Students speak: Syrian Civil War
As part of their AP U.S. Government studies, Marshfield High School students researched and compiled information on an issue they cared about and wrote letters to the editor. Hub City Times will publish a collection of their letters.
Dear editor,
I follow current events quite closely here in the U.S. That is why I was so troubled to see that the last hospital in eastern Aleppo, Syria, has been destroyed. It is wrong that so many men, women, and children have to go without medical care in a grueling civil war with no end in sight that is leaving more and more civilians dead and injured by the day.
I used to not care about the Syrian Civil War, as I thought it was just another one of the wars I would have to grow up with, but then I learned of the bloodshed, the death, and the unjust rule of a dictator who is ruthlessly killing his own people in a weak and pathetic attempt to retain control of a country that does not want him as its ruler.
The situation in Syria is severe. An estimated 400,000 people have died since the beginning of the war in 2011, and that number grows by the day. What is worse is that of the 400,000 people dead, over half are estimated to be civilians. Many of these people have done nothing but try and go on in their lives and try and escape the deadly barrage of airstrikes that continue to strike cities such as Aleppo and Damascus. These airstrikes are mostly carried out by Bashar al-Assad and the Russians in an attempt to root out and kill rebel fighters. Hospitals have been a major target for the Assad regime’s airstrikes.
Over 300,000 civilians have been left without care in Aleppo, many of them women and children. To put this into perspective, the amount of people left without care is equal to the size of fifteen Marshfields.
I believe that our lawmakers should focus more on the situation in Syria and should provide more support for the rebels. The sooner this war ends, the fewer civilians will be dead or misplaced.
Drake White-Bergey
Marshfield
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