Syria and the banality of evil

Violence and human loss in Syria became completely normalized in 2013

To borrow a cliché, in 2013 the violence and suffering in Syria came to embody the banality of evil. The tragedy has grown to such proportions that it has become repetitious – without variation, respite, or hope.

In much the same way, the mass of humanity that has fled Syria has also become banal. So omnipresent are the beggars and peddlers in neighboring countries, that one looks not at their misery but at the inconveniences they have created. In Dante’s Divine Comedy, the center of hell is distinguished not by fire but ice. So, too, the inferno faced by Syrians – one of absolute, frigid, unalterable immobility.

The past year has also reaffirmed what we knew about Hezbollah, but which the party’s devotees always sought to play down: that it is an obedient branch of Iran’s security and intelligence apparatus, one that will willingly offer up its children to secure the interests of its sponsors in Tehran. Though the party’s leaders are competent and its intelligence services efficient, ultimately, like others in Lebanon, their role is that of employees advancing the political agenda of their paymasters...............

FULL ARTICLE HERE: Syria and the banality of evil