INTERVIEW TO MARIA AL ABDEH
SYRIA: THE WAR DOES NOT DESTROY THE CIVIL SOCIETY.
Maria Al Abdeh was one of the most relevant figures who represented Syria at the World Social Forum, a young Syrian activist who lives in France: director of Women Now for Development”, and representative of “Citizen for Syria”. Maria represents many of those Syrians who were “caught” by the Revolution when they were already abroad to study or to work and then, when the Revolution became a war, tried, to help Syrian people, returning to their countries of origin.
“Since 2011 I have always tried to help my people as I could. In 2012, I founded an association, the “Syrian no-violence movement” to help the Revolution through peaceful means. I entered and went out from the country several times between 2012 and 2014, until I have been forced to quit because it was too dangerous”.
Among the things Maria has done with her association, she especially worked with women in Syria and with the refugees in Turkey and Lebanon. “Women, in fact, Maria tells, how often it happens in contexts of conflict, have to deal with everything, family, work, and they have to rebuild the social fabric. Many husbands and brothers are in fact missing or dead. Women have to make hard and courageous work, and we have to help them by all means”.
The figures of this war are heavy: today, after four years of conflict, refugees are officially 3.8 million and we count approximately 220.000 casualties. There are data of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, published on the occasion of the forth anniversary of the Revolution (15th of March 2011), resulted then in a civil war whose end is out of sight. “In Syria, Maria says, we are witnessing horrible crimes, but we cannot forget that a strong civil society exists there, in spite of everything. It is against both Assad and Isis. We have to remember these things, as well as the fact that there have been achievements that we try to defend, even if new extremist groups are threatening us. For example, with Assad we had only three governmental newspapers, now we have 43 active journals and newspapers”.
Maria is in Tunis to speak about women and media, and about Mediterranean Citizenship: “It is an interesting and necessary alternative against the “egocentrism” of each country. Isis, for example, is not a Syrian product, but it is a result of modernity and of the failure of international economical and social policies. We have the same problems and we have to look for the same solutions”.
