Ten Aid Workers Were Taken in the Nuba Mountains. I Went Looking for Their Religion Before I Went Looking for Their Names.
Ten names, two sources that disagree, and one woman held five months. The story would not take the shape I wanted.
The Committee for Justice put out a notice on August 16 with ten names in it. Makrious Youssef. Jalal Konda. Jaqoud Omar. Widad Bashir. Then John Omar, Moaza Younis, Al-Najah Koko, Dr. Mirghani Adam, Akhnouq Ramadan, Nasri Mousa. I read the list twice, and I want to be exact about what I was doing the second time, because it was not learning them.
It was sorting them.
Christian aid workers taken by Islamists is a story I run. Aid workers taken in somebody else’s war is a story I skim on the way to something else. I have never once said that out loud, and I am saying it now because the record refused to give me the answer I was shopping for.
