Delegate
Quotes As of June 1,
1998
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Dennis Apel
My experience in Iraq was heartbreaking. The suffering is all pervasive. Incidents which remain embedded in my memory and heart include a woman sitting in an overcrowded emergency room with her dying infant child, tears streaming down her face as she looked up and said, "You come here and take pictures and go back home, but nothing changes." I felt helpless. On the bus leaving Saddam Pediatric Teaching Hospital, by the wall of the exit gate, sat two women on the asphalt crying. As I looked down from the bus, one woman stood up, approached, and unfolding her black garment revealed her infant in her arms. The child was dead.
In the Hospital in Mosul I stood next to the bed of a seventeen year old student with aplastic anemia and no treatment available. The doctors had told him they would try to keep him as comfortable as possible until he died. I took his hand in mine as I felt tears coming to my eyes. He looked at me peacefully, no tears. I feel responsible to do what I can to end the sanctions and these peoples' suffering.
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Philip Booth
Although I was aware of Iraq's suffering from reports by Ramsey Clark and others, the stark reality of the horror we have wrought struck me most forcibly when I visited the hospitals in Baghdad. Weeping mothers and dying babies, several to a bed, as a result of the genocidal sanctions imposed by our government in our name, evoked feelings of shame and anger. Our government has committed a grave crime; we need to end the sanctions now and assist Iraq in its recovery.
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Lee Booth
The significance of the challenge was reflected in the loving gratitude expressed to us almost everywhere we went, and was epitomized most eloquently to me when leaving the mural showing. I was surrounded by a group of the Iraqi students and, to my surprise, doused with water. One young man explained in English that the water is brought from Babylon and symbolizes love. I'm grateful to have been a challenge participant and received that special outpouring of love.
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Jack Bournazian
Faris plays the violin in the hotel lobby of the Al Rasheed. Mohammed accompanies him on
the piano. Both are 27. Faris lost his father in 1990. Mohammed lost his parents at age
six. One is Christian and one is Muslim. They are the best of friends, they are brothers.
They met at the university. They are both engineers. Both want to marry, have a family,
work in their field and live a fulfilling life. But they can't.
Every three minutes a person dies in Iraq because of the sanctions. "Do you know of anyone who has died because of the sanctions," I ask. "Yes," they answer in a voice so strong and unequivocal that I do not ask more out of courtesy for their pain. "What is your mission, what is your message, what will or can you do when you get back?" The questions are desperate. I search for answers. "Because we are dying," they say. In the lobby where they play people walk, wait and talk. They finish a song and no one claps. At the end I say good-bye. They say, "don't forget us."
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Marie Braun
I was struck by the pervasiveness of the sanctions. The hospitals are wards of misery,
filled with dying children, and operated by doctors without medicine, medical supplies, or
medical tools. The school children have no pens, no pencils, no books, paper or color
crayons... Most of the people live on a starvation diet. There are no fertilizers or
pesticides to increase the production of food and insufficient chlorine to purify the
water. Any industries that might in any way be connected to the production of weapons,
even in the remotest way, have been closed down. There are no spare parts for equipment
that has worn out. The only way into Iraq is a 15-hour trip by car or bus. No planes come
and none go out. It is a country cut off from the rest of the world, whose peoples are
being denied the most basic necessities of life.
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Patrick Carkin
Two children, a boy and a girl, sat in the hotel lobby with their father who wanted us to take them back to the U.S. for treatment. Both kids had double sickle cell anemia. The girl was dressed in what appeared to be her finest dress. I gave them both a box of crayons. The girl could only shrug. She was hot to the touch, too thin, and obviously very sick. She is just one of thousands of children who are being harmed by the sanctions. To see her father's desperation, to see how sick that little girl was, to know that it was preventable -- I will remember that always. The U.S. is killing those kids and we have to stop it.
http://www.proactivist.com/photojournal/iraq.html
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Edith Eckart
How Will History Judge us?
I have just returned from Baghdad, where our group delivered 4 million dollars worth of
medicines and medical supplies directly to the hospitals where children are dying due
UN/US sanctions.
