I read several interesting articles recently regarding assistance given for a school for the blind in Iraq. http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaking_news/2008/09/perkins_school.html

http://www.perkins.org/whatsnew/braillers-to-baghdad.html

The article talked about how the Perkins School for the Blind in Massachusetts, Helen Keller’s alma mater, recently sent twenty Braille typewriters to the Al Noor School for the Blind in Baghdad, Iraq, along with a 72 volume Braille dictionary. One important aspect that these article point out is how people with disabilities can make a real difference in the lives of other people with disabilities. Often when we think of people with disabilities we think of these individuals as needing help for themselves and not as individuals providing assistance to others. These articles show how people with disabilities can help others, even each other.

It was touching to hear how hard the visually-impaired students and their instructors worked to learn and to teach in a difficult war-time environment despite having so few resources. The Al Noor School had no Braille typewriters prior to receiving the gift from the Perkins School.  The Perkins School had actually learned of the Al Noor School and its needs from an earlier story that Kyra Phillips of CNN had done on the school.

This story has a happy ending. The Perkins School for the Blind’s donation of the Braille typewriters and other-related materials is helping some of these blind Iraqi children learn to read and write for the first time in their lives. It shows the power of the media as a force for social change. I hope some day the ultimate happy ending will happen with the end of the war in Iraq and an environment where the students at the Al Noor School can concentrate on their studies without distraction. A new video by Kyra Phillips gives a flavor of the school and captures the gratitude of the students and its teachers for a gift that will make a real difference in their lives.

http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2008/10/16/phillips.iraq.school.blind.cnn

People with disabilities are the double casualties of war. They face all the burdens that average people in society face during war and extra burdens because of their disabilities. When critical infrastructure is damaged as a result of war, someone who can walk around on their own may still be able to get where they need to go, while someone in a wheelchair may be completely stranded and isolated.

PS On a sad note, this same week Gayle Williams, a Christian aid worker with the aid group Serving Emergency Relief and Vocational Enterprises SERVE Afghanistan, who worked with the disabled in Afghanistan was targeted and murdered by the Taliban for her work there. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/asia/july-dec08/afghan_10-20.html It is a real tragedy that someone like Ms. Williams who dedicated her life to helping others reach their potential and served at personal risk to herself was killed for her efforts.