Crowd Gathers Outside Dearborn City Hall To Show Solidarity For People Of Aleppo
DEARBORN (WWJ) -- As the crisis in Syria continues, dozens gathered outside of Dearborn City Hall to show their solidarity for the people of East Aleppo.
Thousands of citizens have died in the Middle Eastern city, which the Syrian government is trying to recapture from rebel groups.
Dozens gathered in the cold and snow, chanting "For your freedom we will rise. Aleppo's children, don't you cry." The group gathered with megaphones, bright signs and lit candles along Michigan Avenue on Saturday.
"We don't endorse ISIS and their methodology," one Dearborn resident told WWJ Newsradio 950's Lauren Barthold as he flew his Syrian Flag. "But people are way exaggerating in the media the ISIS effect versus the [Bashar] Assad effect. You can't just turn a blind eye over chemical weapons and dirty bombs and weapons of mass destruction and just zoom in to one person and butchering. I'm not saying that this is right, but people are really -- just when they say 'ISIS and Assad,' then there's a mistake, there's a problem."
Syrian President Bashar Assad and the country's military have come under scrutiny for bombing the city and killing thousands of civilians while it was under rebel control.
Refugees have been trying to escape the city -- the country's largest -- for weeks. Some have been gunned down during evacuation efforts.
The United Nations has called the conflict in Syria the biggest humanitarian crisis of our time, with more than 500,000 people killed -- 31,000 in Aleppo -- and 11 million residents forced from their homes.