T
hey may not have been home for the holidays, but for thousands of displaced children in northern Iraq, the Christmas spirit has endured thanks to an annual gift-giving campaign born from a single question: a young girl, recently evacuated from her home in Nineveh, asked a volunteer whether Santa would still visit her.
“We were not planning on doing this event,” said Savina Dawood, co-founder of the Etuti Institute which organized the project. “It started when this girl asked me if Santa was still coming this year. I didn’t answer her — I just asked what she would like Santa to get her. She said a doll and that’s how we thought of this event.”
That same year, the Islamic State terror group began its assault on towns in northern Iraq, forcing residents into internally displaced persons (IDP) shelters north of Baghdad. Dawood was part of a small team of about ten volunteers delivering supplies to one of these shelters.
When children asked whether Santa would visit them, the volunteers decided to make it happen. They dressed up as Santa and surprised about 50 children — from newborns to 12-year-olds — with gifts purchased from money pooled among themselves.
The group couldn’t afford a Christmas tree and lights, so they decorated the space with large sheets of white paper covered in stickers and paint. A projector, screen, and speakers were donated, allowing the children to watch cartoons — something many had not seen in months. Afterwards, volunteers spoke to them about the meaning of Christmas.
“We explained that Christmas is not about getting new clothes,” Dawood said. “For these kids, none of that was actually possible. We explained that it’s about being friends to one another, about helping one another and giving to somebody who doesn’t have something and helping them in anything they need.”
Christmas spirit grows
A group called “Help Iraq” learned about the effort, and its founder, Rafed Yaldo, met with Dawood to offer $10,000 — on the condition that they bring Santa to other communities in the region.
Etuti’s volunteers began researching areas that had not received gifts and eventually chose Alqosh, a town about 30 miles north of Mosul. Dawood contacted a local priest to request an announcement at church, and they were told to expect a “decent” turnout.
With only two days’ notice and nothing more than a church announcement and word of mouth, 3,500 children — along with their parents and siblings — showed up to receive gifts and watch cartoons.
“This was the first time we saw this many children at the same time, so we kind of freaked out,” Dawood said.
With no room to decorate and barely enough space to move, the volunteers — each still dressed as Santa — quickly devised a system to distribute the gifts.
The Alqosh visit became a turning point in shaping the new Christmas project. The group soon began traveling to other regions, including Sharafiya located in the Nineveh Plains, relying on local churches to announce their visits, and often with only a few days’ notice.
By then, other organizations had begun to hear about the effort and offered to donate.
“We didn’t make a campaign or ask anyone for gifts, people heard from other people,” Dawood said. “It was amazing and it was beautiful.”
Supporting the Yazidis
In 2015, Dawood and her team of Santa volunteers set an ambitious goal: to visit every IDP camp in Erbil and the surrounding regions. Their tour began that February with the Yazidi community.
The displaced Yazidis were living in two camps facing each other in the Dohuk Province of northern Iraq. The camps consisted of tightly packed tents rising from pale dirt, many streaked with mud from recent rains. All together, the two camps were home to more than 4,000 children.
“We did not want to wear Christmas clothes because it was not Christmas and also we did not want to impose our beliefs on them because they are a different religion,” Dawood said. “We were just there to give them gifts and to give the children some joy.”
By then, the Santa volunteer team had grown to nearly fifteen members from around the world, including Iran, Iraq, the UK, Germany, Sweden, Egypt, and the Netherlands. Before each event, volunteers walked through the camps asking children what toys they wanted and ensuring that the gifts wouldn’t put them in any danger.
“We were not sure whether to buy them a ball or not because we weren’t sure if it would put them in an insecure playing situation,” Dawood said.
The event was so large — and the weather so brutal — that it had to be split across multiple days.
“The second day, it was raining like hell. We all were soaked in the mud and it was so fun and exciting,” she said.
Nineveh liberated
In 2016, as ISIS retreated from the Nineveh Plains, Christmas returned to the region for the first time in years. To mark the occasion, the Christmas campaign volunteers decided to focus their efforts on families who had returned to the newly liberated areas.
Nearly twenty volunteers traveled to seven different villages, spending a full week distributing gifts. In some villages, the destruction left behind by ISIS was so severe that no church or community space remained, forcing the Santas to go door to door to deliver presents.
Since 2014, over 17,000 children have received gifts through Etuti’s “Christmas Spirit” campaign. This year, the group plans to reach another 4,000.
Etuti’s Christmas campaign
For the 2017 campaign, Etuti set a goal of raising $40,000 by Christmas, asking at least 4,000 people around the world to contribute $10 each.
“Just think of it as one child in Nineveh the same way as you’re buying gifts for your children this Christmas in America,” she said.
The Christmas project is not an official Etuti program. Instead, it’s a volunteer-driven initiative that the organization takes on each holiday season.
And Dawood may be the ideal person to lead it. She recalls growing up with very little and crafting Christmas decorations from whatever she could find at home, including matchboxes she would color and wrap with small trinkets.
No Santa ever visited her as a child, she admits, yet now, every Christmas she finds herself surrounded by dozens.
