British graffiti artist Banksy recreates iconic image to mark Syrian war anniversary

British graffiti artist Banksy recreated his iconic image of a girl with a red balloon for a video by the #WithSyria campaign with actor Idris Elba, marking the third anniversary of the Syrian conflict.

The video has the animated image of the girl letting her red balloon carry her over the illustrated ruins of a shelled out city with dead bodies in the streets. She is joined by other children as the video progresses. It opens with Elbow's "The Blanket of the Night" and is narrated by Elba.

"On March 15, 2014, the world will wake up to the third anniversary of the bloody conflict in Syria." narrates Elba, "Will we let the people of Syria lose another year to bloodshed and suffering? Will you stand with Syria?"

The #WithSyria campaign is an effort to amass people around the world to show their solidarity with the people of Syria and to call political leaders to make this the last anniversary of the ongoing conflict. Thousands of images have popped up on Twitter and other social media sites of people with red balloons in support of the campaign, including some that have been added to the #WithSyria website. Banksy also made a comment on his website.

"On the 6th March 2011 in the Syrian town of Daraa, fifteen children were arrested and tortured for painting anti-authoritarian graffiti.The protests that followed their detention led to an outbreak of violence across the country that would see a domestic uprising transform into a civil war displacing 9.3 million people from their homes."

[HuffPost Live] [YouTube]