Clancy Sigal writes:
FAR FROM HOME, IN NEED OF HELP—BUT FROM WHERE?
As millions of Syrian refugees search for safety, their dire situation is reminiscent of those who fled Nazi Germany via British kindertransports
…Full marks then to Angela Merkel and the Germans who have a lot to live down and are doing it handsomely. And a salute to those individual Hungarian kids on the roadside who hand out water to exhausted Syrian trekkers. Boo to the official Hungarians whose Prime Minister, Viktor Orban, presiding over a country with a short memory and a rising tide of anti-Semitism, tells the refugees, especially if they’re Muslim, to eff off. Obviously he doesn’t remember how many countries took in Hungarian refugees after the 1956 revolution.
It’s not a moment for blame but for feeding, housing, and taking care. Yes, U.S. “foreign policy” got it wrong, wrong about Syria. Yes, Bush and Iraq. Yes, the hugely rich Arab states like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, etc. can’t care less.
But if I was a Syrian I too would hit the road rather than risk more lung-bursting barrel bombs from Assad’s air force or ISIS going door-to-door executing anybody they please.
