17-Month-Old Yazidi Child Receives Heart Surgery in Israel
17-month-old Wisam and his family are among the 200,000 Yazidi families driven out of Iraq by ISIS. Image by Getty Images
A child from the persecuted Yazidi ethnic group of northern Iraq received heart surgery in Israel.
The 17-month-old, Wisam, was born with congenital heart disease, and he and his father arrived in Israel in June in advance of the surgery, which was performed Sunday.
Wisam’s family — including his mother and two newborn twins — is now among the 200,000 Yazidi families besieged by ISIS, the militant Islamist group, on Mount Sinjar in Iraq. As of Wednesday, Wisam’s father had not made contact with the family.
Dr. Lior Sasson performed the seven-hour surgery at Wolfson Medical Center in Holon, outside of Tel Aviv. It was funded and organized by Save a Child’s Heart, which brings children from developing countries to Israel for cardiac treatment.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and the protests on college campuses.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
