only a third full for this qualifying game.

But of the 5,689 customers, 80 percent were Iraqi fans, nearly all of them men. They never sat down. They never stopped cheering, screaming, dancing. Sensing the moment for what it was. A time of celebration for a nation being blown apart.

``For 20 years we have nothing but war,'' said Yousif Goreegees of Mosul. ``No food, no nothing. But look at us tonight. Look at my country tonight.''

One of the fans became so overcome in the first half, he raced onto the field to hug goalie Nour Sabri. Sabri hugged him back, before the security guards came to take the fan away.

``It is mixed feelings,'' Tamimi Zaki was saying. ``People are dying, and here we are watching this. But we must continue life. It must be better tomorrow.''

Zaki is from Baghdad, but now lives in Sweden, a 34-year-old dabbling in computers. He does not have a lot of money. But nothing would keep him home.

``I would do anything,'' he said, ``to be here to see my country.''

The past misery and future hope of Iraq is carried by its soccer team. It was Saddam Hussein's son Uday who once ruled Iraq's sports teams with fear and torture, and it was the soccer players who most often felt his wrath and endured his pain. Uday's iron maiden and its spikes are now part of infamy.

The war has freed them of that. But not from misery. Not from death. Americans kill Iraqis. Iraqis kill Americans. Iraqis kill Iraqis. But Thursday night, for two hours, the anguish stopped, at least for a little while.

``You see Kurds here, Shiites, Sunnis, Muslims and Christians,''  Zaki said. ``There are no differences. We are unified.''

When it ended Thursday, they threw sodas can and potato chips in the air. They chanted long into the night.

``Iraq! Iraq! With our blood and soul, Iraq!''

The players waved and left. Back home, Iraqis turned off their televisions and went to bed, some of them destined to hear gunfire in the night.

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