Words from Palestine

Kaamil is an elegant presence at the al funduk fanar, the Al Fanar Hotel. His tall lean frame is covered with a saaya arabeeya, the traditional Arab robe of the Iraqi men. Its fit is tailored, always freshly pressed, buttoned from neck to floor. Kaamil’s white head cap, the taaquiyeh, worn by many Muslims, is a symbol of his sense of humility before God.

Kaamil sells tea in a small alcove of the al Fanar. The alcove’s décor is common for an Arab tea house: chairs placed close together to accommodate conversation and small tables to hold little glasses of hot sweet tea. The dim lighting, rich colors and melodious sounds invite refreshment and friendship.

I was not surprised to learn that Kaamil was an internationally acclaimed Iraqi Folk dancer. His every movement is filled with the grace of a dancer. He maneuvers through the small alcove balancing trays of steaming tea as though the work of selling tea were itself a dance. As he places our glasses of tea before us, he quietly repeats his daily query: “What is the news-is it war?”

It hurts us to answer him with a response that brings more concern to his already sad, fearful eyes. And indeed, Kaamil has reason for concern. The Iraqi folk dance for which he was famous is now a dance of tea service because his leg was irreparably injured in the fallout of an American bomb during the Persian Gulf War. His knowledge of the cost of war is personal, and his fear of another bombing campaign is evident in his eyes when he asks, “What is the news?”

Last evening, when honesty triumphed over the human need to speak comforting words to such a gentle being and we confessed that the news was very bad, this beautiful man shared his favorite passage of the Qu’ran with us. In it, Allah speaks to his human creation, saying he created all people to be as one. Then, says Allah, he separated them into various nations, cultures, tribes and religions, so that they could learn to get along with one another in diversity.

Kaamil is a beautiful man. He has a wife and three children under the age of sixteen. Kaamil and his family will be, whether intended or not, a target of any bombing campaign on Baghdad.

Several words come to mind when I think about Kaamil. Kaamil was an extremely dignified man, and he was a sad man. Rarely did the sadness completely leave his eyes. He was special to all of us on the Iraq Peace Team. Several days before the bombing began, Kaamil said that he wanted to flee the country, but needed money. I tried to discourage him from the idea- he had a passport but his children did not, and it would be impossible to procure ones for them at this late date. Then there were exit visas to be gotten, which often took just as long or longer. Getting to any border would be dangerous and costlyat this time, and making it to a bordering country was no guarantee that an entrance visa would be granted. Chances of entry were diminished if the family in question was poor.

Kaamil and his family remained in Baghdad. During the bombing some of us slept in his tea room because it felt safer to us than our rooms upstairs or the makeshift bomb shelter of the hotel’s basement. He remained at home during the first week or so of the bombing. I and others were very happy when he was able to return to the hotel. He came in every morning and remained until late in the evening. Then he would return to his family, a 45 minute trip under the best of circumstances- when buses were running and taxi’s could be hailed. These were not the best of circumstances, and there were nights that he did not get home until it was almost time to come back to work. Now, with the streets as dangerous as they are, I worry for this gentle man for whom the violence of past wars had left such deep scars of sadness in his eyes.

Hello everyone. I am just writing up a plea off the top of my head that I would like you to send out to your email lists if you are comfortable to do so. If you can get in some papers as a letter to editor, that would be great, though I understand that may be difficult. Edit the political part as needed for such purposes. Since time is critical, I am cc’ing this to Chicago myself. Maureen, please send this to my friend in Florida (I don’t recall the email address), and Lauren, Greg, Mike, and Elizabeth, please send to your friends back home. I will do my best to get you some more human interest stories in the next few days and please let me know whatever else I can do to assist you.

As the Bush administration becomes more vocal in their pursuit of an unjust invasion of Iraq, it becomes absolutely critical that we continue to stress the possibility of avoiding this war. As long as there are voices opposing war, there is some hope for the innocent people of Iraq. Those of you who know me know that I am not a gifted speaker, nor does my presence speak strength or command attention. That most difficult part of this witness is on you. I have the easy part- spending time with the beautiful, gracious open-hearted people of Iraq and sharing my impressions of this experience with all of you so that your cry for peace can be embodied with the faces of Iraqi people.

