Distruction of Antiquities in the Syrian War

When the statue of the Abu Alaa Al Maarrie and that of “assad allat” were destroyed and turned into a pile of stones, when ‪Bosra‬ and Palmyra‬ were lost, they were not a loss to ‪Syrians‬ only but to the whole world. The light of civilization that lived in ‪‎Syria‬ is a real threat to those hateful groups that insist on eliminating an enlightenment and civilization thousands of years old.

I don’t like to stuff my articles with boring information, but I will just give a hint about the catastrophe that befell the antiquities and museums starting with the Umayyad mosque in ‪Aleppo‬, to at Em Al Zenar church in Homs, to the Old and New city in ‎Homs‬, and I don’t have the right words to describe Bosra and its great amphitheater, ‪‎Ebla‬ in ‎Idlib‬. The list is too long to continue.

90% of the militant factions that are fighting in Syria are radical religious groups, those same groups participated in Geneva and other conferences claiming the right to rule in Syria.

How would they be merciful to people if they are not being merciful to stones?

Of course everything becomes clear and understandable when we remember that Turkey has the best share in looting Syrian. The majority of Syrian antiquities and museums were stolen and exported to Turkey to be sold there and it is impossible to track them now. the destruction in some of the Syrian areas is way worse than that of ‪‎Dresden‬ in ‪‎WWII‬.

No one ever imagined that Khaled Al Asa’ad, the General Director of Antiquities and Museums in Palmyra, was such a threat to ‪‎ISIS‬ and those supporting it. This man was great enough for Italy to close its museums mourning him .

I wonder what will those monsters do if they reach old city of‪ Damascus‬? What will they do if they reach Ugarite or Amrite?

Syria was moving with steady steps towards secularism, toward a future where everyone has the right to think and believe freely, towards a united homeland where we are all equal.

Alas that there will be a time when we wake up too late and our children ask us about what was once a country and the only answer we have will be “once upon a time…”