West Asian earthquake exposes the skewed face of compassion

It would make even stones cry that awful earthquake that hit Syria and Turkey.Many people in the world found it in their hearts to offer compassion and sympathy for the victims of the earthquake in Syria but some western governments still defied humanity and turned that natural disaster that could have hit anyplace in the world into a political tool .
Some presidents in their speech even forgot to mention the victims of the earthquake in Syria concentrating only on Turkey!!
Cruelty has many faces but the one shown to Syria must be the most intolerable.
Reneva Fourier a South African political activist currently residing in Syria writes about that point exactly.
Reem Haddad
Editor- in – Chief
In the early hours of Monday, February 6, 2023, an earthquake measuring 7.8 degrees in magnitude on the Richter scale rocked Türkiye, Syria and parts of Lebanon, Cyprus and Egypt. Windows rattled, chandeliers shook, pictures abandoned walls, and glassware broke as the tremors of the earthquake reverberated throughout Damascus. Many Damascenes were forced to leave their homes and stand in the icy outdoors lest the tremors caused their buildings to collapse. However, the earthquake’s impact on Damascus was minuscule compared to the devastation caused in its areas of origin.

Soon after the earthquake, social media was flooded with horrific clippings of buildings collapsing and bodies being removed from the rubble. Stories were being shared of lost family members and lost homes. In the Syrian governorates of Aleppo, Latakia, Hama, Tartous and the countryside of Idlib, the earthquake, and the aftershocks that followed, left more than a thousand dead, thousands more injured and hundreds of thousands displaced. Not a single person in Syria was left untouched by the devastation. Each of us had either a relative or a friend who suffered losses. Maintaining a dry eye in the wake of such horror was impossible.

But the anguish of the ordeal was amplified by the indifference of some of the world to the quake in Syria. While there was a global expression of compassion and a rush to provide humanitarian aid, the torment of the people of Syria was completely ignored. All the assistance went to Türkiye and the parts of Syria which either Türkiye or the USA were illegally occupying. Not only had NATO and its allies driven a mortifying, militarised regime-change agenda in Syria that caused a 12-year-long war; not only were some NATO members illegally occupying Syrian territory and stealing its resources, including oil; but now they were callously denying them humanitarian assistance. Syrians were painfully reminded that compassion is confined to those who are allies of the West as they watched some media outlets spewing feeble, politicised justifications for why their suffering is irrelevant.

Such justifications include that the Syrian Arab Republic has been sanctioned by the United States of America (USA). No, these are not the same as the United Nations (UN) endorsed sanctions once applied against apartheid South Africa. Instead, these are unilateral coercive measures enforced by the USA and supported by the European Union (EU) aimed at starving the people of Syria until they turn against their government. In 2004, the USA barred its companies from trading with Syria. In June 2020, however, it extended sanctions through the Civilian Protection Act of 2019 or the Caesar Act. It barred all foreign firms or countries from dealing with Syria.

Some argue that economic warfare is even crueller than military warfare. Banking transactions with the outside world, even for diplomats, is impossible. Thereby international trade is effectively killed. Before the war, the currency traded at Syrian Pound (SYP) 47 to the US dollar. As of the end of June 2020, when the Caesar Act was implemented, it was SYP 2,500 to the dollar. Now the rate is SYP 6,650 to the dollar. Consequently, the cost of living has increased significantly, and only some can afford anything beyond the weekly rations the Syrian government provides.

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Unilateral Coercive Measures, Alena Douhan, released a preliminary report after a visit to Syria in November 2022 that demonstrates how the West is suffocating the Syrian people. In it, she details the multi-faceted negative impact their unilateral coercive measures are having on the people of Syria. Before the war, Syria was one of few countries worldwide that had no absolute poverty. In 2009, less than 7.5 percent of the population experienced multi-dimensional poverty. Now  90 percent of the population is living in poverty. Then, this country had food and fuel in abundance. Now, according to Douhan, there is “limited access to food, water, electricity, shelter, cooking and heating fuel, transportation and health care.” Furthermore, she reports serious shortages of medicine and specialised equipment and that sanctions make it impossible to repair critical infrastructure like water distribution networks.

It must be re-emphasised that these sanctions that the USA and the EU impose on Syria are illegal in terms of international law. It is even worse that these sanctions are being applied at a time when there is a humanitarian crisis. It is for this reason that the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) has urged for the immediate lifting of sanctions on Syria. Sanctions have prevented the SARC from accessing the much-needed equipment, ambulances, and heavy machinery required to assist the injured and those still languishing in the snow-covered rubble. Likewise, the Middle East Council of Churches has called for sanctions on Syria to be lifted. The broader World Council of Churches has endorsed this call. Fortunately, some countries have not allowed sanctions to deter them. Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, Algeria, Armenia, Pakistan and Oman are among some countries that have come to the assistance of the Syrian people.

The generosity and solidarity displayed by these countries are admirable. Still, it pales compared to the hundreds of entities that came to the assistance of Türkiye. The past decade-and-a-half of anti-Syrian government propaganda has not only been swallowed wholly by people in the West. It has permeated the minds of many others globally, including in South Africa. Beyond a general statement by South Africa’s Presidency, no calls were made to the President of Syria nor the Foreign Minister, as is usually the case in such instances. The Gift of the Givers extensively mobilised resources within and across the country, none of which went to people living in the parts of Syria that are not under the control of members of NATO. They did not even extend condolences to the government of Syria. Such cold-heartedness is unfortunate. Our embracement of a particular political narrative had rendered us inhumane in the wake of tremendous suffering. Trauma knows no boundaries. Compassion should not either.