Dienst: The main thing is that refugees are people just like you and me. They love their families; they want their children to have a better future; they want peace and stability. Yes, they come from a different culture. Yes, they practice a different religion—although Islam has its roots in the Old and New Testament, tracing its lineage back to Abraham, same as the Jewish and Christian faiths. All three religions worship the God of Abraham, even though they call him by different names. All three believe that this same God is the creator of the universe. Muslims also honor Jesus, believe he was a prophet, born of the Virgin Mary, and came with a message for all people. So, when you sit down and break bread with them, they are much more like you than different. We need to get past the urge of our leaders and media to stereotype and demonize these people. Be advised that when you are stereotyping and demonizing a group of people, you are setting yourself up to justify committing horrific acts against them. This is true about my work in Palestine, too.
The MOON: It’s interesting to me that we are supposedly concerned about them enough to want to “liberate” them from their evil dictators, but at the same time, don’t trust them or want to live with them. Why would we risk American lives to liberate them if we’re convinced they’re evil terrorists?
Dienst: That’s why we have to be skeptical about what we’re told by our leaders when they want us to go to war: liberating Iraq, for example. I’m not so sure we would have been interested in liberating Iraqis from Saddam Hussein if their country hadn’t been sitting on one of the biggest known oil reserves on the planet. There are horrific things going on in central Africa—the Congo, say—and we do nothing about it. I would be very skeptical about using our military “to liberate” anyone.
The Ku Klux Klan calls itself a Christian organization, but I doubt that many Christians would agree with that.
The MOON: Well, how about Syria? We’re trying to liberate Syria from the evil dictator Assad, but we don’t want to let his people into our country.
Dienst: I’ll be honest with you. I have friends—refugees, some of whom I’m in touch with on Facebook—who are happy we bombed the Syrian military base last week. And I have other Middle Eastern friends who were very much against it. So what to do is clear as mud at this point. I personally agree with Albert Einstein when he said, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.” We can’t bomb our way to a new democratic government—whether you support or oppose the Assad regime. We think we’re minimizing our involvement when we supply military aid to the so-called Syrian resistance; but a lot of it ends up in the hands of ISIS or Al-Qaeda, so we’re literally arming our enemies. That’s why even John Kerry has said he doesn’t see any military solution in Syria. Escalating takes us head-to-head with more powerful opponents, like the Russians. I don’t think any additional warfare will liberate the Syrian people.
The MOON: I don’t know how familiar you are with the Quran, but I’ve heard it said that it is the only Scripture to encourage “killing infidels,” all infidels. Is this true? What is your response to those who say this justifies excluding Muslim refugees from entering the country?
Dienst: I think that’s a joke. You can turn to the Bible, the Torah, or the Quran, and cite scripture to justify all kinds of barbaric things, and this has been done for centuries. The Old Testament is full of examples of God telling the Jews to kill those who worship other gods; to kill the Canaanites, the Midianites, and so on. I’ve known Jews, Muslims, and Christians on all points of the political spectrum. They can all quote scripture to justify their point of view. So to fear that all Muslims are going to behave according to the dictates of the most violent verse in their holy book is ridiculous. Most people want to live and let live. They’re not interested in putting other people to death for any reason. I know a lot of Muslims. The very word “Islam” is from “salaam,” which means peace, so a Muslim is a person who follows the teachings of peace. And that’s how I would say 90% of Muslims see themselves: as devotees of peace; not as holy jihadists.
You know, the Ku Klux Klan calls itself a Christian organization, but I doubt that many Christians would agree with that. Similarly, most Muslims don’t identify with or condone ISIS, either. But there are people in this country who want to create Islamophobia and demonize Muslims. They haven’t sat in coffee shops with them, or traveled with them, or broken bread with them, to find out that they’re simply human beings with much more in common with you than different from you.
The MOON: Have you been able to follow any of the refugees you’ve treated beyond their camp experiences?
Dienst: I’m mainly in touch with Syrian refugees who have worked as translators for us. In fact, just before we talked I was speaking on the phone with one who is still stranded in Greece. He actually supports Trump’s bombing of Syria, but he was tortured by the Assad regime, so he has his reasons. He was also tortured by ISIS.
