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From people living (at least for now) in the middle east:

• M.L. Lyke, a Seattle Post-Intelligence reporter embedded on board an aircraft carrier.

  I just saw a T-shirt design that showed a crater where Baghdad used to be, with the logo "Hooters, Baghdad.. Coming real soon." But I've also had conversations with officers and sailors who question the need for this war, the timing of it.

  
  
• Live from Kuwait, "A day-by-day account from the sidelines."

  My brother and I were out in the car this around 11 am when we heard the All-Clear siren... which means, you guessed it, we didn't hear the real one!! Apparently there were 3 loud explosions very close to the city (which we also didn't hear in the car!). It turned out that 3 missiles were fired at us from Iraq but landed the other side of the bay.

  
  
• Living in Egypt, "A Canadian resident of Egypt since the 80's comments on both life here and the outside's view of life."

  I've seen many, many situations here in Egypt when foreigners were either intimidated by locals simply because they couldn't understand the questions that they were being asked in Arabic...things like "Where are you from? or How old is your child? or Are you enjoying your time here? or What are you doing?" Not speaking the language is a serious disability that leads to anxiety and the assumption, often wrong, that someone means them ill.

  
  
• L.T. Smash, "a reserve officer in the United States Military," stationed somewhere near Iraq.

  Then it hit me – Umm Qasr is a border town. For these men, it holds memories of a different time, a time before war, when they could travel freely to Iraq, and do all the things not allowed in their own country.
  
  Umm Qasr is their Tijuana.