Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, January/February 1999, pages 112-117

Waging Peace

Aaron Miller Analyzes Wye

The Center for Policy Analysis on Palestine in Washington, DC held a luncheon series dedicated to the “Who, What, and Wherefore of Wye.” Speakers in the series included: State Department deputy director for the peace talks Aaron Miller; journalists James Anderson and Eugene Bird; Hasan Abdel Rahman, Palestinian Authority representative in the U.S.; Joseph diGenova from diGenova and Toensing, who was the chief prosecutor in the Jonathan Pollard espionage case; Michael Hudson, of Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies; and Muhammad Hallaj from the Palestine National Council.

Aaron Miller, deputy special Middle East coordinator for Arab-Israeli negotiations at the Department of State, assessed the Wye agreement at a Nov. 2 luncheon.

Miller posed three specific questions regarding the agreement: Why did Wye close when it did?, What is the significance of Wye?, and What are the next steps?

In response to his first question, Miller proposed that the negotiations at Wye ended in an agreement due to combined efforts, a degree of urgency, and the substance of the agreement. “Wye was built on one fundamental foundation: the decision to find an alternative to conflict,” Miller stated.

The significance of Wye, according to Miller, is that it presents a road-map for the “pursuit of a durable and real Israeli-Palestinian peace.” The Wye agreement has “restored some measure of hope that negotiations are a viable tool in mutual and lasting agreements,” Miller said.

In the final stage of his assessment, Miller asked rhetorically, “Where do we go from here?” His plan includes four concentric circles. The first is Israeli-Palestinian implementation “to broaden the circle of peace.” Since the U.S. played a major role in the negotiations, the U.S. must also be involved in the implementation of the agreement.

The U.S. must offer support to the Israelis and Palestinians, but cannot serve as a surrogate, Miller stated. The U.S. should encourage a balance of effort between the two parties.

The second circle involves U.S. economic and political support for the agreement. “Israeli-Palestinian peace is a broad, international responsibility,” Miller said. “Unless we can find a way to make peace real, it will remain an abstraction.”

The third circle is seeking regional support for the agreement, and the fourth is a commitment to peace in the future. All parties involved in the peace process must look for ways to facilitate future negotiations.

Miller stressed the difficulty involved in achieving policy acceptable to all parties. “Policy is really an effort to find a balance between the way the world is and the way you want it to be,” Miller concluded.

—Samia El-Mahdi

Journalists Bird and Anderson Assess Agreement

Journalists James Anderson and Eugene Bird spoke Nov. 10 at the Center for Policy Analysis on Palestine about their experiences covering the Wye River conference. Bird, president of the Council for the National Interest and the Washington Report’s diplomatic correspondent, quoted Henry Kissinger’s remarks that there wouldn’t be peace until agreements equally unsatisfactory to both parties are reached. Using isolation and forced togetherness, the Wye River negotiations tried to put a timetable on the stalled previous agreements, Bird said.

Anderson, Washington correspondent for DPA, the German Press Agency, said that State Department spokesman Jamie Rubin’s press conferences were like feeding time at the zoo with no food. By contrast, he said, there was a torrent of leaks to the Israeli press, though CNN was Israel’s “leaking vessel of choice.” Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was so concerned about Israeli domestic reaction to every step that he encouraged leaks to gauge public responses to contemplated Israeli concessions, Anderson said. After four days, it was difficult to sort out the truth from the false leaks.

Anderson predicted that the agreements wouldn’t last two weeks, and a real settlement won’t be reached until something restores a sense of fairness and trust in the region. He said he hoped the European Union would play a larger role to give more balance. Moderator Clovis Maksoud of American University added that at Camp David there were two states negotiating with each other, but at Wye there was “total asymmetry” with the Palestinians in total dependence on American mediators.

—Delinda C. Hanley

Dr. Michael Hudson Compares Wye to a Tranquilizer

In his Nov. 20 talk in the CPAP series on the Wye agreement, Professor Michael Hudson said, “The Wye agreement was grievously hyped and exaggerated in the media.” He explained: “Those who advise Clinton were in no particular hurry to move this peace process forward. The peace process was not dead but it was in the deep freeze while Clinton was distracted.”

