Aleppo, once Syria's largest city and once known as its jewel, sits in rubble, but more tragically so do its people.

"The cradle of civilizations and the birthplace of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, the Middle East has become the theater of incredible brutality," said Archbishop Bernardito Auza, the Vatican's permanent observer to the United Nations in addressing the U.N. Security Council Oct. 19 about the deterioration of the situation.

"The corpses under the ruins and the wandering refugees are a clear witness to this cynical contempt and trampling of international humanitarian law," he said.

U.N. Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura said to a group of European Union foreign ministers in Luxembourg on Oct. 17 said that "between now and December, if we cannot find a solution, Aleppo will not be there anymore."

Images of children physically hurt or killed in the conflict have gone viral, prompting pleas this fall from Pope Francis, who said in an Oct. 12 general audience that he is "begging, with all my strength" for an immediate cease-fire that would allow the "evacuation of civilians, especially children, who are still trapped under cruel bombardment."

Almost everyone agrees that something has to be done. Some worry that the repercussions of using force would only shift the violence toward other minority religious groups.

Russia and the United States, two external players in the conflict — one supporting Syrian President Bashar Assad, the other mildly supporting the rebels — keep accusing each other of violating cease-fire agreements. Meanwhile, the nation's leader keeps crushing those who want to see him gone, regardless of how it hurts innocent civilians caught in the middle.

Since the beginning of the conflict in 2011, Washington has been focused on an option that does not include military force even though President Barack Obama in 2013 said: "We have been very clear to the Assad regime, but also to other players on the ground, that a red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized. That would change my calculus. That would change my equation." Continue reading

Sources

• Crux article by Rhina Guidos
• Image: New Vision Foundation

Now that women are having to cover up with the abaya, or at least keep a veil handy when they venture out, just in case (something previously inconceivable in Syria), now the press is reporting the establishment of sharia courts which, according to the Washington Post, pass sentences "daily and indiscriminately" on Christians and anyone else who violates precepts of Wahhabi Islam.

Now that the economy has been brought to its knees by the widespread destruction and looting of stores and workshops; now that famine is at hand in the city of Aleppo, and foodstuffs are to be had only at enormous prices; now that the terrorists have reached Homs and Aleppo and the mountains above Damascus—now at last the press seems to have stopped describing the rebels' fight as a high-minded struggle for "freedom."

Syrian culture used to be distinctive among the lands of the Middle East for a coexistence between Christians and Muslims which went beyond mere tolerant forbearance, a reality of which Syrians were proud. Under the iron fist of the ruling Alawite dictators, who kept fundamentalists at bay, a good degree of religious freedom was preserved. Christians fleeing persecution in other Middle East countries found refuge in Assad's Syria, including Iraqi Catholics fleeing post-Saddam persecution. Continue reading

Sources

• The Catholic World Report
• Image: Future Challenges

• Pope Benedict XVI used his Sunday Angelus address to call for peace in Syria and to urge the government there to respect "the legitimate aspirations" of its citizens. "I renew an urgent appeal to the Syrian authority and population, for peaceful coexistence to be restored as soon as possible and for an adequate response to the legitimate aspirations of the citizens, respecting their dignity, and for the benefit of regional stability," the Pope told pilgrims gathered at his summer residence August 7.
• Another Jesuit, Father Samir Khalil Samir, a Vatican Arab scholar says "In reality, most Syrians are just fed up." He thinks that even if a change in government creates the possibility of producing an Islamic regime, the West should embrace the need to oust the Assad regime.
• President Bashar al-Assad and the protesters seeking to bring him down seem locked in a mortal and painfully protracted struggle, says Margot Patterson in the London Tablet "But time is not on the side of the regime. The economy is crumbling, the regime is increasingly isolated by the international community, its credibility shredded both inside and outside the country, and the opposition is becoming better organised."

Source

• The Vatican Insider
• Catholic Culture
• The London Tablet
• Image: Time to Liaise