Mutanabbi Street slowly re-emerges, 20 years on from Iraq war

A statue of Abu al-Tayyib al-Mutanabbi stands on the banks of the Tigris, gesturing towards the water to people walking down the street named after him [Abdulrahman Zeyad/Al Jazeera]

Baghdad, Iraq – Haj Mohammed al-Khashali has outlived four sons and one grandson, killed together when a car bomb tore through Mutanabbi Street in 2007.

Sixteen years later, and 20 years after the United States-led invasion of his country, 89-year-old Haj Mohammed is still serving tea in the Shabandar coffee house, on the corner of the historic street he first encountered as a child running along it towards the Tigris River.