Nine Letters from Iraqi High School Students
March 20, 2003

The following letters were sent to the Foundation in the weeks preceding the U.S. invasion of Iraq. The letters were collected by the Iraq Peace Team (IPT), an initiative of Voices in the Wilderness that is remaining in Baghdad for the remainder of the war. For more information on the Iraqi Peace Team click here.

Al-Adamia Secondary School for Girls - Baghdad
March 3, 2003

Dear Friends,

We love you and want to see you and we hope all the world live in peace and love each other like the flowers in one garden in heaven. Please urge your government to let us live in peace.

Best wishes,
Somiea, Anfal, & Yasamin (we are 18 years old)

My name is Rasha. I'm 18 years old. I want to say that I love the world and I love peace. I don't want war. Why do you want to kill the smiles on our faces? We want to learn and live in peace. I want to be a dentist, so how could I make that if the war happened? We are a peaceful people. We love peace. We love American people, so why do you want to kill us? I pray for the God to avoid us the war, and I hope for whole the world the peace and love. I want to be friends and keep in touch with you. Let us spread love among us.

With all the best,
Rasha Ali Abdul-Raheem, age 18

Al-Mustafa Secondary School for Girls - Al-Amal City, Baghdad
March 8, 2003

Dear Friends,

I'm Hind Salaam. I want to tell you that I only dream for the future. I want to be a doctor after I end the preparatory school, because I love to help people and I hate the death. But I don't understand why America insist on bombing Iraq people. We love the people of America although Bush want to kill us, because we know that you didn't hate Iraqi people. And I want you do your dreams.

Hind Salaam, age 17

Qataiba Secondary School for Boys - Saddam City, Baghdad
March 9th, 2003

We love Iraq as we love our parents, and we love the people of the world. I wish that I can keep in touch with you. Please help us. I have many dreams to the future.

Ahmed Camas

Al-Adamia Secondary School for Girls – Baghdad
March 10th, 2003

Under the threatening of the American government of every day, we live and continue our daily life. We go to school, to work, visiting each other, but still we have the hope of getting over this crisis. God will help us and save our country from this war. If war will arise the coming few days, I might not be able to continue writing my own diary. We don't know what is going to happen... We might die .. and maybe we are living our last days in life. I hope that everyone who reads my diary remember me and know that there was an Iraqi girl who had many dreams in her life, but war has destroyed all her dreams and her dreams will never come true.

Thuraya El-Kaissi, age 17

Al-Adamia Secondary School for Girls – Baghdad
March 11th, 2003

They were talking in TV about the war. Now we couldn't do anything, just pray for God to save us and all Iraqi people. And I wished that we all live in peace, because if there was a war they will destroyed all our dreams. So please be with us in our case. Because we are human like any others and we have all rights be live in peace.
Thank you.

Lubna Saad, age 17

Al-Adamia Secondary School for Girls – Baghdad
March 15th, 2003

I started watching the t.v. and the daily news and this news all about the same - about America's threat and this threat and this war is injustice .. I don't know if I could stay wrote this letters because maybe my life is too short and the responsible is America .. am just a young girl, am just 17 year old, and am not afraid from America or the death cause my fate is not in the hands of America but in the hands of God .. and if I didn't die in these days I will always hate the American Government.

Sarab El-Anne, age 17

Qataiba Secondary School for Boys - Saddam City,Baghdad
March 18, 2003

In the Name of God, Most Merciful, Most Compassionate
We thank you for your help and sympathy, and we thank you for your feelings, because we feel for any student that says inside your heart, for any American student that says, "Stop the war." We apologize now, for all the people in America, and we do not hate you.

Ali Mehson Rahim, 17 years old
Imad Ali Said, 18 years old
Kadham Jawad Taher, 18 years old
Ahmed Hashim, 17 year old