As you know, for all practical purposes, Mr. Bush made a declaration of war in his State of the Union Address. Because he is unable to make a case for his war through WMD rhetoric, he is stepping up rhetoric designed to manipulate fear into the hearts of our fellow Americans. He has used the tragedy of September 11 to invade Afghanistan, silence free speech, imprison the innocent and justify racism. He is now using this tragedy to justify an invasion of Iraq by attempting to manufacture a link between Iraq and Al Queda, a link which has consistently been disproved by intelligence agencies in the United States and abroad. I am outraged my government would attempt to manipulate my brothers and sisters of America, and vehemently renounce this ploy. However, my outraged is eclipsed by the overwhelming sadness I feel when I consider the innocent lives which will be lost if the United States invades Iraq.

And so I implore you to raise your voices in opposition to this war. Be firm and steadfast while remembering that many people who support this war do so out of fear. They need to be assured that peace affords the greatest safety to all. Appeal to the hearts of family, friends and strangers with the images of Iraqi people. Insist at every opportunity that there is a peaceful solution to this situation. Demand that your government representatives demand a peaceful solution is pursued. Be a thorn in the side of local press until they give voice to our cry for justice. Be prepared to answer US propaganda with facts.

Please, please do not place this plea in your to-do box. Do not think this is an issue which can be dealt with sometime in the near future. The future of the people of Iraqi- men, women, elders, children, is in grave jeopardy. I have tied my own fate to the fate of the Iraqi people, and I beseech you to give voice to our cry for justice and peace so that we might live.

In most of the journal entries included in this book, I edited out the personal notes to friends back in the states. The above journal is unedited. The paragraph to my friends indicates the sense of urgency I felt after hearing the State of Union Address.

Myself and another IPT’er, Mary, were bent over laptops writing our letters home after watching the State of the Union address. We had been up all night and had heard war declared on the nation we were living in to witness for peace. Our emotions were raw, to say the least. We wrote for some time, sometimes crying as we wrote. Then, as we usually would have someone proofread our journals before sending them back to the states, we traded spaces and Mary read my mine (above) and I read hers. It was short and to the point. It read
“Dear Family and Friends,
We are fucked.”

Yesterday there was a long line to get on a computer at the internet center so I went to the little store nearby to buy a soda. The women who runs the store was eating her lunch and she insisted I join her. I wasn’t hungry and indicated so, but it seemed inconceivable to her that someone would turn down food, whether hungry or not, and so I sat down to share her lunch of rice and beans. (She fed me-a stranger- with her spoon!). She asked me if I had been to the Amaryah Shelter and then she told me her story. She is one of the 14 survivors of the shelter. She was 8 or 9 years old and was in the shelter with her mother, father, sister, brother and some aunts and cousins. They were all killed. She said her mother was sleeping and holding her baby brother. She said they were “burned black, like this” and she pointed to her black dress. She has scars all over her body from imbedded shrapnel. She said she remembers being taken to the hospital and asking again and again for her oom and baba (roughly equivalent to mommy and daddy). They finally told her they were all dead. She went on to say that the government (here, and she named the president) gave her a house and money, but she said she really couldn’t understand that, because what she needed was her mommy and daddy and sister and brother and aunts and cousins. She said when so many Americans started coming to Iraq she didn’t trust them at all. She didn’t understand why they were coming here. She didn’t know what the English word “peace” meant until our conversation. But they would indicate to her that they wanted to be friends of the people in Iraq. Gradually she came to accept their presence, and if her welcoming of my presence is any indication, she sees the Americans who come here as friends. But she sure doesn’t like Bush!

I visited with this kind and generous woman a number of times before the bombing began and she stopped coming to work. She spoke enough English for us to communicate pretty well, and we taught one another some of our respective languages. When I came into her shop, she would insist I eat or drink something, and she would prepare some type of language lesson for me to complete. She would interrupt my lesson to ask me how to say something in English. Several times she asked me to spend a Friday with her. She had the day planned out-“You will come home with me on Thursday night and we will eat and then we can visit some of my friends. On Friday morning we will go to prayer at the Mosque then we will go to the soog (central market) and you can teach me how to say everything in English. Then I will make “good” food-home-cooked. And then we can visit some of my friends and I will give you some Arabic lessons. OK?”

