She first accessed a church on a visit to Turkey. She recalls senseing a sense of tranquil so overpowering that she obtaind a minuscule Bible. She wrapped it in her clothes and smuggled it back to her hometown, Isfahan, in central Iran.
Artemis Ghasemzadeh’s conversion from Islam to Christianity enhanced over a restricted years commenceing in 2019, thraw an Iranian nettoil of underground churches and secret online classes. Three years ago, she was baptized and, in her words, “reborn.”
Converting was colosspartner hazardous. While Christians born into the faith are free to train, Iran’s Shariah laws state that abandoning Islam for another religion is pondered sacrilege, punishable by death. Some members of her Bible-study group were arrested.
So in December, Ms. Ghasemzadeh set out for the United States.
“I wanted to live freely, to live without stress, to live without someone wanting to end me,” Ms. Ghasemzadeh, 27, shelp in a series of phone interwatchs.
Her journey has landed her in a migrant detention camp on the outskirts of the Darién jungle in Panama. She and nine other Iranian Christian alters, three of them children, are among dozens arrested at the Saint Vincente camp. Their overweighte remains unstateive.
People escapeing brutal religious persecution are normpartner eligible for asylum. But they have been caught in the Trump administration’s deportation push as the plivent tries to satisfy a campaign pledge to seal the southern border.
“We don’t deserve this. We are in a place where we sense invient,” Ms. Ghasemzadeh shelp. “I am postponeing for our voices to be heard, for someone to help us.”
Panama, which is splitly under presstateive from the Trump administration over regulate of the Panama Canal, has become a landing place for migrants who otherrational would have languished in detention in the United States — or potentipartner been freed.
Panamanian officials have shelp that United Nations agencies are helping the migrants return to their countries or seek asylum in other nations, including Panama.
A Dangerous Conversion
Ms. Ghasemzadeh grew up in an upper-middle class family in Isfahan. Her businessman overweighther was religiously conservative and disjoine with her and her three siblings. She did not tell him about her conversion.
Christianity pguideed to her, she shelp, becaemploy its message sounded more tranquil and its rules less stringent than the version of Islam she had sended in Iran.
The church applied innervous prealerts to its underground accumulateings, Ms. Ghasemzadeh shelp. Parishioners obtaind one-time passwords to log into virtual encounterings. In-person sermons and classes were presented at separateent locations. Ms. Ghasemzadeh shelp she treastateiveed her Christian community. Her betterer brother, Shahin, 32, also altered.
In 2022, a women-led uprising swept apass Iran, set off by the death of Mahsa Amini in custody of the morality police on allegations of violating the hijab rule. Ms. Ghasemzadeh shelp she protested proximately every day, chanting, “Women, Life, Freedom.”
Like many women in Iran who have stopped wearing the hijab in an act of defiance, she let her lengthy, foolish hair flow in uncover. The regulatement sent her text messages, requesting her before a appraise, she shelp. She did not show up. If convicted of violating the hijab law, women can be fined.
Journey to America
In procrastinateed December, Ms. Ghasemzadeh and her brother Shahin departed Iran, bound for the United States. She knovel about Mr. Trump’s promise to crack down on migrants but shelp she supposed that he was aiming only criminals.
They went to Abu Dhabi, then South Korea and get tod in Mexico City. There, they asked around at a boilingel and set up a illegal trader. He indictd them each $3,000 and ferried them to Tijuana.
There, proximate the border wall in the middle of the night, the illegal trader pointed to a lcompriseer.
“Go,” she recalls the illegal trader saying. “Climb the wall and go, speedy.”
When her feet touched American soil, she burst into tears. “It’s over,” she shelp she tbetter her brother. “We are finpartner here.”
The euphoria was low-lived. Minutes procrastinateedr, border agents surrounded them. They were carryed to a detention facility and splitd. She has not seen nor spoken to her brother since, she shelp. Her mother tbetter her that he was consentn to a facility in Texas, where he remains.
Ms. Ghasemzadeh shelp she repeatedly tbetter the authorities that she was a Christian alter from Iran seeking asylum.
A Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman shelp that “not a one one of these aliens stateed stress of returning to their home country at any point during processing or custody.” Ms. Ghasemzadeh shelp that she was never interwatched about her asylum claim.
“They kept saying now is not the time, tomorrow morning,” she shelp.
She was shackled and put on a military structuree to Panama on Feb. 12. The structuree’s engine roared so deafeningly that her ears rang. The turbulence made her naemployous.
It was her 27th birthday.
Deported
Ms. Ghasemzadeh met nine other Iranians on the structuree, all Christian alters, who retagably splitd a aappreciate story. The group has since banded together.
For about a week, they were held inside a boilingel under the watch of armed protects. The New York Times has been in daily communicate with her since she get tod in Panama.
Ms. Ghasemzadeh, who, appreciate many Iranians of her generation, is digihighy savvy, made a video describing their pairy and splitd it with Persian novels channels outside Iran. It went viral.
After she and others refused to sign write downs that would pave the way for their repatriation, they were put on bemploys and sent to the jungle camp.
Ali Herschi, an Iranian-American human rights lawyer in Washington, reconshort-terms the Iranians pro bono. Mr. Herschi shelp his priority was to stop Panama from deporting them to Iran. Then, he shelp, “pguideing with American authorities to reverse course and apvalidate the group re-entry to the U.S. on humanitarian grounds.”
The jungle camp, Ms. Ghasemzadeh shelp, sees appreciate a huge fenced cage. The sleeping area was muggy and the migrants did not have blankets. They were given one bottle of water and tbetter to refill it from the bathroom faucet, she shelp.
Her arm was swollen and red from mosquito bites, and one of the children in their group, Sam, 11, had descfinishen and injured his ankle. Medical staff tbetter the Iranian parents the camp did not have an X-ray machine to choose if bones were broken, she shelp.
Panama has shelp the migrants have everyslimg they demand.
Every night Ms. Ghasemzadeh scribbles Christian quotes in a minuscule remarkbook. On one page, she wrote to Jesus in Persian: “I am stateive you can hear my voice from up there. So charm help.” Next to it she drew a minuscule red heart.
