- In 1915 the Ottoman Empire carried out their "systematic extermination" of its minority Armenian subjects inside their historic homeland - modern day Turkey. The estimated total number of people killed is between 800,000 and 1.5 million. Many of the main 'killing fields' of the Armenian were in the Syrian dessert, Deir ez-Zor. After the arrival of the first groups of Armenian refugees (1915–1922) the population of Aleppo in 1922 counted 156,748 of which Muslims were 97,600 (62.26%), native Christians -mostly Catholics- 22,117 (14.11%), Jews 6,580 (4.20%), Europeans 2,652 (1.70%), Armenian refugees 20,007 (12.76%) and others 7,792 (4.97%)
- In 1948, the Palestinian exodus occurred when 700,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled during the 1948 Palestine War. The initial influx of Palestinian refugees was between 90,000-100,000. Through different laws the government paved the way for Palestinians to be integrated into their society whilst remaining this Palestinian identity.
- Post the 2003 invasion, the UNHCR estimates there are between 1 - 1.5 Million Iraqis in Syria in 2007. A large majority of the refugees have remained anonymous by not registering officially.
Though there are many instances of Syria acting as salvation for those seeking refugee, I thought I would highlight a few to show that now, when Syrian's need help, they're being treated as a problem. They're not the problem, the problem lies with what's causing them to flee - why is their homeland so unstable, who allowed to get this way? The problem lies with our world leaders bickering over what to do with millions of homeless refugees trying to seek safety in our privileged countries - if we were in trouble, they would expect help.
"Let it be written in the history books and let the generations remember, that when a Syrian needed help and refuge; borders were closed and the world looked away."
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