Iraq the tourist destination?

Amir Taheri:

THE way Barack Obama talks of Iraq, you'd think the whole county is a sea of fire and blood, created by the United States. So he might be surprised to learn that tour operators in Europe and the Middle East are touting this "sea of fire and blood" as a new holiday destination.

One program just put on the market by Terre Entiere, a leading French tour operator, offers a "Christmas Pilgrimage" in December to Iraq's biblical sites, some of which date back more than 2,000 years.

Another program starts in January. Called "Forgotten History," it includes visits to some of the most ancient sites of human civilization in Iraq, the ancient Mesopotamia.

"Frankly, we were surprised by the positive echoes we had as soon as we launched our program," says Pierre Simon, a spokesman for the French company marketing the Iraqi holidays. "People from many European countries, not just France, are showing interest. They want to go and see for themselves."

That Iraq should be a tourist destination is no surprise. Mesopotamia, or the Land of the Two Rivers, is universally recognized as the birthplace of civilization.

It was there that the first cities appeared and the first governments took shape. Sumer and Akkad invented the first forms of writing, the first bureaucracies and the first organized religious doctrines. In its heyday, Babylon, with its "hanging gardens," was the world's largest metropolis.

The first ever book, the Epic of Gilgamesh, was written in Mesopotamia some 3,000 years ago.

The area also holds the location of many biblical stories. Abraham - the common father of Judaism, Christianity and Islam - is said to have been born in Ur, near the present-day city of Nasseriah. It was also there that Jacob first saw Rachel at the well and fell for her.

Iraq has an even greater wealth of relicts from Persian, Macedonian and Islamic empires. Ctesiphon, near present-day Baghdad, was capital of the Seleucid and Sassanid empires for almost 400 years. Baghdad, of course, was the capital of the Abbasid caliphs and, for two centuries, the world's largest city.

And, for those who look for rare natural sites, Iraq offers a unique ecological treasure in the marshlands of its southeast.

...

I think with some development Iraq could develop a Garden of Eden theme park that would be a big attraction since it was originally between the two rivers. Iraq has already had a large migration of tourist from Iran. Imagine the cultural impact on the Iranians to see how prosperous Iraq is in comparison to their hell hole of a country. Seeing westerners should also enlighten them and rebut the nonsense they hear from the religious bigots in charge of Iran.

technorati tags:
political news | news | world news
More at: News 2 Cromley