A good day

Homs was a working town. Tough and self-reliant. Its people had endured centuries of the ebb and flow of rule ranging from Christian Byzantines to Muslim Ottomans. It had abided the whims and cruel heel of distant kings, emperors and dictators. But by 2011, the people of Homs had had enough. Enough of the corruption that had overwhelmed Damascus. Enough of the grinding oppression by Bashir al Assad’s forces. Homs became a key battleground to overthrow the Syrian government.

Tough and independent, the rebels in Homs weren’t looking outward for inspiration and support. They dreamed of Homs rising to become the new capital of Syria. Four years later, that dreams lies under mounds of rubble. Homs is a bombed-out shell. Its one million people have mostly fled—likely never to return. There is nothing left with which to rebuild. And Assad still rules from his palace atop Mount Mezzah.

For four years, western powers have fidgeted nervously on the sidelines—wavering between action and inaction. Even as Assad murdered men, women and children with the brutal efficiency of poisonous gas and barrel bombs, the most powerful nations in the world looked away.

The people of Homs weren’t expecting salvation. And it didn’t come.

Four million Syrians have fled their country. Another 7.6 million people have been displaced—no longer able to live in their homes. Half of the pre-war population of Syria have been violently banished into life as refugees.

So what do we do now? What is our response? For a long time we were able to ignore the suffering. Eventually, the images became too much. One image in particular crystalized the horror for many around the world— the lifeless body of little boy on a beach.

For a moment, the world rallied to give aid and comfort to these fleeing refugees.

How quickly that initial enthusiasm and resolve has faded.

Some worry these war-ravaged people are too damaged, too hardened to successfully integrate into western societies. Others fear that the Darwinian nature of their flight from Syria and subsequent survival in miserable refugee camps makes them risky bets. While the world’s cameras capture the images of children and families— some worry the more successful refugees are ruthless young men. On the absurd fringe of this fear is the theory that the uprising in Syria and elsewhere in the Mideast is a co-ordinated plot to populate the West with Muslim extremists.

Fences are being erected and justifications rehearsed. Even in Canada, the story has faded from the headlines. Each of the competing parties looking to get elected in October has quietly shuffled exuberant pledges to help all the way to the back of their deck of talking points. The issue doesn’t poll well.

It is against this backdrop that a group of Prince Edward County residents, with the aid and experience of Ryerson University, have stepped up to offer refuge to those with neither a home nor land they can ever return to.

Once again the County proves to be populated by exceptional people.

The first family may arrive in a matter of weeks. Others should follow. PECSyria will sponsor them for a year—providing training, transportation, housing and support. They will give them the tools they need to become self-sufficient in this strange, cold country. They will find work. They will go to school. They will live indoors. They will do, for the first time in years, what we take for granted everyday.

We can rejoice in this day and celebrate those who have stepped up with their time, money and resources to make this happen. It is the day when we, in this community, refused to look away. Refused to be distracted by the next headline.

We are comfortable and well nourished. Meanwhile in tents fashioned from nylon tarp, families subsist on a few dollars a day from aid agencies straining for resources from an indifferent and self-obsessed West. Some families have been there for years. They are unwanted and unwelcome. They aren’t permitted to work. Their hosts complain they are fouling the land and water. They strive for normalcy in a world that wishes they would disappear—or at least, be a problem somewhere else.

The truly compelling bit is that Canada and North America is populated by families whose ancestors fled war, strife, starvation and poverty. From these mutts and castaways was built a most remarkable nation.

We cannot shrink away now. We cannot allow our resolve to be tapped by vague misgivings. These are humans we can help. We cannot look away—for our own sake as well as theirs.

For more information about how you can help go online to PECSyria.org

rick@wellingtontimes.ca