Last month, Samaritan’s Purse opened the Emergency Field Trauma Hospital outside Mosul, Iraq, to treat those wounded in the fight to retake the city from ISIS. Those treated include “badly wounded” members of the vicious terrorist group.

As Samaritan’s Purse President Franklin Graham explained in Facebook post Saturday, the hospital treats Muslims, and many of them had been shot by ISIS snipers as they fled the city. “At the same time,” he said, “we are treating badly wounded ISIS fighters. Our medical teams take them in, perform surgery, bind up their wounds, and give everyone the same compassionate, Christian care — helping them in Jesus’ Name.”

The organization describes itself as a “nondenominational evangelical Christian organization providing spiritual and physical aid to hurting people around the world … with the purpose of sharing God’s love through His Son, Jesus Christ.”

A Difficult Place

Dr. Elliot Tenpenny, the field hospital’s director, told The Christian Post that the hospital is working to save as many lives as possible. “Every single one of them is a trauma from the war and all of them are in need of surgery or they are critically ill and in need of stabilization.”

We need prayer everyday. We do this in the name of Jesus Christ and we need to be sustained. This work is difficult in many different ways. It’s wearing and it’s challenging.

The hospital had only been open a few days when he counted almost 100 patients they’d treated. And this just steps from the war zone.

“We live and work in a difficult place,” Dr. Tenpenny acknowledged. “You wake up and go to sleep with the sound of artillery and gunfire around but we are protected by our security that is here. There is no specific incident that has made me fearful, but we are sitting close to a war zone and we hear the war going on behind us and we know what the people are going through in those areas.”

Dr. Tenpenny asks for prayer for the hospital in order to continue helping those in need. “We need prayer everyday. We do this in the name of Jesus Christ and we need to be sustained. This work is difficult in many different ways. It’s wearing and it’s challenging.

“We need prayer individually and as a team in order to continue on striving. We need prayer for the community in general and for the people of Mosul — that they are spared and that they can access the healthcare they need. Just pray for us that through all this we are really a beacon of light in this area for Christ.”

To support or learn more about Samaritan’s Purse efforts in northern Iraq, including the Emergency Field Trauma Hospital, click here.