Um Fares

The UK and US have agreed to start officially arming forces opposing the Syrian government. In some respects, my heart sank when I heard this, as I can only imagine the repercussions of more weapons in a country where the opposition is as divided into subsets, each group self-labelling as the heroes. And my memories of watching footage of factional fighting in Afghanistan's civil war in the 1980's come back at me in vivid, chilling, clarity.

But this week I met Um Fares, part of the team of reporters at Syria Direct, an organisation that aims to put the real stories from Syria out there, via its networks of Syrian citizens-turned-journalists based in Jordan and Syria. The woman who runs it, says that western news agencies are behind the curve as they don't have much representation in the country.

Um Fares, or 'Nonna' as her family call her, ran a school for children with mental and physical disabilities in Damascus before the war started. Al Asad's wife was one of her main supporters. She is tall and strikingly beautiful, with hazel/green eyes, accentuated further by her emerald headscarf. As well as running the school of 65 pupils and her household, she also brought up her two sons and her daughter with her own principles - those of integrity and the courage to stand up for what you believe in despite the consequences. It is this strength of spirit that perhaps cost her the life of her second son, Qutaiba, who was killed 2 weeks ago, fighting against the governement army in the hills surrounding Damascus. His obituary is here. This is the calibre of man the West should certainly be supporting.

http://syriadirect.org/sas/30-reports/511-in-memoriam-qutaiba-shabaan

She is heartbroken, and terrified she'll lose her older son, who is also fighting his government back home. She struggles to contain her anger about the suffering of Syrian women at home and in surrounding countries. But since Um Fares arrived in Amman over a year ago with her daughter, she's been using this anger in a positive way by reporting for Syria Direct and other agencies. I can imagine she would be vital tool in any such outfit.

We sat in the late afternoon sun as she smoked cigarette after cigarette, and conversation swung from bringing up boys to losing sons.

I've always felt a certain responsibility bringing two men-to-be into the world. The Jesuits say: 'Give me a boy before he is seven, and I will make him a man.' Um Fares obviously made good men from her boys. But she has paid the highest price for encouraging them to stand up and fight for what they believe to be their truth.