I am a mother, and my children were kidnapped to the Middle East by their father. This is how it happened.
I first met my husband while studying as an exchange student in a college in Japan. I'm American, and he was Middle Eastern. At the time, he seemed very exotic and unique and nice. A couple months after being together, he returned to his homeland, and I stayed in Japan for another 9 months.
When I returned to America, he came to "visit" me shortly after I arrived home. I didn't know he was coming. I just got a call from him one day saying, "I'm in New York and I'm coming on a Greyhound. Please pick me up at the station". So, I did.
When he got here, he had no money and no place to stay, and I hadn't found a job yet, so I couldn't support him. I told him he had to go back or get a job. He said that the only way for him to get a job was to get married. That way, he could get a green card and go to work. I wanted to help him, and I liked him, so I agreed, and we went down to the courthouse and got a marriage license.
The day after he got the marriage license, he left. He said he had some friends in Wisconsin who would let him work "under the table" at their gas station, so he left, even though I had just told him that I found out I was pregnant. After he left, he would call me and tell me that I had to have an abortion because his family wouldn't approve. He said if I didn't have an abortion that he wouldn't be with me anymore. So I told him to go away and never contact me again. No one was going to tell me what to do! I changed my phone number and didn't hear from him again for the next 7 months.
Then one day, when I was 7 months pregnant, he showed up at my door and wanted to stay with me. Stupid as it was, I let him in. Of course, now, I wish I would have slammed the door in his face and let him go on his merry little way. But I was young and naive, and basically, really stupid.
The day he came back, he was a different person from the one I had known previously. He called me names, slapped me, pinched me, forbid me to leave the house. He wouldn't let me talk on the phone to anyone and he monitored everything I said on the phone. He was mean and abusive. I should've kicked him out, but I was due in a couple months and a full-time college student, so I figured I'd just put up with him until I could graduate with my college degree. Then I'd be better able to take care of myself and my child.
I tried to please him, giving in to all his ridiculous demands. He hit me, punched me, kicked me, slapped me. I rationalized it away, saying, "Well, that's how they treat women in his country and he doesn't know any better". Of course, I told him all the time that hitting women was illegal in this country, but he didn't care. I figured he'd learn eventually. He didn't.
Things got worse. He got angrier and more abusive. When he wanted sex, he took it, whether I wanted it or not - which of course, I didn't because before long, the sight of him made me sick to my stomach. I got pregnant again soon after I gave birth to my daughter. I didn't want to bring another child into this horrible situation, but he refused to let me go to a Dr. I had to sneak out of the house when he was a work if I wanted to leave at all and then pray no one would tell him I had gone out.
He wore me down. I lost my spirit, my fight, my will to live. I tried to kill myself and was hospitalized. After that, he had a label that he shared with everyone who would listen, "Crazy". "You're crazy". "My wife is crazy, so don't listen to her".
He hit me really hard when I was 7 months pregnant with my second child, and I had had enough. I left and went to a battered women's shelter. However, the shelter only let me stay for 30 days, and when I ahd no money and no place to go after the thirty days was up (there was a 2-year waiting list for housing assistance), I had to either go live on the streets with my children and risk having Children's Services take them away, or go back and live with him. So I went back.
In 2001, he attacked me at a public mall. The police officer saw him and promptly arrested him for domestic violence. He denied everything, of course, but the policeman saw the red marks on my face and neck and pressed charges anyway, even though I begged him not to. They handcuffed him and took him to jail.
I thought, at the time, that this was going to be his eye-opener. Now he would know that hitting his wife was illegal, he would be sorry, and he would learn his lesson. I was so wrong.
He got out the next day. I out a restraining order on him, which he violated within 12 hours and was re-arrested for violating a protection order and put back in jail. I went to a battered womens shelter once again.
Once again, I had no money, no place to go, and after 30 days, I was forced to leave the shelter. I went back to the apartment where he lived. He begged me to contact the judge and the prosecutor and make them drop the charges. Again, being stupid, I did as he asked. By this time, I knew better than to fight him. All I wanted was peave, adnt eh easiest way to try to get some peace was just to do whatever he said. The consequences of not doing so were horrible.