In the crowded wards we visited, babies on beds without sheets, with their mothers fanning the flies off their faces, were dying of dysentery. pneumonia, renal failure, leukemia. Our doctor conversing with the units doctor learned that simple potable water, antibiotics, immunizations, sterile syringes, IVs were unavailable.
Our doctor asked "So, how many of these babies in this ward will die?"
Their doctor through up his hands and answered.." All of them."
The economic sanctions are warfare against the innocent humans of Iraq. They have had no political effect toward bringing down their leader. The people blame the sanctions for their tragic conditions.
United Nations Children Emergency Fund...Unicef...reports that 4,500 children under 5 years of age are dying each month from causes due to the UN/US sanctions. Per day, that is 130 children. I read yesterday, that in the Vietnam War, if averaged out, 22 soldiers died each day.
What kind of a Memorial WAll to Iraqi children would be
appropriate? And the dying continues.
Edith Eckart, a Veteran for Peace, reflecting on Memorial Day 1998
At the ruins of Babylon, we arrived at the close of the day, when the hot blast of the sun had abated. No tourists. Six thousand years ago, amillion people lived closely, legislated by the Code of Hammurabi.
As we left, a full moon came up over the ruin walls. How far have we progressed? "Smart" bombs blasting innocent children at Ameriya bomb shelter; babies, born to die of malnutrition and contaminated water... How will history judge us?
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Kenneth Freeland
I doubt that any of us left the Basrah Children's hospital, or the Al Ameriyah bomb
shelter, with dry eyes. One objective of our mission, to galvanize our solidarity with the
long-suffering people of Iraq, was more than met, despite the fact that $4 million worth
of medicine could not begin to make up for the catastrophic effects of what can only be
called an enforced economic shutdown - "manufactured suffering," as Ramsey Clark
so ably put it.
The legal-political challenge to these anti-human laws restricting humanitarian aid, and personal contact between our peoples, were successfully challenged by default. I am readier than ever to confront them more directly now that I have returned. The warmth and beauty of the Iraqi people, so nobly masking their desperation, is not something any of us can soon forget. As to the delegates whom I got to know so well, I have never in my life felt I was in better company. I would do it all again in a heartbeat, and certainly intend to if my Iraqi brothers and sisters are ever again seriously threatened with American military action in the future.
An anecdote Visit to Basrah
About ten of us attended a Mass concelebrated by Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, one of our
delegates, and Msgr. Djibrael Kassab, the Archbishop of Basrah. After introducing him
during the sermon, the Archbishop gave Bishop Gumbleton the microphone. It was so
invigorating and refreshing to hear a clergyman, in a church, express such solidarity with
the people of Iraq (translated into their language, of course) who are the victims of
sanctions, and to hear it declared in no uncertain terms that the sanctions are an evil,
and therefore to be morally opposed as any other violation of Christian morality.
As if to emphasize this point, the electricity went off right in the middle of his oration. (The Minister of Trade informed us the following day during our visit to the food Distribution Center that Iraq is operating on 1/3 the electricity it had prior to the Gulf War.) As hot as it is in Basrah, the church began to get very hot very quickly, with no ceiling fans or air conditioning. One of our delegates was having a particularly tough time, and was sweating profusely. He said he suddenly felt a refreshing breeze behind him, and looked back to see a couple of Iraqi women fanning him from the pew behind him! But the people took it all in stride - they're used to these periodic power outages. They opened the windows wide, and the doors of the church, and somehow we all managed until the power returned some 20 minutes later.
Later on, the archbishop set out for us a lavish table at his
residence: "Not typical sanctions food," he assured us - one of his better-off
parishioners had underwritten this evening's hospitality - and this
graceful gesture in a city which according to the Archbishop has an unemployment rate of
87%!
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Manzoor Ghori
What I saw in Iraq is a human tragedy created by humans(USA). To bomb a country to the
ground including hospitals, milk factories, electric &water treatment plants. And then
place an embargo is a genocide and I saw the results with my own eyes. Hundreds of
children dying of malnutrition infection and cancer (leukemia), leukemia since we dropped
tons of Depleted uranium. Those of us who have any conscious left must respond to help
these people and that is our responsibility.
