"I don’t cry easily. But I couldn’t hold it in watching Elian and Almas talk about their time in ISIS captivity. I lived through it. I met so many survivors—some were family, some were close friends. And still, every time I hear one of their stories, it hits me like it’s happening all over again.

250 Assyrian Christians were kidnapped by ISIS. No one came to help. No cities were flattened for us. Our stories didn’t make it to the news.

I still don’t understand how some get the world’s full support… and the rest of us are just numbers, forgotten in the Middle East.

And the most infuriating part?

The man who helped create ISIS in Syria—who later split off and gave birth to HTS—is still in power.

He’s being normalized by the world, while our pain—and the pain of every minority in Syria—is treated like it never mattered."