Syria: Infant in E. Ghouta becomes symbol of resistance

EAST GHOUTA/ANKARA

An infant, who lost his left eye and his mother last month in an attack by Bashar al-Asad’s regime in the besieged Eastern Ghouta region of Syria, has become a symbol of resistance.

Twitter users in East Ghouta are expressing solidarity with two-month-old Karim by posting their pictures with their hand clasping their left eye shut.

Members of White Helmets, activists, and two sisters named Nour and Ela, who tells the catastrophe in the region through children eyes, posted solidarity messages via Twitter.

Turkish social media users also expressed solidarity with Karim and Eastern Ghouta using hashtags such as #SolidarityWithKarim and #EasternGhouta.

Messages in English Turkish and Arabic, “#BabyKarim I see you” and “#EasternGhouta siege must end” were widely shared.

An Anadolu Agency video on the tragedy of the family has been widely shared on Twitter to promote solidarity with Karim in Turkey.

Speaking to Anadolu Agency, Karim’s father Abu Muhammed said: “Life under siege is a nightmare. It is very difficult to find a proper job under these circumstances.”

The bereaved father told that his children were starving for the last 24 hours and the only thing they could eat was bread.

‘Wife martyred’

Muhammed has lost his wife in an attack by Bashar Al-Assad forces in the area. "My child Karim was only one-month old when my wife was martyred.”

The infant, who is miraculously holding on to the life, is now being looked after by his siblings, who are also at child-age.

Ongoing regime attacks on Syria’s Eastern Ghouta, a suburb of Damascus, are turning the life of civilians in the area into an endless nightmare.

Home to some 400,000 civilians, Eastern Ghouta has been under siege by regime forces since December 2012.

The besieged area falls within a network of de-escalation zones -- set up in Syria by Turkey, Russia, and Iran -- in which acts of aggression are expressly forbidden.

Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011, when the Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests with unexpected ferocity.

Since then, hundreds of thousands of people have been killed and more than 10 million displaced, according to UN officials.

Reporting by Selen Temizer and Mohamad Misto:Writing by Handan Kazanci