Syria: Broken Nation

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

It's been 4 years since the revolution started with at least 220,000 dead and half the population displaced. This little documentary by Al-Jazeera, which dedicated the month of March to talking more about Syria since it's the 4-year anniversary of the genocide, is not graphic but it is very heart-wrenching. Most of the stories here are tragic, but Farid's was particularly devastating to me. Poor baby:

[youtube]L5aE86hg4_4[/youtube]

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10153264364398690

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

The mother in that video above who mentioned her baby's heart racing and either freezing up or trying to run away when he heard airplanes reminded me of this recent picture of a girl who thought the camera was a weapon so she held her hands up to surrender:

The photographer said of this 4-year old girl whom he took a picture of this past December:

"I was using a telephoto lens, and she thought it was a weapon," says Sağırlı. "İ realised she was terrified after I took it, and looked at the picture, because she bit her lips and raised her hands. Normally kids run away, hide their faces or smile when they see a camera..... It is the children who reflect the feelings with their innocence."

The photographer who broke the internet's heart - BBC News

A similar image:

"Another little girl was photographed in a Jordanian refugee camp, weeping with fear after mistaking an aid worker's camera for a weapon.

The photographer who took the heart-breaking image in November did not grasp how terrified she was until he was editing the photographs.


It was then Rene Schulthoff realised the girl - alone and barefoot among the metal huts - was so scared of his camera that 'she raised her hands to surrender because she thought it was a weapon'."


Red Cross shares image of SECOND Syrian girl who surrendered to a camera | Daily Mail Online

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum helped host "a public briefing in the U.S. Capitol with selected photos from Syrian regime prisons taken by defected forensic photographer “Caesar." The 55,000 photos Caesar smuggled out of Syria document at least 11,000 deaths under detainment between 2012 to 2013," in July 2015.

Some quotes from the speeches:

"I find it most disheartening that again, 80 years after the end of WWII, the world is faced with a regime that targets its own people for destruction. One of the major differences is that the destruction of the Jews in Europe was secret. The humanitarian crisis in Syria is certainly not a secret." - Margit Meissner, Holocaust survivor

"I keep a copy of these pictures on my desk so that every single day when I come to my office I will be reminded of the horrific crimes that have been committed and are being committed as we speak against innocent Syrian men, women, and children. What is happening today is in direct contradiction to the testimony of our wonderful citizens who are joining us: our Holocaust survivors. Because of their horrendous experience, we promised never again. My friends, today it is happening in Syria." - Senator McCain

"God forbid and God have mercy on us if in 10 years we look back on this tragedy and say that we did nothing. Bill Clinton said his greatest regret of all his time in office was inaction in Rwanda. I fear we'll all look back and say the same about Syria. God bless you." - Representative Adam Kinzinger (R-IL)


Copy and paste these if you would like to watch the videos on youtube since I can't link to them here due to the graphic/disturbing images in the background:

Holocaust Survivor Margit Meissner's #WithSyria Remarks
Senator John McCain's #WithSyria Remarks
عضو الكونجرس يذكر النشاط المتميز للمؤسسة السورية لعمل الطوارئ SETF

 

[stamperben]

The world burns and all we as a country can do is worry about more oil that fans the flames.

 

[seashale76]

It's extremely sad what's going on there.

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

Very painful to read about it...

"Syrian government has conducted nearly 7,000 air strikes during the month of July....making it the most intense bombing reported in one month since the beginning of the conflict in 2011."

"At least 791 civilians were killed due to these air strikes, including 207 children below the age of 18. At least 3,000 others were injured while thousands were forced to flee their homes as a result."

Highest number of Syria air strikes recorded in July - al Jazeera

 

[stamperben]

It is so painful to read about, that must be the reason for the decided lack of comments here.

 

[seashale76]

It is so painful to read about, that must be the reason for the decided lack of comments here.

They're not lions.

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

It is so painful to read about, that must be the reason for the decided lack of comments here.