So, I made an appointment with the prosecutor. I went and begged him to drop the charges. He said that since I didn't file the charges - the police officer did - couldn't drop them, and he wouldn't drop them, either. So I wrote tot eh judge and asked her to drop the charges, on several occasions. She refused. When the day came to show up in court to answer his charges, I stood next to him and defended him and once again asked the judge to drop the charges. He was found "guilty" and sentenced to time served, as well as being put on probation for a year.
So, it was over with - we thought. Then, a couple weeks later, he received a letter from the Dept of Homeland Security stating that under the IIRIRA law, he was being deported because he had been convicted of a crime (domestic violence and violating a protection order). At first, he thought it was some kind of misunderstanding, but after researching it, we discovered that anyone who is not a US citizen who is convicted of any crime is automatically deported from the US. A new law called IIRIRA had been passed in 1996 making this the case.
So, a long legal battle began. He begged me to support him, and although I hated him, I felt it was my duty to do so, and that, for the sake of his dreams and his life, adn for the sake of my children, I should fight to keep him in the US. First, we went through the local courts, trying to re-open the case and erase the guilty verdict. That failed. We petitioned the Federal Courts and the Immigration Service. That failed. So then we went public, seeking the help that sometimes comes through publicity. That also failed.
Meanwhile, the government had been compiling a case against him for ties to al-qaeda. The FBI had arrested an al-qaeda operative at an airport in New York, and when they arrested him, they found my husband's business card in his wallet. The FBI came to our house, asking my husband how he was affiliated with this man. He said he didn't know the man and that he had no idea why that man was carrying his business card.
Then there were phone calls from my husband to a place in Brooklyn, New York. According to the FBI, this number was known to have been used by people laundering money for al-qaeda. The phone records showed several calls from my husband to this number over a several-month period. The government wanted to know who he talked to and what he talked about. He denied anything, just saying that the only calls he made to New York were to some friends he had there who owned a convenience store.
Then there was the fact that an arrested al-qaeda member who was already in custody had the same address that my husband had on the Wisconsin ID that he got when he left me and went to work for his friends in Wisconsin. Same street address. They once again came and asked how he knew this man and why they both listed the same address as their own. My husband denied knowing anything about this other man.
Then there was 9/11. On Sept. 11, as we stood in front of the TV watching the horror of the World Trade Centers unfolding before us, my husband's comments made me sick. Instead of being horrified, as I was, he was smug, and his comments were, "That's what the US gets. They send all their money to the Jews and use their money to buy bombs that Israel uses to kill innocent Palestinians. This is what the US deserves." Then, when information about the hijackers came on TV, identifying them, he said to me "That was my friend! I grew up with his brother. I used to spend all my days after school in his house. We played together. He's a good guy". I was sick to my stomach.
He had cut me off from all friends and outside contacts, so my only release at this point was a journal that I kept on the computer. When things got really bad, I would sit and write my thoughts. So, I added this new revelation of misery to my journal.
On Oct. 21, 2001, life changed dramatically. My husband went to work as usual. An hour later, I received a call. The caller said, "This is the FBI. We have your husband in custody. We're bringing the van back". Within 5 minutes, there was a knock at the door, and standing at the threshold were 8 FBI agents. They asked to search the house. They said that they believed that my husband was affiliated with al-qaeda. I let them in. They spent the rest of the day going through everything in the house, copying the hard drives on the computers, carrying out boxes of documents, and asking me questions.
I was in shock, but mostly I was just glad that he wouldn't be coming home that day. For once, I could go a day without getting hit. I was SO relieved that he was out of the house. That immense relieve is just indescribable with mere words.
For the next three and a half years, he remained incarcerated, fighting his impending deportation. Scared about what would happen if he were deported and how that would affect the kids, I stood once again and supported him. I stood on street corners getting people to sign petitions to support his release. I spoke at public events about his plight. I held fundraisers to raise money for his legal defense. I spent half my monthly income paying for a special phone line so he could call home and talk to the kids whenever he wanted, andhis collect calls cost over $3.00 a minute. I don't know why I did everything I did, but I felt bad for him. I felt guilty, since it was the domestic violence conviction that started the whole thing. I worked with the lawyer and helped him with research and filing briefs on my husband's behalf. I worked my butt off for him for three and a half years. Then, in November 2006, he was deported to Yemen, unable to ever enter the US again. All efforts had failed.
This is where the REAL nightmare began.
