Israeli surgeons saved the life of one-week-old Iraqi girl, Bayaan Jassam, yesterday. The girl was born with a congenital heart defect that could not be treated in Iraq.
The operation was made possible due to the American presence in Iraq. Dr Lior Sasson, who headed the eight-hour surgery at the Wolfson Medical Centre, near Tel-Aviv, is the son of Jewish immigrants from Iraq.
Dr Tzion Houri, the head of the hospital’s intensive care unit, said last night, "The operation seems to have been a success. Her heart is working normally and she has been taken off of life-support respirators. If all goes well, she should be able to go home in a month to six weeks."
The young girl’s good fortune began in the Kurdish city of Kirkuk in northern Iraq. A doctor attached to the United States forces found that Bayaan's arteries were transposed and warned that if the condition was not corrected by the time she was two weeks old, she would die. The necessary operation had never been performed in Iraq.
The doctor contacted Jonathan Miles, the head of Light to the Nations, an American Christian organization that brings Arab children from Gaza to receive medical treatment in Israel. Miles turned to an Israeli charity, Save a Child's Heart, which brings African and Asian children to the Wolfson hospital for surgery. Of the 900 patients treated over the past five years, a third were Arabs from Yesha (Judea, Samaria and Gaza).
According to the Associated Press, European hospitals refused to accept the girl for treatment.
By Friday, Israeli and Iraqi cardiologists were in touch with one another. Bayaan was taken to Baghdad, where an Iraqi surgeon performed a preliminary operation.
Miles then flew with Bayaan and her parents to Israel, via Jordan. Save a Child's Heart put the parents up in its hostel, 10 minutes away from the hospital.
Following the marathon surgery, Bayaan's father, Abdullah Jassam, told the UK newspaper, the Independent: "People say Israel is bad, but we've been treated very well here. We thank the doctors."
The operation was made possible due to the American presence in Iraq. Dr Lior Sasson, who headed the eight-hour surgery at the Wolfson Medical Centre, near Tel-Aviv, is the son of Jewish immigrants from Iraq.
Dr Tzion Houri, the head of the hospital’s intensive care unit, said last night, "The operation seems to have been a success. Her heart is working normally and she has been taken off of life-support respirators. If all goes well, she should be able to go home in a month to six weeks."
The young girl’s good fortune began in the Kurdish city of Kirkuk in northern Iraq. A doctor attached to the United States forces found that Bayaan's arteries were transposed and warned that if the condition was not corrected by the time she was two weeks old, she would die. The necessary operation had never been performed in Iraq.
The doctor contacted Jonathan Miles, the head of Light to the Nations, an American Christian organization that brings Arab children from Gaza to receive medical treatment in Israel. Miles turned to an Israeli charity, Save a Child's Heart, which brings African and Asian children to the Wolfson hospital for surgery. Of the 900 patients treated over the past five years, a third were Arabs from Yesha (Judea, Samaria and Gaza).
According to the Associated Press, European hospitals refused to accept the girl for treatment.
By Friday, Israeli and Iraqi cardiologists were in touch with one another. Bayaan was taken to Baghdad, where an Iraqi surgeon performed a preliminary operation.
Miles then flew with Bayaan and her parents to Israel, via Jordan. Save a Child's Heart put the parents up in its hostel, 10 minutes away from the hospital.
Following the marathon surgery, Bayaan's father, Abdullah Jassam, told the UK newspaper, the Independent: "People say Israel is bad, but we've been treated very well here. We thank the doctors."