Relief Workers: Winning the Peace
Christian groups join the effort to aid millions in Iraq.
The huge scope of the effort needed to provide post-war Iraqis with food, water and medicine, and to rebuild the country, is being compared to American efforts to rebuild Europe and Japan after World War II. Christian aid groups are among those that have long been involved in the Mideast, and now are hoping to play a significant role in what could become the largest humanitarian operation in history.
The United States military is leading and controlling humanitarian operations in Iraq. The government has been storing food and medicine for after the war, and last week it asked Congress for more than $8 billion for international relief and reconstruction. This amount allots $3.5 billion for Iraq ($2.5 billion in a relief fund and much of the rest for oil-field repair) and $5 billion for assistance to nations that have been helpful in the Iraqi war or in fighting terrorism.
Iraqis have about a month's worth of food left, according to the World Food Program, a U.N. agency. At least 13 million people – more than half of the country's total population – are completely dependent on food handouts, World Food Program spokesman Trevor Rowe said. Before the war, Iraqis depended on government rations distributed under the United Nations' oil-for-food program, which allowed the sale of oil to buy food and medicine. The war has thrown the future of that program in doubt. U.N. officials pulled out of Iraq after the start of the U.S.-led war. The World Food Program will make the biggest single request for cash in its history – more than $1 billion – to help feed war-stricken Iraq for about six months, but U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has warned that the United States is legally responsible for providing relief aid because it failed to get U.N. backing for the war.
While the war continues, getting relief aid into Iraq has been a struggle. After days of fighting and clearing mines in southern Iraq, the first major relief convoys reached the southern Iraq town of Umm Qasr last week. Tractor-trailers carrying food and water donated by Kuwaitis were brought in Umm Qasr by the Humanitarian Operations Center, a joint U.S. government-Kuwaiti agency. Crowds cheered and swarmed around British and American soldiers as they handed out meal packets and bottles of water, according to news reports. Meanwhile, forces struggled to clear the way for more aid shipments in the city of Basra, where dolphins are being used to clear mines from waterways.
Iraq borders six other nations, but most of the war's refugees are expected in Iran, Jordan, and Syria. Some displaced people may stay in Iraq while others seek refuge in neighboring countries. Wherever they end up, displaced people will have many needs, including food, shelter, water, clothes, medicine and supplies.
Mixed messages?
Some humanitarian groups are troubled that the U.S. military, instead of nonprofit groups, is leading humanitarian efforts in Iraq. "With the U.S.-led coalition forces going in with one arm with bombs and the other arm, perhaps, with humanitarian aid to follow up, that gives us great pause and concern, because what you have is a politicization of this humanitarian aid," Kevin King of the Mennonite Central Committee told Religion & Ethics Newsweekly.
The humanitarian agency Church World Service, which is affiliated with the National Council of Churches, appealed for $1.5 million in contributions to be used in the Gulf region by its partner, the Middle East Council of Churches. CWS said it will not accept U.S. government funding for the initial emergency phase of the conflict in Iraq. Humanitarian relief workers must take neutral positions, said Rick Augsburger, director of emergency response programs. The Department of Defense's control over post-war reconstruction in Iraq "flies in the face of humanitarian principles," he said.
But Ben Homan, president of the Christian aid group Food For the Hungry, which is active in relief efforts, told religionjournal.com that U.S. government leadership in humanitarian efforts will be necessary. "When government structures (in Iraq) completely disappear, you face a potential vacuum that could bring chaos, further civil war, and conflict." Without something sufficient to temporarily fill that vacuum, there could be "an absolute crisis" in Iraq, he said.
Stepping up
NGOs say they are planning for the worst and hoping for the best. In Jordan, the Red Crescent has worked to set up camps to feed two groups of refugees – Iraqis and the third-country nationals who had been working in Iraq. The United Nations expected about 60,000 people, predominantly Egyptian, Ethiopian, and Sudanese nationals, to flee Iraq through Jordan in the coming weeks, but so far only a few hundred have trickled in.
The Christian relief agency World Vision has been providing relief supplies to Jordan, Syria and Iran, partnering with the Red Crescent and other relief agencies. Its immediate task is assisting Iraqi refugees in border areas, and it hopes to move into Iraq when the fighting subsides. The group has airlifted blankets, water containers and plastic sheeting for temporary refugee shelters to Jordan, on Iraq's western border. Volunteers at World Vision's international distribution center outside of Pittsburgh are sorting through hundreds of boxes of clothes to send to the area. Only black, dark blue, and dark gray are accepted by Iraqi culture.
Catholic Relief Services is working with local church organizations, including Caritas, in Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Turkey to help them respond to the immediate needs of Iraqis, including refugees. "The needs in Iraq – particularly health – were acute even before the onset of war, with high rates of infant mortality and a dire shortage of medicine," said Chris Tucker, regional director for the Middle East and North Africa.
The national church in Jordan is helping lead relief efforts in Jordan near the town of Ruwayshed. International Christian aid groups are providing funding and staff as needed, Kelly Miller of the Christian group World Concern said. It costs about $51 to provide food for one family for a month, he said.
"The uncertainty is wearing on the aid community," said Peter Sundt, relief manager for World Concern and Food for the Hungry's joint Middle East relief project. "The BBC is on in hotel rooms here all night in case there is a scrap of information that might signal when the relief effort inside Iraq can start."
When people watch televised images of the bombing of Baghdad, "you think that no one would choose to stay," Sundt said. "But perhaps the repeated messages touting the accuracy of the bombs, and that civilians are not being targeted, caused many to stay and guard their homes instead of becoming refugees and giving up what they owned. At any rate, we are still planning, and they have not come just yet." In countries such as Iraq that have deep historical roots, "it takes a lot of fear to cause people to leave their home for the border, or as it is known in most places, the frontier," he said.
Inside Iraq, Action By Churches Together, a global alliance of churches and relief agencies, is working in collaboration with the Middle East Council of Churches to set up centers of refuge. Churches and mosques are engaged in this humanitarian initiative. ACT, based in Switzerland, works through 195 Protestant and Orthodox churches and related aid agencies from the membership of the World Council of Churches and the Lutheran World Federation.
Lutheran World Relief's Iraq aid is ready to help people who flee their homes and to strengthen aid management. Iraqi church aid workers are on the job and report that life "is still going on" and that people have not moved to shelters yet. More than 50 church and mosque shelters and supply depots are ready in four Iraqi cities, offering refugees shelter, water and food.
The long haul
Many groups have affirmed a commitment to help the suffering people of the Middle East. In these trying times, Christian groups must do all they can to show love and concern for Iraqis, the groups say. "Let us lift high His banner of love for friend and foe, respect for others, attention to the outcast, and sacrificial service. These indeed are the doorway to the brighter and better day that we seek for ourselves and all of God's children," said Judy Mills Reimer, general secretary of the Church of the Brethren General Board. Church of the Brethren is a partner with the group Churches for Middle East Peace.
"While we support a humanitarian response, we must continue to work for peace, to lay the foundation for rebuilding what is damaged by the war and promoting the dignity of each Iraqi citizen," Chris Tucker of Catholic Relief Services said.
"This is only the beginning" of the relief efforts, said Homan, of Food for the Hungry. "This is so large and sweeping that we are going to be talking about Iraq and the Middle East for a long time."
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