Listen to: Greg Haines — Nueblo Pueblo

These wars have shaped our youth and redefined the course of our future before it began. We all have a burden buried deep within, you see. It is no longer about freedom or the desire to break-free, or perhaps it still is, but the grave amount of grief and melancholy that has overtaken my nation has overshadowed the will to live, among other yearning desires.

You come across any Syrian, whether pro or anti government, and you hear heart wrenching stories about a nation that once stood so tall that even the clouds could not reach it. There is not one family in Syria that has not suffered the loss of a member, been displaced, had its house demolished, or gone through the horrors of kidnaps and thefts. My family alone has suffered enough. Be it kidnaps and that dreaded wait for the ransom call, thefts that led to bankruptcy, or a home we can no longer set one foot into.

Upon meeting any Syrian, whether a complete stranger or otherwise, the first and foremost question is this: “How is your family?” Some would say, “Alhamdllilah, they’re alive.” While others would sigh, holding back their tears. To be alive in Syria today, with food enough for one day, and a roof above one’s head present is indeed a blessing. The lucky few in Aleppo can make bread on their own, while the rest pray for bread at the end of the waiting line.

As a young Syrian myself today, I am unsure of who the enemy is. Of course, there must be an enemy present, or else people would not have been dying. But how, how can the enemy be one of our own? At the start of the revolution, there were two sides; the government versus the people. Soon, the people started going into different directions, adding more sides to this already complex equation. Slowly, the FSA and SNC started forming, and along with it came Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey. The FSA then started branching out on its own, while most protected those in need, others killed, kidnapped, and robbed in the name of the revolution. Later on, Jubhat Al Nusra joined; fighters from South Asia started fighting in the name of Allah and what have you of terrorist slogans. Who are they fighting to be exact? That I am yet to understand, but they are fighting.

I was told by a friend once that it is not the right time to criticize the FSA. Once they succeed in overthrowing the government, then we begin to question them. But I refuse to let a dictatorship overthrow another one in the name of our revolution. Those kids in Dar’aa, the ones who were tortured by the regime for chanting an anti-government slogan back in March 15, they deserve a clean government that has not killed its way to the top.

At the beginning of the revolution, all protests were against the government. Now, there are protests going out against all sides, really, including the FSA. People are still being shot at, detained, and killed for being anti- anything (whether government, FSA, and so on).

I don’t know where Syria is headed. I am no political analyst, nor have I obtained a degree in Middle Eastern studies, but I am a Syrian who has been denied the right to literally fight for her country because of reasons we all know. I don’t know what the future carries for Syria. But I do know this: I will rebuild it; brick by brick, we will rebuild it.