Yazan...I am really sorry

The crime I am about to write about is also one I am guilty of.

The crime I want to write about is not the brutal killing of the little boy named Yazan. The more shocking crime is the lack of public outrage concerning Yazan’s story. It is the complacency towards a suffering that many of us could have turned into a lesson of compassion and empathy.

Yazan is a Jordanian 5-year-old child whose mother and father were imprisoned at the same time. This left Yazan in the custody of his aunt, whose husband abused, tortured and viciously inflicted pain on this little child’s body. Yazan gave up at the end and fell into a coma. He died few weeks ago.

Yazan was laid to rest today.

For days I read about Yazan’s dead body laying at the hospital waiting for someone to claim this innocent angel. As if the lack of justice in his life was a foreshadowing of the misery he would endure in his death. The thought did cross my mind of claiming him and preparing a funeral for him. Every time I thought of doing something, I was worried of being judged as pretentious and butting into business that is not mine.

As I read news of Yazan, I had a strange feeling of detached sympathy. I somehow believed that my reaction and contribution wouldn’t count. There will be others who will take up the cause of Yazan and deliver justice to this little boy. The faith I did not have in myself was sadly misplaced in others.

As I learnt that Yazan’s misery is finally put to rest, I also saw images of his funeral. A funeral I thought would be a crowded show of love and apology to this child who fell victim to a system that failed to detect his suffering. A funeral that turned out to be a gathering of no more than few kids who were pictured seated in front of lecterns on the ground of a mosque reading Koran while this little boy’s body laid wrapped in white cloth waiting and desperately “wanting” to be interred.

The gist of what I am writing is that whenever one detects injustice, and whenever one is blessed enough to do something about it, one should rush to do it. I hope I won’t be faced with a similar choice again. But if I do, I will go by what my gut feeling tells me to do and I really won’t care what cynics might make out of it.