After he was deported, he contacted me constantly. He said that he hadn'tseen his chidlren in 3.5 years and that he needed to see them. He said that he had had time to think and pray in jail, and that he'd read the Koran from beginning to end 8 times while he was in jail. He said he was a changed man. He begged me to bring the kids to Yemen to see him since he couldn't come back to the USA.
I didn't believe that he was a changed man. After enduring his abuse for 7 long years, I knew the depth of the evil that resided within him. I refused to bring the kids to Yemen to see him. But, I kept reading the emails and accepting the IMs. I started to feel bad for him. He seemed so sincere. I thought, "Well, maybe he has changed. People can change when bad things happen to them". Mostly, I thought, "My God, if I coudln't see my kids for 3.5 years, I would go crazy. He must be feeling the same way. I couldn't stand to be without my kids. I'm sure he can't stand it, either." That was my huge mistake.
He made tons of promises to me, trying to get me to bring the kids to see him. He told me that he would provide round-trip plane tickets. He said that we would always be free to come and go as we please. He said he wasn't interested in custody or anything like that - he assured me over and over that he just wanted to see the kids once more. He told me that he had a well-to-do respectable family, most of whom are physicians, and even if he wanted to keep the kids, his family would never permit him to kidnap them or do anything bad to them. He promised to buy the kids new clothes, he promised my daughter the cell phone she was asking for, he promised to teach my son how to play soccer, he promised my middle daughter her very own horse, etc. I was still very skeptical. But, I kept listening.
After 6 months of hearing all the kind words and wonderful promises, I accepted his offer. I was convinced that he was, indeed, a changed man and that he was sincere when he said he only wanted to see the kids for the summer. My oldest daughter fought me tooth and nail. She remembered her father very clearly. She remembered how he hit her and me and how mean he was. She refused to got o Yemen to see him. She secretly talked to a neighbor of ours and arranged to stay with her while I took the other two children to Yemen to see their dad. When she told me about this, I told her "No!. I'm your mother, and I'm taking you to see your father! It'll be fine - I promise!" She fought me and cried and refused to go, but after all, she was an 8-year-old child with no autonomy, and I had made up my mind. I made her go.
I made her go.
The knowledge of that kills me every second of every day. I took her to Hell, where she became trapped in the deepest, darkest bowels of Hell. Her own mother - the mother who loves her SO much and who would die for her in an instant, took her by the hand and led her straight into the mouth of Hell. How can a mother live with that guilt? It's not possible. I am a mother who loves her three children more than the air I breathe, and yet I took my three wonderful children and led them straight into Hell. I deserve no mercy, no pity. I deserve all the pain they feel every day of their lives. I wish I could save them and take all their pain away and add it to my own. I don't know how to save them, though. But God knows I've tried everything I can think of.
I believed a man who had a history of lying. He was so convincing at the time. He seemed so sincere, and maybe I just wanted to believe he was a changed person and that he was telling the truth - over and over and over again. Maybe the repetition of his lies is what made me believe him. Maybe it was my own desire that he had finally learned and become a better person. Maybe it was because I conferred my own sense of how I would feel without my children on him, when it wasn't there on his part. In any regard, I believed someone who couldn't be trusted, and now my children are suffering immensely because of it. I made the decision to continue listening to him and to ultimately believe his words. It is all 110% my fault. And now I can't fix it.
I'll have to finish the story later. I can't see through my tears.
Sometimes in life we encounter the most horrible situation we can imagine, and there are people who have hurt us so badly that we grapple with anger and despair so deep that we find it unbearable. So we have a decision to make. We have to decide which attitude we will choose and how we will respond.
I my case, I've had a lot of horrible circumstances and met a lot of greedy, mean people who seem to act solely to create chaos and serve out hurt, for no reason other than they have their own misery and just want to help spread it around. I've always taken to heart the teachings I was brought up with from the Bible. I was taught that, when you get slapped, turn the other cheek. When people have been mean, when people stole from me or hit me, I always forgave them, smiled, and did nothing mean in return. In fact, I've always returned their evil deeds with good ones. I had a neighbor who stole from me and spent her time telling nasty lies about me to everyone she came into contact with. Believing that love is the most powerful force, I reacted by buying her flowers. She promptly threw them on the ground and stomped on them. I have always felt that no matter how evil someone appears to be, love and kindness will overcome their attitudes and behaviors eventually, if applied with perseverance.
