It’s in the Kurdish areas.
You can actually go there without being shot or kidnapped.
Not all of Iraq is a freak show, only the 2/3rds that are Suni and Shia areas.
Sadly, the Kurds get the short end of the stick.
We are their big brother and life line to a large degree. But may it be Iran, the Turks, Syria or Iraq, no one wants a free Kurdistan which would be carved out of their country.
We are in the precarious situation of having to balance the interests of the Kurds (our ally) with the interests of the Turks (our ally).
You can actually go there without being shot or kidnapped.
I remember going to Erbil from Baghdad in ‘06 with a couple of our engineers to see about a compound being built for some police liaison personnel. (CPATT stuff.)
I was very surprised to find that we could walk around town with no body armor on and dine at local restaurants.
It was like being on a vacation.
A good Ex-British friend of mine from volunteering in the IDF went to Sulaymaniyah where he drank beers with the head of the largest Kurdish political party who tried hard to set him up with a beautiful Kurdish girl.