Father Georges Jahola sits hunched over his laptop, his clerical collar just visible underneath a jacket he’s forgotten to remove. The parish priest is studying spreadsheets and cadastral maps of his hometown in Nineveh Plain, Qaraqosh, while men and women scurry in and out of his office, questions flying amid a shuffle of papers in Syriac, Arabic, and English. The balding Jahola, whom everyone everywhere calls Father George, is the steady in the room, concentrating on the figures on his screen, then breaking into a slow smile that sends wrinkles around his wire rims before choosing which of the languages to use to answer that last question.

Jahola approaches the day’s frenzy with the deliberation you might expect from a parish priest, but the Syriac Catholic clergyman’s slim build and calm demeanor seem no match for the responsibilities he shoulders: As head of the church board for reconstruction in Qaraqosh, Jahola is in charge of rebuilding efforts underway in the largest Christian city in Nineveh Plain. That’s thousands of homes caught in the heaviest destruction outside of Mosul following three years’ occupation by ISIS.

Before the ISIS takeover in 2014, Qaraqosh numbered 60,000 people, nearly all members of Assyrian, Catholic, and Orthodox churches. ISIS took captives, including a 3-year-old girl named Christina, and sent everyone else fleeing under heavy fire. In November 2016 Iraqi forces with assistance from a U.S.-led coalition fought the Islamic State militants street by street, from the air, above and below ground. After its liberation, Qaraqosh sat empty and in ruins: The militants torched homes and churches, left wired explosives everywhere, and tunneled extensively under the city. When I visited Qaraqosh three months later, the odors from burnt metal, oil fires, and decaying flesh hung in the streets (see “Iraq’s grisly liberation,” March 18, 2017).

That’s why, instead of presiding over prayers or sacraments (though Jahola does those things), the priest more often is at his desk, a giant aerial map of the city hanging behind him and a spreadsheet charting progress before him. Since returning to Qaraqosh last September, Jahola has overseen reconstruction efforts for more than 2,600 homes. More than 1,200 are complete with returning families living in them.

Testifying to the community’s progress and determination are the sounds of power saws and machinery outside as Jahola talks. Across the street from his office a print shop has a floor-to-ceiling sign reading in English and Arabic, “Come in, we’re open.” A motorcycle swerves around dug-up sewer pipes while front loaders and tractors dodge oncoming cars.