Making Great Strides

Chaldean Community Foundation’s Iraq Mission

By Mike Sarafa

It was day two in Iraq. We were still jet lagged. Several in our delegation were born in Iraq but had never been back. We stepped off the van and into a tiny village that appeared to be unchanged from a couple hundred years ago. While modernity and progress had passed it by, war and destruction did not. Maybe 250 families live here, we were told. It was the Christian village located in the Nineveh Plain just a short mile from Telkaif. For this group, it was our first opportunity to see what had become of our ancestral homeland. Emotions were raw.

We boarded back on the van after a short visit, anxious to head into Telkaif before dusk. You could have cut the silence with a knife. As tears rolled down the eyes of these grown men, it was then that we vowed to turn this trip into more than a sightseeing opportunity. Action was needed. Arkan Jonna later stated, “[this] must be seen and dealt with.”

Making good on a pledge that was made that day, a fundraiser was held at the home of Wissam and Efnan Kashat, raising $35,000. Those funds will support the construction and furnishings of a workshop in the town Batnaya, described above, that will create jobs and help support a small group of special needs children and adults that live there.

“You can’t look at the situation of these people and go home and forget about it,” said Wissam Kashat, a delegation member. “We wanted to make sure we did something to help.”

Wissam relayed this story about the evening at his home: The event included a presentation, some short talks, and a video regarding the plight of Christians in the Nineveh Plain. The hosts had hired some staff to help with service and cleaning. They were Chaldean and more recent immigrants and were listening and watching during the program. At the end of the evening, the Kashats went to pay for their service. Having been moved by what they heard and saw and having themselves fled that exact situation, they refused to accept the money. They asked that those funds be donated to assist the people back home.

Karamlesh is a small Chaldean town, also in Iraq’s Nineveh Plain, with a long agricultural history. For centuries, the town has been known for its fertile lands, which have produced a variety of crops such as wheat, barley, and vegetables. However, due to a lack of water supply, which is required for irrigation, the town’s agricultural output has declined in recent years. The canal that irrigates Karamlesh’s lands has been suffering from a lack of water due to a variety of factors, including low rainfall, climate change, and water diversion to other regions.

The town’s growth and prosperity have been hampered by a lack of water. Many farmers have been forced to abandon their lands, causing the town’s economy and overall well-being to suffer. For years, residents have been looking for a solution to the water crisis, with little success.

Thanks to a generous $50,000 donation from Michigan businessman Chris Yatooma, and the efforts of retired civil engineer Dave Nona, the CCF’s Iraq Mission is going to spearhead the building of a water well in Karamlesh. “You can’t help but be moved into action,” said Yatooma, a delegation member and owner of Citizen’s State Bank.

Several other initiatives borne out of last fall’s trip to Iraq are being spearheaded by the Foundation.

The Nineveh Plain Box Initiative intends to let Iraqi Americans and others subscribe to a quarterly program where goods and merchandise made in northern Iraq are shipped to people’s homes here in the United States. “It’s a win/win kind of program,” said Tommy Haji with the CCF. “Chaldeans here will receive items from their ancestral homeland while supporting small businesses there at the same time.” It is modeled after a program that does something similar in partnership with the Holy Land.

Also, the CCF has partnered with a travel agency to begin annual pilgrimages to the Nineveh Plain region. These trips promise to reconnect Iraqi American immigrants to their ancestral homeland while also creating an opportunity for American-born Chaldeans to visit the birthplaces of their parents and grandparents.

“All of these things are equally important,” said Martin Manna, president of the Chaldean Community Foundation and Chaldean American Chamber of Commerce. “But amongst equals, these ongoing pilgrimages will expose more people to the situation on the ground in northern Iraq. That will help create more awareness and ultimately more resources to continue our work there.”

Importantly, the Iraq Mission and all the related projects are being supported by the Chaldean Community Foundation – Iraq Mission. This includes two full-time staff people in Iraq that oversee the Mission’s projects and help ensure accountability and progress. They will also be directly involved in helping to host the participants of the annual pilgrimages. This entity is being legally formalized and recognized in Iraq both by the central government in Baghdad and the by the Kurdish Regional Government.

Finally, in an historic achievement, through the encouragement the Iraq Mission Committee of the CCF, Congress has introduced a resolution that will further the politics necessary to achieve greater equality inside Iraq for religious minorities. It reads in part:

Resolved, That the United States House of Representatives —

(1) protects and upholds that the fundamental human right and dignity of the religious and ethnic minority communities of Iraq should be a policy priority of the United States and the international community;

(2) supports the restoration of security, stability, and economic opportunity of, as well as the safe, dignified, and voluntary return of the displaced Indigenous peoples to the territories of Mosul, Baaj, Sinjar, and the Nineveh Plain, and other ancestral homelands of minority religious and ethnic communities, and should be a policy priority of United States and the international community;

(3) supports the restoration of homes, schools, churches and other religious sites, and community buildings of religious and ethnic minority communities in these regions should receive a specific and enduring budget allocation by the Iraqi Government, as well as continued support from international aid donors;

(4) supports the effective representation in consultation with members of the Indigenous population, including internally displaced members of religious and ethnic minority communities is essential to restoring and upholding the rights of these communities, in line with Article 125 of the Constitution of Iraq, which states that the Constitution ‘‘shall guarantee the administrative, political, cultural, and educational rights of the various nationalities, such as Turkmen, Chaldeans, Assyrians, and all other constituents, and this shall be regulated by law’’; and

(5) supports greater regional integration for minority groups in Iraq and encourages the Secretary of State to promote opportunities for affected minority groups to achieve greater administrative autonomy within the federal structure of the Republic.

In conclusion, there is much work to be done, but many hands (and hearts) make the work lighter.

Mike Sarafa is one of the original publishers of the Chaldean News and host of a short-form podcast, Mike’s Musings.