Re: Lynch & Rescuer Lawyer Reunite

Date: April 29, 2004

"Lynch, Iraqi who helped free her reunited

By Joseph R. Chenelly

(April 29, 2004) — WASHINGTON — Army veteran and former prisoner of war Jessica Lynch and Mohammed Odeh al-Rehaief last occupied the same room in the cardiac ward of the former Saddam Hussein Hospital in Al-Nasiriyah a year ago this month.

Earlier this month, they were reunited for the first time in Washington, D.C.

Lynch was part of the Army’s 507th Maintenance Company, which was ambushed after mistakenly driving into Nasiriyah on March 23, 2003. The U.S. military has credited al-Rehaief with risking his life to provide critical information that led to Lynch’s rescue April 1, 2003.

Al-Rehaief, an Iraqi citizen, said they spent their private hourlong meeting April 7 exchanging thanks, briefly discussing each other’s whirlwind year and promising to stay in touch.

”She was lovely,” he said after the reunion. “She looked very different than she did in (the) hospital. There, she was injured very badly and with very bad people. I am very happy to see she is safe and healing now.”

Al-Rehaief’s daughter, Abir, and wife, Iman, also met with Lynch.

Lynch declined to be interviewed for this story, instead releasing only a statement.

”Jessica was especially taken with Mohammed’s 6-year old daughter, who presented her with a portrait of an American soldier that she’d drawn,” Lynch’s spokesman, Stephen Goodwin, wrote in a statement.

”… Jessica looks forward to continuing her very special relationship with Mohammed and his family.”

Some media outlets criticized Lynch in the past year for not making herself available for a meeting with al-Rehaief.

”The truth is, meeting her was not my concern,” he said. “My concern is, she is safe, she is healthy.”

Both individuals were media darlings after being thrust into the national spotlight last April. Each released a book telling their separate stories. Lynch’s book, I Am a Soldier, Too: The Jessica Lynch Story by Rick Bragg, hit the New York Times best-seller list after being released last year on Veterans Day. Al-Rehaief’s Because Each Life is Precious hit bookstores a month earlier. They plan to exchange signed copies at a later time, said al-Rehaief.

According to Bragg’s book, Lynch says she was never slapped, interrogated, threatened or tortured in the hospital. Al-Rehaief has described seeing such a scene.

”Jessi said she never met Rehaief and does not recall anyone telling her they were bringing help,” Bragg writes. “She dreamed it would happen, but it never did.”

At the back of the book, the Lynch family thanks “the Iraqi citizens who aided Jessi” but do not mention al-Rehaief.

”She was hurt badly,” al-Rehaief points out. “She was tired and scared. I understand she does not remember me. The Marines remember me, though.”

A report from the Marine Corps said he was “instrumental” in the rescue.

”I am glad for the opportunity to meet her again,” he said. “I thanked her for being part of American soldiers who came to my country. I told her that I am sorry for what she suffered. I wish her a wonderful life.”

Al-Rehaief has lived in the Washington area since being granted humanitarian parole, a status typically awarded for urgent humanitarian cases. According to al-Rehaief, he was asked last year which country his family wanted to go to. They got their first choice and flew into Boston a few days later.

Al-Rehaief accepted a job shortly after he arrived in the United States with the Livingston Group, a lobbying firm. Al-Rehaief evaluates potential clients in Iraq and other Middle Eastern countries. He hopes to someday work for the Iraqi Embassy in Washington.

But not everything is perfect for the family. They have had to move several times because of threats, he said.

”There are some Muslims who believe that any Muslim who helps America is bad. They believe God upset with me, and they have to kill me to make God happy again. It is ridiculous. There is one God and he loves all. I am not concerned for me — but my daughter … but my wife — I worry about them. We cannot give up being who we are, though.”

His daughter bears scars she doesn’t understand yet. According to al-Rehaief, Abir was diagnosed with tuberculosis a few years ago. Iraqi doctors removed a lung. Her father later found the doctor lied because a senior Baath Party leader had a daughter who needed a lung.

They would like to return to Iraq in the future, al-Rehaief says, but only as visitors.

METRO[at]DemocratandChronicle[dot]com

About the writer
Joseph R. Chenelly, 27, is a U.S. Marine Corps reservist and a 1995 graduate of Fairport High School. While on duty in Iraq, he wrote columns for the Democrat and Chronicle. Chenelly was the first war correspondent to talk to Odeh al-Rehaief about his role in Jessica Lynch's rescue.


©2004 Rochester Democrat and Chronicle"