Category: Iraqi refugees

Tent cities coming to a neighborhood near you?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Jumping from Syracuse, NY to Boise, ID this morning, we have another story of US refugees about to be evicted, this time because they have no jobs and their rent subsidies are about to end.

One Iraqi family, brought to the United States from war-torn Baghdad and resettled in Boise with refugee status, may soon face an eviction notice at their new home.

In two weeks, Walid and Samira Waheed and their three children will reach the end of their six months of rental assistance. They have no savings, and, largely because of the declining job market, they have not found work. They do not have rent money for March.

“I am happy in Boise,” Walid Waheed said. “Please help us.”

Waheed is just the tip of the iceberg. More than 1,000 refugees resettled in Idaho in the last year, most expecting to quickly find jobs and become self-sufficient.

But now, with their welcome benefits running out and no work in sight, refugee families are facing the stark possibility of becoming internally displaced people in the very nation that offered them refuge.

Tent cities!  A Boise community manager is shocked to learn there are no solutions.  Although I feel for her, it wasn’t too long ago I read about how wonderful and welcoming Boise was to refugees and immigrants generally.   I’m not sure I can find it now*, but they even reportedly had city benches painted with “welcoming” messages to immigrants.  So the city shares some blame for not looking ahead.

According to community manager Barbara Seguin Du Haime, another two families have funding through March, but come April, she will have nine refugee families facing eviction.

“I was just amazed to learn that there aren’t solutions out there,” she said. “What happens to Boise? Are we going to have tent cities?”

World Relief says they are short $5000 a month for upcoming rents.

Jones said World Relief is still compiling the numbers, but needs about $5,000 a month to continue paying rent for unemployed refugees.

Tent cities in the US or left to die?   Oh, come on, the choice is not that stark.  Many of the refugees we have written about are not on the verge of death where they were, some like the Iraqi family we told you about yesterday were doing o.k. in Jordan.

Moore, at IRC, said communities across the country that have taken in refugees are all facing the same dilemma: a potential wave of refugees losing their housing.

“It’s a real possibility across the country,” Moore said. “It’s almost a question of playing God. Are you going to bring them here to have a difficult resettlement experience, or are you going to leave them there to die?”

How about going to the top dogs at the IRC and asking them to contribute their six figure salaries (from the US taxpayer) to these poor families you are bringing to Boise and other US cities.   Maybe if that happened the refugee spigot would be turned off for awhile.

*Update:   I found it!  The “Welcome the Stranger” campaign.  Now maybe they can use those benches for seating in the tent cities!

Iraqi refugee: Why did the US bring so many refugees if they aren’t ready to host them?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

For Iraqi refugees that is the question.  I’ve read at least 20 stories about unhappy Iraqi refugees in 15 states,  but this one is probably the most wrenching.

The subject of this story is a well-educated and formerly prosperous Iraqi family resettled in Oakland, CA.   From Oakland North, it begins:

When I knocked on the door of an apartment building in East Oakland, a woman’s voice nervously asked who I was. The voice belonged to a 45-year-old woman who wishes to be identified only as S. Mohamad because she fears prosecution [Editor: persecution?] in her native Iraq; she is a former radiologist who came here as a refugee three months ago along with her husband and their three children. She hid behind the door because she was without a headscarf; Muslim women usually wear one to cover their hair when they are around anyone but family or other women.

The family which apparently had been doing well in Jordan was resettled to California because of availability of cheap housing (is that because people are leaving CA in droves?).  But, as we learned yesterday, California has no jobs.

Mohamad, her husband and children left everything behind and at first found refuge in Jordan. They lived in Amman for two and half years before applying to the United Nations refugee program to obtain legal papers and avoid deportation. They were accepted into the program and granted refuge in the United States. The International Rescue Committee (IRC), a nonprofit group that works with the U.S. State Department to help refugees resettle in the United States, relocated Mohammad’s family to East Oakland because of its affordable rental houses.

The number of Iraqis coming to the US will increase.  The Presidential determination for 2009 is 17,000, but NGO’s are pushing for up to 100,000 this year (see yesterday’s post here).    I’m puzzled by this next quote from the article about where the Iraqis are resettled.   The State Department knows exactly where they are resettled.  But, within three months or so refugees are free to move wherever they want and are not tracked, so I suppose that is what is being referred to here.   One downside of not tracking is that any refugee who began treatment for TB can readily fall through the cracks, but I’m digressing.

There were 13,000 Iraqi refugees admitted to the United States in 2008, according to the State Department’s resettlement program, and the IRC says it expects that number to increase to 17,000 this year. The records do not break down the number of refugees in each state because the State Department stopped tracking them more than a decade ago. “I think they stopped tracking the refugees in the States because it costs a lot of money to do the job,” said Don Climent, the regional director of the IRC’s office in San Francisco.

