Heartwrenching: 4-year-old Syrian girl thinks camera is weapon, 'surrenders' to photographer

Four-year-old Syrian boy Adi Hudea poses, arms raised in surrender, after mistaking a camera for a gun. PHOTO: Osman Sağırlı

After years of civil war, it’s not surprising that a four-year-old Syrian child assumed a photojournalist’s camera was a weapon and surrendered.

The image, believed to have been taken in 2012 by photojournalist Osman Sağırlı, was recently tweeted by Palestinian Nadia Abu Shaban and has earned more than 12,000 retweets over the last week.

The original publication identifies the child as four-year-old Syrian girl Adi Hudea.

“Her name is Hudea… She is only 4 years old. She lost her dad in the bombing of Hama. She took refuge at the Atme camp at the Turkish border with her mom and three siblings,” the caption reads.

The photo, which has captured the hearts of thousands of Twitter users, paints a heartbreaking image of the everyday situation faced by children caught up in Syria’s ongoing civil war.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) says that since March 2011, when the Syrian civil war began, about 10 million Syrians are displaced.