Back in the Middle East

Eid Mubarrak. As the whole Muslim world commemorates Ibraham's willingness to obey God through sacrifice I pray that people will be convicted by the story of Eid al-Adha that while God asks for obedience he never wills the death of innocents.

Apologies for my silence over the last month. I've been waiting for something positive to say about my abducted friends from CPT, but unfortunately there is nothing to report yet. Things seem to have gone stagnant and we only have rumours and theorising to go on. What we know for sure is that CPT's work is appreciated by a great number of Iraqis, Palestinians and Muslims around the world with whom we'd had no contact prior to the incident, and I am grateful and humbled by the depth of this support. In Palestine some friends of the team actually lost their jobs because they dropped everything to work full time on the case. I met two particularly brave people, Anas from Britain and Ehab from Canada, who travelled to Iraq to lobby for their release.

For my part I'm embarrassed to admit that since 20 December I've been on holiday. There did not seem to be anything much I could add to what others were doing by being in the region and so I stuck to my plans to spend Christmas in America with my fiance trying to plan our wedding (unfortunately we eventually ruled out Baghdad as a venue! It's likely to happen in the summer in two parts, one in the US and one in the UK, possibly with some follow up celebrations in the Middle East) and then New Year in England seeing many family and friends for the first time in many months.

Of course I've been glued to email and the phone through this period and continually aware that somewhere in Iraq those four wonderful people are now entering the 7th week of their ordeal. And many others besides including some kidnapped Iraqis I'm trying to help and one of my first and closest Iraqi friend who is being detaineed by US soldiers. I just heard about Jill Carroll's abduction. She was one of Marla Ruzicka's dear friends and I was moved by her words at Marla's memorial service in Baghdad last April. Jill has written consistently insightful articles in the CSM over the last few years. Tragically her translator Alan (a friend of Riverbend) was killed in the abduction. It is frustrating that so much time and energy is being drained from those reporting the truth in Iraq through the kidnapping of people like the CPTers and Jill.

Anyhow I'm back in the region now and I value all of your prayers for my friends and all those suffering in Iraq. May 2006 be the year when the tide turns against occupation and sectarian violence and the country begins to move towards peace, justice and prosperity. Inshallah.