After 10 years of ongoing war in Syria, the National Evangelical Synod of Syria and Lebanon (NESSL) and the Presbyterian Church in Aleppo created the Children of the World Medical Center in Aleppo to address the scale, severity and complexity of the humanitarian needs in the country.
More than 894 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in 155 countries, about 5.9% of the global population, including 209 million doses in the U.S., according to Bloomberg News. But the availability of vaccine varies greatly around the world, with smaller countries finding themselves a distant priority.
Since conflict and violence began in Syria in 2011, at least two-thirds of Christians and two-thirds of health professionals have left the country, according to the Jinishian Memorial Program (JMP), a long-time partner of World Mission and Presbyterian Disaster Assistance (PDA).
From October 2019 through the beginning of 2021 and for the foreseeable future, Lebanon continues to navigate its way through four simultaneous crises that compound the challenges faced by all who live here: political corruption; economic collapse; COVID-19 and the resulting health-care crisis; and recovering from the Beirut Port blast of Aug. 4, 2020. These crises have left young adults in Lebanon without hope for their future. No employment possibilities mean no capacity to marry and start a family. In this context, it has been easy to withdraw into one’s own community and to blame others, whoever they may be.
The humanitarian situation in Syria continues to worsen — much in part, many faith leaders believe, to the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act passed by Congress last fall and signed into law by President Donald Trump in December.
In Lebanon, a country “bursting at the seams” with refugee families, Scott Parker helps migrant children from Iraq and Syria unpack the trauma they have experienced.
She arrived in Italy on Feb. 4, 2016. Of the flight that brought her and her husband and their two small children from Beirut to Rome, she remembers only the emotions she felt on the plane, and the flowers and hugs they got when they landed.
As he and his small church help some of the thousands of Syrian refugees living in Tyre, Lebanon, to learn a trade to feed their families, the Rev. Amir Ishak has adopted the gazelle as the symbol for his innovative ministry.
