Zip:
He put a little face on the migrant/refugee crisis gripping Europe.
The story being pushed by the media is that Aylan died, washed up on the beach in Turkey trying to get to Greece, after fleeing terror in Syria. That his family had applied for them to get to Canada but that Canada had turned them down, leading them to this desperate journey in an unsafe dinghy. Aylan, his 5 year old brother, and their mother all died when the dinghy tipped.
Here’s a sample, from the Independent:
There are no beaches in Kobani, just bombs. From the Syrian town besieged by Isis, Aylan Kurdi and his brother fled. For the three short years of his life, Aylan had apparently only known fear.
Europe, and the sanctuary it can offer those fleeing Syria’s civil war, was the goal of Aylan’s family. After travelling several hundred miles through Turkey, eventually the time came for Aylan to cross the two short miles on the Aegean Sea to the Greek island of Kos. Thousands of others have made similar crossings – it is considered less fraught with danger than other refugee routes.
But that story isn’t quite true.
First, let’s start with that his name isn’t Aylan Kurdi, it’s Alan Shenu. Aylan is a Turkish equivalent of the name Alan, and Shenu is the actual family name. Turkey called them ‘Kurdi’, because they were Kurds.
The extended family admitted on Thursday that they had not actually applied to Canada for asylum for the family, despite earlier reports claiming that was the case. So they had not in fact been rejected.
Further, the Kurdi, or more exactly, the Shenu family had been living in Turkey for three years, pretty much as long as Alan was alive, so no, he hadn’t ‘only known fear’, he’d only known Turkey. They were not running from a war zone, at least not for the last three years, they were basically economic migrants because they wanted to leave Turkey. According to the Guardian, the deputy district governor Ekrem Aylanc told the BBC that the family had been in Turkey for three years before deciding they should move on to Europe.
Update:
The father had a job in Turkey but wanted to go to Europe to get his teeth fixed. According to the WSJ:
The narrative got fishy for me the other day when I read a headline about Aylan saying “Daddy please don’t die.”
It’s just that everything becomes too perfect at tugging on heartstrings that its’ hard not to become skeptical and cynical about the narrative being painted.
Here’s the latest image.
@Wordsmith:
It’s much better to be just cynical, rather than use death to promote personal political agenda. The latter is indeed never-missed liberal opportunity.
From the ‘Photo of the Day’ Article about the same family:
Skookum
“How did we flee from the region of our Muslim brethren, which should take more responsibility for us than a country they describe as infidels?”
This is the pivotal point. The wealthy Arab nations admit, they fear the possibility of Muslim terrorists being hidden among the refugees, and surely, no one believes there will not be murder and mayhem committed by at least a few of the refugees. However, acceptance of inevitable death by the Muslim fanatic is accepted as a cost of being humane.
In regard to the toddler on the beach, everyone in this family drowned, except the father. I was in a similar situation twenty years ago. I was thanked and declared hero for the day, but that is a trivial matter, that only a few people remember. However, it qualifies me to ask, why did the father survive, while his wife and children drowned? If he was only able to save the toddler, why didn’t he save the child? I realize these people may be dry land peasants, but he was able to swim well-enough to save his own life, what about his family?
Sadly, two empty water bottles tied under the armpits would have probably saved his children, but that would have required a great scientific and analytical mind. Like a lot of photographs used to sway public opinion, the story is usually much deeper than the photo itself.
SEPTEMBER 6TH, 2015 AT 1:02 PM
If this so called Aylan Kurdi story is HOAX, is Alyan, his older brother and their mother are still alive? Or they all ended up dead to concur with this ISIS-jihadists propaganda schene?
@James Lee: We can assume, our political media will promote any fraud or lie to promote the Leftist cause. From the White House on down, including most of our Republicans, it is important to carry the lies of this president and the international Leftist movement.
@James Lee: Such short memories!
Do an image search of fauxtography in gaza.
Focus in especially on how those new toys and korans were carefully placed atop piles of rubble, how the same woman cried and screamed over the loss of her home (all over Gaza and on many different days.) Note the added smoke billowing up over gaza. Note “green-helmut man,” who took a dead child from a hospital and raced all over rubble in front of sympathetic cameramen. Don’t miss Mohammad al Dura’s pretend killing with audience, second takes, and bad angles.
The father is a liar, but that doesn’t mean his two children and wife aren’t really dead.
He just lied about why.
He certainly could have avoided their deaths but he put them in harm’s way…..for free dental work.
@James Lee:
I don’t see the story as fake so much as embellished or tweaked for the sake of propagandizing and achieving maximum effect, tugging on the world’s heartstrings.
@Nanny G:
From my old blog (which made me remember now why my handle is “wordsmith”- fits with the title of my blog).
Also the FA fauxtography category.
@Wordsmith: Wow!
I hadn’t realized it was you who had made such a great record of the fauxtography issue!
I did remember Zombie.
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If this were not an invasion but rather a humanitarian refugee crisis the migrants would NOT have destroyed this southern Italian city:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fX73ggsMNEI
Looks like the mayor of Baltimore relocated and told the police to give them room to destroy stuff.
The MSM are simply despicable.