Syria Deeply interviewed Nicholas Kristof, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist from The New York Times. He has been covering the Syria story since its earliest days, reporting from Syria in late November.
We chatted with him about his experience covering the conflict. ‘It’s frustrating that we have this apathy,’ he tells us.
Read the interview, here: http://beta.syriadeeply.org/2013/01/with-nichol...
Lara Setrakian, founder and managing editor, explains how Syria Deeply has helped us understand the nuances of the Syrian conflict—and recognize the enormous costs along the way.
“The stories we have received from regular Syrians also show that many do not see this as a clear-cut conflict between good and evil. To many Syrians, rebels groups have earned themselves a reputation for bad behavior. Rogue brigades and assorted armed thugs have been looting, kidnapping, and extorting the local population. Syrians who fall prey can pay with their lives or their life savings. Those crimes may not reflect the Free Syrian Army as a whole, but they are enough to damage the rebels’ reputation.
…
“This chaos is tearing apart Syria’s social fabric. We’ve written about how Syria’s young women face forced marriage for the sake of the bride price, their families desperate to live off their dowry. Funerals, a solemn but sacred tradition in Aleppo, have devolved into a stock dumping of bodies, devoid of religious ritual. Profiteering has left citizens disgusted and distrustful of each other as they witness price gauging of food and basic necessities – the haves ripping off the have-nots.
“For Syria’s kids, it’s leaving scars that can last a generation. Violence is breeding nightmares. Schools are overflowing with refugees, leaving few open to actually teach in overcrowded classrooms. In refugee camps, as NPR’s Deborah Amos explored, the signs of post-traumatic stress disorder are made manifest in children’s drawings.
“Among adults, Syrians have been enveloped by a hardened fatalism that we journalists used to only among the survivors of Lebanon’s civil war.
‘Whether we’re bombed or killed, it doesn’t change anything because we’re hopeless. [Syrians] say, ‘If I’m going to die, let me die in my home,’” said one resident of the embattled neighborhoods of Damascus. “There is something broken inside the people.’"
Read more at: http://beta.syriadeeply.org/op-eds/2013/01/cove...
“What affected me the most is the sorrow over things that won’t come back,” he said. “I don’t really care if I die or not, but if I live, I will be a stranger. Maybe I have always been, but I feel we’ll never come back to how we were.”
— Los Angeles Times, “More Young Syrians disillusioned by the revolution” (http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/m...)
Seeing the conflict develop into a complex reality, our work at Syria Deeply seems more important than ever. That is why we have been traveling to the region, pulling together our resources, and staying up nights to help clarify what’s happening on the ground.
We’ve got a week left to our IndieGoGo campaign — please spread the word and keep visiting us at syradeeply.org. We always welcome your feedback on how we can improve and make SD a user-friendly space.
Our very own Lara Setrakian writes about how a story-specific model can change the news business:
“I was driven by a deep consumer need and a profound personal mission to build Syria Deeply, a platform that fuses journalism and technology to better cover a complex story. It is part news aggregator, part interactive backgrounder, part original reporting space. Most importantly, it aims to fuse all of the kinds of content that have become critical to this crisis: professional reporting, citizen journalism, and social media. We wanted to visualize more, convey greater nuance, and focus on civilian stories, rather than just emphasize the big shots and the battle action that normally lead our headlines.”
Read more at: http://www.niemanlab.org/2013/01/lara-setrakian...
The situation in Syria is deteriorating. This past week alone, stories of flooding and cold weather has left refugees in Jordan in a more dire situation. Read New York Times’ coverage here: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/13/world/middlee...
Meanwhile, those who can are trying to help Syrians in need, but the fighting does not cease. Syria Deeply spoke with the operations advisor of Doctors Without Borders in Syria about the country’s hospitals that are now war zones, and the incredible lack of international response.