Sunday, 05 March 2017 21:18

From Syria With Love

Written by Gill Kennett

From Syria With Love is a UK based charity that raises funds and awareness for the refugee crisis. On Saturday 25th February 2017 they brought to Hull their exhibition of pictures drawn and painted by children from Syria. The founder and director Baraa Ehssan Kouja also gave a presentation showing the devastating results of the war on these children and how the charity From Syria With Love is working with them and for them. HHfR is hoping to arrange for FSWL to return to Hull and do further presentations at schools in the area later this year.

They have also produced a CD - copies of which may be available from HHfR for £10 at our next FRUIT market - and a beautiful and moving book, which contains many of the pictures in the exhibition and poems and stories by young people living in a Syrian refugee camp in Lebanon. It can be ordered through FSWL's website. HHfR will be using the book as a resource for awareness raising.

 

 

From the Foreword:

The Syrian people have a tradition of providing a refuge to those in need: the Circassians in 1870, the Armenians in 1915, the Palestinians in 1948, and the Iraqis in 2003.

Now the Syrian people need our help. In five years of civil war, hundreds of thousands have been killed or injured, and many more have been forced to flee their homes. They need us to put pressure on governments and world leaders to bring about a lasting peace; and to provide aid and support to those who have been displaced by fighting.

And for our own sakes, as well as theirs, we must challenge the poisonous idea that refugees do not deserve our aid and our compassion, or that they pose some kind of threat to us.

As we approach another winter, with so many Syrians living in makeshift camps, the need for practical aid, raising funds for food, medicines and shelter, is paramount. But aid alone is not enough, if we allow prejudice to gain a hold.

This makes From Syria with Love so timely. The money it raises will go straight to help the children who are featured in its pages. But more than that, by seeing the world through these children’s eyes, and hearing their voices, we are reaffirming our common humanity.

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