DPs 0
Yes, when I was young, that’s what they were called.
DPs.
Displaced Persons.
Now it’s more fashionable to call them refugees.
The Current Federal Administration has created a bumper crop of them in Iraq, but has failed to accept responsibility for its actions.
(And this surprise us how?)
Trudy Rubin discusses the harvest and the craven, despicable failure of the Current Federal Administration to see to the safety of those Iraqis who have aided it (emphasis added):
He’s right. Things could get worse. But Iraqis already face a humanitarian nightmare as millions of refugees flee their homes to escape ethnic cleansing. More than 2 million are displaced within Iraq, and 2.2 million have poured into neighboring countries, according to U.N. agencies. That’s around a sixth of Iraq’s entire population, many living in desperate conditions, with tens of thousands still escaping monthly.
This is a refugee crisis of a magnitude that can destabilize the entire region. So why didn’t it rate a mention in the president’s speech?
“I’m very puzzled by why it’s gotten such short shrift,” says Kenneth Bacon, president of Refugees International, one of the few international aid agencies addressing the problem.
But we know the reason. As Bacon points out, administration policy is to stabilize Iraq so refugees can go home. Meantime – with stability still a mirage – refugee flows are on the rise as the desperate run for their lives.
This refugee crisis creates a security threat to the region – and a moral challenge to the United States. Among the current and potential refugees are thousands of Iraqis who have been threatened with death because they worked with U.S. officials. Many have risked their lives to help Americans, yet the United States has been pitifully slow in helping those under direct threat. In July, the U.S. ambassador to Baghdad, Ryan Crocker, urged the administration to grant immigrant visas to all embassy staff members in need, after nine U.S. embassy employees had been killed, including a married couple who were kidnapped and executed.
And, of course, as long as the Current Federal Administration continues to play its tune that “Everything is coming out roses!” over there, innocents will continue to die.
For a lie.