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Bishop Thomas Gumbleton
I went back to Iraq with the feeling of "what's the use?" Even $4 million of
medicine is nothing in relation to the overwhelming needs. Then I met Doctor Abdul-Abban
in the hospital in Basra. He was tired. His face was sad. But as he walked up to us and
recognized us, his eyes lit up, his whole demeanor changed. "You make me happy. I
smile from my heart. You make me strong." For him and all the people of Iraq we
must keep going back until we end the sanctions
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Gerry Haynes
It will take time and reflection to gather a full understanding of the impact on my life
and work of the ISC trip to Iraq this month; May, 1998. At this immediate juncture, I know
that I am compelled to take the message of failing humanity to every person I encounter,
encouraging all of us to step forth as loving citizens of the earth to end inhumane
sanctions on our brothers and sisters. While awaiting our departure from Amman Airport on
May 7, I spoke briefly to a Palestinian gentleman, exiled from Nablus, West Bank since
1967.
He said, "Thank you for coming to help the Iraqi people. I knew the Americans would come. Some of my friends said the Americans would never come, but I knew you would come." A woman in Iraq asked us why it had taken us so many years to come. I know we cannot have carried the message of ending the sanctions yesterday -- we can only do this today and tomorrow -- and we must. It is a blessed opportunity.
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Berta Joubert
On our way from Syria to Iraq, while riding through the desert, I offered some sweetened
dried cranberries to the drivers. One of them, after taking a handful, thanked me and
proceeded to give one to each of the delegates saying at the same time: "please, take
this, I would like your blood and my blood to be the same". This was my introduction
to Iraq.
I am still haunted by the pair of dark, round, beautiful and sad
eyes of an Iraqi infant who was resting in his mother's arms. He was so frail, so thin,
yet it was the most powerful message I have ever received. With his silence, he voiced the
plea of millions of Iraqi people: "Let us live, End the Sanctions Now!".
Many mothers in the hospitals we visited wanted their picture
taken. I vividly remember one who after I took her picture with her sick baby, she said,
moving her hands as if handing something: "to Clinton". We really have to find a
way to dramatically get this message through, thousands of pictures of Iraqi children to
the White House. A message from the mothers of Iraq.
It was a very wrenching experience. But it was also wonderful to see the creativity and
the generosity of the Iraqi people. The resilience of the children, and the cheerfulness
of the youth. Participating in the student's collective dance in the Art College campus
was particularly a happy moment for me.
Visit to Abn Rashid Psychiatric Hospital
I was able to visit at least for a very short time, the Abn Rashid Psychiatric Hospital
which serves 1,300 patients in the Baghdad area. There I met with several psychiatrists,
Dr. Natiq Kamal Khalil, the Direct Manager of the Hospital who gave a brief overview, and
Drs. R. H. Alkhaiat and N. J. Alhemyary. Also present were 2 other doctors and the Chief
Nurse, a very friendly young woman dressed with the classic white uniform and cap. When I
arrived, they were conducting an interview with a patient and his relative and asked me to
join them. Although the interview was in Arabic, it became clear that the patient was
depressed. His wife was very attentive and obviously an integral part of the therapeutic
process. They did not seem to be bothered by my presence.
This first contact with a patient underscored what the
therapeutic team said afterwards. Because of the sanctions, there is hardly any
psychiatric or anti-Parkinsonian medicines. (The latter is used to treat some neurological
reactions to anti-psychotic medications.) They had always used the family support as a key
ingredient of the therapy, but now because of the lack of drugs, they have sometimes to
rely exclusively on the patient's support systems. Unfortunately, this added pressure to
the family causes more destabilization both in the family group which is unable to cope
with the patient's symptoms that have become more frequent and disruptive, and their own
hardship due to sanctions, ( Lack of food, electricity, general medicines, etc., etc.) It
then becomes a circle, patients have no medications, they get worse, the family support is
missing, patients is worst. In some cases, particularly when the patient is extremely
agitated and violent they have to resort to ECT (Electroconvulsive Therapy) which they
have to administer in a very primitive way, without necessary drugs to counter the violent
convulsions. Sometimes the relatives see their loved ones undergoing this treatment and
take them home.
