Loading ...Being Arab In Alaska Part III
Anchorage, AK- In Part III of “Being Arab In Alaska,” all four featured Arab-Alaskans reveal their thoughts, on the international community’s response to the Syrian refugee crisis.
Islamic Community Center of Anchorage Alaska (ICCAA) Spokesman Dr. Youssef Barbour described, “Particularly Syria, it was always an open place for refugees, like me as a Palestinian. I sought refuge in Syria and lived in Syria, and never felt that I am a refugee. I was treated just like Syrians. Syria has always been a place where refugees were always able to find safe a haven, and now unfortunately, this is happening to Syrians, and that’s what makes it very painful. Turkey is accommodating them, Greece is accommodating them, Lebanon, Jordan, but there are a lot of other countries that kind of claim the benefit of Syrians, and they don’t do nothing.”
Syrian-American Anchorage resident Salomé Hussein offered, “There just needs to be a redirection of the dialogue and reemphasizing that these are human beings, and reemphasizing what they are leaving behind, and try to foster more compassion. There is always more that could be done, and it probably was a matter of waiting too long, because this was building up over a period of nine years, and we didn’t hear about it until the refuge crises, supposedly two years ago, but there has been a conflict in Syria for a decade. People didn’t care until things started going wrong for them. It’s been going wrong for Syrians for ages. It’s always someone else until it’s you. Right?”
As the Syrian refugee epidemic continues to escalate without significant global assistance, thousands of migrants have been forced to flee their war torn homeland, in search of a chance at life.
Syrian-German Anchorage resident Camilla Hussein added, “There is a misconception that is being portrayed in the media, that this is what Syrians are. They aren’t showing the real Syrians, who are just families trying to survive with children wanting to come to the United States, as all the other immigrants came, in the last century. They just want to start a new life without being shot or tortured.”
Orthodox Christian Palestinian Anchorage Resident Ramzi Abuamsh concluded with, “We should help those people because they are deserving. I wish America, Russia, Britain, Germany; I wish they could do more.”