Saratoga, California Since
1955
Cover Story
For the last 15 years, Saratogan Rosalee Sogolow has loved teaching refugees to speak English at Jewish Family Service of Silicon Valley, located in Los Gatos. She says it's fun to teach beginners because she can watch their understanding grow. Yearning to be Free Iranian refugees flee persecution and oppression, seeking freedom in the United States. Just getting out of Iran is a major hurdle. First, there's the matter of a passport. Sabet says that the governments give out passports randomly and mostly to women. Men of military age usually don't get a passport. (By Sandy Sims) (Photographs by George Sakkestad) Hundreds of Iranian refugees waiting in Vienna had finally received visas to enter the United States - some had even received plane tickets - before America closed its doors on Sept. 11. These Iranians are members of religious minorities - Christians, Baha'is and Jews - who are severely persecuted in Iran. After Sept. 11, those refugees who'd been approved for resettlement in the United States had to go back through the lengthy approval process again. With little to no money left to sustain them, and new Iranian refugees pouring into Vienna daily, many are living in churches and scrounging for food. Tim Prince, executive director of Los Gatos' Jewish Family Service of Silicon Valley (JFS), says the U.S. Department of State projected that some 14,000 refugees would enter the country during the last quarter of 2001. After Sept. 11, only 700 were admitted. Between January and September of last year, JFS processed some 132 refugees through its refugee resettlement program. Since Sept. 11, they have resettled no one. However, the door to the United States is beginning to open up ... slowly. In January, Iranian refugees - a mother and daughter and an elderly man - arrived at JFS. Last week two young Iranian women arrived, and during June and July, some 30 or so Iranian refugees will be arriving on JFS's doorstep. "We haven't had such a large group come all at once," says Azita Es-hagh, caseworker for Iranian refugees at JFS. She says the group is almost all Christian women, some children and a few men over 60. Since Sept 11, Middle Eastern men between the ages of 18 and 50 have not been coming through the resettlement pipeline. "They must prove they are not members of the Taliban," Es-hagh says. "I don't know how they prove that." Prince says that refugees are the most scrutinized people coming into the country, although "the men who hijacked the planes on the 11th had student visas. They were not refugees." Since Iran's revolution in 1979, when the Shaw was deposed and an Islamic fundamentalist regime took over the government, Christians, Baha'is, Jews and all other religious minorities have suffered persecution, and women have been oppressed. Es-hagh, 32, a Christian, came to the United States a year ago as an Iranian refugee. She has known persecution in Iran as a woman and as a member of a minority religion, and she has been through the long process of approval and resettlement in the United States. "If you are walking with a man or a boy in Iran," Es-hagh says, "the security guards stop you to ask what the relationship is. They stop you for any reason." On one occasion, she says, Islamic officials stopped her and her brother because some of her hair was showing from under her veil. The guards discovered that Es-hagh was carrying a Bible (written in Farsi), and the two were taken to headquarters, interrogated and fined. "Women can be lashed for hair sticking out of their veil," says L.J., 26, a Christian refugee from Iran who arrived at JFS in October of 2000. She says women have a hard time in Iran. "If a couple divorces, the mother may only keep her child till age 7. Then the child goes to live with the father," she says. "The mother has nothing to say about it." L.J. does not want to give her name because she has family still living in Iran. While conditions for religious minorities are bad now, L.J. says, early in the 1980s things were even more terrible. She reports that after the revolution, all citizens had to pass an Islamic ideology test. She says it's supposed to be better now, but the discrimination is only subtler. "You have to write your religion on applications." This information effectively keeps religious minorities out of jobs and out of universities. "Discrimination against Baha'is has been the worst," L.J. says. Sitting in his Los Gatos living room with his wife and three Baha'i friends, Saeid Samadi, an architect who came to the United States as a young man just before the revolution, explains that Baha'is have always been persecuted in Iran and to a lesser degree in other countries. But since the revolution, according to Samadi, the persecution in Iran has been severe. He says that the Baha'i faith is a particular threat to Islam because Muslims believe their prophet, Mohammed, received the final revelation from God. Baha'is believe that Bahaullah, an Iranian Muslim, received a new revelation some 110 years ago, from which came the Baha'i teachings that emphasize the spiritual unity of all mankind. Islamic clerics see these Baha'i teachings as heretical. Baha'is also hold women in high esteem. In fact, if parents must choose who to educate between a son and a daughter, Baha'is choose the daughter. "The mother is the one who educates the next generation," Samadi says. 
