I am an emergency nurse who has served in many humanitarian medical aid missions in the Middle East. I have lately spent 3 months providing care in Syria during the crisis. I have witnessed the unspeakable atrocities of the war in Syria firsthand. I’ve seen the terrible suffering and displacement that is happening everyday and I know that Canada is not doing enough to help civilians find safety here within our borders.

That’s why I started this petition. I want to know what the party leaders running in the upcoming election intend to do to help Syrian refugees. I am asking them to commit to accepting and admitting 10,000 Syrian refugees into Canada by December 31, 2015.

The Syrian war has been ongoing for more than 4 years now. More than 240,000 Syrians, mostly civilians, have lost their lives. The war and the political oppression have resulted in the displacement of more than 11 million, internally and externally. The modern world has not witnessed such an immense influx of refugees since the second world war. This is an international humanitarian crisis in every sense of the word.

Canada, the country of human rights and freedoms, has admitted less than 1500 Syrian refugees since the crisis began in 2011. Given the millions out there, this is simply NOT enough. The current government has pledged to bring in more refugees but little has actually been done. We are talking about hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians, including women and children, who are in desperate need of food, shelter, and above all, in desperate need of a peaceful place to live.

Historically speaking, Canada has always taken a solid and proactive stance on humanitarian action and has stepped in to take in refugees of war and political oppression. So I keep wondering, what is stopping Canada now? Countries like Turkey, Lebanon, Germany and Sweden (to mention few) have all stepped in and taken in a large number of refugees. So why is Canada in stand-by mode?

The situation is very dire and cannot wait any longer! This is a massive humanitarian crisis that requires Canada to act, and act immediately and at a large scale. Millions of displaced civilians are in need of a peaceful place to live, and in need of it now, not next year or the year after. Unless we act, history will remember us as the nation who witnessed the atrocities of war, but chose to stand by and watch as the Syrian refugees desperately tried to flee to lands of peace. This is not who we are as Canadian. We are the country of humanitarian zeal and we value human life above all. So let us be true to our values: open our country to the Syrian refugees. We promise we will open our hearts and homes to them.

Please sign and share my petition to add your voice to this call to action.