Reflective of much of the world's silence and inability to respond to this genocide. I can think of 2 reasons for the silence:

1.) It hurts and infuriates so much that some have to look away. After the chemical weapons attack in 2013...something broke in me when I saw footage of people, especially babies, struggling to breathe and sometimes foaming at the mouth and when I saw pictures of dead children laid side-by-side after they were attacked with chemical weapons by the Syrian regime. I largely stopped keeping up with the news regarding Syria for about a year after that. But as much as I wanted it to avoid it, the reality was still there and so was the inaction.

2.) Syrian Sunni lives aren't considered very valuable to most of the world.

"Yet the international community has made little effort to stop Mr. Assad’s barrel bombing of civilians. The two governments with the greatest potential to influence Mr. Assad — his principal backers, Russia and Iran — have refused to get him to stop. Western governments have been reluctant to exert strong public pressure on them because of other priorities — Ukraine, in the case of Russia, and the nuclear deal, in the case of Iran. The European Union is putting far more effort into stopping Syrian asylum seekers from reaching the Continent than addressing the root causes of their flight. The United States and Turkey recently announced a plan to make a 60-mile strip in northern Syria an “ISIS-free zone,” but the goal is to fight ISIS militants, not protect civilians."

Barrel Bombs, Not ISIS, Are the Greatest Threat to Syrians

Whether these reasons or others are given, ignoring the genocide in Syria cannot be justified.

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

"If no one is on our side, God is on our side. We are patient and God will provide a solution."

Wise girl. When asked what her message is to the world that abandoned her, "Nothing. They all left us, no one stayed by our side. The only thing I say to the people is may you be happy and blessed with what you have."

 

[seashale76]

I mentioned in another thread that I donate and am actively involved with two humanitarian organizations.

I donate to IOCC, which has a campaign to help Syrians. http://www.iocc.org
I have also been an active member of Amnesty International for many years. http://www.amnestyusa.org

Perhaps you all could list some organizations that are also actively trying to help with this issue? Perhaps the apathy is simply horror and helplessness to do anything, which is why people would rather ignore human suffering? It's not a happy thought.

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

I mentioned in another thread that I donate and am actively involved with two humanitarian organizations.

I donate to IOCC, which has a campaign to help Syrians. http://www.iocc.org
I have also been an active member of Amnesty International for many years. http://www.amnestyusa.org

Perhaps you all could list some organizations that are also actively trying to help with this issue? Perhaps the apathy is simply horror and helplessness to do anything, which is why people would rather ignore human suffering? It's not a happy thought.

Thank you...truly.

The Syrians are in need of food/water. There was one time when they actually ate a lion and they asked an Islaamic scholar if they could break their fast by eating cats (both of these things are forbidden to eat under normal circumstances).

They are also in need of blankets, heaters, or anything else to keep them warm. Winters have been brutal for them and I've seen pictures of Syrian children frozen to death. Winter Appeal 2015

This page gives a list of a few organizations one can donate to for Syria: Syria Crisis: How to Donate

I've seen appeals for gas masks but I can't find any organizations asking for donations for them right now. But that's also a good idea.

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

One of the more difficult, non-graphic videos to watch:

You don't need the translation to feel their pain, but the one holding the baby is crying a variation of, "Oh God! Oh Asma! My sisters are dead! They're dead," over and over again.

The little boy is weeping and saying the names of the sisters, "Oh Asma! Oh Karima! My sisters are dead. My sisters! Oh my sisters!"

He also says, "Oh my mother," so I'm assuming she's dead as well.

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

Video from 6/10/15:

After a school was struck by the regime in May, parents stopped sending their kids to school because, as Zaina Erhaim (a resident in Aleppo) interviewed here said, "One of the mothers told me I want to die with my kids so we stick together. We're either killed all together in the house or survive all together."

She also mentions how between Assad vs. ISIS, she's more worried about Assad because while she can avoid ISIS, she can't avoid Assad's barrel bombs.

