美国国家公共电台 NPR In Syria, A School Helps Children Traumatized By War

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

Now to Syria for a look at a U.S.-backed school for children traumatized by war and by ISIS. The program is in danger. It might not survive the Trump 2 administration's cuts in aid for Syria, and it could come down to donations from other countries or private individuals to keep it going. NPR's Tom Bowman visited the school and spoke 3 with the children while he was traveling with the U.S. military in the Syrian city of Raqqa.

UNIDENTIFIED CHILD #1: (Speaking Arabic).

TOM BOWMAN, BYLINE 4: This skinny boy says he's 12, though he looks years younger. He points to a crayon drawing he created this summer when he arrived at this child care center. It's mostly colored in black. There's a tank, an aircraft, a crude figure of a man with a wispy 5 beard holding an oversized gun.

UNIDENTIFIED CHILD #1: (Through interpreter) This is when ISIS shelled my home. My sister and niece were killed just like that - two missiles.

BOWMAN: There's a red tongue of flame rising from the roof of his home.

UNIDENTIFIED CHILD #1: (Through interpreter) When the house was hit, the smoke was red like this.

BOWMAN: Therapists have known for decades a primary way young children communicate and comprehend trauma 1 is by drawing pictures. If that's true, these drawings on the wall are one collective scream. There are childish scrawls 6 of beheadings, corpses 7, planes dropping bombs. One small boy gestures to the picture he made. His eyes are pinched by burns. This school and 10 others like it is designed to ease the kids back into something like a normal life.

DEANIE HOLDER 8: It's everything from art to music to sports.

BOWMAN: Deanie Holder is a State Department official who helps oversee 9 the child care centers in northeast Syria, an area controlled by U.S. forces and its Kurdish and Arab allies.

HOLDER: What we've found is that the children had been so traumatized, they couldn't even recognize numbers and letters, so we had to work through that before we could actually start educating them again.

BOWMAN: The school's outer walls are painted with colorful toy bears and balloons. It sits just a block or two from piles of rubble 10 and skeletons of buildings destroyed by ISIS booby traps and American airstrikes. There are about 500 kids here with space for hundreds more. We're not identifying any of the Syrians for security reasons.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Speaking Arabic).

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENTS: (Speaking Arabic).

BOWMAN: A Syrian teacher instructs a small classroom, just seven boys and girls who never went to school during the years of war. She says the children were afraid to be inside any building or even on the roads. They just didn't feel safe because of the bombings and destruction they witnessed.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Through interpreter) First, they were still carrying memories of the war, and they had lost people close to them. Some had lost their fathers. Some had lost both their parents.

BOWMAN: She points to two girls in the back of the room. One stares blankly at the floor, thumbing the pages in her book. The other covers her face with her hands, peering through a web of fingers at the visitors in the room.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Through interpreter) They had an obvious case of social isolation 11.

BOWMAN: In the beginning, she says, they didn't talk to anyone at all.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Through interpreter) Thankfully, they've recovered. They've adapted to the new place and adapted to their new friends.

BOWMAN: One boy in the class lost both his legs and sits in a wheelchair; another is 13 and lost his left hand.

UNIDENTIFIED CHILD #2: (Speaking Arabic).

BOWMAN: He and two other children were playing with a bomb. When it exploded, it killed both his friends. Deanie Holder says the schools like this in the area helping 12 these kids are part of a program that costs about $13 million in U.S. funds, but the money will run out in just four months.

HOLDER: We're working very hard with the international community to explain to him the many different ways that they could be involved in the education sector 13.

BOWMAN: President Trump cut $200 million in aid. What impact did that have in your program?

HOLDER: Basically, part of the education programming money was tied up in the money that was stopped. So instead of having a full year coming up, I will basically end funding at the end of January.

BOWMAN: Holder says there's hope from other countries who are kicking in aid money. The United Arab Emirates gave $50 million but prefers the money is spent on projects like water and electricity. Saudi Arabia is providing $100 million, but it's uncertain whether it can be used for the schools. Private donations, officials say, can also help fill the gap. For $1.5 million, Holder says, she could renovate 14 100 schools. For about $5 million, the care centers could continue for another year.

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENTS: (Singing in Arabic).

BOWMAN: Whatever the fate of these schools, there are signs of hope. Girls in red and white uniforms perform a dance routine on a stage, and the boy who lost his hand in an explosion shows a picture he just drew in his notebook. It's a bouquet 15 of flowers. And that boy whose black crayons pictured an ISIS fighter in the burning home the family left to flee to Lebanon - next to that one is a new and more vibrant 16 drawing of his home.

UNIDENTIFIED CHILD #1: (Through interpreter) I was so happy I drew this. This is when we returned. We rebuilt our house, and now we are very happy.

BOWMAN: He draws the house in bold and bright colors - all yellow, orange, blue and red. Tom Bowman, NPR News, Raqqa, Syria.