Hardly a day goes by without a new insult being hurled in the faces of asylum seekers and refugees. We’re scroungers, rapists, fighting-age men who shouldn’t have left our home countries. Sometimes we’re simply “illegals”, the most dehumanising term of all. When did it become a crime to run for your life?

The people levelling these accusations are superb at making themselves heard. Mud sticks – and most of us are too scared to try to set the record straight. I don’t know how many of our accusers have sat down with us, human to human, and listened to our stories. Here’s mine.

I grew up in Syria. My childhood was safe and happy – idyllic when I look back at it. In 2011, the Arab spring and civil war in Syria changed everything. I was imprisoned twice for protesting against the Assad regime, but it never crossed my mind to leave. Like many young people, I never thought death would come for me.

Everything changed when I was almost killed in a deadly missile attack in a suburb of Aleppo I was only 17, and I realised that I wanted to live. So I escaped. First to Turkey, and then I travelled through Europe until I reached Calais. I hoped to reach the UK for two reasons. First, my auntie and cousins live here. After my mum died when I was 14, my auntie........

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