Young Muslim saviour helps two elderly Iraqi Christians start a new life

10 May 2007
Reuters AlertNet, UK
Source: UNHCR
By Abeer Etefa in Cairo, Egypt

Reuters and AlertNet are not responsible for the content of this article or for any external internet sites. The views expressed are the author's alone.

In the article below it says: "What can I say? Where in the world can you find someone who will host you for five months, feed you, take care of you and worry about you?," Rose asked, tears rolling down her cheeks. "I am indebted to this man, whom I consider a son now, and his wife and their 20-month-old daughter."
[...]
For her part, Amal can take heart from her good deed, but it might not be quite enough. "I will truly miss them, I got so used to having them at home," she said. "I hope that the next phase of their life will bring them peace and serenity. No one deserves to go through the trauma that they went through at this age."
[...]
The older sister, whose ancestors came from Armenia, said her family were targeted by militias in Baghdad because they were Christians and from a minority group. "My [teenage] grandson sustained serious injuries on his way from school one afternoon [last December] after escaping from the militias who were trying to kidnap him. That night we made a decision to leave," Rose said."

How can you tell devout Muslims from the ones who profess terror? Answer, by their actions. Religion has always been hijacked by people of ill intentions. The blame is not on the religion. Find the bad guys and stop them. While Ottoman Turks massacred the Armenians during the genocide of 1915, many devout muslims including Arab bedouins, saved Armenians. It is the memory of those muslims that we should hold high as representatives of their religion and in the same breath condemn those Ottoman administrators that used religion to incite the massacres.

CAIRO, Egypt, May 10 (UNHCR) – Two Iraqi Christians were beginning a new life in the Netherlands on Thursday, eternally grateful to the young Egyptian woman who took them in more than five months ago after finding the two old ladies alone and bewildered at Cairo International Airport.

The women, Rose*, 78, and her 76-year-old sister Georgette*, flew out of Cairo International Airport on Wednesday for a reunion in Amsterdam with the older woman's daughter, perhaps their only living relative. The siblings fear that Rose's son, who put them on a plane for Egypt at the end of December, has been killed in the Iraqi cauldron along with his family.

Seeing them off was Amal*, the devout 23-year-old Muslim who had been dropping off relatives at the airport on New Year's Eve when she spotted the distressed women and offered them shelter, help and friendship.

While the Iraqi women were looking forward to a reunion with their relative, they were also distraught at leaving behind the young Muslim woman and her Saudi husband, Mohamed,* who had done so much for them, including putting the women in touch with UNHCR to help find a lasting solution.

"What can I say? Where in the world can you find someone who will host you for five months, feed you, take care of you and worry about you?," Rose asked, tears rolling down her cheeks. "I am indebted to this man, whom I consider a son now, and his wife and their 20-month-old daughter."

She was also crying for her son and his family. "All we want from life now is to see my daughter and to hear news about my son. We want to rest in peace," Rose stressed.

Rose and Georgette's journey has its roots in the fighting and sectarianism that has gained pace in Iraq since 2004 and uprooted millions of Iraqis. Some 1.9 million Iraqis are displaced inside the country and up to 2 million others have fled abroad, mainly to neighbouring Syria and Jordan.

The older sister, whose ancestors came from Armenia, said her family were targeted by militias in Baghdad because they were Christians and from a minority group. "My [teenage] grandson sustained serious injuries on his way from school one afternoon [last December] after escaping from the militias who were trying to kidnap him. That night we made a decision to leave," Rose said.

"We sold all of our furniture and belongings and took the US$250 that we were able to collect and headed to the airport the next morning," she noted. Her son Ragheb,* his wife and their children were unable to board the plane because they did not possess the correct documents, but Rose's boy gave his elderly relatives the money and said he would try to get a visa and join them later.

"He asked me to use the money for one or two week's rent and said that we should call him as soon as we had an address," Rose said, adding that when they arrived in Cairo they had no money left because they had to spend it on excess baggage charges. They felt depressed and lost.

This was when fate entered in the form of Amal, who always wears the niqab veil that covers the face leaving only small slits for the eyes. "While I was about to leave the airport, I saw two elderly ladies crying and in a state of panic," she recalled. The young woman went up to the women and when she found out about their predicament, Amal invited Rose and Georgette to her house.

The Egyptian thought Rose's son would soon turn up in Cairo, but he never did and she could not reach him on his mobile phone number. "One day passed and another day and then a week and I started to feel worried about the two elderly sisters and about the son, whose fate up till this moment is unknown," said Amal.

Amal was able to contact Rose's daughter, who had been living in Amsterdam for many years. She also contacted UNHCR after a cousin told her about its work in resettling refugees. "The moment I reached UNHCR, I felt that a heavy weight had been taken off my chest. Someone else besides me was thinking of a long-term solution for these two elderly ladies."

