Imprisoned Pastor Saeed Abedini's Children Make Video Pleading Obama to Help Father

Rebecca Bellecci Monday, August 11, 2014

U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) (C) delivers his remarks with members of the Christian Defense Coalition in front of the White House in Washington September 26, 2013. The event marked the one year anniversary of Saeed Abedini, an Iranian American pastor who is serving eight years in an Iranian prison. | (Photo: Reuters/Gary Cameron)

The children of Saeed Abedini, the American pastor currently jailed in Iran, have made a video pleading President Barack Obama to help free their father from Iranian prison as he serves his second year of an eight-year prison sentence.

The video, published on YouTube, shows Abedini's children, Rebekka and Jacob, pleading to the camera and asking the President and the Obama administration to help their imprisoned father, a pastor originally from Boise, Idaho.

"I miss him so much," Rebekka says in the video, posted to YouTube by Josh Wiese last week. "Why does our Daddy need to be in prison for loving Jesus?"

"I don't want him to miss another birthday or Christmas or Father's Day,"Abenini's son, Jacob adds, saying his heart "hurts" and "cries because it misses Daddy [â€¦] I miss him a lot [â€¦] a thousand lots."

The children have also been featured in another YouTube video also posted by Josh Wiese that shows the two asking Iranian leaders to free their father. The children are wearing bright yellow t-shirts, one of which reads "Helping Boise Pastor" with a photo of Saeed Abedini on the front.

Abedini, 33, is currently serving his second year in prison out of an 8-year jail sentence given to him for allegedly preaching the Christian faith in Iran.

Multiple petitions calling for Abedini's release have circulated in the U.S. and abroad, including a "We The People" petition started on the White House website. President Obama previously told Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in September 2013 that he was concerned about the plight of Abedini, as well as the imprisonment of two other American citizens being held in Iran at the time.

Abedini's wife, Naghmeh, has also been an outspoken activist for her husband's release. She said at a House Foreign Affairs Committee last December that she thinks the U.S. government should do more to help her husband.

"My husband is suffering because he is a Christian. He is suffering because he is an American," said at the time. "Yet, his own government, at least the executive and diplomatic representatives, has abandoned him. Don't we owe it to him as a nation to stand up for his human rights, for his freedom?"