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COVID-19 Diaries: The Danger for Refugees While World Stays Home

Heather Murdock

   ISTANBUL - Five years ago, in an apartment near Turkey's border with
   Syria, I met a man named Mustafa, a former Syrian rebel-turned-activist
   who introduced journalists to refugees and other victims of the war.
   This time, he said, he was not sure he wanted to help.
   "I've been working with journalists for three years now," he explained.
   "I thought if the world knew the suffering here, things would get
   better."
   I knew how he felt. I once thought so too. "But it has done nothing,"
   he added. "Every year, the war gets worse and worse."
   He was right. As journalists, we weren't saving Syria. And if we were
   just witnessing the suffering with no results, what were we really
   doing?
   But now, as international borders close and millions of people,
   including myself, are mostly staying home to try to slow the spread of
   the coronavirus, it has become clearer to me what we were doing then.
   More frighteningly, it has become clear to me what we are not doing
   now.

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