That must have been one long flight! Here are some photos of Angelina Jolie arriving at LAX yesterday afternoon. She spent a long weekend in Iraq, specifically the Iraqi Kurdistan refugee camps housing Iraqi and Syrian refugees. We covered her trip yesterday – go here to read. Considering airports across the Eastern seaboard were canceling thousands of flights this week, I wonder if Angelina was supposed to make an earlier flight, or if her flight got diverted to perhaps an Atlanta layover or something like that. Don’t ask me why I’m interested, I have no idea. She would have flown west from Iraq to LA, right? Right.

Anyway, Angelina is still very affected by what she witnessed and the people she met in Iraq. It was her fifth trip in-country, and she ended up writing a New York Times op-ed to draw more attention to the crippling humanitarian crisis. And as I said yesterday, the UNCHR is using Angelina to shame donor countries into ponying up more money for the refugees – Angelina specifically writes about the UNHCR budget shortfalls. You can read the full piece here. Here’s an edited version:

I HAVE visited Iraq five times since 2007, and I have seen nothing like the suffering I’m witnessing now. I came to visit the camps and informal settlements where displaced Iraqis and Syrian refugees are desperately seeking shelter from the fighting that has convulsed their region.

In almost four years of war, nearly half of Syria’s population of 23 million people has been uprooted. Within Iraq itself, more than two million people have fled conflict and the terror unleashed by extremist groups. These refugees and displaced people have witnessed unspeakable brutality. Their children are out of school, they are struggling to survive, and they are surrounded on all sides by violence.

For many years I have visited camps, and every time, I sit in a tent and hear stories. I try my best to give support. To say something that will show solidarity and give some kind of thoughtful guidance. On this trip I was speechless.

…Nothing prepares you for the reality of so much individual human misery: for the stories of suffering and death, and the gaze of hungry, traumatized children.

Who can blame them for thinking that we have given up on them? Only a fraction of the humanitarian aid they need is being provided. There has been no progress on ending the war in Syria since the Geneva process collapsed 12 months ago. Syria is in flames, and areas of Iraq are gripped by fighting. The doors of many nations are bolted against them. There is nowhere they can turn.

Syria’s neighbors have taken in nearly four million Syrian refugees, but they are reaching their limits. Syrian refugees now make up 10 percent of Jordan’s population. In Lebanon, every fourth person is now a Syrian. They need food, shelter, education, health care and work. This means fewer resources available for local people. Far wealthier countries might crack under these pressures.

Stories of terror, barrel bombs and massacres have acquired an awful familiarity. There is a great temptation to turn inward, to focus on our own troubles. But the plain fact is we cannot insulate ourselves against this crisis. The spread of extremism, the surge in foreign fighters, the threat of new terrorism — only an end to the war in Syria will begin to turn the tide on these problems. Without that, we are just tinkering at the edges.

At stake are not only the lives of millions of people and the future of the Middle East, but also the credibility of the international system. What does it say about our commitment to human rights and accountability that we seem to tolerate crimes against humanity happening in Syria and Iraq on a daily basis?

[From The NYT]

Jolie gave some examples of some of the heart-wrenching stories she heard from the refugees in the camps, stories of rape and torture and so much more. Jolie goes on to restate the purpose of the UNHCR, and says the high commission was never intended “to feed, year after year, people who may never go home, whose children will be born stateless, and whose countries may never see peace.” But, Jolie writes, that’s exactly what the UNHCR is doing for 51 million refugees every year.

Here’s the donation page for the UNHCR.

Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet.