More than 100,000 people, perhaps a third or more civilians, died violently in conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and the Gaza Strip in 2014, making it one of the bloodiest years in the Middle East’s history, Financial Times reported on Friday.
They were killed in barrel bomb explosions while sitting in their homes, hit by stray gunfire, pummeled by million-dollar cruise missiles or shot dead along ditches with single bullets to the back of their skulls.
“Already in 2013 we all thought it had reached a level of violence and devastation that couldn’t get worse,” said Bente Scheller, Beirut-based Middle East director for the Heinrich Boll Foundation. “It became worse in every country.”
Perhaps even more dismaying than the large death toll is that none of the underlying political tensions driving the conflicts appear to be easing. In fact, violence and lawlessness have the potential to accelerate in all the conflicts.