BETRAYING THE BETRAYED — When Integrity Costs You
In the shadowy world of international diplomacy and hostage negotiations, silence is often preached as virtue. But when silence becomes complicity, when fear masquerades as strategy, and when truth is buried beneath layers of hierarchy and ego, someone has to speak.
This is the story of a small group of people who refused to wait quietly — inside the campaign you were never meant to see.
The Hidden Detention of Lindsay and Craig Foreman
Most people have never heard of Lindsay and Craig Foreman. They are a British couple currently detained in Iran, held not because of any crime, but because of the geopolitical chessboard they happened to land on. The UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) advised their family and community to remain silent on their incarceration.
It was the kind of advice we’ve heard before — one rooted in decades of diplomatic orthodoxy, where silence is meant to keep hostages safe. But for those familiar with the painful histories of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, Anoosheh Ashoori, and others, that orthodoxy feels dangerously outdated.
Time and again, silence has not led to rescue — it has led to erasure. Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Ashoori are only free today because of aggressive public campaigns. Meanwhile, Mehran Raoof still languishes in Iran’s Evin Prison, without a single global campaign in sight. All of them are political prisoners — hostages to paranoia and despotism.
A Parallel Campaign — Quiet, Strategic, Defiant
When Lindsay and Craig were taken, Susanne, who had seen how public action helped secure the release of Belgian national Olivier Van der Casteel, immediately recognized the signs. But by then, the family — advised by the FCDO — was already deep in a cone of silence.
They spoke to no one. Even in alumni circles, Lindsay’s name was whispered cautiously. People deleted posts. The mere association with a university might, some feared, validate Iranian claims that they were spies.
But Susanne wasn’t buying it. She was resolute: something had to be done. For that, she was shut out. Labelled “too pushy,” she was dismissed from alumni groups and support forums — spaces where diplomacy ruled and difficult questions were off-limits.
When I raised similar concerns, suggesting we at least debate as a group how to respond, I was treated like a traitor. I walked away, head bowed, feeling isolated and deeply out of touch.
Then four of us — Susanne, Naomi, Sarah, and myself — found one another. We weren’t trying to hijack anything or seek the spotlight. We simply couldn’t sit back and do nothing.
We built an underground support system. We researched. We reached out to former hostages like Jason Rezaian. We spoke with journalists, NGOs, politicians, and intelligence experts. We mapped out “what if” scenarios — plans for a moment that hadn’t yet come.
The Moment Arrives: Cracks in the Regime
That moment arrived when Iran erupted into chaos. War broke out and bombs fell. Susanne, who had lived through the East German revolution, recognized what many missed: regimes in crisis fracture. Chaos is dangerous, but it also opens windows.
What if Lindsay and Craig escaped? Would they have passports? Would they know where to go? Would anyone be ready?
We penned a respectful, private letter to the family asking these questions. But it wasn’t the family who responded — it was the gatekeepers. Senior voices from the tightly controlled alumni network told us our thinking was “inappropriate,” “out of bounds,” even dangerous. One suggested we were trying to orchestrate a jailbreak.
All we had done was ask to be heard — to explore the possibility of helping if the opportunity arose. And we had done our homework. We had consulted experts, hostage negotiators, and diplomats. We knew that Lindsay and Craig faced a ten-year sentence for the “crime” of holding British passports. In some cases, even the death penalty is not out of the question. These were not abstract concerns.
Then Something Shifted
Joe Bennett, Lindsay and Craig’s eldest son, reached out. He wanted to understand.
We showed him what we’d learned — that silence rarely saves lives; that public campaigns don’t endanger hostages; that history does not support that claim; that FCDO advice is often outdated — sometimes dangerously so.
Slowly, carefully, Joe began to rethink the path forward. We worked together quietly and cautiously, because we knew that if official channels found out, they might try to shut everything down.
At that point, the FCDO couldn’t even confirm where Lindsay and Craig were being held.
The Backlash: Silenced from Within
As the campaign launch drew closer, we were running on empty — working 18-hour days with no funding, minimal sleep, and constant pressure. Just days before the public campaign launched, we were still receiving emails calling us subversive, dishonest, even “a danger to the family.”
These messages came from the very people who had tried to silence us from the beginning. Some reached out feigning support, only to feed information back to the old guard. In hindsight, it felt like surveillance. The goal wasn’t unity — it was control.
When Joe finally went public — when his parents’ names saw daylight — those same voices re-emerged. Angry. Defensive. Resentful at being left out of something they had tried to prevent.
Why Speak Now?
Because I believe in integrity. Because history is too often rewritten by those who stayed quiet until it was safe to speak. Because this campaign wasn’t reckless or spontaneous — it was the outcome of months of careful preparation, grounded in evidence, caution, and love.
We weren’t acting out of ego. We were acting out of duty. And yet we were treated like threats.
There’s a deeper question here about the culture we create in our institutions and communities. If that culture silences dissent, punishes initiative, and guards reputation at the expense of truth — then it’s broken. Or maybe it never worked at all.
We were thrown out of a group called “Compassionate Friends.” The irony didn’t escape us. Later, we were invited back, but only on the condition that we acknowledge the group’s “new values” of respect, support, and kindness — as if we had violated those principles. As if the very people who shut us out were now the gatekeepers of moral tone.
I declined. It didn’t feel like an olive branch it felt like a thorny vine, destined to wrap around me and sting.
This isn’t a story about heroes. It’s a story about accountability.
So to those still clinging to silence, to hierarchy, to the myth that good intentions are enough, I ask you this: What if you’re wrong? What if the “truth” you’re protecting isn’t truth at all, but comfort? Let’s do better. For Lindsay. For Craig. For all those still in the shadows. They are locked up — but they should not be locked out.