We live in a world where violence has become common place, suffering a regular feeling we have learned to cope with and the dead just one more number. Or maybe this is the world that the Middle East and Arab World has taken to be its ‘daily bread,’ leaving little left to move us so deeply that it will impact us for the rest of our lives. The region has witnessed too much to mention in the last half century, without even mentioning the current ongoing wars – in Syria and Iraq – with no end in sight. The violence intensifies, the suffering unstoppable, the dead pile up until the next day, when it starts all over again.
No matter how stoic we have become, a child’s single tear, let alone a cry for mercy or a bloodied face will never fail to break our hearts. Not only does this come from the depths of our own humanity, but for lack of another way to apologize on behalf of the world, wondering why some children live as children should, while others are deprived of their innocence and shown the extents of human evil before their time.
Human Rights Watch’s latest report on the arbitrary detention of children and their ill-treatment in Bahrain, joined by the disturbing glimpses of the same going around Arabic television stations, is yet another dark page in this region’s history. If ruthless dictatorships currently have complete disregard for the present, stripping their people of freedom and dignity, why would we have any better expectations for them caring for the future, for the children?
Shame…
Eye on the East 