{"id":16594,"date":"2018-09-28T03:23:55","date_gmt":"2018-09-28T03:23:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=16594"},"modified":"2018-09-28T03:23:55","modified_gmt":"2018-09-28T03:23:55","slug":"exhibition-highlights-the-endless-struggle-for-syrian-refugees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=16594","title":{"rendered":"Exhibition highlights the endless struggle for Syrian refugees"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\nLONDON: Suffering has become the status quo in Syria but the casualties of its seven-year conflict are drifting from the public eye.<\/p>\n

\nThe world\u2019s attention span dwindled with the decline of Daesh in the region and Syria is increasingly seen as just another Middle East crisis, warned\u00a0Lina Khatib, head of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House).<\/p>\n

\n\u201cThe military defeat of ISIS largely contributed to a perception that the story is over for Syria and everything else that happens is just routine,\u201d she told Arab News. But for millions forced to flee their war-torn country, the struggle is far from over.<\/p>\n

\nOn the streets of Beirut in neighbouring Lebanon, people have grown accustomed to the sight of homeless Syrians huddled in doorways and women with young children shivering on blankets at the side of the road.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\nSpeaking at the launch of her new video art exhibition,\u00a024 Hours on Hamra Street\u00a0in London on Thursday, Khatib spelled out the dangers of compassion fatigue and the routinisation through which conflict in the Middle East \u2013 particularly events in Syria \u2013 are often perceived.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\u201cI felt that people have started to think of conflict in Syria and elsewhere in the Middle East as normal and this is very disturbing because it dehumanizes both the victims in the conflict and also the people who are ignoring these conflicts.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\nHer footage, shot over 24 continuous hours on Hamra Street in Beirut, brings the viewer\u2019s gaze down to ground level, where those left begging by the loss of their homes in Syria scrape a living on occasional handouts from passersby.<\/p>\n

\nKhatib, who is also a\u00a0visual artist, used her phone camera to record a few minutes every hour on the busy shopping street, where pedestrians walk past, oblivious to those whose lives have been placed on hold here.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cThis is about the human dimension,\u201d she said during a panel\u00a0discussion entitled\u00a0Keep your eyes set on Syria.\u00a0\u201cI feel like I could write a whole book asking for empathy but it\u2019s not going to be as effective as the exhibition upstairs.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\nShe also collaborated with Damascus-based heavy metal band Maysaloon to produce a short documentary chronicling their determination and defiance as young musicians finding a voice amid the chaos of war. \u201cCultural expression is another avenue for discussing what Syria is going through today,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\nThe video installation, which is part of\u00a0Chatham House’s Syria From Within project, reminds viewers of the human cost of a\u00a0conflict that has forced 5.5 million people to flee Syria and displaced a further 6.6 million inside the country since 2011, according to The UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR.<\/p>\n

\nIn the past year, 50,000 refugees have returned home from Lebanon, despite concerns over their safety. The Lebanese government says the country can no longer cope with hosting an estimated 1.5 million Syrian refugees and is pushing ahead with a controversial programme to facilitate returns.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cSince the beginning they considered the refugees as visitors,\u201d said\u00a0Fadi Hallisso, CEO of Basmeh and Zeitooneh, an NGO working with Syrian refugees in Lebanon. \u201cMany politicians are misleading the public by pretending that the war has ended in Syria and now it is time for the refugees to return.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\nAs a result, he said, donations are drying up despite the enormous need for ongoing compassion and support.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\nThe exhibition at P21 Gallery in London runs until Oct. 5, 2018.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LONDON: Suffering has become the status quo in Syria but the casualties of its seven-year conflict are drifting from the public eye. The world\u2019s attention span dwindled with the decline of Daesh in the region and Syria is increasingly seen as just another Middle East crisis, warned\u00a0Lina Khatib, head of the Middle East and North…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":16595,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16594\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16595"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}