UNHCR staff registered the sisters and referred their case to the Dutch embassy for resettlement in the Netherlands. "The two ladies did not have any long-term support in Egypt and were a classic case of vulnerability," said Muriel Jurmie, a UNHCR resettlement officer, who thanked Amal and her husband Mohamed.

Rose and Georgette now have the opportunity to live out their twilight years in peace and comfort, but there will always be uncertainty and sadness so long as the relatives left behind in Baghdad remain missing.

For her part, Amal can take heart from her good deed, but it might not be quite enough. "I will truly miss them, I got so used to having them at home," she said. "I hope that the next phase of their life will bring them peace and serenity. No one deserves to go through the trauma that they went through at this age."

* Names changed for protection reasons

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Iraq insurgents kill at least 17

27/03/07
France 24
AFP News brief

two elderly Armenian women who had lived in Kirkuk for years were shot dead when gunmen broke into their house early Tuesday in the restive northern oil capital, said police Captain Imad Jassim.

One of the women was aged 80 and the other in her 60s

Gun and mortar attacks killed at least 17 Iraqis on Tuesday, including women and children, as insurgent attacks homed in on the war-torn capital, security officials said.

Two mortar rounds slammed into the capital's Abu Chir neighbourhood, part of the southern militant stronghold of Dura where Iraqi and US forces have been concentrated under a massive new security crackdown, officials said.

Two children, a man and a woman were killed from separate families, while another 14 people, again women and children included, were ferried to hospital with injuries from the attack, the sources said.

A roadside bomb attack killed an Iraqi policeman in southeast Baghdad, while another police officer was killed in a gun attack in the heart of the capital.

A local soldier was killed by an insurgent sniper in central Baghdad and four civilians were hospitalised following a mortar attack near the finance ministry, also in the heart of the capital, a security official said.

South of Baghdad, another four people perished in Iskandiriyah when unidentified gunmen opened fire on a Sunni Muslim funeral cortege, said Iraqi army officer Mohammed al-Tahi.

Iskandiriyah, a majority Sunni Arab town, has been rocked by a series of attacks in recent days. The US military announced that five Iraqi civilians were killed and another 11 wounded by mortar attacks in the town on Monday.

Iraqi and American troops also battled insurgents firing guns and a rocket-propelled grenade from a nearby Al-Wasafa mosque on Monday, in a fight that pockmarked the mosque walls with bullet holes and killed one insurgent.

In northern Iraq, two policemen and two civilians were killed in a string of shooting attacks in Mosul, said Major Mohammed Ahmed.

Meanwhile, two elderly Armenian women who had lived in Kirkuk for years were shot dead when gunmen broke into their house early Tuesday in the restive northern oil capital, said police Captain Imad Jassim.

One of the women was aged 80 and the other in her 60s, the officer said.

Mass emigration has seen Iraq's Christian community slump to around 700,000, out of a total population of 27 million.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.

Glendale Armenians reach out to Iraqi Christians

February 25, 2007
LA Times
By Teresa Watanabe, Times Staff Writer

An Armenian church in Glendale is part of an effort to allow more refugees persecuted in part for their faith into the U.S.

They were dressed as police officers, but Iraqi physician Nina Grigor knew something was dreadfully wrong when they threw her into a car, blindfolded her, tied her wrists — and ripped the cross from her neck.

For five days last March, the Iraqi Armenian Christian was held somewhere in Baghdad. When she was finally freed after her family paid $100,000 in ransom, she was immediately spirited away to Armenia for safety and then, in July, to Glendale.

Now she is free — one of a growing number of Iraqi Armenians who have found safety in Southern California amid spiraling sectarian violence in their homeland. Grigor, 26, has received political asylum and is studying for her U.S. medical licensing exam.

Grigor's sleepless nights and frightening dreams have finally stopped. But the widespread kidnappings, killings, rapes and church bombings — atrocities that have become almost routine — continue to terrorize hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Christians left behind, she said.

"I have a safe life here," said Grigor, who asked that an alternative first name be used to protect her and her relatives. "But the other Iraqi Christians need our help."

Now, at last, more of them will get it. After months of mounting violence, the U.S. government recently announced it would accept 7,000 Iraqi refugees by the end of September — a big increase from the few hundred accepted so far since the war began in 2003.

Locally, St. Peter Armenian Church in Glendale kicked off the Lenten season last week with a candlelight service and letter-writing drive urging greater resettlement opportunities for Iraqi Armenian refugees. The letter, which will be sent to elected officials, said Armenians have lived peacefully in Iraq for centuries but that the rise of Islamic fundamentalism since the war began has made them open targets of killings, harassment and discrimination.

The Iraqi Armenian Relief Fund in Glendale is raising money to move families from Iraq to Armenia, where it supports them for one year. But so far the group has only managed to relocate nine families in the last two years, according to vice-president Rafi Ohanes Garabedian. The group is aiming for 15 families this year, he said.

