The refugees from Syria desperately need our help. The bitter cold of December is seeping through the flimsy walls of their tents and makeshift shelters and women and children are freezing to death. Snow, rain and freezing temperatures have descended on the region and the cold weather will continue for many months ahead in hundreds of camps throughout Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and Iraq, as well as in Syria itself. More than two million refugees are scattered outside Syria and four million are refugees in their own country. This vast number of men, women and children need immediate help in order to survive.
It will be wrong to say nothing is happening. There are substantial efforts to mitigate one of the worst-ever humanitarian disasters. The United Nations has organised a fund and many countries have put in a lot of work to get vital aid to the refuges. The Gulf Cooperation Council made it a priority at its summit last week and the UAE has been running a large camp in Jordan for more than a year.
But all this work is not enough. The huge scale of the humanitarian crisis is overwhelming efforts to help the refugees. As the world looks forward to 2014, there needs to be a renewed international effort to support the humanitarian task. Donors who promised money to the UN fund should make sure that they have paid in full and then they should recognise that they need to double their contributions as what was planned a year ago has proved totally inadequate to deal with the consequences of the continuing mayhem.
It is shocking that this massive humanitarian disaster has been totally created by man. Nature had nothing to do with it, but only the cruelty and lack of interest of human beings fighting for a deluded and miserable cause.
The government of Syria has totally failed its people, but any political solution will take a long time. Meanwhile, our basic human values mean that we have to do what we can. The refugees need our help now.