Then this was a shocker.  The family was safe in Jordan but they feel the same insecurity in Oakland as they did in Baghdad!

There is the also the problem of security. Many Iraqi refugees feel shocked and frustrated when they realize that they have to deal with security-part of the reason they had run away from home-again. Mohamad’s 21-year-old son made his own security, buying pepper spray and a knife to protect his life. “I only felt safe in Jordan and all I did is to focus on my study,” he said. “But here, I found the United States similar to Baghdad. I changed my old nice clothes into saggy ones to blend in. I avoided passing any young men group standing in a corner of the street. I tried to put my wallet, phone and my ID in different places in my clothes. I have to struggle to stay safe in Oakland.”

The article goes on to tell more of the travails this family is experiencing including the biggest of all—joblessness.

My eyes are dry of tears,” his mother said as she considered her family’s situation. “I cannot see well because I cried so hard. I just wish I could go back home but I could not. I have no family left there, my house is rented and I can not just ask the residents to leave because I will have to go through the court and that means many papers and time and money. It is not safe yet for us to go back and I’m torn between longing to go back and my children’s safety and future. “

We are alone, we struggle by ourselves.

“We did not leave our country for fun-all my concern was my children’s safety and their future,” she continued. “We struggle to learn the American system here by ourselves and it is very hard. How am I supposed to learn all this and get a job in a month? Why [did the] U.S. bring big numbers [of refugees here] if they are not ready to host them? I do not have any relatives in the United States like some have to rely on. I cannot go home now. I sold everything I have in Jordan, and I can not go back to Baghdad because we will be targeted.”

She broke into tears.

Why Mrs. Mohamad?   You were brought here as political footballs.  You were used by the likes of Refugees International which wanted to score political points in Washington against the Bush Administration.   And, you were brought here to keep these resettlement agencies like the IRC in business.

I’m getting tired of repeating it and Judy has written often on it as well,  but for families like this one, all efforts should have been made jointly with the UNHCR, the government of Jordan, our government and the new Iraqi government to keep these people safe in the region.  Obviously they were doing fine in Jordan and funding should have been found to keep them comfortable and safe there until they could go back to Iraq and be part of re-building the new country.   Instead Iraq will continue to see a brain drain as educated people like the Mohamad’s rot in Oakland on welfare.

Learn more about Iraqi refugees in our special category here.

Part III: Refugee Council USA tells Obama we need to resettle 45,000 Iraqis this year

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I’ve been telling you about the briefing book prepared by the Refugee Council USA (RCUSA) for Obama and the 111th Congress.   (See Part I and Part II)

Today I’m writing about the section (page 6) entitled:  Iraqi Humanitarian and Displacement Crisis. 

Right off the bat, I’m ticked off.  They define the problem with this first sentence:  “Millions of Iraqis have been violently displaced and made vulnerable since the 2003 war.”   But, they never tell you that many of these same groups that make up RCUSA were coping with possibly hundreds of thousands of refugees from Iraq BEFORE the war because of Saddam Hussein’s policies.    But, telling us that some of these refugees have been refugees earlier than 2003 does not suit their political agenda!

They go on to recommend that we resettle 45,000 Iraqis in the next 12 months.

Then here is something we have been warning about for some time.  There are Palestinian refugees in camps along the border between Iraq and Syria that no Muslim country will resettle.  The pressure is on for us to take the Palestinians.  Here is the recommendation from this group:

Create a priority two processing category to resettle Palestinians forced out of their homes in Iraq and particularly those languishing in camps near the Syrian border.

These Palestinians are refugees because they are persecuted by their fellow Muslims.  There is however no special treatment recommended for Christian Iraqis being persecuted by Muslims.

Obviously refugee lobbying groups are not on the same page.   Here is a roundup of Iraqi refugee resettlement wishlists:

Refugees International wants 105,500.

Obama’s friends at the Center for American Progress will only be happy with an airlift of  100,000.

And, Human Rights First wants a paltry 60,000 over two years.

Meanwhile there are no jobs for Iraqi refugees, or most other refugees either.

Cool graphic: Where have all the resettled Iraqis gone?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I missed this back in December, it’s a very useful graphic at the Baltimore Sun showing where the 15,000 Iraqis we have brought to the US have been resettled.  Check it out here.    Note that the top resettlement states for Iraqis are California, Michigan, Arizona, Texas and Illinois.

No Iraqis were resettled in Montana and Wyoming (possibly other small states in the east as well, it’s just that the graphic is not clear).     This reminds me.  Montana takes only a handful of refugees while Wyoming has completely opted out of the refugee resettlement program.  I have been trying to find out for over a year how Wyoming got out, but no one will tell me.  Apparently a state can get out!

