Ash Shatrah

Al-Shatrah (also known as Shatrat al-Muntafiq) is a town in southern Iraq, located north of Nasiriyah. It is the administrative capital of the al-Shatrah District, a part of the Dhi Qar Governorate. Al-Shatrah is situated along the Gharraf Canal at the intersection with Highway 7. It lies 22.35 km (13.9 mi) west of the ancient city of Lagash. In 2009, it had a population estimated 254,000.

==History== Al-Shatrah was founded in 1872 in the late Ottoman Iraq period, and was part of the Basra Vilayet. Not long afterward, the town established a strong trading relationship with Baghdad and became a hub of the grain trade in southern Iraq. Shatrah became the most important town along the Gharraf Canal and gained the nickname "Little Baghdad". It served as the administrative center of a qadaa (subdistrict) of the same name, which was part of the Muntafiq Sanjak of the Basra Vilayet. The town's original official name was "Shatrat al-Muntafiq", but it was simplified by local residents to "al-Shatrah" to distinguish it from the nearby town of Qal'at Salih, which was officially known as "Shatrat al-Amarah" by the Ottoman authorities.