Obama faces no easy answers to Syrian crisis

Luke Skywalker · Sep 9, 2015

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[h=4]Obama faces no easy answers to Syrian crisis[/h]There's no easy answer for the Syrian refugee crisis, which has its roots in the civil war and the lack of regional cooperation.

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Migrant refugees from the Middle East continue to enter Hungary despite a barbed wire fence along the border. Aerial drone footage shows crowds walking along train tracks near the border. (Sept. 9) AP

A migrant woman holds her child as they sit in a bus heading to Belgrade from the southern Serbian town of Presevo on Wednesday. The European Union unveiled plans to take 160,000 refugees from overstretched border states, as the United States said it would accept more Syrians to ease the pressure from the worst migration crisis since World War II.(Photo: ARMEND NIMANI, AFP/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON*—*The images are heartbreaking, the crisis is escalating and the calls for action are getting louder.
But for President Obama, there are no easy solutions to a Syrian refugee crisis — just as there were no easy answers to the four-year-old civil war that*precipitated it.
The Syrian exodus is not the largest refugee crisis in history, but it may be the most complicated. Within Syria, ethnic groups and religious factions*— few of them friendly to the West*— battle the brutal regime of*Bashar Assad. Outside, neighboring nations of Turkey, Iraq,*Jordan and Lebanon are often unwilling to work together on a coordinated response, even as millions of refugees flood across their borders. And Syria remains at the center of a geopolitical struggle that involves the United States, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Russia.
"I think the only thing we can do at this point is accept that Syria is a divided country," said Andrew Tabler, a fellow with the*Washington Institute for Near East Policy.*"But the problem with that approach is because the conflict in Syria is so intractable,*and isn't going to end anytime soon, Syria*is going*to*continue to hemorrhage a lot of people,*and it's going to hemorrhage a lot of terrorism as well."
More than 4 million people have fled Syria since 2012, the United Nations says, a number that has steadily increased since*Assad's use of chemical weapons in 2013.
Once that red line was crossed, Tabler said. "You have a situation*where Syria melts down, and as it goes on it gets more sectarian, more bloody, and then the options get more expensive."
As a result, he said,*"I think that we have always just treated the symptoms."
For Obama to be discussing refugee resettlement is one indication that the world response to the crisis has failed.
"Refugee resettlement is a strategy that's been the last resort," said*Stacie Blake of the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants.*"The first option for anyone who’s in the situation of being a refugee is that whatever it is that's causing you to flee would be resolved and you can go home. If that is not possible, we might look for a solution in the country where the refugee fled."
But those countries — some already fragile*—*are inundated, with Syrian refugees now representing about a quarter of the population. Refugee relief groups say it's important for the United States to*show leadership by taking on some share of the burden.
The Obama administration is proposing a modest increase in the refugee ceiling, telling congressional committees Wednesday that it would raise the number of refugees allowed into the United States by 5,000 a year beginning Oct. 1. Germany has proposed admitting as many as 500,000 a year, and refugee relief groups would like to see the United States take 65,000.
USA TODAY
Obama to propose higher refugee limits for Syrians

Even if Obama lists the refugee ceiling*— now capped at 70,000 a year worldwide — it often takes years,*sometimes decades, for displaced families to work their way through the background checks necessary to gain entry into the United States. Refugee relief groups say the administration should do more to streamline that process.
Kathleen Newland, of the Migration Policy Institute, noted that the United States airlifted Bosnian refugees to U.S. military bases in New Jersey and Guam in the 1990s, giving them safe haven while the United States vetted and resettled them.
Leaving Syrians in refugee camps — or worse, allowing them to wander through cities and towns throughout the Middle East*— is both a humanitarian crisis and a security threat, she said.
"There is no surer way to create a young terrorist than leave them to fester in an under-resourced refugee*community," she said. "If someone offers you a job as a combatant, it’s very enticing."
Another issue is one of money. The United Nations says donor countries have only contributed 37% of what's needed this year to feed, house, protect and screen Syrian refugees this year.
The Obama administration has repeatedly emphasized that it has spent $4 billion*— more than any other nation*— on humanitarian aid to the region since 2011. But it's also deferred to the European Union to take on most of the responsibility.
"Ultimately,*it's*not the job of the president of the United States to solve every problem in the Middle East," Obama said in June, as he announced a proposed solution to one of the biggest problems*— the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran.
Obama's Republican critics — many of whom have advocated a more forceful military response*—*say the refugee crisis is another example of "leading from behind."
"This crisis didn’t just come out of nowhere, like an earthquake or a tornado," said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. on the floor of the Senate*Wednesday. "“Let’s be clear: the current crisis before us is not a migrant issue. It is a mass exodus of refugees who are fleeing conflicts that this administration has refused to address for years."
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Obama faces no easy answers to Syrian crisis

Luke Skywalker

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