The blasts that struck the Boston Marathon on Monday were shocking not only for their brazenness and the lives they shattered, but also because attacks like this usually happen in far-off, troubled places — not in the middle of a major American city.
As the chief of emergency services at Massachusetts General Hospital, Alasdair Conn, put it: “This is what we expect from war.”
Many who live in countries such as Iraq and Syria where violence remains troublingly common had mixed reactions to the bombings. While they were sorry to hear about the attacks, some expressed dismay that the assaults they face on a regular basis get less attention.
“Nobody cared about the dozens of victims who fell yesterday in Iraq and Syria,” said Hazim Khazim, a teacher who lost a cousin in a bombing in Baghdad on Monday, in a reaction typical of many in the region.
Internet cafe owner Hassan Sabeeh in Baghdad was more understanding.
“The Iraqi people can feel, more than anybody else in the world, the misery of the Boston victims and their families,” he said. “We sympathize and feel their suffering.”
Authorities in the United States are urgently searching for clues into the bombing in Boston that killed three, including 8-year-old Martin Richard. More than 170 people were wounded.
Here is a look at some other countries that have faced violent attacks of their own in recent days:
SYRIA
Syrian warplanes swooped over the quiet town of Saraqeb in the country’s north Saturday, dropping bombs on a residential district. The blasts shattered storefronts, set cars ablaze and sent huge plumes of smoke into the sky. Rubble and twisted metal littered the street after the airstrikes, which left 20 dead. Harrowing images like those have become routine for those watching the Syrian civil war unfold. Activists say an average of 120 people get killed daily in violence and clashes across the country.
“In Syria, it’s not Boston every day, but many times per day,” posted Jean Pierre Duthion, a French expatriate in Damascus who has Tweeted the war.
IRAQ
From: http://feeds.foxnews.com/~r/foxnews/world/~3/tWpDFv2M9Oo/