Grounded Planes Take Flight in Congo

 

In this remarkable Telegraph photo essay, children in a bleak landscape have little but to play in, around, and on a series of abandoned jetliners. Evidently, these airplanes provide a flight of fancy, a respite, however fleeting. Many of these photos were in an earlier Daily Mail piece.

 

Toy and model airplanes have been part of my youthful fantasy. In fact, planes like the DC-8 shown, were those Space Age miracles that I flew on. Still in touch with my childhood self, these planes still evoke emotion.

 

In this portrayal, however, innocence has but all been lost.

 

A Day in the Lives of Two Homeless New York City School Children

 

Every day, among New York City’s public school students, more than 114,000 are homeless. A recent New York Times article and photo essay followed two of these children, Darnell (8) and Sandivel (10). Both students and their remarkable families invited a New York Times reporter into their lives. Their school days begin before the sun rises and do not end until well after sundown. Like their moms, Darnell and Sandy show tremendous resilience, making the best with what little they have. Both mothers fled abusive relationships; their strength offers their children strong role-models.

The essay tracks a day in the life at school for each child. School offers a refuge, hope, a place to learn and grow. Like the children and their moms, the schools offer nurturing support with what desperately little they have. It’s a long day, and a long ride back “home.” Tomorrow, they will do it all over again.

Trauma to these Middle Eastern children goes well beyond the moment. It is a lifelong scar, at times with devastating consequences.

Victims of ISIS brutality much of the world has forgotten.

 

The New York Times Magazine recently published a searing editorial and photo essay piece on children from Middle Eastern countries (many of them Kurdish and Yazidi) caught in the cross-fire of conflict and “ethnic cleansing.” The article asks, “How Does the Human Soul Survive Atrocity?” Furthermore, “After the horror of ISIS captivity, tens of thousands of Iraqis—many of them children—are caught up in a mental-health crisis unlike any in the world.” Said one young woman about her younger family members, “Maybe I’ll be happier if they are all dead, because at least I’ll know they aren’t being tortured.”

 

Portrayed are the following children:

• Kristina, 12. Enslaved by ISIS
• Delivan, 10. Acts out violently
• Sumaya, 21. Has suicidal thoughts
• Enas, 17. Contemplates suicide (her 16-year-old sister put herself to fire)
• Hessen’s four brothers and three brothers have been missing since 2014.

 

One form of treatment is a new cognitive behavioral therapy technique called narrative exposure therapy (NET). This was created during the Balkan wars in the 1990s to help children there cope with trauma from torture and genocide. Yet, trauma still makes it very difficult for children to feel safe and regain trust.

• Rezan, 11. Kidnapped in 2014 and freed only this year
• Hediya, 9. Spent five years enslaved by ISIS with her sister Kristina
• Hundreds of Yazidi children, some as young as 8, have been raped.

 

In Iraq, mental health treatment is almost nonexistent. Yet, about one in five Iraqis suffer from some form of mental illness. Among young Iraqis, the rate for PTSD is more than one in two; 60 percent suffer from depression. Some 92 percent of children show learning disabilities. Many children in Iraq have thought about suicide. The article goes on to chronicle atrocities inflicted by ISIS terrorists in the country.

 

Said Ilyas, who did not know whether her daughters were still alive, “I am sick, and I don’t know what to do.”

Meet the Child Refugees

Minute by minute, we hear the abhorrent rantings of various public figures confronting hate with hate, fear with fear, despair with despair. Rather than quote all those individuals, as well as the fine people who have stood up to this bigotry, I will let some powerful photographs speak up for the child refugees of the Middle East, who make up more than half that desperate population. A very fine photographer uses his art to document where child refugees in the Middle East sleep. The article in Buzzfeed has the rest of the photos.