News-Info-Alerts

Re: Lynch Rescuer Hit by Friendly Fire

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: May 03, 2003

"Allied Fire Hit Lawyer Who Aided U.S. POW
Iraqi Gets Treatment; Family Has Asylum

By Caryle Murphy Washington Post Staff Writer

The Iraqi lawyer who became an American hero for helping U.S. military forces rescue prisoner of war Jessica Lynch is undergoing treatment for a serious eye injury sustained when he came under allied fire in Iraq.

A source close to those who helped the 32-year-old lawyer, Mohammed Odeh Rehaief, come to this country said his injury occurred before Lynch's rescue, when the car he was riding in was hit by U.S. or British fire. At the time, Rehaief was making a clandestine trip to speak with U.S. Special Forces troops about the captured American soldier.

Earlier reports about Rehaief's role in rescuing Army Pfc. Lynch have said that he had to travel several miles outside the southern Iraqi town of Nasiriyah to reach a U.S. military checkpoint, at one point trekking through what U.S. Marines had nicknamed "Ambush Alley."

Rehaief's injury affects his sight in one eye, the source said.

Asked about the circumstances of Rehaief's injury, spokesmen for U.S. Army public affairs and for U.S. Central Command said yesterday that they had no information about the incident.

Lynch, 20, an Army supply clerk from West Virginia, was captured by Iraqi forces March 23 after an ambush on her convoy in Nasiriyah. Severely injured in the attack, she was in a nearby hospital when Rehaief saw her being slapped on the face by an Iraqi security officer.

Upset by the incident, Rehaief risked his life to contact U.S. military forces stationed outside Nasiriyah to tell them about Lynch's location. He made several subsequent trips to provide information about the hospital's layout to U.S. Special Forces, who rescued Lynch on April 1.

Rehaief, his wife and their 5-year-old daughter have been in the Washington area since April 10, and Rehaief has been receiving treatment at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. On Monday, they were granted political asylum. They were allowed into the country under a program called "humanitarian parole," which expedites entry into the United States and is often used in medical emergencies.

But a spokesman for the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services said yesterday that Rehaief was approved for humanitarian parole more for his own safety than for medical reasons.

"Quite honestly, it was the fastest way to get him and his family to safety in the United States," said spokesman Bill Strassberger.

Rehaief has accepted a job with a Washington-based lobbying firm, the Livingston Group, according to one of its consultants, James Pruitt. The firm is headed by former U.S. representative Bob Livingston (R-La.).

© 2003 The Washington Post Company"