Fear keeps Syrian refugees away from Allentown event

ALLENTOWN— Fear kept a group of Syrian refugees from attending an event to welcome them to the community in Pennsylvania.

More than 500 people attended Sunday’s event in Allentown that was sponsored by the Lehigh Valley Conference of Churches. But seven Syrian families who arrived in the area in recent weeks stayed away.

Conference ecumenical director Larry Pickens tells The Morning Call they’re afraid in the wake of the terrorist attacks in Paris.

Pickens called the attacks “the elephant in the room.”

Mayor Ed Pawlowski pledged to take care of the Syrian refugees in Allentown.

A Syrian refugee, who agreed to be photographed on condition of anonymity because of fear of retaliation against family living in Syria, poses for a portrait with her child on Wednesday, Nov. 18, 2015, at the Muslim Association of Lehigh Valley in Whitehall, Pa. Dozens of Syrian refugee families are being resettled in the Allentown, Pa., area in part because the city is already home to one of the nation’s largest population of Syrians, who began settling here in the late 1800s.

https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/web1_refugee.jpg.optimal.jpgA Syrian refugee, who agreed to be photographed on condition of anonymity because of fear of retaliation against family living in Syria, poses for a portrait with her child on Wednesday, Nov. 18, 2015, at the Muslim Association of Lehigh Valley in Whitehall, Pa. Dozens of Syrian refugee families are being resettled in the Allentown, Pa., area in part because the city is already home to one of the nation’s largest population of Syrians, who began settling here in the late 1800s. AP Photo | Matt Rourke