The Big Problem With President Trump's Comments About Syrian Children
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President Donald Trump responded to a chemical attack in Syria by launching more than 50 Tomahawk missiles at an air base in the country on Thursday.
Speaking from Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida Trump said that he ordered the attack on the airfield from the attack was reportedly launched, because of the chemical attack's brutality and the deaths of children.
"It was a slow and brutal death for so many. Even beautiful babies were cruelly murdered in this very barbaric attack," he said about the chemical attack that killed more than 70 people, including children. "No child of God should ever suffer such horror."
However some people pointed out that children have been dying and attempting to flee Syria in large numbers since the start of the Syrian conflict. MSNBC's Chris Hayes noted that Trump's immigration orders halted Syrian refugees from entering the United States.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) also pointed out that the U.S. refugee ban keeps Syrians in dangerous conflict zones.
Other people also pointed out the hypocrisy of invoking children's deaths in this missile attack.
On January 27, Trump signed an executive order banning citizens of Syria, and six other majority-Muslim countries from entering the U.S., halted the refugee program for 120 days, and indefinitely stopped entry of Syrian refugees. After legal challenges to the first executive order, Trump issued a second travel ban on March 6, that stopped entry to the U.S. for Syrians and citizens of five other countries for 90 days. The order temporarily halted the refugee program, and stopped Syrian refugees from entering the country for 120 days, and cuts the number of refugees that can enter the U.S. from 110,000 to 50,000, according to the New York Times. The second executive order has also faced legal road blocks. In mid March, a federal judge in Hawaii halted the ban from going into effect. A federal judge in Maryland also blocked the second travel ban.
UNICEF, the United Nation's children's organization, called 2016 the worst year for children caught in Syria's conflict. At least 652 children were killed, and 255 of those were in or near a school, according to NPR.
