Ask Sister Beth Murphy about her recent trip to Iraq and she’ll tell you about Hussein, a four-year-old boy who was hiding under his bed in a hospital room in Basrah. Hussein had neuroblastoma. During treatment he contracted hepatitis; his doctor said Hussein had only a few months to live.
On Wednesday, Murphy, a Dominican nun from Springfield, spoke at the Lincoln Library about her two-week stay in Iraq, where she joined a delegation of U.S. religious leaders on what they called a “peace journey.”
Hussein and millions of other Iraqis are suspected of suffering from the aftereffects of depleted-uranium bombs, which were dropped by the United States 12 years ago during the Persian Gulf War. Depleted uranium is an especially dense metal that can easily pierce heavy armor, such as tanks, and reach high levels of temperature upon impact. According to the Department of Defense, the U.S. military dropped about 320 tons of it on Iraq during the Gulf War–and not always on intended targets. Though our government acknowledges that depleted uranium carries alpha radiation, it claims this is not enough to cause adverse health effects.
That point, however, is widely disputed. And not just by Iraqis. Depleted uranium is considered a key contributor to what’s become known as Gulf War Syndrome. Iraqi physicians, according to Murphy, claim that up to 40 percent of the population in some regions of the country will die prematurely because of radiation poisoning from those bombs.
Murphy wants to let U.S. citizens know how our government’s bombs and foreign policy have affected the Iraqi people. Bombs have left behind a dust storm of loose radioactive isotopes, some claim, and sanctions imposed since the Gulf War have decimated an economy still suffering from the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s. True, Saddam Hussein has persecuted his own citizens and has evidently used chemical weapons against them. Even so, Murphy said there’s a perception among Iraqi citizens that the U.S.– not Saddam–is out to get them because it hates Muslims and Arabs.
But what about Saddam Hussein? Isn’t he to blame for Iraq’s problems?
“He’s a dictator and a tyrant,” Murphy says. “But he’s not the worst in the world or even in the Middle East.”
A common misconception among Americans is that Iraq’s human rights record is one of the worst in the world. It’s bad, Murphy says, but no worse than North Korea’s, and the U.S. is working much more diplomatically with that country. Or what about Israel, America’s strongest ally in the Middle East? Israel’s record on human rights is terrible. Saddam Hussein might be an “evil doer,” Murphy says, but his status as Iraqi ruler is complicated by the fact that the U.S. helped put him there in the late 1970s and that this country depends on Middle Eastern oil reserves.
In addition to the dangers of the depleted uranium, Murphy’s also concerned about religious persecution in Iraq. Anti-American sentiment has translated into anti-Christian sentiment. Before the Gulf War, relations between Muslims and Christian were cordial if not positive. Since then, persecution against Christians has grown. One message she’s bringing back to the U.S. is from Iraqi Christians, who fear that a U.S. attack will not only lead to anarchy in Iraq but to the widespread massacre of Christians there as well.
During her trip, Murphy kept a journal. In Basrah, which was bombed by the U.S., she wrote the streets are “a war zone. Children play in open sewers and garbage dumps. The canals, stitched to and fro with quaint footbridges reminiscent of Venice, are now a slough full of refuse, oil, and waste. . .
“Basrah is a hellhole. But it is also where God lives. Here Gabriel Kassab, the Chaldean Archbishop of Basrah, and the Chaldean and Dominican Sisters who work with him, provide services for the Muslim and Christian children and families of Basrah. The services include shoes and medicine, housing for the poor, kindergartens, and a computer lab that trains children and adults. What happens if a new war destroys this community and these fragile programs?”
The better route, she says, is diplomacy. Why not lead the world in reconciliation instead of war? Iraq is the perfect place to demonstrate that the U.S. can handle its role as the only remaining super power in the world with humility and grace. She says that starts by admitting our mistakes and righting our wrongs.
And if no one listens to her?
That’s OK, Murphy says. In about a week she’ll head to Brazil to address attendees of the World Social Forum, a meeting of international groups seeking to humanize the effects of globalization.
A daily journal of Murphy’s trip can be read online at www.paxchristiusa.org.
Click on “Iraq Peace Journey.”
This article appears in Jun 26 – Jul 2, 2003.