(Photograph courtesy of Sudahbeh Sabet) Sudahbeh Sabet, a member of the Baha'i faith, resettled in the United States two years ago to escape the persecution of her religious group by the fundamentalist Islamic government in Iran. According to Samadi, the Iranian regime also believes that Baha'is are spies for Israel because the Baha'i spiritual center is in Haifa, Israel. Soheila Afnani, one of the friends in Samadi's living room, explains that the spiritual center is located in Haifa because leaders of the Ottoman Empire exiled Bahaullah to the worst penal colony of that time - Akka, in Palestine - long before Israel existed. The Baha'i leader and his religion were supposed to die there. Instead, Akka became a Baha'i holy place, and the spiritual center was built close by in Haifa. "Under Iran's constitution," Samadi says, "Baha'is have no rights, and government agents feel free to harm them." He says that Baha'is have been thrown in prison, tortured and killed. Their property and pensions have been taken away. Their religious places and artifacts, even their cemeteries, have been confiscated by the government, forcing Baha'is to bury the dead in their gardens. According to Samadi, the Iranian government has summarily executed Baha'i leaders, including Samadi's former business partner. Samadi says that one man executed as a spy was 80 years old. In 1983, the government also executed 10 women and girls as young as 16 for teaching Baha'i classes. Afnani's father, a Baha'i leader, was killed in Iran 17 years ago. The United Nations, Australia, Europe, the United States and other countries have condemned the treatment of religious minorities in Iran. "Without international support, the Baha'is would have all been killed," Samadi says. But there were other frustrations. Iran's religious minorities cannot attend universities. Afnani says that education is a top priority for Baha'is. "It's so important to us that we leave money in our will for teachers," Samadi says. Sometime in the mid-1980s, Baha'is in Iran began taking extension courses from Indiana University. Then they organized an underground university patterned after the American school, calling it Open University. Sudahbe Sabet, a young computer software engineer who came to the United States two years ago, sits in Samadi's living room balancing a large book on her lap. "It's a photocopy of a textbook," she says. "We bought one textbook for each subject from Indiana University because that was all we could afford. Then we photocopied it." Because the print wears off easily, she had to trace many words with a pencil, and the book was in English, yet another barrier. "We had no classrooms," Sabet says. A person studying dentistry went to the dentist's office for lab work; kitchens were also used as labs. Many professionals helped - engineers, pharmacists and chemists. Afani's father was a civil engineer who taught classes. She says there were also professors who were not Baha'is who taught classes. "A supervisor would be assigned to someone's home, and we would go there to take the test, sometimes in a basement." Sabet says the university was so successful that student's units transferred to U.S. schools. A friend of hers who got a bachelor's degree through Open University qualified to enter a master's program here in the United States. Then, a year ago, Iranian authorities broke into Baha'i homes, smashed computers and destroyed documents, books and musical instruments, effectively ransacking Open University. Around the world, Baha'is drew up petitions, which they then took to universities. Afnani says this is when the outside world discovered Open University. "Big universities like Berkeley and Stanford were outraged," Samadi says. "When I came here," Sabet says, "it felt so good to be in a real university." 
(Photograph courtesy of Sudahbeh Sabet) Sudahbeh Sabet and her husband fled religious persecution by the fundamentalist Islamic regime in Iran and came to the United States, where they can openly practice the Baha'i faith. But coming to the United States and resettling is difficult. Just getting out of Iran is a major hurdle. First, there's the matter of a passport. Sabet says that the governments give out passports randomly and mostly to women. Men of military age usually don't get a passport. Sabet's husband left Iran 20 years ago, when he was 16. He couldn't get a passport, so he paid a good deal of money hoping to be smuggled out of the border at Turkey. Instead, because of an agreement between Iran and Turkey, he was returned to Iran, imprisoned and tortured. After his release, he escaped to Turkey. Sabet says her father would not allow her to leave that way because the smugglers often rape young girls and then return them to Iranian authorities. But sometimes smuggling over the border is the fastest way out. When Samadi's father died in Iran, Samadi and his siblings talked their mother into leaving. They had her smuggled over the border into Turkey. Samadi says his aged mother had to walk through the desert and ride a motorcycle and a camel. "We kept track of her the whole way," he says, "because we had people watching out for her. We didn't breathe until she was out." His mother said the only thing that kept her going was the fact that she would see her grandchildren. She lived in the United States for a few years before she died. Es-hagh's brother was also smuggled out of Iran through Turkey. Es-hagh says, "He was 18, a Christian and didn't want to fight for Islam." He rode a horse some 20 days to the border of Turkey, with only bread and water to eat. At the time Es-hagh was 19 and wanted to follow her brother. But it would be some 10 years before she saw him again. While still in Iran, Es-hagh and