We are told over and over again  that refugees are resettled where there is the best chance for them to find work and become independent.   That is not true.  They are resettled in a willy-nilly fashion by the non-profit government contractors depending on where they have offices that need to keep government funds coming in.

Look at this list of states experiencing the highest unemployment rates and note that many are also the states where the Iraqis are being resettled.   California and Michigan are in the top 4 states with the most unemployment and they are the top two Iraqi refugee resettlement states.  Now does that make any sense?

Just a reminder we have written about Iraqi refugees who cannot find work and are unhappy enough to make it into a news story, these are the states we have identified where recent Iraqi arrivals are not finding jobs.  No correlation it seems between the states with the worst unemployment figures—there are just no jobs anywhere for refugees:

The fifteen states we have written about so far that have no jobs for Iraqi refugees are Arizona, Maryland, New Hampshire,Virginia, New York, Michigan, Ohio, Georgia, Idaho, Connecticut, New Mexico, California, North Carolina, Utah and Washington.

And yet the refugee pushers(!) are asking for as many as a 100,000 Iraqis to be resettled this fiscal year (summary here).  But, now that Obama has opened the welfare spigot in the bailout bill, I guess the sky is the limit.

Endnote:  I wonder if anyone has correlated the immigrant numbers in a state with the state’s economic distress.   We know for instance that California has huge immigrant numbers and is also the state in the most dire economic situation.  Does anyone know if there is such a study?

Boise, Idaho: No job for Iraqi father of eight

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

The stories are coming every week, will they be daily soon?    We have reports from 15 states* that there are no jobs for Iraqi refugees.   Surely other refugees are experiencing the same problem, but it seems the Iraqis  attract more news coverage.

Oregon Public Broadcasting has this report from Boise, Idaho where refugees are still pouring in despite the desperate economy.   The story of Iraqi truck driver Kaled Wali is told with the help of an interpreter.  His government assistance is running out, he has no job, he has 8 kids and his wife is ill.

Khaled Wali/Adel Muhammad: “The UN help me and my children. The UN gives him cash card for cash money monthly and this paper to food for my family. He save this because story for your children.”

Wali’s face softens as he explains the day he and his family found out they would be resettled in America. Now, all ten of them have been in Boise for nearly four months. They’re living on federal assistance; $1100 a month for rent and utilities; $1200 a month in food stamps. They also get Medicaid. But after 8 months all of the federal help goes away.

Sadie Babits: “After eight months what happens?”

Khaled Wali/Adel Muhammad: “I don’t know because don’t found any job here.”

Sadie Babits: “You don’t have a job in Boise?”

Khaled Wali/Adel Muhammad: “No. not yet.”

The International Rescue Committee (IRC) representative hopes no one will have to go to a shelter!  The IRC is one of the richest of the federal contractors.  Its CEO makes nearly $400,000 a year and it got $88 million of your tax dollars in the most recent year I could find (2005)—-hey President Obama, how about capping salaries of the non-profit CEOs too and keep the refugees they  bring to America out of shelters!

Leslye Moore is the executive director for the International Rescue Committee — the IRC — in Boise.

Leslye Moore: “You know the difference between an American not having a job and a refugee is that most Americans have a safety net of some kind built in. Refugees coming have nothing. They don’t have anything to fall back on so it’s a much more terrifying experience for them knowing there’s no work for them out there and wondering what their future is going to be.”

Unemployment in Idaho is the highest it’s been in 15 years. Major employers in Boise like Micron recently laid off some 1500 workers. That’s increased competition for entry-level jobs, which have historically been a good fit for refugees. And this isn’t just happening in Boise. Moore says resettlement agencies across the U.S. report major difficulties finding work for refugees.

Leslye Moore: “You know the last thing we want to do is put a refugee family in a shelter. We haven’t done it yet “

Once again, high expectations are not realized. 

Wali says he’s thankful to be here. But coming to America he had high expectations: a house, a new TV, and plenty of money. Now that he’s here he’s discovered just how unrealistic those expectations were. Adding to the disappointment and worry, Khaled Wali’s wife Zahra is sick. Doctors think she may have thyroid cancer.

By the way, the IRC is a part of the Refugee Council USA that wants to double the number of refugees we take in 2010.   So, it isn’t just Wali’s expectations that are unrealistic.

* The fifteen states we have written about so far that have no jobs for Iraqi refugees are Arizona, Maryland, New Hampshire,Virginia, New York, Michigan, Ohio, Georgia, Idaho, Connecticut, New Mexico, California, North Carolina, Utah and Washington.