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

I've been busy so I don't know if anyone already posted about this. About 1.5 weeks ago, the Syrian Alawite regime carried out an airstrike against Sunnis in a marketplace in Douma in Eastern Ghouta killing 100+ people and injuring 500+ more.

"Time and again, the Syrian government's Russian-made fighter jets have targeted busy public spaces, including markets or near mosques after prayers, seemingly hell-bent on causing the maximum possible civilian death toll and destruction of the places they frequent."

Syria's Douma Market Bloodshed: Saying 'We Told You So' is No Comfort

The regime is continuing its acts of terrorism in Douma after bombing the marketplace.

....but much of the world merely watches in silence, with some portions even (supporting) making deals with governments that are contributing to this genocide in Syria. As long as it's not seemingly religious-looking Sunni Muslims causing destruction, it's a-ok I guess.

 

[cow451]

It is hard to make any comment other than about how tragic it is. There are no good solutions. There are really no good parties to support. The Assad regime is brutal, ISIS is ISIS, there is no really functional opposition of any size worth supporting.

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

It is hard to make any comment other than about how tragic it is. There are no good solutions. There are really no good parties to support. The Assad regime is brutal, ISIS is ISIS, there is no really functional opposition of any size worth supporting.

It really does make a person speechless and feel helpless, doesn't it? It's heartbreaking (over and over again). There might not be any good solutions yet we (rightfully) fight ISIS while specifically telling rebels we train to NOT fight against the regime that has killed the most civilians in Syria, make deals with governments that are aiding in the genocide in Syria (i.e. Iran), and attack the rebels even though they're fighting against ISIS AND the regime. How must this look to most Muslims? To the majority of Syrians? To the world as a whole?

--
"Austrian authorities made a ghastly discovery: a truck abandoned in the emergency lane of a highway near the Hungarian border, packed with the decomposing bodies of 59 men, eight women, and four children...."

“You have to understand,” the Somali-British poet Warsan Shire once wrote in relation to refugees, “that no one puts their children in a boat unless the water is safer than the land.....”

“We would only die once in Syria,” Ahmed says at one point, after his brother-in-law is nearly hit by a car in Belgrade, Serbia. “Here we are dying 5,000 times....”

The Black Route of Death from Syria

 

[LoveBeingAMuslimah]

“We would only die once in Syria,” Ahmed says at one point, after his brother-in-law is nearly hit by a car in Belgrade, Serbia. “Here we are dying 5,000 times....”

The Black Route of Death from Syria

Reminds me of this:

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1030098110374096

She fled Syria but the people who were supposed to help her just took her money ($12,000), leaving her and her baby with Down syndrome helpless and stranded in an unfamiliar country. She says she had two options: stay in Syria and die or leave but be humiliated. If she could go back, she would rather have stayed in Syria and died with dignity.

 

[brewmama]

It really does make a person speechless and feel helpless, doesn't it? It's heartbreaking (over and over again). There might not be any good solutions yet we (rightfully) fight ISIS while specifically telling rebels we train to NOT fight against the regime that has killed the most civilians in Syria, make deals with governments that are aiding in the genocide in Syria (i.e. Iran), and attack the rebels even though they're fighting against ISIS AND the regime. How must this look to most Muslims? To the majority of Syrians? To the world as a whole?

I don't really see other Muslims or the rest of the world doing very much either. Very sad.

 

[stamperben]

Britain takes in so few refugees from Syria they would fit on a subway train

Of the 4 million Syrians who have fled their country since the war began, including hundreds of thousands who have poured into Europe, the number who have been resettled in Britain could fit on a single London Underground train — with plenty of seats to spare.

Just 216 Syrian refugees have qualified for the government’s official relocation program, according to data released last week. (Tube trains seat about 300.) British Prime Minister David Cameron has reassured his anxious public that the total number won’t rise above 1,000.​