Vincent—the pseudonym I’ve given this young man in our book—was born in Iraq, not Syria, because his father was an opponent of Assad’s father, Hafez al-Assad. When his father left home and his mother fell into a depression following the birth of his younger brother, three-year-old Vincent went to live with his grandmother. In 1995, when he was seven years old, the family returned to Syria to escape the growing hardships resulting from the bombings of Iraq, followed by the no-fly zones and the embargo. Upon returning to Syria, however, the entire family was arrested. Vincent became a seven-year-old prisoner.
After three months, the family was released, but with restrictions. Friends and acquaintances risked persecution for any association with his family. Over time, the restrictions eased somewhat, and Vincent was able to finish high school and enter the university in 2009. He calls those three years at university the best of his life.
Then came the Arab Spring in 2011. Although people were optimistic, especially after what looked like progress in Tunisia and Egypt, the Assad regime cracked down on the dissidents. Many of Vincent’s friends, neighbors, and their entire families were slaughtered. Fellow students and friends were gunned down in the streets by snipers. Vincent left school to flee for his life, having finished only three of his four years. However he’d almost earned a degree in English literature, which is why he can now work as a translator.
He went back to his hometown to hide from security forces who wanted him to serve in the Syrian Army. He stayed within the confines of his home in his small town for three years, afraid to show his face outside: no job, no life, no income, no friends. Finally his grandmother offered him the resources to try to escape all the madness, go through Turkey, and live with relatives in Germany. Vincent decided to risk it.
To get to Turkey, he had to cross Syrian territory that was occupied by ISIS. Unfortunately, he was captured, tortured, and imprisoned for two months. The torture he experienced included sleep deprivation, being suspended by his wrists for hours on end, bludgeonings, being subjected to electric shocks, and more. He was ordered to recite verses from the Quran, and fortunately, he was able to do so. This probably saved his life, as friends who could not had their necks slashed. ISIS finally moved on to other torture victims and let him go.
Vincent and a group of other travelers moved at night towards the Turkish border. Their route took them across minefields and past ISIS night patrols with mounted machine guns. On several occasions Vincent’s group was chased and people running behind Vincent were killed.
When he at last made it across the border into Turkey, he paid smugglers over a thousand dollars to bring him overland to Istanbul and then to Izmir. He paid other smugglers an additional thousand dollars to take a rubber dinghy overfilled with refugees across the straits to the Greek island of Chios. There he registered with the Greek government, received a six-month visa, and made it by ferry to Athens and the Greek mainland. He took a train to Thessaloniki, and then a bus, which dropped him off at the refugee camp at Eko, where he joined his friends in a tent. He has since moved on from the gas station camp to a military camp, and then back to Athens. He has given up on reaching Germany and now hopes that he can make himself useful enough to be allowed to stay in Greece—or to gain asylum in Australia or New Zealand. His story is not that unusual in terms of horror.
The MOON: Please tell us about the Salaam Cultural Museum—the nonprofit you travel with.
Dienst: Salaam Cultural Museum is a nonprofit engaged in humanitarian and educational activities, with a sister organization, SCM Medical Missions, which focuses on medical relief. SCM started as a Seattle-based cultural organization focused on helping Americans get to know and understand Middle Eastern and North African peoples and culture. It was founded by a Jordanian woman, Rita Zawaideh, whom I’ve known since the 1980s, and evolved when the crisis in Syria began to unfold. Rita had lived in Syria as a teenager, and many Syrian refugees first spilled over into Jordan, so SCM provided both medical and humanitarian assistance in Jordan—and then in Lebanon, which has also been hugely impacted by the Syrian refugee crisis. Most recently they’ve added work in Greece. They’re holding a fundraiser in Seattle on May 20, 2017, which is also when Leaving Syria will be launched. They will be serving a traditional Middle Eastern dinner, and there will be a number of speakers—including myself. There will also be quite a few Syrian refugees, who live in Seattle now, available to tell their story. Anyone who lives in the Seattle area is welcome to attend.
The MOON: Despite the hostility many so-called Christians display towards the threat of a “Muslim invasion,” hasn’t it often been church groups that support many of the resettlement efforts in the U.S.?
Dienst: Yes, I think so. Mercy Corps, Church World Service, and several others are faith-based groups. It really does take a community of people to assist the transition—particularly because refugees arrive with so little. However, they often relocate among relatives, and the ones who have been here longer help the new arrivals. That process is under way now with Syrian refugees in Seattle and Spokane. It’s a very hard transition, and those who make it deserve our empathy and support.
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For more information about the process of vetting and settling refugees in the United States, visit: The International Rescue Committee.
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