(ANS - Madrid) - "Numbers do not tell the full story. Today we talk about 250,000 deaths in the conflict in Syria, and it is regarded with horror as an enormity. But if we were speaking of 25,000 dead, the figure wold be equally shocking." So said Fr Alejandro Leon, a Salesian missionary in Syria, yesterday, Thursday 15 October. He was speaking to about twenty Spanish media at the headquarters of Misiones Salesianas in Madrid. And to illustrate what every death in the conflict means, and how one physical death means many other deaths, he told the story of a Salesian oratory leader.

"One of our young people, about 24 years old, had just completed five years of a law degree. He had been accepted for training to become a judge and was to be married in a week. One of the hundreds of missiles that fall every day in Damascus killed him. Yes, he is dead, but can you imagine what the death of their only son meant for his parents?  Can you imagine what it meant for his future wife and his friends of whom I am one, and for the teenagers that he used to work with in the Salesian Youth Centre? I know.  He was their model. He had realized his dream. and the doors to a better future were wide open before him. Now these young people ask me what use is studying if that was the end that awaited their leader, and especially if this was surely going to be their end also.  If you want to get the real figures of this conflict, take this case and multiply it by 250,000".

This is what the thirty-six year-old Venezuelan missionary had to say. He has been in Damascus since the end of 2010. His mission was to be director of the youth centre, close to the children and young people who are suffering the consequences of war. Now he is Economer of the Middle East Province. He also says: "Parents have to choose between sending their children to school, risking their lives, or keeping them at home and jeopardizing their future."

The war in Syria has lasted for over four years, and it is a war that has been reported in different ways. Fr León shows his disappointment when he hears people talking about Civil War. "For one thing, the people who are fighting are from over eighty different countries. There is no dictionary that would consider that a civil war. Syria is a chessboard and the Syrians are the pawns who kill one another. Today, four years later, all the Syrians have a death to mourn and a death to avenge. Perhaps today we might talk about a conflict between Syrians, but it was caused by four years of war."

European media coverage of the war in Syria has gone through distinct stages. With the arrival of refugees in Europe it seems that the focus has switched back to the conflict that plagues the Middle East. However, Fr Leon helps to put the situation in context: "The adults do not want to leave the country and if they do it is for the sake of their children. Or maybe you thought that someone with a decent university career would leave their own country to reach another land where he will become an illiterate?"

Fr Leon is convinced of his mission, and he says: "I will not leave Syria, because it's my family, and nobody leaves his family in a time of war."

Further information and statistics of the situation in Syria are available on the website of Misiones Salesianas.

Published 16/10/2015