Yes, very different situations of course. Without getting into politics, it's clear that Syria is a no-win scenario for civilians caught in the middle, with few good options if they escape. I think Mark_R was only trying to point out some very human commonalities.

To illustrate that point: we have a number of Syrian refugee families in the Edmonton area, and they have been sharing their stories. While the more affluent among them were initially able to take household stuff with them in their initial move out of Syria, by the time they went through the refugee systems of two different countries, they touched down in Canada with nothing more than ... documents and momentoes.