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Outlook: My forbidden love for a US soldier

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Close up of Iraqi Mortada Gzar who smiles at the camera. He wears a cap

19/05/2021 GMT

My forbidden love for a US soldier

BBC World Service - Outlook, My forbidden love for a US soldier

What happens when an Iraqi student and a soldier from the invading US army fall in love?

Mortada Gzar was a pious Iraqi student, Morise an American soldier from the invading forces. To admit they were gay could be fatal. But what can you do when you fall in love?

Mortada Gzar experienced violence and persecution as a gay teenager under Saddam Hussein's regime. He tells Jo Fidgen how he tried to immerse himself in religion to overcome his feelings, later serving as an imam while studying at university in Baghdad. But during the US-led occupation of Iraq in 2003, he fell deeply in love with an American soldier who was stationed at a checkpoint outside his university. The two men spent years hiding their relationship, and dreamed of one day living openly together in the US. But things didn't go according to plan...

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Picture: Mortada Gzar
Credit: Jonathan Reibsome

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