"I was using a telephoto lens, and she thought it was a weapon,"says Sağırlı. "İ realised she was terrified after I took it, and looked at the picture, because she bit her lips and raised her hands. Normally kids run away, hide their faces or smile when they see a camera."Turkish photojournalist Osman Sağırlı took the picture. The four-year-old girl, Adi Hudea, was at the Atmeh refugee camp in Syria in December 2014. The image was first published in the Türkiye newspaper in January:
The caption on the photo reveals just a small amount of the horror that a child whose natural reaction to a camera is so unnatural would have already experienced:‘His face suddenly drops. He squeezes his bottom lip between his teeth and gently lifts up his hands. Where he remains like that without a word. It is not exactly easy to cheer up the child who thought the camera was a machine gun about to strike him. Adi Hudea, only four years old, lost his father in the Hama bombing. He went to Camp Atmen on the border of Syria/Turkey with his very nervous mother and three siblings.’
BBC Trending spoke to Sağırlı - now working in Tanzania - to confirm the origins of the picture. The child is in fact not a boy, but a four-year-old girl, Hudea. The image was taken at the Atmeh refugee camp in Syria, in December last year. She travelled to the camp - near the Turkish border - with her mother and two siblings. It is some 150 km from their home in Hama.
How to help Syrian refugeesThis is why we can't let journalism die. The photographer who took this photo has been employed by the Türkiye newspaper for 25 years.Doctors Without Borders is providing direct medical aid in six hospitals and four health centers inside Syria. They are also sending medical supplies, equipment and support to the medical networks throughout Syria that they cannot access themselves. They accept donations online, and you can earmark your gift for Syria by calling 1-888-392-0392.
This photo will save lives. I truly believe that. Journalism matters.