Think your finals were bad? At least you weren’t bombed.
Last week the forces of Bashar al-Assad’s Syrian regime shelled Aleppo University during the first day of final exams.
Just like U.S. universities, finals week sees some of the best attendance Syrian schools have had all semester.
More than 87 students were killed when regime planes bombed the university. Students who survived reported that security personnel locked the doors of buildings before the shelling began.
Students trapped in buildings on campus had to forcibly break out of them to escape. One young woman stated, “We were in the exams and all of a sudden a shell landed and all the laboratory glass fell.
Right away, we went to open the windows…I saw destruction of ambulances...I smelled something that I cannot describe”
The Assad regime has previously bombed playgrounds and bread lines.
With no armed opposition anywhere near the university, this was clearly another deliberate attack on civilians — just the latest in a long list of war crimes.
Students around the U.S. have begun holding protests and vigils in solidarity with the students of Aleppo University, and I encourage all Penn Staters to join them.
More information and toolkits for hosting events can be found online at www.standnow.org. Please make your voice be heard.
Universities are sanctuaries of learning, and this regime has transformed them into death traps
Christy Delafield
Class of 2002
