Iranian immigrants in central Ohio are trying to contact family and create community as conflict escalates between Israel and Iran.
Farnaz Maleky, an Iranian immigrant who lives in Columbus and is a professor at Ohio State University, has not been able to contact her family that lives in Tehran since Tuesday. She said it feels like a bad dream.
Meleky said she has also tried to reach out to local Iranian community groups for support, but hasn’t had much luck.
“From the first day, from the first minute, I was very much active on Facebook, on LinkedIn, sending emails to people, even contacting my Iranian community in Ohio, and said, 'do you want to have any gathering, any campaign, anything?'” She continued, “Even a student association at OSU, on Facebook, I emailed them and messaged them, 'do you wanna have anything?'”
“Can you believe that nobody even replied,” Meleky said.
Meleky also discussed the last time she spoke to her family in Tehran. She said they didn’t want to evacuate.
“They didn't want to leave Tehran. They said, 'this is our country. This is our city. We are not going to evacuate Tehran.' To be honest with you, I myself, if I can be in Tehran, I would be there immediately. I was searching for the flight. There is no flight available,” Meleky explained. “The airports are actually closed, flights are all canceled. I really want to be there because I want to be with my people.”
Meleky ultimately hopes that there is peace and former negotiations with Iran about nuclear capabilities can be restarted.
She also hopes that the central Ohio Iranian community is able to organize to urge the U.S. not to enter the conflict.
