A few thoughts on the refugee crisis

There is a crisis of humanity brewing overseas, an endless wave of people fleeing the Middle East in numbers that hasn’t been seen since World War II. Fleeing from countries like Syria, Iraq and Lybia to name a few. Unending war and terror is the root cause of it all. These are people caught in the middle of a myriad of warring factions. Factions like the Syrian government vs. the Syrian rebels. Whole cities are under siege as the two duke it out. Those in rebel-held cities are being starved, bombed and even allegedly gassed with chemical weapons like nerve gas by the Syrian government. Escape is preferable to any of those fates.

Then there is ISIS and their reign of terror, murder and utter barbarism across Syria, Iraq and anywhere else they can dig their talons into. Everyone is a target to them. They recruit at gunpoint and kill with little cause or qualm in the most brutal of fashions. Anyone who doesn’t convert to their ultra extreme ideology dies. Even sites of ancient human history have become victims of these barbarians. The ancient heritage of mankind are blown to bits or smashed by hammers held by these fanatics.

Now to make things even harder for those caught between a rock and a hard place come the drones and aircraft flown by the U.S., the bombers flown by allied nations all targeting ISIS, the Taliban and their cronies. The Kurds duke it out with ISIS. And the Turks battle both of them with equal zeal. The Iraqis struggle to put up a fight against a hardened enemy equipped with only the best of captured arms and weapon systems money could buy for the former owners. Many American-made weapons are now in the hands of ISIS.

In Lybia, a country split into pieces since its uprising against Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, the various factions fight for rule of that fractured nation. All over the Middle East everyone is fighting everyone else with small arms, tanks, barrel bombs, chemical weapons, suicide bombers, missiles and rockets. The region is a madhouse bent on death.

Is it any wonder why so many are flooding into Europe in numbers that boggle the mind? They cross the Mediterranean Sea in overcrowded unseaworthy boats, rafts and even rubber dinghies. Many never make the crossing; the boats flounder and sink. The refugees drown by the hundreds. The sight of bodies washed up on the shores and beaches across the Mediterranean is now a daily occurrence. God-awful sights like the dead baby that washed up on a beach and into the media is far from being the first nor the last.

Others take to land routes by any means possible. By foot or by crooked smugglers in overstuffed vans and trucks. In some cases to left to suffocate and die in those trucks and vans by the roadside. The smuggled die and the smugglers make a profit in money and death. Desperate people with little to lose because they lost everything along the way will do almost anything to be free of the terrors of endless warfare.

Europe is reeling from the tsunami of human misery. France and Germany struggle to help these desperate men, women and children. For a short spell Germany opened its borders and welcomed a large number of refugees from Hungry with open arms and hearts. But there were so many the German government reestablished border policing to stem the tide. Other countries have tried to fence off their borders with razor wire fencing and armed guards equipped with rubber bullets as well as regular rounds. An effort to push the rising numbers of refugees on to other countries less equipped to handle them. Sadly, the flood continues.

On Sept.10, President Obama directed the U.S. government to accept at least 10,000 refugees from Syria into the country. Many of the Republican presidential candidates and conservatives voiced strong opposition to this. Citing security concerns that ISIS inspired terrorists might try to infiltrate our country disguised as refugees. It is a possibility that has U.S government screeners looking for them while vetting the incoming refugees, a wise decision on the government’s part.

According to U.S. News the United States admits about 70,000 refugees from around the world each year. Ten thousand Syrians is a drop in the bucket, yet it is becoming an issue of some resistance among some Americans. It is more than evident here in Alaska after the Frontiersman published not one but two articles on the issue of allowing some of those refugees to come here to live. The responses from people of the Valley and beyond in the paper and on the Frontiersman’s website and Facebook page were largely negative. Some were downright hostile to put it mildly.

Why is that? I believe it is due to a decade-plus years of our fighting over there after 9/11. It has crept into our mentality of an embedded us vs. them reasoning for years on end. Then there is the religion of the region and of most of the refugees: Islam. That has many seeing falsely a terrorist behind every rock.

It all boils down to fear. Fear of terror. Fear of a religion that many see as alien. Something to focus hate upon for reasons very old. A grudge that has been going on centuries before this day. The long running bloody feud between Christianity and Islam that has gone on for 650 years or more give or take a decade.

Fear that somehow these people fleeing from the Middle East will somehow take over the Valley and then the state and maybe the country. Fear has taken over reason, logic and sadly human compassion to help those in dire need. This nation has become slaves to fear itself. I blame that on the terrorists, not on the religion they falsely claimed to have served on that day, September 11, 2001. A day when hell was unleashed upon us all. After all this time those animals succeeded in one thing, spreading fear across this nation.

That was one day, imagine what it must have been like to live with endless bombings and violence day in and day out for decades. To see your towns and homes reduced to rubble. To see your loved ones killed in a myriad of violent ways. To starve as vital supplies were cut of by factions and governments. To live in terror of your very lives every day. That is what the vast majority of these poor retches are fleeing.

There is a line or two on a plaque at the base of a certain statue. Something to think about as we ponder this issue. It goes something like this: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

This hangs at the base of the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor. She has been the beacon of freedom to those coming to this nation since 1886. This nation has a well-founded history of welcoming those fleeing oppression, famine and war from day one. It is past time we remember that. We need to own up to our responsibility in this mess and let some of these poor people in from the cold of terror and war. No one deserves to live like that.

I stand with the Frontiersman in the idea of letting some of these refugees to come to Alaska and live in freedom. I do so without reservation or fear. I choose not to let prejudice and fear-based ignorance rule my life. This is the right thing to do. It is the Christian thing to do and I am a Christian. And it is the American thing to do. We have done it before, many of those we helped in the past are living here today. Remember that poem I quoted earlier that says so much about who we really are.

There are those who will disagree. Some will vehemently, I have no doubts about that. This is about doing the right thing and not about a popularity contest. The right things tend not to follow the popular route — and neither do I.

Daniel D. Grota is a retired U.S. Army veteran with over 21 years in service. He is also a Tuesday morning co-host on KVRF 89.5 FM, Radio Free Palmer. Write to him at news@frontiersman.com