U.S. response to Syria hits home for University of Iowa student

IOWA CITY - Sitting on a bench in Iowa City with a cellphone pressed to his ear Friday, University of Iowa junior Monzer Shakally connected with his parents back home in Syria.

They were safe. Living in Damascus - about 90 miles southwest of the Shayrat air base blasted by 59 U.S. Tomahawk missiles late Thursday - Shakally knew they would be. In fact, he received a text from them after President Donald Trump ordered the attack letting him know.

But it was nice to hear their voices, Shakally said.

'You can tell they're happy,” he said.

Of course, they couldn't say as much. The Syrian government routinely wiretaps civilian phones, Shakally said.

'They really can't talk much on the phone,” he said. 'No one ever talks or anything in Syria.”

But the U.S. missile attack, Shakally said, comes as a refreshing change to the same old 'empty” rhetoric condemning government attacks on Syrian civilians.

'It's just a little update from their routine - from the usual people-killing,” he said of what his parents, brother and sister, who all live in Syria, have to deal with regularly.

Shakally, 21, is in his third year at UI after fleeing the violence in Syria in late 2012. He's one of nine students from Syria who registered at UI in the fall. Iowa State University reported just one Syrian student this year and University of Northern Iowa reported none.

Before immigrating, a teenage Shakally protested government forces by waving flags and burning tires, eventually leading to his arrest and assault at the hands of Syrian officers.

He fled after being 'blacklisted” and ordered to serve as an informant - and after one of his brothers was arrested and tortured in a detention facility akin to a concentration camp, he said. The UI biology and pre-dentistry major is here on a student visa but has been waiting for years on word of his political asylum application.

He's still waiting. This summer, Shakally plans to take a dental admissions test in hopes of continuing his education at the UI College of Dentistry. He'd like to make the United States his permanent home, but also shares the perspective that many Syrians don't want to be refugees.

He said they don't necessarily want international leaders to respond to the violence by opening borders, setting up refugee camps and attempting to broker temporary cease fires. Those actions, he said, address the symptoms, not the problem - namely Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his regime.

So when news broke Thursday evening of the U.S. missile strikes, Shakally took heart.

'It was a great move,” he said. 'It was the thing that should have happened since 2013. It was a great response.”

Whether or not the attack serves as a deterrent remains to be seen, Shakally said.

'But even if it doesn't, it shows at least that this administration is not going to be just standing aside and seeing all this destruction take place,” he said.

Upward of 470,000 people have died since the Syrian war began in 2011, according to international research and media reports, and millions more have been injured and displaced.

About 70 people, including children, were killed this week in a chemical attack the White House blamed on the Assad regime. The total seems relatively low, compared to what is typical, Shakally said.

'Usually, on a daily basis, people are dying at a much bigger rate,” he said. 'We see videos every day of people being gassed. ... This has been common for a while.”

So when he learned of this week's chemical attack, Shakally wasn't expecting much international blowback.

'I thought it was going to be just another one of those things where Germany and England and the U.S. say a couple words,” he said. 'I wasn't expecting an actual response.”

What prompted the military response, according to UI political science professor Cary Covington, was past rhetoric, broken promises and political power.

'I think Trump felt he needed to follow through on his statements a day or two ago about this attack crossing several lines,” Covington said. 'If he's going to be taken serious in the world community, then his words have to have consequences.”

The missile attack also follows action former President Barack Obama took in 2013 - in collaboration with the international community - to rid Syria of its chemical weapons.

'What especially made Trump's actions important was that the Sarin (gas) attack a day or two ago demonstrated that Syria violated its own agreement to get rid of these,” Covington said. 'The idea that they lied and then used the weapons they lied about to attack people just made it something that the president had to respond to.”

The attack also presents a new angle to Trump's complicated - and unclear - relationship with Russia.

'This shows that Trump isn't cutting Russia any slack in his desire to have good relations,” Covington said. 'If he thinks Russia or its allies are behaving badly, then he's going to act accordingly. And the desire for a more cooperative sympathetic relationship with Russia won't impede that higher priority.”

Shakally said he doesn't know what the attack will mean for Syria, specifically, going forward.

Today though, he said, Syrians are feeling some degree of vindication.

'I think they felt a little bit of justice.”

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