By: Harman Kaur
Times have been tough for Syrian refugees amidst their battle for safety and survival. More and more refugees are leaving war-torn Syria without a place to go, since many countries only have enough room for a few. America has been in a tug-of-war between deciding to take in refugees and giving them the boot.
The attacks that occurred in Paris has only made the situation worse for Syrians. Many countries are now paranoid about letting in potential terrorists, especially members of the extremist group ISIS. GOP candidates such as Marco Rubio and Rand Paul say we shouldn’t accept any refugees, while Ben Carson compared them to “rabid dogs”. Donald Trump even wanted to bring back waterboarding as a way to interrogate refugees and possible terrorists. Then there are Ted Cruz and Jeb Bush who believe we should help refugees, but only if they are Christian. Meanwhile, Obama has clearly stated that it is our duty as the United States of America to accept the refugees, and we will be accepting 10,000 over the next year.
America is at war over the idea of accepting refugees into the country. Some say that not accepting them would be against the ideology of our entire nation, which was created by immigrants, and others say that the risk of terrorism is too high. President Obama has argued that not accepting Syrian families into the country is pushing them towards ISIS, as they make claims to protection that the refugees desperately seek. One of our national monuments, the Statue of Liberty, stands for the American belief in accepting immigrants- how can we possibly turn our back to that? Democratic candidates such as Bernie Sanders believe that we should accept refugees, but we have to have an extensive screening process to make sure we are protecting our citizens.
Even with the attacks that occurred, France has pledged to take 30,000 refugees over the next two years, which is 15,000 more refugees than American pledged to take in. Even with the six attacks that occurred and the 130 lives lost, France still agreed to accept people who just want to live to see another day. Our northern friends in Canada have just recently said that they would take refugees but have limited their acceptance to women, children, and families. This would decrease the amount of people who could be terrorists, even though men only make up two percent of the refugee population.
More and more Syrian refugees are turning up at our front door, the Mexican-American border. We need to make a decision to either help save their lives, leave them to die, or, worse, have them turn to ISIS as a method of protection and safety.
