An Iraqi Interpreter’s Story
By Michael J. Totten
MJT: Anything you want to say that I didn’t ask you about?
Hammer: Because of the few bad Iraqis who work as interpreters for
the U.S., no one trusts us. But if you give me a gun I will fight harder than
the Americans. You can go home. I can’t. I have to live in this country. If the
Americans don’t give a Green Card to me and my family, I have to stay in this
prison.
At Camp Taji the First Cavalry Division thinks interpreters are the
enemy. They decided that interpreters who aren’t American citizens have to take
the American flag off their uniforms before they are allowed to enter the dining
facility.
I cried that day.
I wasn’t supposed to, but I complained. I said It’s okay for me to
die outside wearing the American flag, but I can’t eat wearing the American flag
with Americans? That was the worst day of my life with the American
Army.
I’ll tell you what I tell my family. If I die here, wrap me in the
American flag when you bury me. I don’t want to be wrapped in the flag of Iraq.
Hammer is looking for employment in and permanent relocation to the
United States for himself, his wife, and his son. If you can sponsor him for a
Green Card and help save his family, email him at superlink_par@yahoo.com and superlink_70@yahoo.com
