No Friends Left Behind

[posted by Callimachus]

She belongs in America.

American Reporter Steven Vincent and his translator Nour Al Khal were putting their lives on the line each day in Iraq to uncover the truth about sectarian violence. In August 2005 they were kidnapped by the very people they had been reporting on. Vincent was shot dead, becoming the first U.S. journalist murdered in Iraq.

This week, NOW's Maria Hinojosa travels to the Middle East to talk to Nour, an extraordinary woman who, despite being shot three times, survived. Like two million of her compatriots, Nour has fled Iraq and still fears for her life as a refugee in a neighboring country.

Now Vincent's widow, Lisa Ramaci, is doing everything she can to bring Nour to safety in the U.S. "We share Steven. She was his friend. He was my husband. But we both loved him in different ways," Ramaci tells NOW.

But Ramaci is facing an uphill battle, as the U.S. denies the entry of thousands of Iraqis like Nour who helped Americans in Iraq. In fact, only 466 Iraqi refugees have been permitted into the U.S. since the war began in 2003. What's next for Nour and millions of other refugees who are overwhelming cities across the Middle East?

On Steven Vincent's killing here and a follow-up from Reader here and some sorry examples of the anti-war reaction to it here.

If we must come home now, let's not come home alone. If you think this theme is becoming tiresome here, you'd better find another blog to read.

Anti-war blogger Richard Warnick also is fighting the good fight on this one. This ought to be something that transcends everything but a solid sense of right and wrong, obligations, and whether America really intends to continue to be what it says on that statue in the harbor.