More Spoils of War

Some people collect the spoils of war and some are spoiled (ruined) by it.

Back home in Iraq, Umm Hiba's daughter was a devout schoolgirl, modest in her dress and serious about her studies. The 16-year-old Hiba wore the hijab, or Islamic head scarf, and rose early each day to say the dawn prayer before classes.

But that was before militias began threatening their Baghdad neighborhood and Umm Hiba, whose honorific means "mother of Hiba," and her daughter fled to Syria last spring. There were no jobs, and Umm Hiba's elderly father developed complications related to his diabetes.

Desperate, Umm Hiba followed the advice of an Iraqi acquaintance and brought her young daughter to work at a nightclub along a highway known for prostitution.

"We Iraqis used to be a proud people," Umm Hiba said over the frantic blare of the club's speakers. She pointed out her daughter, dancing among about two dozen other girls on the stage, wearing a pink silk dress with spaghetti straps, her frail shoulders bathed in colored light. As Umm Hiba watched, a middle-aged man climbed onto the platform and began to dance jerkily, arms flailing, among the girls.

"During the war we lost everything," said Umm Hiba. "We even lost our honor."

This just makes me ill ...