Houda Shretah has an unusual background. From fleeing Syria when she was just four years old, to being taken in by Switzerland and raised as a Swiss national, to becoming an American green card holder. Having been in the United States for eleven years, it came as a complete shock when she was detained at LAX one day after President Donald Trump signed his executive order banning anyone who originated from seven targeted countries. What she uncovered during her hours in detainment gives us a firsthand account into the madness and chaos created by a executive ban that was poorly executed.
I had a chance to speak with Shretah shortly after she was released to give her a chance to tell her story, no holds barred, and share with the American people how the experience looked from the inside.
Shretah is a former model and actress who has now taken what she has been through in the past several years of her life to shift her focus into more humanitarian efforts. So being thrust into the center of a national controversy gave her a unique perspective and allowed her to express her feelings on the ban in a way that most people might not be expecting from a citizen whose country of origin is being targeted.
This is her story.
You were out of the country when the executive order was signed. Tell me about how the executive action affected your travel itinerary.
Houda Shretah: I was in Switzerland, I left the day of the Inauguration to surprise my sister for her 30th birthday. I was supposed to stay for two weeks but then my lawyer called me and said, “You have to return immediately, because of your origin, or you might not be able to come home.” I was like, “Wait a minute, I have a green card, what are you talking about?” My lawyer said “Right, but the law might change and you just happen to be from one of the countries that they banned.”
Houda mentioned that she quickly gathered her things, because everything was so uncertain, and that she barely had time to say goodbye to her family before getting on a plane to return to the United States.
Were you worried when you got on the plane?
HS: Yeah I mean, I was worried, but the first question I asked my lawyer was, “What do they want?” What do they want. Because if I know what they are after, what their expected result is, then I know what they want and if I have it, I can give it to them. If I didn’t know what they wanted then I wouldn’t be able to do anything. That’s when my lawyer said, “I think they’re looking for terrorists.”
Or at least trying to prevent terrorists from entering.
HS: Right. I said well, “I’m not a terrorist.” Well how do you prove you’re not a terrorist, when you’ve already been living in a country for eleven years and haven’t had a single problem? So I thought well I guess the only thing I could do was be nice, and not make people afraid of me.
That’s a hard label to fight against. Especially when it rarely is about what you have done and often times about how you look. Tell me about landing at LAX. What happened after you arrived?
HS: After I landed they saw my green card which states that my country of birth is Syria. They immediately told me I was going to secondary. When he said secondary, In my head I heard “solitary,” which just freaked me out. It was definitely strange that you have a green card and you’re supposed to be fine, you have lived here for years, and the system works but then one day it doesn’t.
Literally in one day, the whole system fell apart. What about secondary holding what was that like?
HS: I was shocked because the room was completely filled, completely filled. The officer told me to sit down and I looked at him and said. “Where?” There was no where to sit. We weren’t allowed to contact anyone, and they were checking people for phones. There was about fifty people in there, maybe more, and it was a small room. I looked around and realized there were a lot of Asians. I asked around and a lot of them were Koreans, Filipinos, Chinese, there were some Turkish people, Iranian people, and other Arabs. I asked about their status and they were saying, “I have a green card, I have a visa, I have a green card, etc.” Everyone was really confused. They were law-abiding citizens, they had gone through the process, they studied American law and proved that they were assets to this country. I mean, it’s not an easy process getting a green card, but when you do, the deal is that you get to work in this country in peace. That’s the deal. But now there was no deal.
Aside from the confusion what were the other things you noticed in the room?
HS: I mean, there were grandpas and grandmas in there. There was no water or food, people were waiting there for hours. There was not a single translator, and a lot of these people don’t speak English. I was trying to translate for people but it was German and Arabic, what about the others, you know? It was so unorganized. Also, there were mostly brown people in the room, and a very small percentage of them were from the countries listed in the ban. To me, I’m like I’m an Arab, these people aren’t, why are they here? What does the ban have to do with a Chinese or a Filipino? It has nothing to do with them. I mean, if a Chinese business man, a green card holder, could be an Islamist terrorist in the eyes of immigration that means anyone can.
I started asking a couple of questions to the officers, and you know they were not happy about that but I asked him, you know, “What’s up?” He finally said, “You know we’re just trying to do our jobs, we don’t really know whats going on. We’re just waiting. This guy says yes on the Muslim ban, this guy says no it’s not a Muslim ban. Now, you’re cool but it might change a bit and we’ll have to put you on the plane.” They had no clue what was going on. They were embarrassed. Here they are, officers who want to protect and serve, but no one knew what they were doing or why. He said, “We’re just trying to do the best we can here.” I realized everyone is trying to do the best they can. I’m sure [President] Trump is trying to do the best he can.
That’s really noble of you to try to understand Trump’s point of view, especially when you were personally affected by his executive order.
HS: Absolutely, no absolutely, because of the suffering that has happened in my life, I have been taught compassion. Even the worst person in the world doesn’t really want to do the worst thing. With Trump, I don’t know if he knows, maybe he does, but its unclear to other people; when you’re not sure about your desired result and when the letter of the law is unclear the outcome could go both ways. When I studied law I was told that when you didn’t know what to do you had to look at the intention of the lawmaker.
What do you mean by that?
HS: If the intention is to Make America Great Again, then what do Americans want? They want their basic needs met. They want food, water, shelter, safety, freedom, and happiness. So if you want to provide safety, but your actions create more terror than you need to adjust your actions, adjust the variables. That’s just speaking scientifically. If you want to get to “B” and you try “A” to see if it will get to “B”, and it doesn’t work, then you need to try something else. If you’re not clear what you want, you’re not going to be very clear on how to get to that point.
That’s a very simple way to put it. What was this ban after? Was it to fight terrorism before it starts or was it to keep Americans safe? It seems a bit unclear, like you said, as to what the desired result is.
HS: In my opinion, you have to make a decision. Either you’re fighting terrorism or you’re keeping America safe. They are completely different. If I’m going to fight, I’m going to arm people, barricade myself, I’m going create walls. I’m going to do things that might scare people and create terror.
You can’t fight terrorism with terrorism.
HS: Yeah, you can’t fight fire with fire. If he wants to fight terrorism then he is doing exactly what he wants to do, but then the American people need to know about it because it may have undesired results. There is a difference between fighting terrorism and wanting peace and safety.
When you got released, you took a photo with a sign. What prompted you to take that photo?
HS: There were a lot of protesters there. Everyone was pretty welcoming when we were getting released. Someone asked me if I was detained and I said yes, and then he handed me his sign so I took that photo because it spoke to me and to my message. We are one people. I like to think that the world is a house with rooms in it. If one room burns to the ground, we have a choice. We can all watch it burn or we can help free them from the fire.
Shretah will no longer be able to travel while the ban is in effect.
In speaking with Shretah, I realized her message was a simple one. The way forward is realizing that we do not live in a closed world. We can have our borders but as she said to me, “diseases, airborne illness, famine, it doesn’t care about your borders.” That’s poignant because the borders are something we create, but they are not real.
Using her analogy about the world being a house with rooms; if one of the rooms is burning or in a more literal sense, in dire straits due to war and conflict, we as a species have the responsibility to help. We can choose not to, we can close our doors and barricade ourselves, but we will never have enough borders to protect us from the results of our own actions.
It comes down to understanding that all human beings want their basic needs met. Food, water, shelter, freedom, and the pursuit of happiness. That is not only an American ideal. It is a human one.
Maybe if we step back and try to understand that, we can understand that peace is possible. It will require however, thoughtful leaders, diplomacy, and an open heart.
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