"Sending a Better Message to the People of Iraq" by Siun at Firedoglake

Editor's Note: This post is from our friend Siun at Firedoglake. Meant to get it up on Friday for World Refugee Day but other factors conspired to delay. Please read and respond -- with prayers, words and dollars. -- Mike+

Friday was World Refugee Day. Thursday, the House passed an Iraq Supplemental with no deadlines for withdrawal and with funding for the occupation into next year.

Every day in Iraq, the Iraqi Red Crescent workers put their lives on the line to bring food, water, and medical care to their fellow Iraqis. Scores of these humanitarian workers have been kidnapped, murdered and harassed by death squads. Reports of raids on Red Crescent offices by our forces are frequent. Yet they keep on working – doing all they can to bring relief to internally displaced Iraqis and to their neighbors across Iraq. IRC is the only organization still bringing such aid to every region of Iraq and across all sectarian lines.

In honor of World Refugee Day, many of us are working to flood the IRC with donations – and even if you can only donate a little, they will put every bit to work. This is one small way we can show our opposition to the occupation and our concern for the devastation our country is causing the Iraqi people.

To send a donation, click here and select “Iraq Humanitarian Response” in the “I want my contribution to go here” box. 100% of your donation will go directly to assisting Iraq Red Crescent’s work. Here's what your donation will buy:

Every 15 days, Iraqi Red Crescent networks deliver food rations that include flour, rice, sugar, vegetable oil, tomato paste, salt, jam, spaghetti, lentils, tea, sardines, and cheese. The $33.50 USD cost per family ration covers the expense of the food, distribution, transport and security. (These rations are delivered to 200,000 families.)

A share of non-food items contains 4 blankets, a cooking stove, lantern, 2 jerry cans, a kitchen set and thermos, which are distributed every three months at a cost of $99.50 USD per family.
(These supplies are delivered to 50,000 families.)

Since it is World Refugee Day, here’s an overview of the work IRC did last year for the Internally displaced families in Iraq :

Since March 2006, the Iraqi Red Crescent maintained a humanitarian aid operation to assist IDP and destitute families through the distribution of food and non-food relief items. This is in addition to distribution of gifts on national occasions, kitchen sets, school kits, fuel and water and provision of basic medical care to IDP residing in the Iraqi Red Crescent camps. More than 11,625 volunteers are contributing to this operation.

Since March 2006, the Iraqi Red Crescent distributed 584,093 food shares, 322,134 shares of relief items and 271,481 hygiene kits to IDP and destitute families. This distribution took place through the Iraqi Red Crescent branches and offices in the 18 governorates. Other humanitarian aid distributions took place through the Iraqi Red Crescent Headquarters to local non-governmental organizations, orphanages and institutions serving special vulnerable groups. In April 2008, distributions took place in Baghdad, Basra, Diwaniya and Dohuk governorates, where the Iraqi Red Crescent branches distributed 3,559 food baskets and 767 relief shares, in addition to wheat flour and rice in Baghdad.

And you can listen here to hear IRC president Dr. Said Hakki describe their recent efforts during the Sadr City siege and their work to rebuild neighborhoods in Baghdad.

Sending a donation to support these efforts seems the least we can do as our Congress continues to approve funds for the very occupation that leads to these conditions.

Again, to send a donation, click here and select “Iraq Humanitarian Response” in the “I want my contribution to go here” box. 100% of your donation will go directly to assisting Iraq Red Crescent’s work.

Our friends at Crooks and Liars, EENR Progressive Blog, Main and Central, Florida Speaks, Slobber and Spittle, and Episcopalians for Global Reconciliation will be joining in (sorry we're late to the party - MK!) - let us know of any other links we can add to this list.

Two good posts for background can be found at A Refugee Story (h/t Laura) and at Cujo's Iraq's Refugees Eight Months Later.

How are we as Christians engaged in the world?

by Abbie Coburn

I struggle with being an Episcopalian.

I struggle with the priorities of what seems to me to too often be an antiquated, hierarchal structure where who’s rubbing elbows with whom is the most discussed topic. I struggle with faith being separated from daily life in such a way that ‘following in Christ’s footsteps’ becomes a diluted phrase, rather than a way of transforming one’s life.

How’s that for an introduction?

This past weekend there was international mobilization against the current U.S. occupation in Iraq. All across the country (and various parts of the world) there were marches, demonstrations and teach-ins. I hope that some of you reading this were able to participate in your local community.

As I marched in San Francisco I chose to join the contingency from the War Tax Resisters. These are people who choose to resist paying varying percentages of their taxes as a protest against the absurd amount of federal funds being used for the purposes of war. As there wasn’t a large contingency of folks of faith marching together, I chose instead to align myself with war tax resisters, a lifestyle I choose to lead as well.

It seems to me appropriate to be a person of faith and a tax resister. Would Jesus not be a tax resister as well. Or that he would at least not be paying taxes to our current US government. If our government is doing so little to address issues such as the Millennium Development Goals, but rather is continuing to be responsible for the killing of thousands daily, is it not my duty to stand up and say ‘NO’? For all our banner-bearing, petition-signing, email-sending that goes on, is it not our faith that really pulls at us when injustice is occurring? When we can see with our own eyes that we are directly responsible for such atrocities throughout the world, why in God’s name do we continue to be herded?

Marching with thousands on Saturday, however, was a touching experience. A highlight of how disjointed the peace movement(s) is, as well as a testimony to diversity in the exhaustion with our current state of affairs. In front of me marched Palestinian women pushing their strollers and holding the hands of their small children, chanting for an end to the US-funded occupation of Palestine. As 10,000 of us fell to the ground in a symbolic die-in along Market Street a mother of a young Marine lay next to me loudly reciting her Hail Marys. I found it comforting that someone was calling upon God to be present as we lay there in protest to the injustices done in our names.

Yes, it is important to divert 0.7% of funds to the MDGs. But isn’t it also important to make sure that the 99.3% of funds is not used to support killing and suffering throughout the world. And when we find out facts such as 51% of the federal budget going towards military expenses (which obviously is not getting to the military families), how can we continue, in good conscious, to pay that money? I find that there is immense amounts of fear involved with standing up – fear of the government, fear of jail, fear of alienation. Aren’t these all fears that Jesus and his disciples faced as well? And fears that they in turn cast aside in order to live a life more meaningful.

The time for action has come. The repercussions are but blips on the screen. The injustices have reached a cataclysmic roar and we must not turn a deaf ear. We must not sit idly by debating, as Christians with immense privilege, the best ways to move forward. But, rather we must charge. With the convictions that Christ has showed us. Casting aside fear and living fully with faith in a life more meaningful.

Abbie Coburn is a 23-year old from San Francisco who has lived in Zimbabwe, attended the international school, Friends World Program, and has worked in Palestine with Birthright Unplugged. Currently traveling around the U.S. with Wheels of Justice -- which organizes education and nonviolent action for justice and human rights, especially in Iraq and Palestine.

Tomorrow: The Rev. Jay Lawlor