What nations does Syria border?

In an exceptional feat of human rights reporting, the New York Times has created a compilation of videos from the Syrian conflict, with associated GIS data, tweets, and general information. It is a heart-wrenching, enraging, sickening, and mournful compilation to watch–but somehow essential to watch as well.  I hope that this reporting will not become banal, and that the writing and reading of this post will be more than superficial. In the very least, I hope that we watch some of these videos and engrave them upon a portion consciousness that excites us to learn and do more; to not merely pass over this conflict as yet another, far removed, and somewhat surreal atrocity. Lets be informed. There is no obvious solution for what can or should happen to resolve this entrenched conflict; there are plenty of calls for and against international intervention (whatever that means and whoever it is), but does the average citizen even know enough to have an opinion?

A few of the videos depict entire families—-families once as vibrant, quirky, and alive as yours and mine, with tiny children and future hopes—-massacred. To recognize that these are real, once living, men, women, and children is essential, but in a digitally overwrought world it is also hard to imagine. So take a moment to imagine. Genuinely stop now and imagine.

 

You may not know much about the Syrian conflict, and you could know more. Enough, at least, to know where Syria is and bit about it’s culture and ardent conflict.

I realize that there are wars, atrocities, issues, and injustices all around the world. This blog is a tiny attempt to highlight some of them. There is no hierarchy intimated here. They all deserve our attention, energy, and informed activism. But in this post, the bell tolls for Syria.