The peace process was revived for domestic reasons because President Clinton needed a triumph in diplomacy, Hudson continued. “Wye presented no real breakthrough, it just played a game of catch-up with earlier commitments. Wye was a bit like a tranquilizer when the patient needs more radical treatment. At least it keeps the fever down. The day-to-day life under the Palestinian Authority may have improved, though there have been no strategic visions. At least there has been some movement. The opening of Gaza Airport gives it some punch and lifts Palestinians’ spirits.”

Professor Hudson described the “Swiss cheese model of the West Bank” that is emerging, with the Palestinian land as the holes and Israeli-occupied land the cheese. Palestine will maintain enclaves but little else, with borders, roads, economic and financial control still in Israel’s hands.

“Wye delivers little to Palestine,” Hudson said. “Why have Arab governments been so passive? They were enthusiastic about Madrid and Oslo. Has a consensus of Arab states regarding Palestine disappeared?”

Hudson said he thinks Arab states can’t bear any more military conflicts with Israel and they don’t want to invest more in their military. Finally, Palestine “squandered support from some neighboring countries” when it took the wrong side in the Gulf war and “cut its own deal in Oslo.” Hudson said cooperation with Syria and Lebanon, whose lands are also occupied by Israel, would probably have resulted in a much better deal.

Professor Hudson saw two possible scenarios for the future of Palestine. In the first a semblance of a Palestinian state is formed in all of the West Bank and Gaza and it enjoys economic and political freedom, resulting in stability and economic security for the Middle East. The second scenario looks tempting in the short run for Israel: a Swiss cheese Palestine, with Israel enjoying maximum control over Bantustan territories. But the second scenario will cause burning alienation and anger that will energize the Middle East into responding to the continued injustice.

—Delinda C. Hanley

Robert Fisk Pessimistic About Lebanon

Robert Fisk addressed a packed audience at the Middle East Institute Nov. 17 in Washington, DC, on his personal concerns about Lebanon. The award-winning journalist for the London Independent, who has covered the Middle East for 25 years using Beirut as his base despite the 15 years of civil war there, said that as a result of the dying Middle East peace process, “Lebanon is a battlefield for its neighbors. As the reconstruction of Beirut proceeds, the Lebanese dream dreams amid danger.” The rebuilding of Beirut is deeply connected to the peace process, Fisk said, and when the peace process stalls, investment in Lebanon falters.

There is growing belief in Lebanon that Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu wants a war, Fisk said. “When your administration tells a country to ‘exercise restraint’ I start wearing my flak jacket. On this trip to the States, I bought a new flak jacket.”

Fisk said Palestinians in Lebanon, Syria and Jordan were not helped by the Wye agreements, and they feel abandoned by President Yasser Arafat. Fisk said angrily that in his opinion the Palestinians have been left to rot. No American newspaper journalist ever revisits the scenes of the 1996 Qana massacre or the 1982 Sabra-Shatilla refugee camp massacre on their anniversaries, the way journalists return to other tragedies, he charged.

He finds it hard to go into the Palestinian refugee camps himself. “If I lived there I’d commit suicide,” he said. “No hope can live in those conditions. They are oases of sewage, rats, poverty, and hopelessness. The refugees have no hope of returning to Palestine, and they would be better off in Syria and Jordan with citizenship than they are in Lebanon.”

Fisk gave a short history lesson to explain why the Lebanese government takes instructions from its Syrian sponsors and Syria uses Lebanon as a bulwark against Israel. Lebanon was created with land taken from Syria by the French in 1914, and the Syrians feel a bit like the English with Ireland now, Fisk said. He added, however, that Syria only wants to influence, not annex, Lebanon. Fisk said Syria chose Gen. Emile Lahoud, the Lebanese chief of staff who received military training in Britain and the U.S., to become president of Lebanon in October 1998. Fisk said most Lebanese don’t really believe in elections because the candidate for whom they vote have always already been “chosen.”

Elections, he said, are pre-decided. “Lebanon never learned the lessons of civil war,” Fisk warned. The Taif agreement, which ended the civil war, “used bandages instead of surgery and Lebanon’s sectarian system remains intact. The war is un-discussible. Schools don’t talk about it, there are no books or courses on it.”

Pity the Nation, Fisk’s book on the civil war, is banned in Lebanon. However, it is considered by many U.S. and British specialists as the definitive work on the subject.

Robert Fisk’s advice to young Lebanese during the war was to leave Lebanon for their education. Those who left during the war for their own safety returned “untouched by hatred.” Fisk said, “Take them out of the filthy system of sectarian hatred, give them a good education in social democracy and they’ll return with the ideas of freedom.”

