A Catholic priest and school teacher in a monastery in Baghdad, Anastas Al-Karmali (1866–1947) became the first librarian of the Al Salam library.

Bell devoted some of her time and energy to the management committee and to fund-raising for the Library, but it struggled financially and in 1923 discussions about transferring it to the government commenced.

[citation needed] In the early 1950s, the Baghdad Public Library was situated on Imam al-Adham Street at the north-west corner of the present day Bab al-Mu’azzam Square, where the North Gate of the old walled city used to stand.

[citation needed] Although archival collections had accumulated over the centuries, there appears to have been no organisation responsible for them in recent times until action was taken by the University of Baghdad, following a study carried out by an ad hoc committee in 1963.

[4] "In April of 2003, the National Library and Archives (Dar al-Kutub wa al-Watha’Iq), which was located directly across from the Ministry of Defense, had been burned and looted".

He noted that three days before the invasion, library staff were told to destroy all archival material related to the Ba'athist rule.

[5] Eskander also reported that the destruction was performed by “a mix of poor people looking for a quick profit, along with regime loyalists intent on destroying evidence of atrocities”.

[6] The United States Army as the occupying power had a responsibility for the burning, theft and destruction of Iraq cultural legacy including the National Library and Archive.

The Hague regulations (Article 2, Fourth Geneva Convention, 1949) state that as an occupying force the USA should have taken measure to ensure that "cultural property must be respected".

[11] "According to Eskander, Saddam loyalists burned the entirety of the Republican Archive, which contained the records of the Ba'athist regime between the years 1958 and 1979.

[14] Despite the fact that five staff members have been killed, along with the library closing for days at a time due to heavy fighting, Eskander says he sees the institution as "an important source of uniting and unifying the country."

"[15] Almost five years later, in 2012, Eskander reflected again on the critical importance of cultural institutions, and stated "Primary, intermediate, and high school libraries have not been functioning throughout the course of the war.

Unfortunately, no importance is attached to the role that the library can play in an emerging young democracy, or in a country where its social fabric is disintegrating rapidly.