Do you remember playing hide and seek when you were a child? Remember how you never believed that your parents would suspect your secret hideouts within the clothing racks? Then, they went about their tasks, leaving you behind. They knew they could do this, and in a moment you would find them. Your connection to your parents was-and is-not merely biological. They were your home.Never could you imagine living an instant without your parents. Those few moments apart, believing that you would be lost forever in seemingly endless aisles, likely, struck you with fear. 

Now, imagine for an instant that this loss was not merely for a few minutes, but for a lifetime. According to UNICEF,, an Nongovernmental Organization tasked with helping children, since the Syrian Civil War began three years ago, at least 8,000 children, presumably fleeing the violence, have traveled to the country's borders without their parents. Children are being forced to grow up much too soon. 

According to the United Nations, 10,000 children have died as a direct result of the civil war. In the past year, the number of displaced children has tripled, reaching from 920,000 to three million. 1.2 million more have become refugees. But the tragedy isn't just in the statistics, it is in the paradigm shift in the eyes of the children affected. 

No longer are there games to play and school to attend. Children take odd jobs on farms, in caf?(c)s and car repair shops, in mines, or become beggars on the street. Due to the difficult times, many young girls are being forced into premature marriages in order to provide them with protection or to give parents one less child to provide for. 

Additionally, lack of resources has created a rise in cases of life-threatening malnutrition along with an inability to treat every child's injuries. Vitamin and mineral deficiencies have become more frequent in recent months as families have become unable to provide enough food for their children due to inflation and rising unemployment. The people are at risk of potentially fatal diseases due to unsanitary and crowded environments. The war has destroyed many healthcare facilities, and oftentimes, doctors and medicines are inaccessible or expensive. 

However, the emotional and physical effects of the conflict are the most jarring. UNICEF cites that in areas with some of the worse violence-including Aleppo, Homs, and rural Damascus-98 percent of parents report disturbing behavioral changes in their children. Parents speak mournfully of the loss of their children's innocence. 

Kinana, a mother of six expressed, "My children see weapons and they can label them. They know the names of each weapon, because they've seen so many." UNICEF interviewed a 10-year-old named Fatima in a refugee camp in Jordan. She expressed: "Sometimes I dream. I dream I am carrying a dead man. And when I look at the children living here, I feel like they have lost their hearts." 

Other children live in a constant state of fear. Exposure to such violence can only stunt or reverse children's social and psychological development.
Oftentimes, it seems as if those who are the adults in the world act most like stubborn children, unwilling to share their toys and good fortune.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad will never consider a transition government, and the disorganized rebels are unprepared for leading a bloodied country. Syria cannot very well be run by a leader responsible for crimes against humanity, and it cannot very well be run by a group of people whose primary goal is merely to depose Assad. Children are punished by their parents, but where is the international community to punish the perpetrators of the violence in Syria?

This question should fill our minds as we notice the politicians and the reporters who turn a blind eye to these victims' stories. The mainstream media can only keep its attention on Syria for a limited amount of time. Violence in Syria has continued to occur; this past Saturday marked the third anniversary of the conflict. It is not something that simply paused as the mainstream media moved onto the new story of the day. 

Something can be done to alleviate the immediate needs of those affected by the conflict. UNICEF calls for a distribution of aid in the form of funds as well as greater access to civilians on the ground by humanitarian organizations to Syria itself and the nearby countries that have been taking in Syrian refugees.
As a short-term solution, this aid package should be required to provide an education for the children who are the future of Syria through education in refugee camps. This would be similar to the work of the Darfur Dream Team, an NGO which provides education to child refugees who are currently living in Chad. War in Syria can only bring about the destruction of the fundamentally significant strides the country had taken in the realm of education. Education was a pillar of Syrian society for a generation, leading to a literacy rate of over 90 percent according to UNICEF. 

The international community must demand for the integration of educational opportunities within the refugee camps as a part of a potential foreign aid package. Syrian children should not have to worry about their day to day survival, they should be thinking about building a successful future for their country.
Next, the international community should step up to ensure that peace talks are successful for the next round. Only once peace is established can the process of recovery begin. This could include the help of organizations as large as the United Nations or as small as the Cambridge-based organization RefugePoint to work with the most vulnerable refugees. Recovery for children would of course include restoration to family members. 

Although children will never recover from the loss of their guardians, they must find a safe place to call home, preferably with a family member. In the United States, we have the privilege of childhood, of identity. Now, it is the responsibility of the world to restore humanity. After absolving the conflict of foreign aid, we must pressure our leaders to change the equation for Syria. No one can undo what has been done in Syria. Children in Syria will forever play hide and seek, never to find their parents. Now, they must find their way out of the store on their own.
*