Baghdadis headed to the barbershop are going more often to the Shiite neighbourhood of Sadr City than mixed neighbourhoods where they could be shot by Sunni radicals who charge that clean shaven men want to look like US soldiers.
"I have customers coming from far away" said Ali Habin, who was happy to see his barbershop packed with customers.
"Young men are coming from remote neighbourhoods like Shaab and Ur where there have been attacks targeting barbershops."
Northwestern Sadr City is solidly Shiite and even Sunni insurgents don't dare venture there.
All Muslim clerics, including Shiite spiritual leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, say that shaving goes against Islamic law, but there have been no attacks in Shiite areas.
According to Dubai-based Al-Arabiya television, Arabs spend 110 million dollars a year at the barbershop and own 697 million razors of all kinds.
"Recently, there has been an increase in the number of attacks against barbershops, to the extent that it has become a daily occurrence and we have to look for safer places" said Ammar Qassem, 20, who was halfway through a shave.
"In one day, four barbers were killed and others decided to close shop to avoid the same fate," said Qassem, who lives in the nearby Ashaab neighbourhood.
In the shop that measures a minuscule eight square meters (86 square feet), six other waiting clients nod in approval and the barber did not hesitate to lay the blame at the feet of Salafists, or Sunni religious hardliners.
"Those who carry out the attacks belong to Ansar al-Sunna or Wahhabi groups that are very active in the neighbourhoods of Al-Jazair, Ashaab and Hay al-Ur," he charged.
The Al-Qaeda-linked Army of Ansar al-Sunna is one of a number of insurgent groups reported to have taken part in talks with US representatives last month, although Internet statements posted in its name have denied it.
The strict Wahhabi version of Sunni Islam is the official religion of neighbouring Saudi Arabia and provides inspiration for some of the militants fighting the Iraqi government and its US backers.
Such is the terror in Baghdad that it is now common to see signs that say: "We apologize for not shaving beards or removing facial hair".
"I put this sign up after one of my friends in the same street was threatened. I've decided to quit shaving beards or removing facial hair to save my life, as well as those of my customers. I only cut hair, said Muhannad Ali Sahib, who owns a barbershop in the western Baghdad neighbourhood of Zaiyunah.
Other barbers have turned their homes into underground barbershops.
According to an interior ministry official, at least 20 barbers have been assassinated in areas like Shaab, Bayaa, Saidiyah and Baghdad al-Jadeeda over the past two months.
"Late Monday, I was still working on three kids who had come with their father, I heard gunshots and felt the footsteps of men who entered my friend's shop and then left a short time later" said Muzafar Mohammed, a barber whose shop was damaged by an explosion that struck next door.
"I went out to see what happened and found my neighbour lying on the ground and still breathing, but with his body riddled by bullets and glass shards," he said, visibly still affected by the sight.
Mohammed's shop is one of a number on the main street of Baghdad al-Jadeeda, including that of his murdered neighbour Abdel Rahman Saddam.
"Just as I was calling for help, there was a big explosion and I understood that they had left a bomb behind," he said.
"If I decide to open my shop again I will be more careful, carry a gun, take only people I trust and shut down before it gets dark."
According to the interior ministry, the attack killed two customers as well as Saddam.
"My father was about to close the shop when a policeman came in asking to have his and his son's hair cut" said Mohammed Abdul Rahman, 10, who lost his father in the attack.
"They sprayed my father with bullets, then set fire to the shop," he said, staring mournfully at what was left of his father's shop.
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