Responding from the audience to a number of Mr. Fisk’s statements, Lebanese Ambassador Mohamad Chatah had a more hopeful outlook on the atmosphere of change in Lebanon. He agreed that the way the civil war ended was artificial and resulted in the breakdown of some parts of society. But it’s important to stress that one million Lebanese have returned and each year Lebanon improves, Ambassador Chatah said. “Lebanon is less divided from the Arab world now,” and more Arab than French, he asserted. He is hopeful that the positive changes will continue.

—Delinda C. Hanley

U.S.-Arab Chamber of Commerce Sponsors Roundtable on Lebanon

The National U.S.-Arab Chamber of Commerce in Washington, DC held a roundtable discussion on Lebanon on Nov. 17, featuring Lebanese Ambassador to the United States Mohamad B. Chatah. A career economist, instrumental in setting monetary policy and securing domestic and external financing of the Lebanese government after the civil war, he has played an important part in the rebuilding of Lebanon.

“I believe that the management of Lebanon’s economy was done right from the onset,” Ambassador Chatah said. “The government had a vision for Lebanon’s future, and with minimum government intervention it set the economic path for the country. It set about establishing macroeconomic stability to attract international investment. In the last eight years there has been economic stability, with a stable exchange rate, and the highest per capita income in any non-oil producing Arab country.

The rebuilding of the country’s infrastructure is not yet complete but basic needs have been met, Chatah said. “Now Lebanon is looking toward future needs.”

Financial, information, media, advertising and education services make up 70 to 75 percent of Lebanon’s economy, Chatah continued. He said that in the 1960s and 1970s Lebanon held the business lead in a dormant Arab region. However, now the Gulf has advanced in so many sectors Lebanon will be one of the business centers, instead of the business center, in the Middle East. The ambassador concluded his optimistic assessment by noting that many Lebanese who live abroad are returning to Lebanon, and foreign investment in the country is increasing.

Abed Tarbush is the business development manager for the Middle East, North Africa and Turkey at the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC). Tarbush described the services OPIC offers, assisting American companies considering direct private investment in more than 140 developing countries and emerging markets. When an American company wants to invest in Lebanon, Tarbush said, OPIC acts like a commercial bank, providing loan guarantees. OPIC can lend a U.S. company up to 50 percent of the total cost of a project for up to $2 million for 5 to 15 years at market rate. OPIC also provides insurance for the investor; 90 percent of the investment is covered in the case of political violence or if a government decides to nationalize or expropriate the company, and currency convertibility is guaranteed.

David Hamod, president of Intercom, an international consulting firm that promotes American products and U.S. concerns worldwide, and Kent Robert Ford, an international business development specialist, also discussed investment opportunities in Lebanon.

—Delinda C. Hanley

Anwar Sadat Lecture for Peace

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter spoke Oct. 25 at the University of Maryland’s annual conference on international issues related to peace and development. This year’s conference, commemorating the Camp David accords on their 20th anniversary, addressed the impact of unilateral concessions on international negotiations.

In his talk President Carter compared the Camp David and Wye River negotiations. He recalled trying to keep Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin apart for 10 days, negotiating with each leader separately. Despite Carter’s efforts, former Israeli Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan managed to speak directly with Sadat and so antagonized the Egyptian president that he packed to leave, until Carter could intercede.

Another time Begin decided to leave, but when Carter came to say good-bye, bringing signed photographs addressed to each of Begin’s grandchildren, Begin decided to stay and try to make peace one more time. However, Carter said, it was impossible to get Begin to stand by the commitments he made at Camp David, and within three months the Israelis started building settlements again. Nevertheless, Carter said, in the 20 years since Camp David, no one has been killed on the borders between Egypt and Israel.

Wye has put the peace process back on track, though not quite where it was before Prime Minister Rabin’s assassination, Carter concluded: “But there will be peace because Israeli mothers want peace. Palestinian mothers want peace.”

Carter recalled that many Jewish-American leaders thought he had betrayed Israel by insisting it return the Sinai and its oil fields to Egypt. He said his early speech calling for a homeland for the Palestinians also had cost him domestic political support. President Carter said that in his unsuccessful 1980 re-election bid, when he was opposed by both Republican Ronald Reagan and independent John Anderson, he was the first Democratic candidate not to receive the majority vote of the Jewish Americans.

