Arak distillery promotes ambitious new brand in defiance of alcohol ban
A small home distiller wants to revive the long tradition of alcohol production in the Iraqi town of Bashiqa, which was once a center of multiculturalism and revered for its booze.
Distiller Amer ad-Doumali launched “Arak Bashiqa” in September, a new brand of the Levant's traditional anise drink whose recipe is centered on dates. It was a bold move in conservative Iraq, where a yet-unenforced 2016 law banned the production and trade of alcohol.
Doumali’s new brand is the product of his home distillery in the town of Bahzani in Iraq’s northern Ninaveh province. The town is very close to Bashiqa, once known as the booze capital of Iraq.
The distillery is the first to be inaugurated since the Islamic State was expelled from the province in 2017.
But Doumali said that production at the distillery “has never been interrupted,” even at the risk of death under IS. “The work secretly continued, although upon the rare demand of trustworthy people. Then we decided to go ahead with commercial production in September,” he told Al-Monitor.
