And Suffered the Little Victims of War: The Syrian Crisis that Eradicated Generations
“War may sometimes be a necessary evil. But no matter how necessary, it is always an evil, never a good. We will not learn to live together in peace by killing each other’s children”
- Jimmy Carter
War is an almost daily routine for Syria’s young souls. In the preceding half-decade the Syrian situation has been wrecked beyond repair. The world has seen a multitude of images and videos of children being covered in dust, lifeless bodies of babies being carried around, children being washed ashore the Mediterranean and that one glorious moment of hope when a baby is excavated from deep in the rubble after a massive bombing, but without any sympathy to avail.
The Syrian Status Quo
According to a UNICEF report, an estimated 3.7 million Syrian children — one in three of all Syrian children — have been born since the conflict began five years ago, their lives shaped by violence, fear and displacement. As the war continues, children are simultaneously fighting an adult war, they are continuing to drop out of school, and many are forced into labour, while girls are marrying early. In total, UNICEF estimates that some 8.4 million children — more than 80 per cent of Syria’s child population — are now affected by the conflict, either inside the country or as refugees in neighbouring countries.
The inception of this problem dates back to 2011. Owing to the Arab Spring, the totalitarian regimes in several parts of the Arab region were challenged and attempts were made in different regions of the Middle East and Northern Africa to topple such a regime. The Al-Assad family in Syria refused to step down. A series of protests broke out across the entire country. The Syrian civilian population was trapped amidst ceaseless violent feuds between the government, the rebel groups and religious extremists.
In 2012, the rebel groups began their assault on the city of Aleppo where children were first attacked. Children being caught in the cross-fire, children being killed by stray bullets, children being attacked by snipers and rockets, children being victims of sarin gas attacks as rebels and government forces continued to fight endlessly. The additional repercussions included children being groomed to be child soldiers, killers, suicide bombers having barrel bombs dropped on their childhood.
The conflict in Syria has continued for five years in a civil war surrounding the legitimacy of Bashar al-Assad. For much of that time, attacks have taken place on humanitarian convoys, medical facilities, and other forms of critical civilian aid.
Syria today represents bloodied toddlers wailing on a hospital bed and rescuers pulling a baby from rubble, unsure whether the child will survive. The violence in Syria has only multiplied, as diplomacy seems to have failed once again. Air raids are worse than the time before the ceasefire went into effect. Hospitals and schools are constantly attacked by the air raids, once again targeting children.
Children are the center of the Syrian war. CHILDREN, are paying the price every day for this armed conflict. Their joys of childhood have been snatched away even before they were old enough to relish it. They do not dream of new toys or new clothes or not having homework for school, all that they dream of is not waking up at night at the dreadful sound of the neighbouring drone and finding themselves amidst rubble with everything desecrated and no desire to live.
The “International Peace” Debacle
The very first objective of the UN Charter reads, “To save the succeeding generations from the scourge of war”. In Syria today, this very text of the Charter is quite evidently buried beneath the roar of bombs and the whimpers of children trapped under rubble, their faces caked with blood and dust.
The international community has severely failed Syria. The United Nations Security Council being dominated by the permanent five, two of which have conducted incessant air raids on Syrian civilians without any legitimate sanction, has also failed. The extent of the American and Russian interventions reflects the countries’ global ambitions. The two countries have committed large-scale violence in the name of ‘counter-terrorism’. Syria is the embodiment of the blatant misuse of the concept of ‘counter-terrorism’ to serve the vested interests of the major powers of the world.
As the violence continues unabated across Syria, the cries of the helpless Syrians constantly go unheard, reflecting an increasingly gloomy situation. However, the international community seems far from understanding the scale and scope of the crisis, despite its inflammatory nature, which is causing regional spillover effects.
The Way Forward
The world has made a giant mess. The world has destroyed cities and burned them to the ground. The world has killed children. The world which needed to come to a united front to the aid of Syrian refugees ended up being more divisive. Before there can be peace in Syria, there will almost certainly be more war. We cannot fix Syria, but what we can do is acknowledge that this catastrophe is alarming and there is a desperate need for the international community to overhaul the way it responds to atrocities. An equally essential step includes holding perpetrators to account — to send an unequivocal message that war crimes have consequences. We can flood social media with sympathy tweets and irate articles but unless these war crimes are brought to book, the cries of “never again” will again ring hollow. The world needs to keep its prejudices aside and begin accepting refugees. If there is one way the world can salvage itself from the horrors of Syria is giving a home and a hearth to those who survived. Lastly, as individuals, what we can do is fight for the rights of Syrians, keep voicing our opinions to raise awareness about the Syrian situation, keep contributing to organizations engaged in the aid of Syria, keep writing to world leaders to change their ways and keep fighting this terror.
Originally published in meLAWange 2016–17, the annual magazine of Government Law College, Mumbai, on February 25, 2017.