A Twitter campaign started by Syria's state news agency — asking users to share fun summer photos from the country — backfired horribly when people chose to share photos of the death and destruction enveloping the war-torn landscape instead.
The English-language arm of SANA, the mouthpiece of embattled President Bashar al-Assad, launched the ill-advised "#SummerInSyria" campaign on Monday, tweeting to about 15,000 followers, "Now that #summer is upon us, snap us your moments of summer in #Syria using the hashtag #SummerInSyria."
But instead of pictures of palm trees, the hashtag was flooded with images of blown-up buildings, dead bodies and injured children.
Now in its fifth year, the bloody conflict in Syria shows no signs of decline, and civilians have been the most affected. The death toll has been estimated at more than 200,000 people by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, and millions more have been displaced.
