Rifqa Bary has a green card! Excellent news just announced today. Congratulations to her lawyer Kort Gatterdam and the rest of her legal team.
I got the news from Rifqabary.com. Pamela Geller also has the news up, but I don't notice any apology to Gatterdam. One might be in order given that a few weeks ago Pamela was insisting that Gatterdam had "failed" on Rifqa's immigration status. The spectacle of Geller's unrelenting campaign of negativity against Rifqa's legal team has been unedifying. The strife over Rifqa's legal strategy has resulted in Rifqa's estrangement (possibly at her lawyers' request) from her dear friend Jamal Jivanjee, just at a time when she needed all the friends she can get.
Congratulations to Rifqa! Let us hope that those who wish her well will be able to admit that they were wrong. May God continue to work for her healing (from cancer) and richly bless her in the years to come.
Comments (10)
Oh Lydia, that IS good news! I really needed that today, and am so thankful for her safety now.
Kamilla
Posted by Kamilla | September 7, 2010 3:28 PM
Thank You, Lord Jesus! May the Lord bring into her life the brothers and sisters who will most help her to grow more and more like Jesus in her new life and can help her to be secure and safe.
Posted by Beth Impson | September 7, 2010 4:33 PM
Good for her.
"The spectacle of Geller's unrelenting campaign of negativity against Rifqa's legal team has been unedifying."
Not at all, it tells you everything you need to know about Pammy.
"Kort Gatterdam, a lawyer for Rifqa Bary, said Tuesday the news means Bary can now start applying for a driver's license, Medicaid coverage and college scholarships."
It's also good to reflect on what a solid social safety net means for real people.
Posted by al | September 7, 2010 4:41 PM
I just linked the story, Al. I'm thinking more in terms of, "Good, now she can legally earn money here."
Posted by Lydia | September 7, 2010 6:36 PM
Ditto but, given her age and work experience, the odds are slim that she is going to walk into a job with full health insurance and that is assuming her condition allows her to work. Beating the cancer would seem to me to be her job just now. If she can do that she'll have decades to work and pay taxes. BTW, a small employer who offers health insurance couldn't hire her as the rates would be off the charts. Having cancer at 18 would preclude her ever getting insurance as an individual. Oops, I forgot, HCR will soon prohibit discriminating on pre-existing conditions for small businesses and individual policies so that may be an option.
Given the advantages of a college education, I would prefer a get well, get educated, get a job scenario.
Posted by al | September 7, 2010 8:59 PM
It's also good to reflect on what a solid social safety net means for real people.
And you suppose that all of us want to burn down every last fragment of the structure of the social safety net?
Hmm, that would be an interesting assumption, given that half of our writers here have distributist sympathies. May I likewise assume that because you support Obama and science, you endorse the eugenic views of the President's science adviser?
Posted by Paul J Cella | September 8, 2010 8:01 AM
Leave it to Al to make this into a discussion of Obamacare, etc.
Oh, by the way, I didn't report it in the main post: Pamela Geller _and_ Rifqa's first lawyer, Stemberger (who hasn't been her lawyer for a while, s I guess he's just a Florida lawyer) have been sued by the lawyer for Rifqa's parents, Omar Tarazi, for defamation. I forget what Stemberger is supposed to have done--I think for saying that the Noor mosque has ties to terrorism, though I forget what this has to do with Tarazi. Geller is being sued for calling Tarazi "CAIR appointed," which he claims he wasn't.
This should be a circus. Thank goodness Rifqa is out of it.
Posted by Lydia | September 8, 2010 9:34 AM
And meet a godly young gentleman who will have a better character and different kind of personality than her father. Am I out of line to ask everyone to pray for her again so we are joined together in prayer? Honestly I'm really overcome right now. I don't know why I took this personally. I guess because she's about my stepdaughter's age, and my students'
Posted by Steve P. | September 8, 2010 2:38 PM
Steve P. that's not out of line at all. She needs many prayers. 18 is so, so young to be on her own in this way. I think any parent must feel that. A young person of that age still needs tremendous help and guidance.
I wish we could tell more about what's up with the cancer. On the rifqabary.com site, they had a post a few months ago saying that she was not going to be updating people about the status of her cancer. Then we found out when she got some favorable rulings from the Ohio judge in early August that (according to the news report) doctors said that they could find no cancer in her body, and she had decided not to have chemotherapy. Now, her lawyer makes reference to her (now) battling cancer. I certainly understand her desire for privacy, but now that so many of us have her interests at heart, it is difficult having no idea if she is actually presently ill or not.
Posted by Lydia | September 8, 2010 3:11 PM
Praise the Lord! Rifqa's Cancer Free. She's working with her Doctors to prevent the Cancer from coming back. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYdA014qHhI .
Posted by Cayce | October 22, 2010 11:12 PM