Forgotten wars

While our attention is glued on Gaza, other wars and other human catastrophes grind on. 

From Tim Mak - who chose to work in Ukraine as a freelancer when NPR laid him off - comes The Counteroffensive. He landed in the country the day that Russia invaded in the February 2022 and reports (with plenty of help, local and international) from Kyiv.

UKRAINE MEDIA COVERAGE PLUMMETS: CNN has been checking its own output, and reports that after October 7th, its coverage of Ukraine fell from 8 percent of the total coverage to under 1 percent. The network had been one of the most reliable in its regular coverage of the Ukrainian conflict.

Following the war in Gaza, most media coverage of Ukraine has been focused on diplomatic decisions, such as whether to give or not give military aid to Ukraine. But, frontline news on how the war is progressing has been far less present in the media. 

Mak recently traveled to Turkey (failing to get into Syria) to see the consequences of another long running Russian assault against a people struggling against autocracy.

He discovered commonalities among Syrian refugees trying to reconstitute a civil society after having been bombed out by Russia and Assad:

...  The war in Ukraine has now gone on for more than 600 days. The dominant feeling is one of exhaustion and pessimism, at least for the time being. But then you look at the Syrian refugees, their advocates, and ordinary civilians – and it feels pretty self-pitying to talk about how long the war has lasted. Their war has been going on since 2011.

“We used to be the war most people paid attention to. Now, that’s over,” one advocate said to me.

And despite how long it's been, how many airstrikes have landed, many advocates and humanitarian workers – not to mention civilians – are still extremely motivated.

They’re still fighting for a democratic society, still working to overthrow Assad, still finding the energy to promote humanitarian goals.

And the Ukrainians are still fighting for their lives. No choice there.