No More Divides:

2017 Should Be the Year of Global March for Syria

Rasa - Peace activists have launched an on-foot march from Berlin, Germany to Aleppo, Syria in hopes of building political pressure to end the fighting and help refugees there.

News ID: 426111

Date: 28 December 2016 - 22:31

RNA - The Civil March for Aleppo is expected to take a little over three months, stretching through the Czech Republic, Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Macedonia, Greece, and Turkey. That's the so-called "refugee route” - taken backwards. More than a million people took that path in 2015 to escape from battlefields in the Middle East.

Per usual, few important points could be said in this respect:

1- The march from Berlin has come too late. The fighting is over and the besieged city of Aleppo has been liberated by the Syrian Army and its Iranian-Russian allies. People have begun returning to their homes and they all have access to humanitarian aid.

2- The Syrian government welcomes peace activists and international aid agencies to help rebuild Aleppo. They can reach the city and contribute because its people need all the humanitarian aid they can get from the international civil society to rebuild their shattered lives.

3- If the true purpose of the march is to build political pressure on ending the fighting, that pressure has to be directed toward the United States and its allies which are still hell-bent on regime changing Syria. Simply put, the terror-ravaged, besieged country is the victim here in need of protection. It is the regime changers that need to be condemned and held to account. Saying otherwise rings hollow.

4- This is not “fighting” or “civil war” between the Syrian government and its people, as the organisers of the Civil March for Aleppo might imagine. This is a full-blown military alliance, US-led war on a sovereign nation, under which ISIL and Al-Qaeda get American weaponry, trained European jihadists, and Saudi-Qatari petro-dollar cash in order to destroy Syria and protect Israel - in collaboration with their “moderate” brothers in arms.

5- There are hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees in Europe or on the way to Europe that are yet to get any access to humanitarian aid and protection. The peace activists will be doing us all a big favour if they first build pressure on their own governments to permanently shelter these refugees. They have had enough of clicking the sad or shocked faces on Facebook and Twitter. It’s time to act and express their humanity - to shun division, to help the Europe-bound refugees, to protect their human rights.

6- The peace activists are right to say the situation in Syria is terrible. However, they are way off the line to suggest they should only march for Aleppo. Instead, they should march for Syria. In fact, we should all march for humanity in Syria, where foreign-backed violence and heinous crimes against humanity have escalated amid an absence of meaningful efforts to end the dirty war.

Tragic enough, as winter approaches, the US-led globalist criminal syndicate continues to do the opposite, carrying out deliberate and indiscriminate attacks on civilians. Many of the worst affected civilians are women with young children who are suffering shock and trauma, and lack food, safe water, hygiene and medical attention. There are large temporary camps now in places like Jordan, Turkey and Lebanon where conditions are no good either.

To make a difference, therefore, the Civil March for Aleppo group can and should appeal for Western support to ensure 2017 will be the year of global march for ending the war on Syria. It will go a long way for millions of women and children refugees in this six-year disaster.

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