It is difficult to imagine the psychological pain these patients
and their relatives go through.
They took me to a tour around the hospital. The conditions mirrored those in the other
general hospitals. Bare rooms, lack of desinfectants, etc. We visited the Hospital
Pharmacy, a pharmacist and her aide were working in a room with 4-5 cabinets. Some of them
were completely empty. One had a pyramid of Mellaril tablet boxes in the upper shelf.
That's all the medicines they had to treat the 73 patients that were admitted at that
time, not counting the outpatients. There must have been around 50 small boxes. Certainly
not enough. Mellaril is a very mild antipsychotic and for that reason it is generally
given to elderly patients. There, it was the only available. Every month the medicines
they receive might be different, so there is no consistency in the treatment. Usually
psychiatric medications need 3-4 weeks in order to reach maximum effect, in Iraq they
cannot monitor the effectiveness, if they are lucky enough to have a medication, the
following month they might not have any or will have to switch to another, starting the
treatment all over again.
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Kathy Kelly
To Feel What Ima Feels
Earlier this month, several members of the Iraq Sanctions Challenge stood at the bedside
of Mustafa, one of at least a dozen dying children in a crowded, wretched ward of the main
hospital in Basra, Iraq's southern port city. His mother, tall, thin and quite beautiful,
sat cross legged on the mattress beside him, waving away flies, as the doctor explained to
us that the child, hospitalized for the past twenty days, now suffered from dehydration,
diarrhea, acute renal failure and extensive brain atrophy. Lacking equipment and medicine
to diagnose and treat Mustafa, the doctors could only stand by, helpless and frustrated,
while the child's condition worsened over three weeks time. If Mustafa survives, he will
be severely crippled.
Ima Nouri, his mother, is 35 years old. Her serious eyes, large
and luminous, followed us as we paused before each bedside. She seemed surprised when we
asked her to tell us a little about herself. We learned that she lives in a rural area
north of Basrah and has two children at home whom she misses very much. We asked the
doctor to tell her that we are so very sorry, that we want to tell people in the US her
story, that we will try hard to end the sanctions. She smiled slowly, nodded. Then we
mentioned that people in the United States were celebrating Mother's Day on this day and
asked if she had a message for mothers in our country. Ima suddenly became animated.
"Yes," she said, "I have two messages. First, tell them, from Iraqi women,
that these are our children and we love them so much." Stroking Mustafa's face, she
continued, "Ask them to please try to help us protect them and take care of them.
And, for American women, -- I want them to feel what I am feeling."
Her message to us could not be more clear. If people in the US
could feel her anguish, humiliation, horror and despair -if they could feel the loss
experienced by Iraqi mothers when their children are sacrificed to US policy, -then
perhaps we would find the energy and passion to end the sanctions. If people here could
feel Ima's frustration and fear, they would realize that Iraq's children are innocent
victims caught between two opposing forces; the main issue is not whether Iraq's
government is criminal, nor even whether the US has acted criminally, - the main issue is
that only dialogue and conciliation can save the lives of these children, and such
discussion is urgently needed.
When the possibility of discussion and dialogue is raised, some will say that only
economic sanctions or military force will make Iraq comply with UN agreements (in other
words, either starve the civilians or bomb them). We believe there is no human benefit in
backing any government into a corner and causing greater desperation, as the economic
sanctions have already done in Iraq. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's February, 1998
visit to Baghdad showed that conciliation and negotiation prompted increased cooperation
and continued dialogue.
Iraq's children bear the brunt of UN/US economic warfare - a war
that employs a hideous weapon of mass destruction: economic sanctions. Ima Nouri wants us
to protect these children, to feel what she feels. Truthfully, we can only begin to feel
the pain Iraqi mothers endure. May their pleas strengthen our resolve to protect the
children who are caught, right now, malnourished, sick, disabled and dying - they are not
bargaining chips, they are children. And they have a right to live.