another brother secretly applied for refugee resettlement through the International Rescue Committee. This is a dangerous step because Iran doesn't want people leaving as refugees. And once an Iranian leaves as a refugee, there is no going back. Es-hagh sent copies of her passport, her birth certificate, and, most important, her baptismal papers to prove she is a Christian to her aunt in the Bay Area who sponsored her. Refugees resettling in California must have a sponsor. Two years later, Es-hagh received the phone call that visas for her and her brother to visit Austria were ready. The two of them flew, each with their two allowed suitcases, to Vienna for the next round of screening. There, the American embassy interviewed, fingerprinted and photographed them. For the next six months, they had to survive in expensive Vienna. "The American embassy lost my documents," Es-hagh says, and she had to redo them. When the final approval came through, Es-hagh and her brother were fingerprinted again before getting on the plane to fly some 24 to 30 hours to San Jose. When they got off the plane, all the frustrations faded away when they saw their brother waiting for them. "When the refugees arrive here, we go to work," says Tim Prince at JFS. Refugees receive a welcome check for the first month and a minimum income after that. They head to the refugee health center for a Medi-Cal card, vaccinations, tests and a checkup. They register with Social Security, and within 10 days they meet with a vocational counselor. Their English is assessed, and they begin classes in English as a second language (ESL) right away. These refugees have left virtually all their possessions, except what fits into two suitcases, so JFS provides them with donated furniture, a car and a trip to a thrift clothing store, where they can shop for clothes for job interviews. 
(Photograph courtesy of Sudahbeh Sabet) Azita Es-hagh, caseworker for Iranian refugees at Jewish Family Service of Silicon Valley, is an Iranian Christian who came to the United States to escape religious persecution in Iran. Mazi Zaraabian, 31, is Jewish. He came to JFS in August of last year to join brothers he hadn't seen for more than 20 years. He now lives in Los Gatos with one of his brothers. Searching for the right words, Zaraabian says, "Everything is different here in America, not just the language." He has two or three Iranian friends and doesn't yet know how to be with Americans. "My brothers are now half American and half Iranian," Zaraabian says. He watches television and movies to help with his English, but he finds it difficult to understand the different accents. When he first saw an American dictionary, he thought he would have to learn all the words in the book. Though Zaraabian was an engineer in Iran, he started working here at Target and is now working at a temporary job in inside sales. "This is so they can see how it works out," Zaraabian says. Though his English is excellent, he is a little unsure of himself. "I understand the customers, but I'm not sure they understand me." Rae Sandler is the vocational counselor at JFS who helped Zaraabian get employment. She creates an individualized employment plan for each one of her clients. They learn to interview, to write resumes, to leave messages. They take ESL classes at JFS. "It's almost impossible to get a job now if you don't speak English," Sandler says. Last year, businesses were hiring "warm bodies." But now "you have to speak near-fluent English to get a job recovering grocery carts or stacking shelves at Safeway." "Teaching English is a very physical job," says Saratogan Rosalie Sogolow, longtime volunteer ESL teacher at JFS. "You do lots of acting." She says the alphabets are completely different. "Many of these people are highly educated, but it is still difficult." She says that not knowing the language leaves newcomers with a helpless feeling, but the young people are "ultra motivated." Sogolow does exercises like having her students leave messages on her phone for practice. But, she says, "elderly immigrants who don't speak English are prisoners in their own homes." She started her popular senior ESL classes for them. Sandler says that the clients she works with are ideal employees. They have no criminal records. They have a record of some 98 percent retention. There are doctors, lawyers, engineers, Ph.D.s, farmers, trade workers. But refugees must start working wherever they can get a job. "During the good times," Sandler says, "it took four to eight months to find work for my clients; now it's more difficult." Es-hagh has two friends in Los Angeles (called Teher Angeles because of the large population of Iranians living there) who are both doctors. One is unemployed and the other is working as a security guard. She says that most Iranians study and get back to the same professional level they were at in Iran. "My friends will be doctors again," she says. Es-hagh says that these resettled people treasure their jobs. They are on time for work, and they put in long hours. JFS has a citizenship preparation program as well. "These people want to become Americans and are fiercely proud of their citizenship," says Zola Lazer, director of refugee resettlement and career services at JFS. "It's a source of great pride." Es-hagh's brother just became a citizen. She reports that the whole ordeal of resettlement is really over when one receives citizenship. But that takes five years. In the next couple of months, some 30 or so Iranians will climb into various planes in Vienna and make the long journey to the Bay Area to begin a new life in the United States. The staff at Jewish Family Service will be waiting. |
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