—Delinda C. Hanley

Author of Israel and the Bomb Speaks at Georgetown

Columbia University Prof. Avner Cohen, author of the newly published Israel and the Bomb (Columbia University Press, 1998), spoke at Georgetown University Nov. 12 on his book, which covers the political history of Israel’s acquisition of nuclear capabilities. In his book he examined the secrecy, or “layers of opacity,” achieved by the Israelis on four levels: the domestic audience, Israel’s neighbors, its relationship with the U.S., and nonproliferation.

An early reason for the secrecy of the project was Israel’s fear of an Arab coalition, Cohen said. Another reason was the more lasting fear that if Israel were to trigger Arab bomb development, the Zionist movement would be over. He also speculated that the United States may have learned about Israel’s plans as early as 1958, but did not establish the facts until 1960. Afterward the U.S. remained very non-confrontational in its attitude toward Israel’s nuclear program, Cohen said, particularly after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Cohen also briefly discussd the absence of an Arab response to Israel’s development of nuclear weapons. He suggested the Arab apathy or denial he noticed may have resulted from Arab assumptions that reports of Israel’s nuclear progress were merely a scare tactic. In fact, he said, Israeli nuclear development seemed to have been of more concern to the United States than to the Arabs.*

—Rashid Ahmed

*See also the item on Dr. Cohen’s book in “From the Israeli Press” on p. 50 of this issue.

MEI Looks at Iraq Developments

The Middle East Institute held a half-day conference Nov. 16 on “Developments in Iraq: Implications for U.S. Policy,” at the Madison Hotel in Washington, DC. Executive director Benon Sevan of the United Nations Iraq program gave the keynote address, describing the “oil-for-food” program in Iraq.

Sevan said there is strong support for this program, which is financed completely by the sale of Iraqi oil. The Iraqi government identifies priorities and prepares a distribution plan, which is approved by the U.N., and then the government of Iraq enters into contracts with suppliers regarding the terms and times of delivery.

The U.N. cannot police the program, Sevan noted. It can only monitor the arrival of goods and the utilization of spare parts.

“The oil-for-food program cannot take care of all the needs of the Iraqi people but it is a temporary measure while economic sanctions are enforced,” Sevan said. Food and medicines are priorities, but funds are also necessary to repair water and sewer systems.

However, as a result of the drop in oil prices, combined with the reduced production capabilities of Iraqi wells desperately in need of spare parts, as well as the necessity to spend oil revenues on compensation for Gulf war claims, the program is not producing enough food to prevent malnutrition and illness. The program is “doing a good job under difficult conditions,” Sevan concluded. “The day sanctions are removed the problems will end, or at least take different shape.”

Sevan’s keynote address was followed by a lively panel discussion entitled, “Developments in Iraq: Implications for U.S. Policy.” Editor Ghassan Atiyya of Iraqi File said all attempts to topple Saddam Hussain have failed and the Iraqi opposition as a whole is in disarray.

“He has turned the oil-for-food program into a tool for terror,” Atiyya said, using it to control his people by making them completely dependent on his ration coupon system. Attiya said Saddam has succeeded in surviving and has enough money to sustain his cronies with smuggled oil revenues, and keep his people helpless, hopeless and angry with America.

Saddam dictates when to have a crisis over UNSCOM inspections, and as long as he survives, it is a victory, Attiya said. However, he concluded, there is a window of opportunity for American policy change, if the U.S. can convince the Iraqi people that there is support for an opposition group.

Editor Walid Khadduri of the Middle East Economic Survey (MEES) examined the current and future effects of sanctions on Iraq’s economy and society. The sanctions, combined with the damage caused by two wars in one decade, have damaged physical infrastructure, caused the loss of $100 billion in oil revenue and wracked up massive unpaid debts. The collapse of medical services has resulted in high child mortality rates, malnutrition, and the resurfacing of diseases that had once been eradicated in Iraq, Khadduri said.

“There has also been a social cost of sanctions. The collapse of education and the mass of unemployment has killed the self-esteem and self-respect of Iraq’s people, leading to a massive emigration, with 15,000 waiting to be smuggled out in boats,” Khadduri said. He added that Iraqis have lost hope of being able to educate their children in their country. They are also disgusted by the increase in drugs, prostitution, crime, smuggling and child labor in Iraq.

