Saturday, July 27, 2024
Stories which highlight young children being injured or killed during conflicts in the Middle East have become all too common in recent years, especially those which touch on the harms resulting from the Syrian civil war.
which highlight young children being injured or killed during conflicts in the Middle East have become all too common in recent years, especially those which touch on the harms resulting from the Syrian civil war. While it has become increasingly normal for U.S. media outlets to detail the horrors that these children and their families have faced as residents of active warzones, rarely are the aftermaths of survivors given any in-depth coverage.
The Burnt Children Relief Foundation (BCRF), which first began in southern California and has since expanded to Galveston, Texas, offers financial support for the treatment of children that have suffered burn injuries as a result of the internal strife in Syria.
Syria’s civil conflict has led to an indeterminate amount of child deaths resulting directly from the actions of Syrian regime forces and Iranian militias, with statistics pointing to a number somewhere in the tens of thousands.
While this number is heart wrenching to see, a sliver of hope has appeared for Syrian children who are taking refuge and recovering from injuries on American soil.
The BCRF has helped bring normalcy to the lives of many children who have been subjected to burn injuries resulting from the chaos of revolutionary conflict in their homeland.
In 2015, Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken featured the story of one victim, Yumna Al-Naser, then 10-years-old, at a reception in honor of Eid-al-Fitr. Naser was saved by the actions of BCRF-connected hospital staff in Galveston who are experts in dealing with pediatric burn care.
Commenting on Naser’s story, and others in similar situations, Blinken stated that, “After more than four years of violence is a vivid reminder of a lesson the world has never seemed quite able to learn. When leaders fail to resolve differences peacefully, the devastating consequences fall disproportionately on the innocent, those without power, those without voice.”
To donate and help care for these victimized children please go to the BCRF website.