Boy who wrote touching letter to child war victim melts our hearts again

Six-year-old Alex got to meet Obama at the White House.
 By 
Brittany Levine Beckman
 on 
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Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

We all can learn a lot from Alex, the 6-year-old who melted hearts when he opened his home to a child war victim, said President Barack Obama as he met the boy at the White House.

Alex's letter to Obama was shared over and over again online in September and inspired the president to quote the young New Yorker during a speech at the Leaders Summit on Refugees later that month. Last week, Alex put on a new suit and visited Obama in Washington. The White House released an Instagram video of the meeting Thursday encouraging viewers to support refugee causes.

“I liked what you wrote so much that I ended up reading it to everybody," Obama told Alex. "You being so nice, and kind, hopefully makes other people think the same way. So I was very proud of you."


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In the letter, Alex promised to befriend a Syrian boy injured during an airstrike on Aleppo. A photo of the child, Omran Daqneesh, sitting in an ambulance, dazed and bloody, had been shared widely online.

Alex asked Obama to bring Omran to his home so he could teach him to ride a bike and introduce him to his friend at school, who is also from Syria.

"We will give him a family and he will be our brother," Alex wrote.

Topics Barack Obama

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Brittany Levine Beckman

Brittany Levine Beckman was Mashable's managing editor. She enjoys crafting feature ideas, learning new things, and party parrots. Before working at Mashable, she covered community news at the Los Angeles Times and the Orange County Register. That's how she met a zonkey and the tallest man in the world.

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