Severe environmental damage has been caused by contaminating oil fields and over-pumping in Kirkuk, Khadduri continued. He predicted that continued Iraqi defiance will lead to disaster, and he warned that open-ended sanctions and the collective punishment of Iraq’s people is not working.

“The sanctions use a sledgehammer to hit a fly,” Khadduri concluded. “The hammer destroys the house and the fly just flies away.”

Fadhil Chalabi, director of the Center for Global Energy Studies, described the effect sanctions on Iraq have had on the world oil market. The restriction of Iraqi oil exports, he said, has actually helped OPEC balance world supply and demand at a time when other oil-producing countries have increased their production.

Chalabi said it will take three years or longer to rebuild and restore Iraq’s oil industry, even after sanctions are lifted. He suggested that Saddam Hussain may not be interested in ending the sanctions.

“Sanctions assure his survival,” Chalabi asserted. Sanctions have served Saddam Hussain by absolving him from facing the challenges of rebuilding Iraq or repaying $80 billion in debts.

Next, former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near East Affairs Richard Murphy discussed policy options available to the United States on the Iraq issue. Threatening force, the first U.S. option Murphy examined, focuses international attention on the unfairness of open-ended sanctions and the absence of a timetable for their removal, and costs the U.S. friends.

Diplomacy backed by military threats also costs the U.S. billions of dollars each time it mobilizes, Murphy said. Another U.S. option is to adjust its diplomatic position if Iraq actually cooperates with UNSCOM, giving Iraq an incentive to comply in hopes of finding “light at the end of the tunnel.”

Yet another option is to encourage and develop Iraqi opposition. Iraq’s neighbors won’t support a U.S.-backed overthrow of the regime, but a promise to lift sanctions after a change in government could rally the people to hope, Murphy said.

Finally, he suggested, perhaps UNSCOM’s job is impossible and it cannot rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. In that case the U.N. could establish a clear “red line” to contain Saddam, and keep him in an independent box, reserving the option to respond militarily if he crosses that line.

U.S. Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, called for a comprehensive review of U.S. policy in the region in his address on “U.S. Policy Toward Iraq.” The United States has followed a “schizophrenic approach” to Iraq by periodically trying to force Saddam Hussain to comply with U.N. resolutions, Hagel said. If the U.S. reviews its policies, he believes it will conclude that they are failing to disarm Iraq or defang Saddam Hussain.

Hagel said U.S. policies toward the Arab-Israeli peace process are linked with every other foreign policy issue. “The world is connected. We live in a global community.” Hagel continued, “We need to respond to the Arab feeling that there is a U.S. tilt toward Israel in peace negotiations. We need to be an honest broker. When the balance is questionable, the credibility of our policy is in doubt.”

Senator Hagel suggested allies should be brought in to help solve the problems. “These aren’t the days for the U.S. to go it alone. We’re powerful enough to do it alone but we can’t solve the problems. We’re in a box. We’re all in a box together. We need to figure a way out. There is no one answer. No more tough decisions deferred.

“The U.S. cannot ricochet from crisis to crisis,” Senator Hagel concluded. The U.S. must stay focused on an identifiable foreign policy, giving it “imagination, consistency and leadership.”

—Delinda C. Hanley

Muslim-American Activist Receives Hard-Won Award

Maryland’s prestigious Montgomery County in the suburbs of the U.S. national capital presented Samira Hussein with an Award for Distinguished Service to Public Education on Nov. 10. President Nancy King of the Board of Education said the award was for Hussein’s work in “educating and sensitizing Montgomery County Public School staff, parents and students to the Muslim religion and Arab cultures,” adding that “she has been tireless in advancing a comprehensive view of the cultures, their way of life, and how it needs to be integrated into all aspects of our current educational world, including curriculum development and school calendar to be a more sensitive organization.”

Mrs. King also listed an impressive number of workshops Mrs. Hussein had organized at schools and mosques to help students and staff increase their understanding of Arabs and Islam.

In her acceptance speech, Mrs. Hussein thanked the Montgomery County schools for their openness and receptiveness to her concerns, and the Muslim and Arab-American organizations that had supported her. It was a warm speech, but it only told part of the story of her family’s arrival in America.

Here’s the rest of it: After Samira Hussein was forced to flee Beit Nuba, her Palestinian village, barefoot on June 7, the third day of the June 1967 Arab-Israeli war, she spent the following months wandering until she finally reached a refugee camp in Jordan. Later she emigrated to America, settling first in Miami, FL and later in Gaithersburg, MD.

