Human memory is short and terribly fickle. In the immediate aftermath of a genocide, ethnic cleansing, systematic rape, or brutal civil war, there is a period when the public will say: never again will we let such tragedies pass.
Then there is a slow dying down. Then resounding silence. Guilt lasts for a few moments, then it is forgotten, and news moves on.
Plus jamais (“never again”), the battle call following the Holocaust, no longer has any resonance. Because it did happen again. After World War II, there was genocide in Bosnia. After Bosnia, there was Rwanda. After Rwanda, Somalia. Darfur. Congo. Sierra Leone. And more.
For these reasons, the war in Syria is one that must be covered. There are 1.4 million refugees and 100,000 people dead in a conflict that is limping into its third year. The U.N. just released a paper on child soldiers and mafia-like rings within refugee camps. Inside the country, there is abuse from both sides, government and rebels: war crimes, civilian slaying, children dying, lives destroyed.
Usually, journalists are the eyes and ears of such a conflict, documenting abuse, keeping tally of the dead, and watching the pitch of the war rise and fall.
But not this time. […]
Read the rest of Janine di Giovanni’s article at the Daily Beast.