Headed to Iraq...

Headed to Iraq
October 2, 2002

Hi everyone,

This will be a lengthy letter.

I just wanted to let those of you who are tech-savvy know that I will be doing a live tv interview TOMORROW (Thursday) at 3:30 pm. This will be broadcast on streaming web video via internet, so you may log on at www.kollegeville.com (yes with a 'k') at that time. The topic is middle east peacemaking, Israel/Palestine and Iraq. Guess I'd better get some beauty sleep...

Next, I am updating my lists for Palnotes (my list), the Hebron team list, and my action alerts and articles lists. If you are on some and don't want to be, let me know this week. If you aren't and do want to be, same goes.

Next, if your congregation or other group would like CPT literature in small quantities (like the Signs of the Times quarterly newsletter highlighting all of the projects, free or free-will donation to subscribe), please send me a mailing address and I'll take care of it for you. Or if you want to subscribe yourself also.

And then, if you know radio stations or newspapers who would like to interview Iowa CPT workers who are traveling to Iraq on an emergency humanitarian delegation in October, please also let me know. I am more than happy to do press work. I'm not really available to travel out of town any more than I've already scheduled, but can do lots over the phone or email.

If you read the Des Moines Register yesterday, call them up and tell them they did a
lousy and irresponsible job. Or at least a lousy job portraying CPT as irresponsible. Meanwhile, the Globe did a far superior article with actual facts about the humanitarian situation in Iraq necessitating such a trip and actual reasons for us going. I like my reporter over there an awful darn lot, as you all can tell.

So anyway, as the press got hold of it yesterday, the time has come to tell you I will be going to Iraq as part of a CPT emergency humanitarian delegation. We will be accompanying civilian areas such as schools, hospitals, and bomb shelters, and documenting and reporting on the situation, particularly if US military activity results in civilian losses. The Iraq Peace Team will ultimately comprise over 100 people arriving over several weeks throughout the winter. In addition, the team will be carrying in and distributing $20-$30,000 worth of vital hospital supplies, particularly leukemia medications. (Leukemia and other cancers, as well as serious birth defects, have skyrocketed since the first Gulf War and the US-sponsored UN sanctions do not permit hospital supplies to enter.) I anticipate staying 2-6 weeks depending on conditions, then returning to Hebron for my usual 3 month stint. This brings me back home about late Feb-early March. My teammates and good friends Peggy Gish and Anne Montgomery are going with me, a group of about 15, joining others on the ground from Voices in the Wilderness.

I have spent a great deal of time thinking through the possible consequences and penalties of my actions, as it violates US law for US citizens to travel to countries deemed 'enemy territory.' It is also against the law to distribute the medicines. I have consulted with the seminary, my team, and several of you already in forming my decision to engage in civil disobedience. It is possible I could serve jail time or be fined when I return. I have decided to refuse any fines imposed on me, and am willing to serve jail time, but will speak out publicly as much as possible before, during, and after, should that eventuality occur. Voices has led 45 educational and humanitarian delegations to Iraq in defiance of the sanctions, and has been penalized considerably lightly given the provisions of the law. So we shall see. I am of course nervous, but my experience of leading two emergency delegations in Palestine, as well as living and working through two invasions, as well as Voices' carefully built relationships with the local community in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities, gives me a sense of what to expect. While I am anxious about the process of getting there, being there, and then getting back to Hebron, I also feel a calm resolve and have since the opportunity to participate was offered to me.

Anybody got a used video camera? Just checking my options. I tried to bribe KIMT the other day, no luck so far. (I promised first crack at the pictures).

But enough for now. I did three speeches and an interview today and got called up to do three more talks, all work and no play are making me duller by the minute. I got a potluck dinner in my honor tonight at the Presbyterians and will do another one with the Wesleyan Methodists and it looks like I'll have plenty of stored reserves to insulate me through the winter over there. Pass the hot dish...

Le Anne