Forty years ago the merciless
tyrant Hafez Al-Assad wiped out the entire city of Hama, killing more than 10’s
of thousands of people, in an effort to quiet those asking for change in the
government. The rest of the country and the world remained silent, forgetting
the thousands that died, the thousands that were widowed and the thousands that
were orphaned. We live in a country where freedom of speech is included in our
bill of rights, and are given the right to speak out against our government,
our rulers and anything that we do not agree with. The people of Syria, and
other countries involved in the Arab spring, live in the fear of not only of
speaking out against the government, but simply of having someone claim that
they spoke out.
Being part Syrian, I remember
visiting Syria a few years ago and experiencing that fear of speaking out first
hand. I would walk through the streets of the country that I loved and adored
and notice the enlarged photograph of Bashar al Assad at every corner, on the
back of every car, on the door of every building, and in every room of every
public institution. My younger brother once stared at the huge photograph on
the side of an entire building and innocently asked, “Why is there a picture of
Bashar everywhere mama?” Immediately my mother, aunt and all my cousins hushed
him and stared around double-checking to make sure no one had heard him making
fun of the president. This was only a small example of the hushed fears.
In March of 2011, children in
Daraa, a village on the outskirts of Syria near the Jordanian border, wrote on
the walls of their town: Down with the government! Down with Bashar! The
government swooped in and tortured the children, ripping off their nails and
beating them. This was the initial spark causing the uprising in Syria that is
still ongoing today. A people’s claim for freedom and a change of government
has brought upon them the death of close to 4000 people and the detainment of
60,000 civilians. Civilians who peacefully went out to the streets in Homs,
Deraa, Deir Ezzor, and other provinces, to call for change, and resulted in a
repeat of the massacre of Hama. This weekend alone, more than 400 people
including 30 premature babies died in the shelling that destroyed Homs. Homs is
bleeding, and people are sitting in their homes still debating whether or not
the Syrian government is committing these crimes. On a daily basis Syrian television,
networks twist and bend the truth, claiming all these atrocities are being
committed by rebels and terrorist groups. If indeed they were done by these
rebel groups, why would they kill their own families and destroy their own
neighborhoods? Why would Qatar, The United States of America, or any of the
other countries the Syrian government is claiming is instigating this
revolution, want to witness the death of so many innocent civilians? And at
times it would be a mercy to be killed and become a martyr, instead of the
ruthless torturing the 50,000 detainees are witnessing. A man had his throat
ripped open and his voice box removed simply for singing a song calling for
Assad to step down!!
This inhumane treatment is being
condoned by Russia and China, who continuously use their veto power in the UN
for their own selfish purposes. I think it has reached a point where intervention
is necessary! How many people have to die, become orphaned, become widowed,
lose a son, daughter, sister, brother, friend, teacher in order for the world
to move?! What is happening in Syria is a genocide, and there is not any time
for everyone to sit around and discuss what is happening, argue about
viewpoints or speculate about the future! It is time to speak out, to pray and
make duaa at every moment of the day for all the people who are suffering in
the world! This silence is leading to a repeat of Hama, but it is even worse,
in Hama there was no media covering the atrocities, now there is every form of
media covering the current carnage and bloodshed; Twitter, Facebook, news
channels, newspapers, etc., to let this pass by would be a dark mark in history
on our parts.
Abraham Lincoln once said, “ You
can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the
time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.” The Syrian government may be content
with fooling and lying to themselves, but it can no longer fool the
world. This bloodshed has to stop and it starts with speaking out, letting
everyone know what is happening, but most importantly it is important not only
for us to make duaa and pray, but to fix ourselves. Allah (swt) says in the
Quran, “Indeed Allah does not change the condition of a people unless we change
that within ourselves,” this is a huge test (balaa) from Allah (swt) and also
an opportunity for all of us as a Muslim Ummah to come together and correct our
mistakes, in order to build a better future. The revolutions in the Arab
countries are not simply Syrian causes, or Egyptian causes or Libyan causes,
they are Muslim causes, we should all work towards a better future involving
freedom for all Muslims! All the revolutions relate to all of us as Muslims, we
need to put aside internationalism and associate with all Muslims as one. It
does not matter if your Syrian, Jordanian, Pakistani or American, Sunni,
Shiite, Muslim, Jewish or Atheist, we are all humans and the rest of the world
needs to give the world the opportunity to enjoy the basic human rights that
only a few of us are offered.
