nothin IRIS Resettles Syrian Refugees | New Haven Independent

IRIS Resettles Syrian Refugees

Aliyya Swaby Photo

George: First 5 of many.

As the U.S. moves cautiously to opening its doors to tens of thousands of Syrian refugees fleeing civil war, New Haven’s Integrated Refugee and Immigration Services (IRIS) has resettled four families from that conflict with another on the way to New Haven.

IRIS Executive Director Chris George (pictured) said that his Nicoll Street-based organization and the other 300-plus refugee resettlement groups in the country are ready to help more refugees — possibly hundreds of thousands more. He made the remarks on WNHH radio’s At the Moment” program with Sharon Benzoni.

IRIS has placed the first four families in homes in the East Rock and Fair Haven neighborhoods as well as West Haven, while the agency works with them to get settled. The families arrived here between July 28 and Aug. 4.

George said the Syrian families at IRIS do not wish to speak with the press because they don’t want their identity known for fear of retaliation against their friends and family remaining home, where a civil war has claimed a quarter-million lives and sent half the nation’s population from its homes.

Some have had harrowing experiences,” George said.

One family had just left home minutes before its house was blown up. Another was separated from an older son who was being pressured to join the government-backed military and is now in a refugee camp in Jordan.

They’re tough people and they’ve gone through a lot,” George said. They’re going to make great neighbors.”

He said IRIS will help the families get on their feet, but they have to do the hard work of quickly getting jobs, some of which will be far beneath what they might be used to. The parents of the families worked at shopkeeper, driving, teaching, restaurant, and construction jobs in Syria. The families are learning English now and beginning to seek jobs.

They’ll work their way up. And they do well. And their kids do well,” George said. Their kids will arrive not speaking a word of English, and then, you know a year later, they’re wining academic awards. Wilbur Cross High School graduated a number of refugee kids. One of them sang the national anthem at the graduation ceremony.”

Though European states have been bearing the brunt of figuring out how to cope with the millions that are fleeing Syria, George characterized the U.S. response as disturbing” and standing on the sideline.”

President Barack Obama announced Thursday that the U.S. will take at least 10,000 Syrian refugees. U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy has called on the country to accept 50,000 refugees. George said the country can and should take many more because the the U.S. can handle more, and because it is the right thing to do.

Look back to 1980,” George said. In 1980, this country brought in 215,000 Vietnamese in one year. That’s the scale of our response. That’s the scale our response should be. It’s an enormous humanitarian crisis. Our response needs to match that. So 5,000 doesn’t cut it. Now we’ve heard reports that behind closed doors Secretary [of State John] Kerry mentioned that well maybe it would be 30,000, so we would go from 70,000 to 100,000. It needs to be two or three times the 70,000 over the next year.”

George said IRIS and similar resettlement organizations across the country like it, stand ready to help, but the government has to have the political will to act.

The network is there. All of us have been getting emails and phone calls about community support,” he said. I mean I’m getting phone calls and emails from Woodstock, Connecticut, from Darien, from Branford, from Guilford, from all across New Haven from across the state. Churches, synagogues, Muslim groups, individuals of every political stripe saying, We want to help.’”

George said his staff also is ready. We’re flexible and agile enough to expand. We just need the government to bring the refugees. This is life-saving help and the benefit for us is they enrich our community, make us stronger, strengthen the economy.”

He said what people might not understand is that refugees — defined in international law as people forced to flee their home country because they’ve persecuted or they have a well-founded fear of persecution — persecution because of their race, their religion, their nationality, their social group or their political opinion” — come from all varying socioeconomic groups. That means a number of refugees will be professionals such as teachers, doctors and engineers.

Einstein was a refugee,” George pointed out. We get people who speak English fluently. We get people who taught English. So talented, resourceful, motivated people move quickly into jobs. They have to. We don’t have enough funding to support them forever.”

He said the resettlement organizations will help the families get on their feet but they have to do the hard work of quickly getting jobs, some of which will be far beneath what they might be used to, and learning English if they don’t already speak it. But in his years of experience, refugees do that hard work, quickly, and they do it well, ultimately becoming very productive citizens of the United States.

George said if the government decides to accept hundreds of thousands of refugees it is going to take money, but it would be a good investment with an even better return. He said organizations would have to hire more staff to provide things like case management help finding jobs and learning English. But for every tax dollar the government spends there is $3 of private assistance from volunteers and donations.

Thanks to social media, the outpouring of support for the Syrian refugees is already flowing, George said.

The biggest question for the first couple of weeks was What can we do? How can we help?’’” he said. The response has been contact your government representative and tell them to bring more refugees. IRIS resettles about 230 refugees a year, but to respond to the Syrian crisis, George said that there would be a need to double that amount each year.

George said inviting refugees to the United States strengthens the country as a whole in many ways.

They make us strong. They help us understand the world,” he said. The United States needs to be more global minded. You go to school with a refugee sitting next to you, you’ll get some insight into how the world thinks of the United States — this kind of love-hate relationship in many cases. So they internationalize us. It’s really the best thing that this country does, inviting persecuted people to come here and start new lives. It’s the Statue of Liberty — what makes us proud. And that’s why, honestly, I wasn’t surprised when I heard yesterday Donald Trump announced that he would be in favor of bringing Syrian refugees to this country. He said, I reach this position very reluctantly,’ he said, because I don’t like the idea of bringing all these people here, but for humanitarian reasons we have to do it.’

Which confirms something I’ve said over the years about this program, which is humanitarianism and hospitality trumps politics. No matter what your political opinion is, hospitality is really in our DNA to welcome persecuted people in this country. That takes precedence and even when the economy is down we’ll still invite refugees to come.”

Click on the sound file above to hear the interview, or find the episode in iTunes or any podcast app under WNHH Community Radio.”

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