Mosul: Abir Jassem is busy preparing stuffed vegetables at a kitchen in Iraq’s Mosul, where after years of unrest a women-run catering service has helped single mothers like her achieve financial security.
The 37-year-old, who lost her husband while the city was under the control of the Islamic State (IS) group, said she had to get a job to put food on the table for her and her children.
“If I didn’t work, we wouldn’t have anything to eat,” said Jassem.
She is now one of some 30 employees of “Taste of Mosul,” which celebrates local delicacies and was founded in 2017 after the northern Iraqi metropolis was liberated from IS jihadists.
Most of the workers — cooks as well as two deliverywomen — are widowed or divorced.
Mosul residents are all reeling from the brutal IS rule and the war to defeat it, but for women in Iraq’s largely conservative and patriarchal society, the challenges are often compounded.
For Jassem, whose husband died of hepatitis, the catering business has offered a lifeline.
Her family had refused for her to work in any mixed-gender spaces, “but I wanted to work so I would not have to depend on anybody,” she said.
Now she earns 15,000 dinars ($11) a day cooking meals that are then delivered to clients.
Her speciality is Mosul-style kibbeh, a minced meat dish.
“Neither Syrians nor Lebanese can make” some of the recipes her Iraqi city is known for, Jassem boasted, as other women sat beside her at a large blue table were preparing the day’s menu.
One cook rolled vine leaves. Another copiously stuffed hollowed-out peppers with orange-colored rice, and a third made meat fritters.
Only slightly more than 10 percent of Iraq’s 13 million women of working age are in the job market, according to a July 2022 report issued by the International Labour Organization.
When the war in Mosul ended in the summer of 2017, the United Nations refugee agency UNHCR estimated the number of “war widows” in the thousands.
“Their husbands were often the families’ sole breadwinners,” the UN agency said.
“Without an income and often with children to support, Mosul’s war widows are among the most vulnerable to have been displaced during months of fighting for the once thriving city.”
Mahiya Youssef, 58, started “Taste of Mosul” to allow women to enter the labor market in the battered city.
“We have to be realistic,” she said. “If even people with university degrees are unemployed, I wondered what kind of work” would “let them cover their children’s needs and be strong women.”
Launched with just two cooks, the initiative has since grown and now also provides employment for young graduates, said Youssef, a married mother of five.
Appetisers and main dishes on the menu go for the equivalent of $1-10, and monthly profits top $3,000, according to Youssef, who plans to expand.
She said she hopes to open a restaurant or create similar projects in other parts of Iraq.
Youssef said her passion was “old recipes that restaurants don’t make,” like hindiya, a spicy zucchini stew with kibbeh, or ouroug, fried balls of flour, meat and vegetables.
One of her employees, Makarem Abdel Rahman, lost her husband in 2004 when he was kidnapped by Al-Qaeda militants.
The mother of two, now in her 50s, delivers food in her car, which she said has drawn some criticism.
“My children support me, but certain relatives are opposed” to her working, she said.
But Abdel Rahman hasn’t let that stop her, and said she has found in “Taste of Mosul” a “second home.”
Many clients order again, but some have become particularly loyal.
For more than two years, Taha Ghanem has ordered his lunch from “Taste of Mosul” two or three times a week.
“Because of our work, we are far from home,” said the 28-year-old cafe owner.
“Sometimes we miss our home cooking, but we have this service,” he said, hailing “the unique flavours” of Mosul’s cuisine.
In war-scarred Iraqi city, food business gives women independence
In war-scarred Iraqi city, food business gives women independence
- Only slightly more than 10 percent of Iraq’s 13 million women of working age are in the job market, according to a July 2022 report
- Most of the workers — cooks as well as two deliverywomen — are widowed or divorced
Syrian military tells civilians to evacuate contested area east of Aleppo amid rising tensions
- Syria’s military has announced it will open a “humanitarian corridor” for civilians to evacuate from an area in Aleppo province
- This follows several days of intense clashes between government forces and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces
DAMASCUS: Syria’s military said it would open a corridor Thursday for civilians to evacuate an area of Aleppo province that has seen a military buildup following intense clashes between government and Kurdish-led forces in Aleppo city.
The army’s announcement late Wednesday — which said civilians would be able to evacuate through the “humanitarian corridor” from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thursday — appeared to signal plans for an offensive in the towns of Deir Hafer and Maskana and surrounding areas, about 60 kilometers (40 miles) east of Aleppo city.
The military called on the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces and other armed groups to withdraw to the other side of the the Euphrates River, to the east of the contested zone.
Syrian government troops have already sent troop reinforcements to the area after accusing the SDF of building up its own forces there, which the SDF denied. There have been limited exchanges of fire between the two sides, and the SDF has said that Turkish drones carried out strikes there.
The government has accused the SDF of launching drone strikes in Aleppo city, including one that hit the Aleppo governorate building on Saturday shortly after two Cabinet ministers and a local official held a news conference there.
The tensions in the Deir Hafer area come after several days of intense clashes last week in Aleppo city that ended with the evacuation of Kurdish fighters and government forces taking control of three contested neighborhoods. The fighting killed at least 23 people, wounded dozens more, and displaced tens of thousands.
The fighting broke out as negotiations have stalled between Damascus and the SDF, which controls large swaths of northeast Syria, over an agreement to integrate their forces and for the central government to take control of institutions including border crossings and oil fields in the northeast.
Some of the factions that make up the new Syrian army, which was formed after the fall of former President Bashar Assad in a rebel offensive in December 2024, were previously Turkiye-backed insurgent groups that have a long history of clashing with Kurdish forces.
The SDF for years has been the main US partner in Syria in fighting against the Daesh group, but Turkiye considers the SDF a terrorist organization because of its association with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which has waged a long-running insurgency in Turkiye. A peace process is now underway.
Despite the long-running US support for the SDF, the Trump administration has also developed close ties with the government of interim Syrian President Ahmad Al-Sharaa and has pushed the Kurds to implement the integration deal. Washington has so far avoided publicly taking sides in the clashes in Aleppo.
The SDF in a statement warned of “dangerous repercussions on civilians, infrastructure, and vital facilities” in case of a further escalation and said Damascus bears “full responsibility for this escalation and all ensuing humanitarian and security repercussions in the region.”
Adm. Brad Cooper, commander of US Central Command, said in a statement Tuesday that the US is “closely monitoring” the situation and called for “all parties to exercise maximum restraint, avoid actions that could further escalate tensions, and prioritize the protection of civilians and critical infrastructure.” He called on the parties to “return to the negotiating table in good faith.”
Al-Sharaa blasts the SDF
In a televised interview aired Wednesday, Al-Sharaa praised the “courage of the Kurds” and said he would guarantee their rights and wants them to be part of the Syrian army, but he lashed out at the SDF.
He accused the group of not abiding by an agreement reached last year under which their forces were supposed to withdraw from neighborhoods they controlled in Aleppo city and of forcibly preventing civilians from leaving when the army opened a corridor for them to evacuate amid the recent clashes.
Al-Sharaa claimed that the SDF refused attempts by France and the US to mediate a ceasefire and withdrawal of Kurdish forces during the clashes due to an order from the PKK.
The interview was initially intended to air Tuesday on Shams TV, a broadcaster based in Irbil — the seat of northern Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region — but was canceled for what the station initially said were technical reasons.
Later the station’s manager said that the interview had been spiked out of fear of further inflaming tensions because of the hard line Al-Sharaa took against the SDF.
Syria’s state TV station instead aired clips from the interview on Wednesday. There was no immediate response from the SDF to Al-Sharaa’s comments.
