toledoblade.com --

BALAD, Iraq - A week after they were refused treatment at a U.S. military base, three children whose plight captured attention across the country are healing - even as opinions simmer over their treatment by American doctors.

The children - half-siblings Ahlam, 11, Budur, 10, and Haidar, 10 - showed up with their mother and father on June 13 outside the base that houses Toledo's 323rd Military Police Company. Sylvania native Sgt. David Borell summoned base doctors, but the doctors refused to treat the children, claiming the injuries weren't life-threatening.

That angered the sergeant so much he broke down and had to be comforted by his platoon leader. An Associated Press photographer captured the moment in a picture that ran in newspapers across the country.

The sergeant also e-mailed The Blade detailing the incident, and his frustrations with a military policy that seemed immoral to him. Reading of his account the next day, an angry U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D., Toledo) took his pleadings to the Defense Department.

While a national debate was brewing on American treatment of injured Iraqi civilians, the children's father, Falah Mutlaq, took the children to Baghdad the next day for treatment.

Budur, a chubby, giggly child with light brown eyes, seems to have recovered except for a large scab on her right arm, according to an AP reporter who visited the family this week.

Ahlam and Haidar are covered with yellowish scabs scattered over raw red flesh. Haidar keeps his left fingers bent and hops on his left leg because it's too painful to use the right one. A smile rarely leaves his face despite the discomfort.

Mr. Mutlaq said he often hears the children whimper at night from the pain.

Despite their suffering, Mr. Mutlaq said he feels no bitterness.

"How can I not love the Americans? They helped me with a flat tire the other day," he said.

The Army has defended the doctors' decision not to treat the children.

Maj. David Accetta, public affairs officer with the 3rd Corps Support Command, said in an e-mail to the AP that the children's condition did not fall into a category that requires Army doctors to care for them. Only patients with conditions threatening life, limb, or eyesight and not resulting from a chronic illness are considered for treatment.

At the scene, doctors gave Mr. Mutlaq and Sergeant Borell a similar response.

Mr. Mutlaq, 36, laughed when he recalled one U.S. doctor's words about why the Americans couldn't treat the children.

"He lied," Mr. Mutlaq said. "The world's greatest power going to war without burn medicine? Who can believe that?"

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