Who is going to help the Syrians?

Depending upon what source you read, there are either 30,000 or 100,000 Syrians seeking refuge in Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon, depending on which part of Syria has been blown up. Turkey currently has within its borders approximately 24,000 refugees, a number reported by several sources, along its border with Syria. The numbers for Jordan are either the smallest or the largest, again depending on the source. Jordan’s refugee problem (and arithmetic) is compounded by the huge numbers of Palestinian refugees already there, whose numbers are also increasing. Those Syrians in Jordan who are registered or awaiting registration with the UN number “only” about 10,000, while unofficial (and unverified) numbers run to 100,000. Lebanon reportedly has around 13,000 Syrian refugees there. Taking the most conservative stance, and calling it between 40,000 and 50,000, the numbers are still huge. As for those imprisoned in Syria, or “missing,” time may or may not provide a final accounting.

I have learned in my long life not to take sides too quickly in most situations. In matters of rebellions, too often have I supported the instincts of my heart, sympathizing with innocents being killed and tortured, only to have the former oppressed turn out to be the new oppressors in victory, horrible (if understandable) in their vindictive rage and eventual misuse of power. This has happened too many times to count throughout the ages, making taking sides complicated at best. If vengeance isn’t taken upon the losers in the form of murder and rape, it is taken in the councils of the victors, where the stage is set for the wars of a later generation; more innocent victims to burn in the crossfire.

However, the truth is, almost anyone, when asked what they would do if they saw a woman being raped, or a child about to be murdered, or even a little kid on a playground being beaten up by a bigger kid, the answer is immediate: They would pull the rapist away, or stop the murderer, or separate the children; the unspoken caveat, unfortunately, is usually if the rescuer would incur no harm in the process.

So, the Syrians; who can help them now? Not only the refugee Syrians, and the ones being locked up and/or tortured, or the families of those past help and buried in mass graves, but the government of Syria itself, which is clearly having problems understanding the people it rules, as well its neighboring countries with which Syria must live after this is over.

The United Nations would seem to be the logical choice, at least in a perfect world, a disinterested third party, dedicated to the peaceful coexistence of all nations and the freedom of their children to grow to maturity, preferably with all their body parts intact. Unfortunately, the UN was constructed with a fatal flaw; the permanent members of the Security Council (the post-WWII version of the Great Powers: France, the United States, the Russian Federation and China) are each granted veto power by which they can block otherwise popular resolutions, like the recent one to support the Arab League plan for President Assad to step down while a new government was formed. Russia and China both used the veto, both in support of Assad and to block the perceived use by the United States to use the UN to topple governments. (Another possible reason that struck me at the time is that both Russia and China have very strong centralized leadership and have historically dealt harshly with uprisings of their own; Assad’s tactics probably don’t seem that strange to them. China and Russia represent a huge amount of real estate and humanity, so their opinion must be acknowledged as valid, if not necessarily agreed with.) In addition, the UN has taken some heat in recent decades, most notably in its peacekeeping attempt during the Bosnian War, which was not only ineffective in general but which also failed to prevent atrocities like Srebrenica from happening, forever to its shame.

Next in logical choices is the Arab League, several of whose 21 current member-states are nearby neighbors of Syria, notably Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Iraq. The league has been active for months in trying to broker a peace agreement, or at least an effective cease-fire, trying to prevent the violence from slopping over into the region, but, as of this writing, to no avail. The league even suspended Syria’s membership months ago and sent a team of observers in to assess the violence and to meet with interested parties. Recently the most public attempt by the league has been the shuttle diplomacy performed by diplomat Kofi Annan, with the blessing of both the UN and the Arab League. As of today, many promises have been made and broken, and the violence continues.

Hope from the West?

The United States, infamous for going to war with people it doesn’t even know and always managing to be hated even when it is trying to do good (which isn’t always, by any means), already has its hands full with its reputed disengagement in Afghanistan and its withdrawal from the quagmire of a catastrophically ill-reasoned, nine-year war in Iraq. With its all-volunteer army exhausted, its world image severely tarnished and its electorate in severe economic recession, not to mention elections coming up later this year, America isn’t the strong man it was half a century ago, and its politicians are fighting for their lives, even as they ignore, for the most part, their own population’s plight. Except for the efforts of its peripatetic Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the US isn’t about to get involved in yet another Middle East engagement, at least not any time soon.

How about the EU? Not likely, considering the bad press that far-from-disinterested France has received over its leading of the Libya “rescue.” In addition, England’s polls have the same problems as their brethren in the US, with an angry, disaffected and divided electorate sick to death of England’s relatively minor (compared to America’s) but drawn-out commitment in Afghanistan as well as its long, but now (apparently) completed, presence in Iraq. Throw in the burgeoning Islamophobia within several other EU countries, and I believe we can count them out for much more than lip service.

That leaves, realistically, Turkey, which is already doing more, and more humanely, than anyone else at this point (excepting, maybe, Jordan), by providing housing and sustenance for thousands of refugees, as well as promoting diplomatic solutions to the crisis. However, as to more substantial action, the reasons for Turkey not to get more seriously involved are laid out very thoughtfully by Abdülhamit Bilici in his column “A Risky Scenario for Turkey” (Today’s Zaman, April 7, 2012) His column ends with a quote from a recent report from the International Strategic Research Organization (USAK): “Turkey is resolute on the topic of Syria, but it must hold on to its cautious approach and keep itself from being pushed into warfare, or single-handed intervention.” Many political players, both east and west, would love for Turkey to take unilateral action and embroil itself militarily in what many observers feel is an internal issue, solvable only by Syrian interests, and be knocked down a peg. Many groups would love to see Turkey lose some of its hard-won world status by opening itself to criticism and outright ostracism by hostile economic and cultural rivals.

I understand all of the above and do not disagree with any of it. There are a thousand reasons not to invade, occupy or otherwise “touch” Syria’s sovereign space. The possible political and economic repercussions for any nation or organization of nations are overwhelmingly negative. It is nobody’s business but the Syrians’. I get it. But I still don’t have an answer to my original question: Who is going to help them? The fatherless families, the childless mothers, the orphans and the mutilated? The displaced, the hurt, the quickly buried dead? The men, women and children who face certain retribution for years to come, no matter which side “wins”? At what point in the violence is the human rights line crossed to justify outside action? We have the technology, but who has the will? I suppose time and many more dead and displaced people will tell. Hopefully, by the time this goes to print someone will have thought of something, but I am not holding my breath.

*Elsie Alan lives in Gebze with her husband.