Southern California is home to at least 300,000 Armenians, one-fifth of whom may have ties to Iraq, community leaders say. They estimate that a few hundred Iraqi Armenians have come here since the war began, mostly on tourist or work visas, and may be seeking political asylum or other ways to stay.

Despite those efforts, many people are calling for far greater measures amid what experts say is the largest mass exodus of Iraqis from their homeland in modern history. Earlier this month, Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) called on the United States to pledge at least half of the $60 million requested by the United Nations for Iraqi refugee resettlement. So far, the U.S. has pledged $18 million.

"Our invasion of Iraq led to this crisis, and we have a clear responsibility to do more to ease it," Kennedy said this month on the Senate floor.

The U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants says $250 million is needed for a more comprehensive resettlement effort.

For their part, Iraqi Christians say that a far larger quota for refugees is needed.

The Chaldean Federation of America said Christians make up about 200,000 of the 2 million people who have fled Iraq since the war began. Joseph Kassab, federation executive director, said Iraq's Christian population has dwindled from 1.1 million during Saddam Hussein's regime to 600,000.

Christians are routinely targeted for violence and accused of being American collaborators, Kassab said. But unlike their Arab and Muslim neighbors, Christians lack tribes or militias to protect them, he said.

State Department official Ellen Sauerbrey said the 7,000 quota was not a ceiling but an initial number that could be adjusted annually. She said priority would be given to Iraqis who worked with the U.S. government, are members of persecuted religious or ethnic minorities or are members of other vulnerable groups.

Ultimately, however, U.S. officials want to stabilize Iraq so people who flee can return, Sauerbrey stressed.

However, Kassab said many Christians no longer regard Iraq as their homeland and do not expect to return. For Chaldeans, who trace their roots to the descendants of the ancient inhabitants of Mesopotamia and who predate Muslims by centuries, the forced departure is particularly appalling, he said.

Many Armenians, who represent a far smaller group of Iraqi Christians, voice similar sentiments. Although they have lived in Iraq for centuries, their numbers particularly grew after the Turkish genocide against them in the early 20th century, community members say, and came to total perhaps 60,000. (The government of Turkey disputes that what occurred was genocide.)

Many say they are grateful to the Arabs of Iraq who welcomed and sheltered them. Under Hussein's secular regime, Grigor and others said, most Christians were allowed to work, worship and socialize at Armenian clubs largely without interference as long as they did not challenge the political status quo.

Now, all of that has changed, they say.

Pamela Hartman, an Encino immigration attorney, has won political asylum for a dozen Iraqi Armenian clients. Clients have reported death threats, kidnappings, vandalized homes and letters telling them "Christians, go home," she said.

The uncle of one client, she said, was told by his kidnappers that "they will get all of the Christians out of their neighborhood or kill them because they're friendly with Americans." Another Christian client in a Shiite Muslim neighborhood received a letter demanding that all non-Shiite families leave immediately or face death.

Hartman and some refugee groups argue that Iraqi Christians have a prima facie case for refugee and asylum status. The United Nations, however, does not agree and reviews all claims individually.

For now, many Iraqi Armenians are relying on prayer and political appeals to help their loved ones.

At St. Peter Armenian Church, pungent incense and chanted Armenian prayers filled the sanctuary as more than 250 parishioners gathered last week in support of the refugees.

One of them, Marine Abrahamyan Abdasho, wept as she held a candle in prayer. The Glendale teacher is not of Iraqi descent, but she said the long history of persecution against Armenians compelled her to support all victims of violence.

"Our history as Armenian people has made us able to feel the pain of anyone suffering now," she said.

After the service, parishioners gathered in the reception hall to sign letters of appeal for Iraqi refugee aid and shared story after story of families fleeing atrocities, of being scattered around the world. Nearly 70% of the church's 500-member Sunday congregation are of Iraqi descent, according to Pastor Vazken Movsesian.

Noobar Zadoian, 32, trained as a computer programmer, said he arrived in Glendale two months ago after too many bombings, murders and kidnappings made him lose hope in his country's future. His elderly father remains alone in Jordan, where he had gone in late 2003 to say goodbye to another son who was leaving for the U.S. The father ended up staying in Jordan because the situation in Iraq had begun to deteriorate too badly to risk returning.

Another parishioner said a relative was stoned as he walked down a formerly peaceful neighborhood street because his sister had married an American.

"You guys have to leave; this is not your country anymore," she said he was told.

"Armenians have been caught right in the middle," Movsesian said. "We were a respected class as a Christian minority in Iraq. Now, Armenians are left without homes and nobody wants them."

*

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teresa.watanabe@latimes.com

Times staff writer Nicole Gaouette contributed to this report.

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.