{"id":10722,"date":"2015-12-18T16:13:28","date_gmt":"2015-12-18T21:13:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/?p=10722"},"modified":"2015-12-18T16:28:06","modified_gmt":"2015-12-18T21:28:06","slug":"how-two-americans-helped-more-than-100-iraqi-christian-refugees-escape-isis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2015\/12\/how-two-americans-helped-more-than-100-iraqi-christian-refugees-escape-isis.html","title":{"rendered":"How Two Americans Helped More Than 100 Iraqi Christian Refugees Escape ISIS"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/files\/2015\/12\/20-20.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"  wp-image-10725 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2015\/12\/20-20-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"20-20\" width=\"300\" height=\"230\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>An American husband and wife team helped more than 100 Iraqi Christian refugees escape\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/abcnews.go.com\/topics\/news\/world\/isis.htm\">ISIS<\/a>\u00a0terror threats in their homeland and flee to Europe.<\/p>\n<p>Joseph and Michele Assad, former U.S. counter-terrorism officers, helped arrange for 25 families, 149 refugees in all including 62 children, to board a privately-chartered plane in the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/abcnews.go.com\/topics\/news\/iraq\/iraqi-kurdistan.htm\">Kurdistan region<\/a>\u00a0of Iraq on Dec. 10, and land in Kosice,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/abcnews.go.com\/topics\/news\/slovakia.htm\">Slovakia<\/a>, where they will be granted asylum within a month.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are so proud of Slovakia,\u201d Michele Assad told ABC News \u201c20\/20.\u201d \u201cThey were very courageous to make this decision and it wasn\u2019t an easy one to make, yet they did. \u2026 We hope other countries will have similar courage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/abcnews.go.com\/2020\/video\/young-iraqi-christian-refugee-forgives-isis-displacing-family-35775282\">ABC News&#8217;<\/a> \u201c20\/20\u201d followed the refugees throughout their journey, from a church providing them shelter\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/abcnews.go.com\/topics\/news\/iraq.htm\">in Iraq<\/a>\u00a0to starting a new life in Slovakia.<\/p>\n<p>Tonight on \u201c20\/20,\u201d Elizabeth Vargas reports on how two Americans helped more than 100 Iraqi Christian refugees escape ISIS. Tune in Friday, Dec. 18, at 10 p.m. ET to watch the full story.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An American husband and wife team helped more than 100 Iraqi Christian refugees escape\u00a0ISIS\u00a0terror threats in their homeland and flee to Europe. Joseph and Michele Assad, former U.S. counter-terrorism officers, helped arrange for 25 families, 149 refugees in all including 62 children, to board a privately-chartered plane in the\u00a0Kurdistan region\u00a0of Iraq on Dec. 10, and&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":271,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[85,537,2835,2834,2445,2237],"class_list":["post-10722","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-television","tag-85","tag-abc-news","tag-elizabeth-vargas","tag-iraqi-christian-refugees","tag-isis","tag-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How Two Americans Helped More Than 100 Iraqi Christian Refugees Escape ISIS<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2015\/12\/how-two-americans-helped-more-than-100-iraqi-christian-refugees-escape-isis.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How Two Americans Helped More Than 100 Iraqi Christian Refugees Escape ISIS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"An American husband and wife team helped more than 100 Iraqi Christian refugees escape\u00a0ISIS\u00a0terror threats in their homeland and flee to Europe. Joseph and Michele Assad, former U.S. counter-terrorism officers, helped arrange for 25 families, 149 refugees in all including 62 children, to board a privately-chartered plane in the\u00a0Kurdistan region\u00a0of Iraq on Dec. 10, and&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2015\/12\/how-two-americans-helped-more-than-100-iraqi-christian-refugees-escape-isis.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Idol Chatter\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-12-18T21:13:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2015-12-18T21:28:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/files\/2015\/12\/20-20-300x169.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Corine Gatti\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"How Two Americans Helped More Than 100 Iraqi Christian Refugees Escape ISIS","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2015\/12\/how-two-americans-helped-more-than-100-iraqi-christian-refugees-escape-isis.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"How Two Americans Helped More Than 100 Iraqi Christian Refugees Escape ISIS","og_description":"An American husband and wife team helped more than 100 Iraqi Christian refugees escape\u00a0ISIS\u00a0terror threats in their homeland and flee to Europe. Joseph and Michele Assad, former U.S. counter-terrorism officers, helped arrange for 25 families, 149 refugees in all including 62 children, to board a privately-chartered plane in the\u00a0Kurdistan region\u00a0of Iraq on Dec. 10, and&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2015\/12\/how-two-americans-helped-more-than-100-iraqi-christian-refugees-escape-isis.html","og_site_name":"Idol Chatter","article_published_time":"2015-12-18T21:13:28+00:00","article_modified_time":"2015-12-18T21:28:06+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/files\/2015\/12\/20-20-300x169.jpg"}],"author":"Corine 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