Unfortunately, I never got the opportunity to take her up in her offer. She did open her shop for a day or two into the bombing. She told me the bombings frightened her very badly. She would make a gesture with her hand to imitate a bomb falling through the sky, then she would cover her head with her arms and cower down, saying “not good, not good.” She did not return to her shop after the 3rd day of bombing. I do not know what became of her.

Because of the bombing of the Amaryah Shelter, most Iraqi’s will not go to a bomb shelter. I never met a single Iraqi who was willing to go to one of the country’s shelters.

Yesterday some of us visited Mother Teresa’s home for disabled children and as I sat on the floor rocking one child and playing with another, the knowledge that these innocent lives are in such grave jeopardy overwhelmed me. These children, most under the age of 5, are severely handicapped. Most are not ambulatory, cannot dress or feed themselves, and so are wholly dependent on the four Sisters of Charity here to care for all their needs. They have no voice in the matters which threaten their existence- they are the silent victims the decimation of the social structures which once protected the vulnerable of Iraq. They cannot demand the US sponsored sanctions be lifted so that they can receive the medical treatment which is their inherent right. They cannot even plead to the world for an assurance they will not be victims of bombing which seems so inevitable these days.

The families I have visited remain silent on the topic of war. They do not want to frighten their children or cause themselves despair so they bury their fears and put one foot in front of another in an attempt to create an illusion of normalcy.

In the heart of ‘old Baghdad’, a hundred or so people meet every Friday night to sing, play and listen to “Maqaam”, the traditional Iraqi folk music. The building which houses the gathering appears to have once been a church. A small stage is the focal point for the long wooden benches that fill the majority of the large building. The cost for this evening of entertainment is 100 Iraqi Dinar, or not quite 2 pennies in U.S. currency. As the room fills up with guests, a gentleman makes his way through the crowd with a large tray filled with small glasses of hot tea.

Maqaam is an ancient form of Arabic music. A basic form identifies maqaam as a particular type of music, but regional variations are many. The tunes are played out on instruments unfamiliar to this westerner- something like a guitar or bango, something like a xylophone, etc.… The Arabic lyrics are improvised by the singers; it is my understanding that singers give voices to events in their lives and the life of their country through the songs. On this particular night the lyrics are lively and everyone appears to be in a jovial mood.

About six of us from the IPT join the crowd on our first Friday in Iraq. The room is already more than halfway full as we make our way to a seat. Within minutes we are served the streaming tea, and we pass around some magic sheets (a document, written in English and Arabic, that explained the mission of IPT) to those near us who appear curious about our presence. Immediately, looks of curiosity are transformed into looks of acceptance and gratitude. That we westerners are voices for peace quickly spreads and many around the room turn to give us the “thumbs up.”

As the night’s music begins, it is obvious that the macaam is an Iraqi favorite. The singers put a tremendous amount of energy into their songs and the crowd frequently bursts into a rhythmic hand-clapping accompaniment to the band. IPT’ers join in the hand clapping, which seems to please the Iraqi crowd. Though unable to understand the lyrics, the music is thoroughly enjoyed by us all. During one of the particularly upbeat songs, I asked Mohammed, the taxi driver who brought us, what the song was about.He said the singer was singing about his home.

The last singer of the night, a 60ish gentleman with sparkling eyes and shining face, appeared to be quite a celebrity with the people. Indeed, he is an old-timer of Friday night macaam in old Baghdad. A picture on the wall shows him performing here when he was yet a young man. The sparkle in his eyes is inflected in his songs as he sings his way through the crowded room. His last song ends the evening and people begin to file out of the rows of benches.

The evening has been uplifting for everyone. I have only been in Iraq for several days, and as delighted as I am with the people and their city, I am deeply saddened at the suffering I have witnessed. The evening of music has dissipated some of the sadness. I can only imagine how much an evening like this means to the Iraqi people who have suffered so much through war and the social/economic collapse caused by the sanctions.