I've lived my life that way. Now I am much older, and I look back and contemplate all the bad people and bad things that have happened to me and how I handled the situations. I am glad that I have no guilty conscious about any of my actions, but beyond that, I don't feel that my way of reacting is right. Instead, I feel like I've been a punching bag and a doormat to all the evil people wanted to throw at me. Are those who hurt me changed people? No. None of my "returning love for evil" made any effect on them whatsoever. I walked away from those who continued to hurt me, and now those people are out finding new victims, continuing their path of sharing their misery with others.
So beyond the here-and-now effects, I think about the eternal effects. All of the great teachers throughout history speak of an eternal soul where all our actions have consequences. Karma is a well-known example, as is the "day of Judgement" that the mainstream religions warn about. None of the ancient teachings state that people will reap what they sow in this lifetime. The Law of Karma, as well as the "Day of Judgement" theory oftentimes means that we may not have to pay for our evil deeds until we pass beyond the veil and enter the next level of consciousness.
I see so many examples in this modern-day world of selfish, mean people who walk through life acting selfishly and caring about no one but themselves, sowing discord and evil along the way, only to be rewarded. Meanwhile, the meek and good-hearted souls suffer so terribly without reprieve for years, or even their entire lifetime. I ask myself, "Where's the justice? When does one reap what they sow? How can evil people go through life continuing to be evil and only getting REWARDED for it without encountering any negative consequences for their actions?" Oftentimes, these people can't even see the harm they do and the pain they cause. They deny to themselves, as well as to the world, that they are anything but great and saintly. It makes you want to MAKE them have some negative consequences so that they can wake up and realize what they're doing and the results of their actions. If Karma is real, sometimes it takes too long to take effect.
In my case, my children are living without their mother, without adequate education, and they suffer enormously every single day. The man who is holding them hostage and beating them and causing them so much pain walks around very well protected, completely believing that he is a powerful God, that he can do whatever he wants without consequence, and that he is good and just and can do no wrong. He doesn't care when his children cry. He doesn't feel anything when he has them on the floor, punching them with both fists flying, etc. He has no consequences and no feelings for anyone but himself.
I look around and see how little life means to people. A man gets shot and killed so the robber can take the $5 out of his wallet. Killed for a mere $5.00. Kids get killed for the name-brand shoes they wear. Sometimes people kill other people for no discernable reason whatsoever. And yet there are people who have committed such atrocities, caused so much pain, done such horrible things, and they walk around with their chin up, feeling untouchable.
Sometimes I wonder if murder is sometimes right. The military thinks so. I saw a bumper sticker that says it perfectly: "Kill one man, you're a murderer. Kill 100,000, you're a hero". If killing one evil man means saving the lives of three highly talented, intelligent children, giving them a chance at life, then is that wrong? Taking one life to save three? In that line of thinking, murder seems like the answer.
But then I think about the great teachings. Everyone is here for a reason. Everyone carries the Spirit of the Creator within them. All is one, so what you do unto others, you do to yourself. There will be consequences for your actions - in some lifetime, anyway. So instead of thinking about the here and now, I think about the eternity of the soul. My problems seem so huge and insurmountable right now, and I could easily take care of the the situation and the person causing the harm. But is there a Creator who has a plan for everything and everyone here on earth? What are the lessons I am supposed to be learning from this experience? Does everything have a purpose - a lesson? Are we supposed to always respond with love and forgiveness, instead of the very-well deserved anger and revenge?
I would very much like to hurt the person who has hurt my children so badly. However, I choose not to. I don't know if I've made the right decision. For now, I'm going to trust that there is a Creator, and that there is another solution somewhere. But if I'm wrong, my children will suffer for many more years as hostages of an evil man, and they will most likely be irrepairably damaged when they reach adulthood, and full of anger like their captor.
I grapple with the ultimate question - do I act and harm one, or do I sit back once again and wait for the universe to exact justice? I've never seen the universe exact any justice. I see injustice and pain everywhere. Injustice and pain seem to be the only things rewarded on this earth.
Even so, I've decided not to react by becoming full of hatred and acting in revenge. Each moment of every day, I have to make that decision over and over again. The pain is real. The injustice is real. He stands and brags about how he can do whatever he wants and yet remain untouchable. The anger makes me want to take action. But somewhere deep inside, there's a flicker of a flame that tells me not to react that way. So today, I choose to trust in a higher power and believe that somehow, the solution will be given to me without having to harm another. Maybe I'm wrong. I don't know.
