‘killed for nothing’ the inspiring story of American doctor Bushra Ibnauf Sulieman who left an indelible footprint

The hostilities in Sudan have claimed many lives put averagely at 413 and 3,551 injured. However, the death of American doctor Bushra Ibnauf Sulieman , a lover of his country and people has been described as a collosal loss to Sudan and the future of generations of doctors. Sulieman had defiled all odds and kept working in Sudan to save lives despite the threat to his life. His commitment to his country of birth, his ailing parents and his devotion to treating Sudan’s poor, kept him in Sudan when he could have escaped to America.

According to reports, since the battles between two rival Sudanese commanders erupted in Khartoum on April 15, the 49-year-old gastroenterologist had been soaked in treating the city’s wounded. He and other doctors resiliently continued to treat the people, hoping and praying for a timely end to the hostilities.

Relating his conviction and drive to his friends who had expreessed fear for him being in the crisis- ridden Sudan, Sulieman had written on his Facebook : ‘‘ Nothing will happen to us except what God  has decreed for us,’” and posited. ”And in God let the believers put their trust.”

According to his friends, death caught up with him the morning that Sulieman decided he had to risk the dangerous escape from Sudan’s capital with his parents, American wife and his two American children.

A roving band of strangers some of whom their future and that of their loved ones were attached to him, surrounded him in his yard Tuesday, stabbing him to death in front of his family. Friends suspect robbery was the motive. By his death, Sulieman became one of two Americans confirmed killed in Sudan in the fighting , both dual nationals.

Authorities say the other, with ties to Denver, was caught in a crossfire. They have not released that American’s name.

Mohamed Eisa, a Sudanese doctor who practices in the Pittsburgh area, was a close colleague of Sulieman. Over the years, “sometimes I asked him, ‘Bushra, what are you doing here? What are you doing in Sudan?″ Eisa recalled.

”He always says to me, ’Mohamed, listen — yes, I love living in the United States … but the United States health care system is very strong,” and one doctor more or less won’t make a difference.

Eisa said Sulieman would tell him: “In Sudan, everything I do has so much impact on so many lives, so many students and so many medical professionals.”

The sudden illness and death of Eisa’s father in Khartoum meant Eisa was in Sudan when fighting broke out. Now trying to get back to his American wife and children in the U.S., Eisa spoke late last week from Port Sudan, a city on the Red Sea now crowded with Sudanese and foreigners who made the dangerous 500-mile (800-kilometer) drive from the capital in hopes of securing spots on ships leaving Sudan.

Eisa described a journey through checkpoints manned by armed men, past bodies lying in the streets, and past vehicles carrying other families killed attempting the escape route.

ADVERTISEMENT

The Sudanese American Medical Association has also spoken glowingly about Dr, Bushra Ibnauf Sulieman whom they stated ” exemploflied the best in us”

In Washington, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby extended “deepest sympathies” to Sulieman’s family.

“For nothing. For nothing,” Eisa, his colleague in Sudan, said of Sulieman’s killing, before finally finding passage over the weekend on a ship out of Sudan.

“You know who you killed?” another Sudanese colleague, Hisham Omar, posted among Facebook tributes from the country’s medical workers, in a message aimed at the attackers who killed Sulieman.

“You killed thousands of patients,” that colleague wrote, speaking of the impact that Sulieman — one doctor — knew he had in Sudan, and all the Sudanese he would have aided in the years ahead. “You killed thousands of needy people. You killed thousands of his students.”

Elizabeth Jerde had posted: ”Bushra Ibnauf Sulieman was a well – respected colleague at the Gastroenterology Clinic and Mercy Hospital in Iowa city, hospital president Tom Clancy said.”