“When I arrived in this country,” her speech began, “I couldn’t speak English. I wanted to be involved in our children’s education so I started learning English. I want to encourage all parents, especially minority parents, to take every step to be involved in our children’s education. Language can be a barrier but, with persistence and work, that barrier can be overcome.”

But Mrs. Hussein didn’t mention the experiences that forced her to combat false stereotypes in her community regarding Arabs and Islam. During the Gulf war in August 1990, her husband, Mohamed Hussein, received a threatening phone call from someone claiming to be from the Immigration and Naturalization Service telling him the family had 48 hours to leave the country because they were Iraqi. The Hussein family is Palestinian, but because of their last name, the imposter may have assumed they were related to Iraqi President Saddam Hussain.

A month later, in September of 1990, their patio door was smashed, and eggs and trash thrown on their deck. The tires on their cars were repeatedly slashed, and threatening notes slipped under their door.

The Husseins have lost track of how many times their doors were broken over the next eight years. Their neighbors’ son, a boy named David, began harassing the Hussein’s children at school and on the school bus, calling them “stupid Arabs” and other insults. This prompted Samira’s first meetings with school officials and, eventually, with the county Human Relations Commission. As a result, things calmed down at school and the Hussein children were assigned front-row seats on the bus to give them a head start in running home with David on their heels.

To halt the continuing reign of terror after school, Mohamed and Samira visited David’s mother, who at first said she couldn’t control her son’s actions since she wasn’t home all day. Then she added, however, that her older son, Brian, would run over the Hussein children if he saw them in the street.

By 1992, as Samira’s human rights advocacy began to draw media attention, David threatened to retaliate against her son if his mother’s picture appeared again in the newspaper. For the next six years, within two weeks of the publication of any article mentioning Samira, something unpleasant always happened.

In 1994, after Mrs. Hussein asked the county Board of Education not to schedule school tests during the Ramadan holidays, a swastika was scratched on her car (a strange symbol for a Jewish child to choose), the car door handles, key holes and tire valves were glued shut, and the tires deflated.

The list of outrages and vandalism continued. Once boys appeared at the door brandishing baseball bats. The family had beer cans and litter tossed in their yard frequently. Each time the police were called, they asked if the Husseins were related to Saddam Hussain, and inquired about the Qur’an and other Islamic literature and knick-knacks in the house, until the Husseins wondered whether the police were confusing the perpetrators with their victims. So far as the Husseins could determine, the police never wrote up reports of the incidents. Finally, however, the police liaison officer in their neighborhood became involved, and tried to catch David in the act.

On Sept. 4, 1997, “Go Home” and “Pig” were scratched alongside the previously scratched swastikas on the hoods of the two Hussein cars, and every tire and car seat in both cars was slashed with a knife. This time the Husseins called local leaders from the Council for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) and, after they were assembled, the police. As the investigation progressed, a moving van appeared at David’s home and his family moved out of their house.

Nevertheless, the police took fingerprints and photographs and fliers were distributed offering rewards for capture of the perpetrators (from CAIR, the local Islamic Center and even from the police department).

David was arrested but he had to be subpoenaed four times before he showed up for trial. At his trial on March 10, 1998, he was found guilty, thanks to the testimony of his own friends, who said he showed the newspaper account of his final act of vandalism to them saying, “I finally made it to the front page just like she did.”

David was sentenced to spend five days in jail (only three of which he served), two years of supervised probation, and payment of $500 in court fees, which the judge converted to restitution to replace the car tires. In fact, however, neither David nor his family has paid a dime and, due to a court mix-up, he is not under probation since he never registered after his early release. Neither he nor his family ever apologized.

That’s not the happy ending people want to hear in the story of a refugee family seeking a new life in the land of the free. That’s probably why Samira Hussein politely omitted it from her speech accepting her award.

 “I have paid very dearly for each step of progress,” she confessed to the Washington Report. Nevertheless she has words of advice for other new Americans.

“Don’t wait until something happens to get involved in your community,” she advises. “And don’t underestimate the power you have in changing your community.”

She also told the Washington Report there will be a Jan. 6 workshop for county teachers, and that April has been named Arab-American Heritage Month in Montgomery Country schools. In fact, that’s better than a happy ending. Perhaps, thanks to Samira and Mohamed Hussein, there will be no more such stories from Maryland’s Montgomery County.

—Delinda C. Hanley