To that end, the administration has set up a special program for a small number of Iraqis, which gives preferential treatment to full-time employees of the American Embassy, about 125 in Baghdad, and to 500 interpreters by allowing them to skip the lengthy United Nations refugee process once they leave Iraq.  But thousands more Iraqis work for the United States through contractors like Titan, a subsidiary of L-3 Communications; DynCorp International; Parsons Corporation; and Triple Canopy, and their subcontractors.  In all, 69,000 Iraqis work on contracts with the Department of Defense through Iraqi and foreign companies, according to the American military. They are cleaners, construction workers, drivers and security guards, to name a few, and though they face the same reprisals as anyone working more directly with the American government they do not fall into the special category.  A spokesman for the United States Embassy here said all Iraqis who had worked for the United States would have their refugee applications sped up once they fled Iraq and reached neighboring countries like Jordan or Syria.  “The big question mark is for those who can’t reach us here,” said Rafiq A. Tschannen, chief of the Iraq mission for the International Organization for Migration in Amman, Jordan.  The United States has processed large numbers of refugees in countries they were trying to flee, namely Vietnam in the 1970s and the Soviet Union in the late 1980s, and it could also do it in Iraq, Mr. Tschannen said, where the embassy is one of America’s largest in the world.  State Department officials said that they might consider being flexible about processing potential refugees in Iraq, but that security concerns have prevented it. There is also the United Nations’ definition of refugee, though the United States is not bound by it.  “It’s an issue that is being looked at constantly,” said Ellen Sauerbrey, an assistant secretary of state, on Tuesday in Jordan, while announcing a $30 million pledge to help educate Iraqi refugees in the region. But, she added, “How do we keep them safe for four and five months in Iraq” during processing? There is also the safety of embassy employees to consider, she said.  For many Iraqis, the travel is no longer possible.  Ali Saleh, a 37-year-old interpreter who worked for the military for four years, said he was barely able to leave his neighborhood in western Baghdad, never mind travel with his wife and 2-year-old son to Jordan, where border authorities turned away one of his friends. He traveled to Syria last year to apply, but gave up, fearing the Syrian police officials knew about his American ties when they questioned him roughly at the border.  In his four years of work, eight colleagues have been killed. He quit this spring, when a woman working as an interpreter from a different camp was kidnapped and killed in his neighborhood. Yet, he said, “The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad is not for us. Nobody can go there.”  The risk is no less for Iraqis who work as laborers on military bases. Though they are considered less of a priority by the State Department because they do not work directly with soldiers or American officials, the militants hunting them do not make that distinction.  “Many people believe that interpreters are exposed to danger more than us, but they are wrong,” said Ali Jasem, a 25-year-old crane operator at the Rustamiya base in southeastern Baghdad. Three of his colleagues were gunned down when they left the base last fall. “Insurgents and militants won’t distinguish between us,” he said. “We are all spies and traitors.”  Money makes the journey outside Iraq that much harder. Hamid Ali, 33, a crane operator at the same American base, burned through most of his savings over four months last year when he tried to apply in Syria, then again in Lebanon. His family sent him money twice, but he could not find a job and eventually moved back to Iraq, forfeiting his application.  Now he is working for the Americans once again, moving drinking water for soldiers around the base for $460 a month.  More than 40,000 Iraqis have registered with the United Nations in Jordan and 90,000 more in Syria, out of an estimated 2 million who have fled Iraq, but not all qualify for refugee status.  The United States does not say how many applications are from former employees, but according to the United Nations, only 436 files out of more than 9,000 that had been submitted to the United States by mid-July might have fallen into that category. Additionally, fast-track applications — which can be filled out in Jordan by Iraqis who worked for the United States through the International Organization for Migration — add a few hundred, the organization said.  Iraqis are arriving in the United States, but slowly. From October to July, 190 Iraqi refugees arrived, according to a State Department official. But the pace is picking up. Ms. Sauerbrey said she expected 2,000 Iraqis to arrive by the end of September, and considerably more next year.  One snag in the process has been in Syria, where the government has not granted visas to officials from the American Department of Homeland Security who need to interview Iraqis there, a resettlement official said. Syria, which has strained relations with the United States, has the largest population of Iraqis outside Iraq.  Half a dozen American diplomats said in interviews that the United States needed to do far more to aid Iraqis associated with the United States.  Oliver Moss, who was a political officer in Baghdad from 2005 to 2006, said that more than 120 Iraqis who joined American-backed local councils at the provincial, city, district, and neighborhood levels had been killed.  “We have taken the initial steps to help Iraqi interpreters,” said Mr. Moss, who now works for the American Embassy in London. “But we have done little to nothing to help the brave individuals who have been promoting democratic efforts at the local level.”  There is no comprehensive count of Iraqis who have been killed while working for the American war effort. But one company alone, Titan, which provides the military with most of its interpreters, said that 280 of its Iraqi employees had been killed since 2003.  Many Iraqis have left their jobs with the United States with bitter feelings, saying the Americans cared little for their plight once they stepped beyond the walls of bases to go home.  But some American officers have made a point of trying to help Iraqis who worked for them. Lt. Col. Steven Miska, an infantry officer in Western Baghdad with the Dagger Brigade Combat Team, knows exactly how many interpreters his unit employs, and offers housing on his base to every Iraqi who works there. On Memorial Day, he paid tribute to two Iraqis — an interpreter and a shop owner on the base — along with fallen Americans.  “Right now, the immigration policy is disconnected from the overall strategy to win,” said Colonel Miska, adding, “It’s not just U.S. soldiers who are sacrificing.”  Rachel Schneller, a 34-year-old American diplomat, said that of about 10 Iraqi employees of the American Embassy compound in Basra two years ago, two have been killed, five have fled the country and three live in hiding in Basra, begging Ms. Schneller for help getting American visas.  “Working with Americans for the last couple of years has more or less become a death sentence in that part of Iraq,” said Ms. Schneller, who now works in Washington. “I must get desperate e-mails every other day from one of them.”  Several weeks ago, American soldiers searched the broken Baghdad neighborhood of Mr. Saleh, the interpreter who has lost eight colleagues. The soldiers entered his house, where he has sequestered himself since quitting his job in March after the translator in his neighborhood was killed. They began to look around, but stopped when he showed his interpreter badge.  “I asked them how can I get outside this country,” he said, rocking back and forth, seated in a chair. “I can’t live here, that’s for sure. They don’t have any answer.”  Sabrina Tavernise reported from Amman and Baghdad, and David Rohde from New York. Mudhafar al-Husaini contributed reporting from Baghdad and Yusra al-Hakeem from Jordan.  A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A6 of the New York edition with the headline: FEW IRAQIS REACH SAFE U.S. HAVENS DESPITE PROGRAM. Order Reprints| Today's Paper|Subscribe
Despite a stepped-up commitment to take in Iraqis who are in danger because they worked for the U.S., few are signing up to go, officials say.