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Palestinian's quandary: Working for U.S. in Iraq

By Cal Perry
CNN

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BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Inside Baghdad's fortified Green Zone, Samir Zedan dons a flak jacket and helmet. But Zedan is not your typical high-level U.S. government employee: He is Palestinian.

It's a moral dilemma for a Palestinian: working for the American government in Iraq while his family lives in the West Bank, where they face restrictions imposed by the Israeli military. The situation clearly haunts him but also reaffirms his humanity.

"Dialogue is the only answer to achieve a political goal," he says. "I can see the negative impact of violence on my own people these days. Any attack that involves the lives of innocent civilians is an act of terror -- be it in Tel Aviv, Gaza or in Baghdad. Terror is terror."

As the heat rises off the pavement, the 43-year-old slowly places five lucky charms in his pocket.

These include a picture of an icon of the Virgin Mary, a picture of St. Anthony of Pauda, a prayer to St. Michael, a Catholic rosary and a Greek Orthodox monk's rosary that Zedan holds in his hands, slowly fingering it as he quietly says a series of prayers.

Zedan after all is a Christian -- and does nothing to hide it in this Muslim land.

He takes one last puff of his treasured cigarette and gets into an unmarked, armored sport utility vehicle surrounded by heavy American security. On this day, he's accompanying Zalmay Khalilzad, the former U.S. ambassador to Iraq, as he visits a power station on the edge of the city.

Zedan works for USAID, a U.S. government agency that seeks to promote economic growth, democracy, conflict prevention and humanitarian assistance overseas.

He carries a Palestinian passport and, at home, he is unable even to leave his village at times due to the travel restrictions by the Israeli army. But here in Iraq, he's escorting one of the highest-level U.S. State Department employees.

"I do believe that I am living two difficult situations, the one in Iraq, and the one in Palestine," he says, adding, "My family is quite lucky."

A 'brighter future' for Mideast

Zedan was born in the village of Beit Jala, which borders Bethlehem in the West Bank. For nine years, he worked as a journalist there, living through intense fighting between Israelis and Palestinians. He covered stories for major news organizations, including the Los Angeles Times and Newsweek magazine.

Zedan says he's nearly been killed multiple times in the West Bank and Gaza. Once, in Bethlehem, he says he found himself yelling at an Israeli solider in Hebrew, "Journalist! Journalist!" The soldier, he says, nearly shot him. Such is the life of a Palestinian journalist, he says.

But Zedan traded that life of a journalist to do what he can to help Iraq.

Zedan talks around the conundrum of being Palestinian, spending American money in Iraq while many Palestinians feel they suffer at the hands of U.S. foreign policy.

"I always keep the hope in my heart to see the peace process revitalized, where we can see again the generosity of the United States, pervaded by its aid -- to revitalize the economy there as it did in the '90s," he says.

Why does a man whose family and people are under the constant strain of conflict come to Iraq and risk his life?

"After speaking to the Iraqi people," he says, "I was stunned to see how much they have suffered under the former regime. I started seeing a bright picture -- that this war could lead to a brighter future for both Iraq and the region."

His duties for USAID are simple and yet vital. According to his official assignment paperwork, they include maintaining "contacts with donor representatives and other U.S. government agencies to collect information for reports" -- an ironic duty for a Palestinian whose people are desperate for any donations.

His lasting legacy, he hopes, will be the growth of the Iraqi press -- a group that struggles on a daily basis to come to terms with its newfound freedoms. "I strongly believe that Iraqi journalists will carry forward the torch of the freedom of the press -- something that has not existed here in Iraq before," he says.

Of course, he is haunted by tragedies here. He's lost two Iraqi journalist friends to insurgent violence, while another four had to flee the country.

Zedan was nearly killed on April 12, when he was blown backward by a suicide bomb as he walked through the main doors of the Iraqi parliament. After the bombing, he says, he could not sleep for 10 days.

After two years in Iraq, Zedan is leaving USAID this week and heading back to his family in the West Bank.

"I am sure that I am leaving Iraq a different person than the person I was when I arrived more than two years ago," he says. "I can see clearer that the division between fair and foul is quite visible. I will carry with me a lot of memories. Both good and bad."

He then adds, "I feel like Iraq has become a part of me, and many times I have this thing of search for identity: Who I am? Am I Iraqi? Am I Palestinian? Am I Christian? What am I?"

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