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Why West, amid horrors of modern war, is struggling to set red lines

The danger democracies are confronting is that the deliberate targeting of civilians 鈥 noncombatant men, women, and children 鈥 and those who risk their lives to help them will become accepted as a kind of new normal.

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White Helmets/Reuters
A girl looks on following an alleged chemical weapons attack, in what is said to be Douma, Syria, in this still image from video obtained by Reuters on April 8, 2018.

A 鈥渞ed line鈥 against the gassing of civilians has been drawn. Again.

Yet in the wake of the US-led missile strike on Syria, two powerful testimonies 鈥 a new documentary and a revealing email from a former British prime minister 鈥 underscore how profoundly the ways of war have changed and the challenge that poses Western democracies. Namely, to find a way, or the political will, to set limits on the systematic targeting of noncombatant men, women and children.

The film is called , and was聽made by former PBS NewsHour foreign editor Justin Kenny in partnership with the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. It lays bare the extent to which civilians are being attacked, and how the particular horror of chemical weapons attacks is part of a broader assault on civilian populations that has received far less international attention. The film focuses on a campaign of attacks against hospitals and medical facilities, doctors and international relief workers, in violation of a seven-decade-old protection for humanitarian assistance under the Geneva Conventions.

The email comes from the office of former Prime Minister Tony Blair, whom I鈥檝e covered as a London-based journalist for nearly 20 years. It was in reply to a request a month ago to discuss the siege by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his Russian backers on Eastern Ghouta, near Damascus 鈥 the assault that culminated in the recent chemical strike in Douma. Mr. Blair was a leading voice in the late 1990s for a new definition of international security that would embrace a duty to respond militarily, if all else failed, to humanitarian crises like the ethnic cleansing then under way in the Balkans. The eventually helped lead to the UN鈥檚 endorsement in 2005 of the principle of an international 鈥渞esponsibility to protect鈥 civilians.

Yet the reply to my request, from Blair鈥檚 press aide, said: 鈥淭ony feels this doesn鈥檛 really fit in with what he is focusing on at the moment.鈥 I doubt his belief in the principles he put forward has weakened. Yet I鈥檓 also pretty sure why he is reluctant to talk about them publicly nowadays: the Iraq War of 2003, a conflict begun in part on the basis of a 鈥渞esponsibility to protect鈥 but which ended up tarnishing not only that principle but Blair鈥檚 own reputation and legacy.

When President Barack Obama鈥檚 first 鈥渞ed line鈥 on chemical weapons in Syria was crossed in 2013, the effect of Iraq loomed large. Britain鈥檚 then prime minister, David Cameron, favored joining the US and France in a targeted response to Mr. Assad鈥檚 horrifying attack on his own people. But the House of Commons told Cameron no, all but ensuring that Mr. Obama, too, retreated from acting. The Commons debate ended up being far less about Assad鈥檚 use of chemical weapons than about purported parallels to the war in Iraq.

UK Parliament/Reuters
Britain's then prime minister, David Cameron, is seen addressing the House of Commons in this image taken from video in August 2013 amid debate over military action against Syria to punish and deter it from chemical weapons use.

It鈥檚 impossible to know whether a more forceful Western response to that earlier atrocity might have prevented further chemical weapons attacks. Assad鈥檚 position was far weaker then. Russia鈥檚 military intervention was a couple of years away. Yet both Assad and Russian President Putin now know that 鈥 despite the latest cruise-missile retaliation, or President Trump鈥檚 similar response to a chemical attack a year ago 鈥 the prospect of any concerted, lasting Western military response to such atrocities has become vanishingly small.

So what, then, is to be done about the broader pattern of attacking civilians and the humanitarian workers trying to protect them?

Stephen Morrison, who as head of CSIS鈥檚 Global Health produced and co-directed the new documentary, has no illusions about a return of the humanitarian assertiveness advocated in the late 1990s. This is not just due to Iraq, but because of NATO鈥檚 intervention in Libya in 2011, responding to what seemed an impending massacre of civilians in the east of the country. As Mr. Morrison puts it: 鈥淲e jumped in with some sort of responsibility-to-protect logic, and we created havoc, and we walked away.鈥

The immediate imperative now, he argues, is to refuse to let the growing assault on humanitarian standards and international law go unnoticed: the attacks by Assad and the Russians in Syria, whether with gas or deadly barrel bombs; by both sides in the ongoing war in Yemen; and in nearly two dozen other conflicts worldwide. The danger is that the deliberate targeting of civilians and those seeking to help them will become accepted as a kind of new normal.

Courtesy of CSIS GHPC
CCTV footage of Dr. Wassim Moaz, one of the last pediatricians in Aleppo, Syria, moments before he was killed in an airstrike as seen in 'The New Barbarianism.'

The film could play a part in preventing this, by focusing on what Mr. Kenny calls the 鈥渄eliberate, wholesale erosion of humanitarian law鈥 and by 鈥済iving a face and a voice to the people on the ground.鈥 Kenny, too, is skeptical about the chances of a concerted international initiative to remedy the situation any time soon. But, he insists: 鈥淚t鈥檚 not too late.鈥 And in making the film, he says, he became convinced of the need 鈥渢o start ringing the alarm bells.鈥

Equally important are the NGOs, diplomats, international law experts, and humanitarian workers whose work the film highlights: groups like the World Health Organization and Physicians for Human Rights, which have increasingly been documenting the attacks on medical and aid workers; M茅decins Sans Fronti猫res (Doctors Without Borders); or newer organizations like the Syrian American Medical Society (SAMS). A group of doctors of Syrian descent, they initially figured on trying to help in whatever small way they could. They鈥檝e ended up risking their lives to provide medical care under conditions of enormous hardship, while publicizing the systematic assault by Assad鈥檚 army and Russian forces on the civilians they鈥檝e been desperately trying to care for.

David Miliband was a top policy aide to Blair in Downing Street and later Britain鈥檚 foreign secretary. Now, he heads the International Rescue Committee in New York. Commenting on the attacks on groups like SAMS, and on his own teams in the field, he says: 鈥淚f you look at the facts, you get depressed. If you look at the people, you have hope.鈥

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