People are visiting with one another and progress towards the door is slow. I look around the building- the worn stone flooring testifies to the building’s antiquity; pictures of singers performing here through the years grace small alcoves set into the walls; traditional Iraqi décor, colorful tiles inlaid with small mirrors, vivify the stone ceiling. As I look forward to next Friday at the maqaam, I am suddenly struck by the awareness that this building might be a casualty of war. These people who welcomed us to share their evening of culture might be casualties of war. And these same people, after the memory of the music fades and they say their goodnights to one another, will harbor the same concerns. But for these good people, the buildings they will most worry over are their homes, and the people they fear for, their families.

Today Khaled, one of the taxi drivers who has worked with IPT for a long time, took me to visit with his family. Khaled and his wife have four children, two grown and two still in school. On this particular day everyone is home, and two of his wife’s sisters are visiting from a nearby neighborhood. The family has recently put in a well so to assure they have safe drinking water if bombing disrupts Baghdad’s water supply. After they show me the well site, cold bottles of Pepsi are passed around. Everyone seems very pleased that they have such a treat to offer a guest. After a little while of visiting, made possible by the excellent interpretive skills of Waleed, Khaled’s second oldest son, the women (excluding myself since I am a guest) go to work in the kitchen. Soon, a mid-afternoon feast of richly seasoned hummus with Iraqi bread baked into it, fresh and pickled vegetables and rice is brought out. There is no dining room table so we all sit in a circle on the floor. The delicious food is heaped on a large platter. We all eat from the one platter. A large pitcher of water is accompanied by a single cup, and we all share of it. The food is excellent. The floor is comfortable. It is wonderful to be with these friends. And the one platter and one cup is all that is needed to share a meal with friends.

I am trying to learn some basic Arabic from one of the shopkeepers, Faiz. He spends an hour or more everyday teaching me. The only thing he has asked for in return is crayons, paper and vitamins for his children, though I am sure it is hard for him to provide for his wife and three children on the limited income he makes in his shop. The other day he said his wife has a lot of pain in her hands and washing diapers and the families clothing everyday worsens it. They, of course, do not own a washing machine. Later I was thinking how nice it would be to anonymously purchase her a washing machine, but of course do not have the resources for it. As silly as it seems, it was really upsetting to me. Here, a laundry-mat (if it would be affordable) would be a luxury. In the states, having to use the laundry-mat rather than have one’s own machine is a burden.

So anyway, yesterday I mentioned to Faiz that my lighter was about out of fluid and I needed to buy a new one from him. He said he would just fill it and I told him it was a disposable. He said he could fix it. I thought he just didn’t understand what ‘disposable’ meant. I showed him the lighter and noted that there was not any place to add fuel to it. He got out a plastic bag of lighter “tools and spare parts” and proceeded to take the lighter apart, fill it with butane, put in a new flint, and even add a part to make the flame adjustable. (Though he lost the sale of a lighter to me, he refused to take any money from me for making my old lighter like new again.) He said that there are plenty of Iraqi’s who now make their living re-enlivening disposable lighters. I wonder how many wars are fought because we think we need what we already have.

In the years prior to my time in Iraq, I had devoted some time to thinking and writing about the difference between want and need, and the general lack of many Americans, myself included, to differentiate between the two. I would, at times, ask myself whether something I was planning to purchase was a want or a need, but the whole question remained on more of a theoretical level than a practical one. A most blessed gift of my time in Iraq has been the movement of that question from theoretical to practical.

When I returned to the States, I had lost my job and with it, my home. Some very kind friends gave me a place to stay, but their home is very small so I had to eliminate much of the material baggage I had acquired. A house full of clothes, furniture, dishes, and other “needs” was reduced to a suitcase and a few boxes containing books, office supplies, photographs and items I cherish because they were gifts from others. However, I have found that getting rid of excess baggage is only half of the battle. I still use far more than I really need on a daily basis.

I am afflicted with a mindset that urges me to drive when I could walk or use a bike, to buy something new rather than make due with the old, to purchase ready prepared rather than make it from scratch…. I don’t expect I will ever be entirely healed of this affliction. But when I am forced to make due with needs instead of wants, I remember what my friends in Iraq get by with, and I realize just how lucky I am to have my most basic needs met.