Voices in the Wilderness
A Campaign to End the U.N./U.S. Economic Sanctions Against the People of Iraq
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Gloria La Riva
We were taken through the emergency ward and a hallway full of
tiny babies being held by their mothers. Most of the children were in critical condition,
wasting, severely dehydrated. Dr. Monaf Shakir, MD, at Saddam Central Hospital for
Children, told us, "Especially in the last seven days, there has been an increased
incidence of gastroenteritis in babies and children, most of the cases being amoebic
dysentery."
When he showed us one small child, he said, "He is very
dehydrated, marasmic, also the patient is receiving antibiotics, but there is no
Metronidazole, which is the drug of choice for his condition."
We knew then that the Metronidazole, the antibiotics, IV solution, and other medicines we
brought would save the lives of thousands of children and babies. In 1996, there were
543,000 cases of amoebic dysentery in Iraq.
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Mary Ellen McDonagh
I was particularly struck by the women of Iraq, during the Iraq Sanctions Challenge. One
woman I met at Saddam Pediatric Hospital wore a beautiful beaded dress and smiled as she
fanned her dying child. She was the only one who smiled, as most gave off an aura of
strength through sad faces. When I presented several small shampoo bottles as a tip to a
toothless, elderly attendant in the Al-Rasheed Hotel washroom, she hugged me.
Another young woman and I shared a pleasant conversation on the
morning we left Baghdad. She spoke of her life as a student and mentioned a brother
studying dentistry in Chicago. In addition, I was appalled to hear Dr. Souad Axxawi speak
of the long-term effects of depleted uranium bullets.
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Sonya Ostrom
A Visit to the University of Baghdad
People everywhere were warm and friendly, especially when they learned we were from
America- - when they heard of our mission they thanked us profusely. This was true at the
University of Baghdad where we paid an almost unexpected visit. Not much time to fake
things if that was their desire. We were shown into the Bio lab, which was woefully
defiecient- - in need of basic equipment and the airconditioning was in need of repair
with no parts available, and while this was obviously to impress on us what sanctions had
done - - I was even more impressed by student complaints about lack of paper and books and
the need to do all their lab work through books. They also spoke of holding exams early
because it became too hot to use the exams for anything but fans.
When we met with the president of the school, I asked him about
computers, and he said they could not teach even a basic freshman computer course because
UNSCOM had canceled their order for PC's. to Iraq's credit, the University was filled with
students, 50,000 in 20 colleges, too many to be merely be the sons and daughters of riche
parents. And unlike much of the Middle East - there seemed to be as many women as men.
Education in Iraq is free, so the University is filled to overflowing with an increase in
graduate students 5,000 in Masters and PHD programs, because they cannot send students at
this level to other countries to study.
Because of sanctions, students and faculty are not able to attend
conferences held in other countries, and they feel they suffer from a loss of this
contact. They also lack the books and journals that would keep them abreast of their
individual fields of study. There is no question here that sanctions harm even the
academic life of the country.
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P.J. Park
Here is my reflection on the Iraq Sanctions Challenge:
I was particularly moved during my visit to the Saddam Central Hospital for Children in
Baghdad, the number one pediatric hospital in the country.
I asked one beautiful mother, Sajeedal Ahmad, how the sanctions
have affected her. She was in the casualty ward holding her three-year-old son Adi, who
had measles. "We are dying out. Everything is very, very hard to get. Without
Tylenol, we cannot bring Adi's fever down." To the American people she said,
"Enough is enough. Get your government out of this place. "We need your
help." I told her I would not stop working until the sanctions were ended.
As we pulled away from the hospital, we heard wailing. We turned
and saw a woman holding a dead child in her arms.
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Rev. Lucius Walker
It was truly empowering to challenge the most sense-less and monstrously evil US policy
toward Iraq. I saw the face of genocide in the mutilated bodies and anguished faces of
Iraqi babies who were at the threshold of death because of US sanctions.
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