Italian author Roberto Saviano has shared this picture with the following commentary on Facebook. Of course, the Assad regime fans in Italy go into full-on denial, but there is not a word in the caption to his picture that is untrue. (Translated in English below)
“Mustafa, this child who wonderfully smiles in his father’s arms, was not mutilated, he was born without hands and without arms [and legs]. The malformations were caused by the gases inhaled by his mother during Assad’s bombings. The Syrian regime has dumped its chemical arsenal on the country’s civilian population.
This shot, “Hardship of life” by Mehmet Aslan, portrays Mustafa and his father in a refugee camp. Mustafa’s father lost a leg due to a barrel bomb dropped from a regime helicopter.
Last year, this photo last year won the Siena International Photo Award (SIPA), and, thanks to SIPA itself that organised a fundraiser, yesterday Mustafa and his family were able to disembark at Fiumicino airport and will be welcomed in their new home made available by Caritas and the Archdiocese. At the Budrio Prosthesis Centre, little Mustafa will have his limbs given back to him.
The war in Syria continues, though completely forgotten. For years, most Italian populists have argued that the use of gas was a lie, despite evidence brought by independent bodies and hundreds of journalistic investigations. The Assad dictatorship has remained standing thanks to the propaganda of those who claim it’s better to keep him than to be getting ISIS, but in reality, Assad has destroyed any hope of democratic life. It is Assad who has destroyed the democratic Syrian spring that sought to create a secular and free democracy in Damascus. It is Assad who has driven many of the opponents of his regime to flee in exile or enlist in the ranks of Islamist troops.
Assad is among the worst tyrants history has ever known, yet he enjoys a strange fortune: to have managed to be considered a “lesser evil” compared to ISIS; having obtained protection from the Putin regime without facing a real contrast from Western democracies; and to have clung to power at least until the pandemic wiped Syria out of the media narrative.”
📸 @mehmetaslan.photoarts
We Write What We Like 