I went to al Monsur hospital today to set up an arts and crafts program for children on the cancer ward. (Why are peace activists doing arts and crafts with children? Because we in the Iraq Peace Team are standing in solidarity with the people of Iraq, and that means being present to them in their circumstances. Many face the tragic circumstances of watching their children die of cancer. In the United States, many of these children would live; in Iraq, they will die because medicines for cancer are not allowed into the country under sanctions. There is much evidence that these cancers are related to the depleted uranium used by the US in the Gulf War… I guess peace activists doing arts and crafts with these children does make a lot of sense.)

We have been trying to get this started for a week now – the red tape! First I had to get a list of 5 IPTer’s who would be here long enough to make it seem a credible endeavor to the hospital-they wanted assurance of continuity. Then the program and the list of volunteers had to be approved by our minder. Then this all goes to the gentleman who I met with today. He approved it, and now someone who is (I think) roughly the equivalent of a mayor of the area of the city the hospital is in has to approve it all.

For some reason, people rarely use telephones here to conduct business. The hospital is half an hour away by cab, and I must physically go back there tomorrow to find out if the “mayor” approves of the program. (Dr. Haseed assured me it would be approved, but the proper procedures must be followed.) I think perhaps that not using the phone to conduct business is more of a social thing than anything else. Certainly it cuts down on efficiency, but it increases human contact.

You can imagine how busy the assistant director of a large, underfunded, understaffed, hospital is. I go in to his office very conscious not to waste his time, but he, like so many people here, seems to feel that the person in front of him deserves undivided attention and, of course, hospitality. He asked me about what I do at home and I told him a little about Pascal Sherman Indian School, and then about some of the social problems we have in the US. I was still feeling very self conscious about taking up his time, and I made to leave, but he insisted we share a cup of tea!

He is very worried about the possibility of war. Not only does he have the hospital to worry about (which is next to a water treatment plant that was bombed in ‘91), he also has a wife and 4 children. The headline today’s Iraq Daily was about the Pope’s call for peace. Dr. Haseed asked me if the Pope has any influence over Bush. I swear, he asked me that with the hope of a child.

I went to Mass last night. The church is not large but it was packed. Most of the Mass is said in both Arabic and English, even though the majority of people attending are Iraqi. In fact, Cynthia, Cathy and I were the only westerners I noticed. The Lectors were men and women from the congregation, which was nice to see and the translation of the Gospel was read by a young woman. The musical accompaniment was violin- eloquent, mournful and altogether in tune to the mood of the community. Everyone prayed for peace. The priest recounted the hardships endured by the people of Scripture, and named the suffering endured by the Iraqi people. He exhorted the gathered community to be strong in their faith, hopeful in their God and steadfast in their prayers for peace. And he prayed for peace. He beseeched God to hear our cry for justice and respond. And the people prayed for peace. Heads bowed or looking heavenward, hands raised or folded in prayer, standing or kneeling, the people made their intercessions to God for peace in their land.

A couple of blocks from St. Raphael’s church is this neighborhood’s Mosque. During the Gospel reading the Muslim Call to Prayer sounded from the Mosque. Though I was inside the church, I knew what was happening on the streets. The Muslim people were stopping whatever they were doing-for several minutes business, conversation, and play would be put on hold-long enough to recite the obligatory prayers of faith to Allah. And just like the people in St. Raphael’s Catholic church prayed for peace, the people outside prostrating themselves toward Mecca prayed for peace.

Entire books can and have been written about war and peace from the Christian perspective. The catholic church has defined boundaries for a “just” war, and counted a pre-emptive war against Iraq “unjust.” A number of Protestant churches made public statements against war on Iraq. Unfortunately, very few Christian churches publicly profess war itself inconsistent with the Gospel message.

If churches were to endorse pacifism as the fulfillment of Jesus’ teachings, “resist not evil” and “love your enemy” they might inspire enthusiasm among more Christians to create new means of non-violent conflict resolution might. The church could proclaim they are ushering in a new “Kingdom” with sincerity. But the church speaks around the exhortation to love our enemies and resist not evil, implicitly supporting the antithesis of Christ’s teachings and leading the faithful astray from the Gospel message.

While Iraqi Christians pleaded for peace to God and to the rest of the world, Christians in the United States chose personal comfort and blind harmony over the very lives of their brothers and sisters in faith of Iraq.

“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”