Kate Knab – Open Doors to Syrian Refugees

Seated around the dinner table, families across America hear the word ‘ISIS’ on the five o’clock news and feel a pang of regret for the millions of people threatened by the growing terrorist organization. It is easy to feel sorry for these strangers, sitting safe in our houses, enjoying our freedoms. It helps us to realize that we cannot take the lives we have here for granted. But it is also easy to miss tragedy among mounting statistics. The millions of refugees fleeing from their home countries are just faces without names hundreds of miles away. We may feel sympathy for these victims, but a #savethesyrians is only a futile attempt at avoiding our apparent powerlessness.

Most western citizens, when they think of ISIS, vaguely associate the name with a militant group responsible for recent Middle Eastern atrocities. ISIS stands for Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, and they are quickly gaining territory. The group is devoted to enforcing a strictly extremist Islamic State as they push further across the Middle Eastern countries, and if that means blowing up historically and culturally precious monuments, so be it. ISIS has no time for people and symbols that attempt to contradict their narrow-minded cabal, resulting in the deaths of thousands of innocent men, women, and children.

To make matters worse, Syria is also suffering under the regime of president Bashar al-Assad, a cruel man not above harming his own people. With ISIS pushing from one side, and al-Assad’s looming atrocities on the other, Syrians are straining against their country’s seams for the chance to the escape these unspeakable horrors.

Thus begins, and continues, the mass exodus of scared and desperate Syrians into the nearby countries of Serbia, Hungary, and Croatia. Thousands of people crowd the borders every day, trying to get their families as far from the terror as possible. But as these countries begin violently cracking down on just who they are allowing through, Germany has agreed to accept more refugees, a proclamation that has been received with overwhelming results. More and more people are fleeing their home countries wracked by chaos and war towards the more economically stable and peaceful Western Europe. Even Iraqis and Afghanis have joined the Syrians in their trek for much needed asylum.

But it seems that the road to hell is always paved with good intentions. The Syrians picked up their families in search of order and peace, and it makes sense to venture towards western superpowers. What does not make sense is the mindless brutality they are met with at border gates and pop-up camps. Fear was supposed to be assuaged the farther they got from ISIS, but it is only amplified by the constant confusion and suffering. Families are being ripped apart, half beaten onto buses destined for unknown places, while the other half is left behind for another agonizingly indefinite wait. Child labor is prevalent in Turkey where the majority of basement factory positions are being divided amongst refugee youngsters who lack the skills of reading and writing, instead toiling away for hours in subpar conditions for meager paychecks. Their futures are almost as grim as one strewn with terrorists and war.

Some have traveled hundreds of miles to escape war and poverty, and often times the journey is just as dangerous as the situation they’re trying to leave behind. For the Kurdi family, an opportunity to escape presented itself in the form of a boat trip to the Greek island of Kos on September 2. But as fate would have it, only one member of the Kurdi family would live to glimpse freedom. Aylan Kurdi, a toddler of two who’s only memories of this world would forever be laced with terror, drowned along with his mother Rehen and brother Galip. The frail boy’s body washed up along the shores of Turkey. Heartbroken father Abdullah Kurdi identified the remains of the boy as his son and held a funeral two days later. A parent’s worst nightmare is burying his child, but Kurdi had to say an early goodbye to both sons and his wife in just one day.

They are tired, they are scared, and they are desperate. Millions of refugees have already gotten so far, but they cannot make it to true safety on their own. It is crucial to support the European countries that have opened their gates and offered their assistance during such a devastatingly vulnerable time for Syrians, Iraqis, and Afghanis alike. Perhaps this evidence of humanity can be the start in sparing a child from Aylan Kurdi’s fate, replacing memories of war and sadness with those of peace and kindness.

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Kee Min – Open Door Policy has its Drawbacks

To say that the ISIS has had a profound impact in the everyday lives of people around the world is an understatement at best. The ruthless extremist Islamic group is continuing to build its power and territory around the Middle East and now has extensive influence throughout the entire world, from Europe to America. While we Americans have been monitoring the situation from afar, the Syrians have been suffering from right under their boots. With the recent flood of Syrians seeking refuges in more safe, reassuring Western countries, the leaders of these nations must keep the emotional attraction towards the refugees limited and think logically.

As awful as it sounds, no European countries gain anything extensive from letting in the Syrians. The obvious fear amongst the potential landing spots for them is the fact that there is close to no background information on each and every person that are “seeking safe haven.” It will be incredibly time-consuming and almost impossible to conduct extensive research on everyone. Are the risks worth the pat-on-the-backs and thumbs-ups from other neighboring countries? The possibility of letting a terrorist in their country is terrifying enough. Almost all of these refugees are from the poorest parts of the country. The lack of proper health care and education has made the region extremely vulnerable to many known and unknown diseases.

It is a known fact that the European nations have been anti-immigration for most of the recent time period. Some might call it racism, and some might call it xenophobia. The Europeans defend it as defending its civic identity. No one should mistake the EU with old China or the United States. China and the US had the ability to absorb cultures around them and make them their own, either by assimilating them into their own culture or adapting them in their melting pot of their culture. In European nations, there are a very little number of countries that can welcome or even accept such outward culture invading their sacred tradition. The thought of taking in a huge number of such immigrants can drastically alter their neighborhood, and they are not ready for such an incredible change. Just their recent protest of local mosques construction can tell people everything they need to know about how the Europeans feel about “the invasion.” Introducing such extreme change in culture could create havoc in local societies and perhaps violence in many places.

Another thing holding back the European countries from stepping in and becoming a hero for the lost is the disunity within the union itself. Ever since the disappearance of internal boundaries within the EU members, many right-wing conservative parties have voiced their concerns over many less-developed nation’s people freely migrating to the likes of France and Germany. Those open internal boundaries should be able to spread the refugees across the continent freely; most of the Syrians have been pushed into countries with oceanic borders such as Greece and Italy, suffocating them with thousands and thousands of lost souls. Nations like Hungary and Austria has even closed its borders with other neighboring countries to discourage the refugees, Germany has taken a lead and extremely relaxed their grip on dealing with the crisis and providing help for the Syrians.

What about America? The land of the free, the home of the brave, and the melting pot of cultures has surely been open to accepting more and more sufferers into their homeland. Most of the time, America has lived up to the expectation that it is the haven for the refugees. However, oddly enough, since 2011, out of 17,000 Syrian refugees that were referred to the US by the UN, only 9 percent have been accepted into the country. Due to their extensive background checks, the process can take up to two years for someone to be accepted. While the fact that the country that is two oceans away is even taking in any refugees could be seen as a sign of benevolence. The blame could be shouldered on our fear of terrorism. The United States’ toleration for any affiliation or contact with any jihadist is zero to none, and for a good reason. The political cost for letting any Syrian who was entangled in anything remotely terroristic will be unrecoverable. The American government, rightfully so, has been more concerned with their own position than the refugees. The fact that 9/11 was planned by the Muslim living in Germany does not help the case.

The intentions are good and all, but sometimes logic must triumph humanitarianism. Where will they put all these new immigrants? How long will it take for them to be assimilated? Will they have a positive impact on the economy? Where will they be housed and where will they be treated? So many questions are going unanswered just because people around the world are screaming for justice to the poor, suffering Syrians. What about the non-Muslim Nigerians fleeing from Boko Haram? What about the ever-increasing number of illegal immigrants coming from Mexico? The EU and the United States cannot simply accept people into their country because it is “a right thing to do.”