jill carroll and the CPT hostages
It feels somehow futile to blog about this--but I've been following the news about the abduction of reporter Jill Carroll in Baghdad, and today I read that al-Jazeera has received a video of her from her captors, with a threat that they will kill her tomorrow unless all female Iraqi prisoners in US custody are released. Reporters Without Borders--which has done an excellent job of tracking attacks on journalists in Iraq--has more information. Carroll's Iraqi translator 'Alan', a beloved music seller, was killed in the course of her abduction; there's a memorial to him here.
Jordanian journalist Natasha Tynes, a friend of Carroll's, has been blogging tirelessly about the story; her most recent post includes the positive news that a wide variety of religious and media organizations in Iraq and elsewhere (including the Muslim Brotherhood, the Muslim Scholars Association (a council of Sunni clerics in Iraq), Al-Jazeera itself, CAIR, and more) have publically condemned the kidnapping and called for Carroll's safe release. I pray their efforts will be successful. Tynes also has links to many of Carroll's stories from Iraq, and to stories published about her by her colleagues in the press in Jordan, where she worked before going to Iraq.
The four members of Christian Peacemaker Teams taken hostage in November remain in captivity--a similar deadline for demanded prisoner releases in their case passed more than a month ago, but their has been no news of their deaths (in contrast to the well-publicized executions of other hostages) so it seems likely that they are still alive. So that's another reason to hope that the deadline is a bluff, although there's no way of knowing if the abductors are linked or not--the tape of Carroll came from a group calling themselves by a different name than the captors of the CPT peacemakers.
Carroll's kidnapping (like the other attacks on journalists and aid workers) is especially heartbreaking because she so clearly loves Iraq and its people, and is dedicated to reporting the truth about what happens there. I think it must be terribly difficult for those who are used to the hospitality and protectiveness generally showered upon visitors in the Middle East--especially those with such an appreciation for the culture--to come to terms with the dangers they face in Iraq. I spent two months in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon in 2002. It was six months after 9/11, in the midst of Operation Defensive Shield, right after Jenin. I was twenty years old, travelling completely alone on an American passport with a very limited amount of money, didn't speak more than three words of Arabic, and had never set foot in an Arab country before. And it was one of the most wonderful experiences of my life--partly because the warmth and assistance of the people I met there meant that I never feared for my safety. I felt more secure walking down the street alone in Damascus than in some parts of London and New York. I've been back since the Iraq war (in 2004), and still felt that way. It must be terribly sad to have that sense of welcome taken away, to be targeted because of what one's nationality has come to symbolize.
Jordanian journalist Natasha Tynes, a friend of Carroll's, has been blogging tirelessly about the story; her most recent post includes the positive news that a wide variety of religious and media organizations in Iraq and elsewhere (including the Muslim Brotherhood, the Muslim Scholars Association (a council of Sunni clerics in Iraq), Al-Jazeera itself, CAIR, and more) have publically condemned the kidnapping and called for Carroll's safe release. I pray their efforts will be successful. Tynes also has links to many of Carroll's stories from Iraq, and to stories published about her by her colleagues in the press in Jordan, where she worked before going to Iraq.
The four members of Christian Peacemaker Teams taken hostage in November remain in captivity--a similar deadline for demanded prisoner releases in their case passed more than a month ago, but their has been no news of their deaths (in contrast to the well-publicized executions of other hostages) so it seems likely that they are still alive. So that's another reason to hope that the deadline is a bluff, although there's no way of knowing if the abductors are linked or not--the tape of Carroll came from a group calling themselves by a different name than the captors of the CPT peacemakers.
Carroll's kidnapping (like the other attacks on journalists and aid workers) is especially heartbreaking because she so clearly loves Iraq and its people, and is dedicated to reporting the truth about what happens there. I think it must be terribly difficult for those who are used to the hospitality and protectiveness generally showered upon visitors in the Middle East--especially those with such an appreciation for the culture--to come to terms with the dangers they face in Iraq. I spent two months in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon in 2002. It was six months after 9/11, in the midst of Operation Defensive Shield, right after Jenin. I was twenty years old, travelling completely alone on an American passport with a very limited amount of money, didn't speak more than three words of Arabic, and had never set foot in an Arab country before. And it was one of the most wonderful experiences of my life--partly because the warmth and assistance of the people I met there meant that I never feared for my safety. I felt more secure walking down the street alone in Damascus than in some parts of London and New York. I've been back since the Iraq war (in 2004), and still felt that way. It must be terribly sad to have that sense of welcome taken away, to be targeted because of what one's nationality has come to symbolize.
posted by kitabet at 4:12 PM
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