Summer 2017

No one can begin to guess when Syrians might safely go home. Their situation is not the only refugee crisis in the world, but it has been the most noticed and reported by the Western press. Since catastrophic civil war broke out in 2011 when President Bashar al-Assad violently cracked down on protesters inspired by the Arab Spring movement, more than 400,000 Syrians have been killed, and another 11.5 million—equal to the combined populations of New York and Chicago—have been displaced from their homes. That's more than half the population. / Johns Hopkins Magazine