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#WakeUpCall to help Syrian children

Dominique St. JohnOctober 8, 2014

New charity craze sparks a #WakeUpCall for Syria on social media. Inspired by the Ice Bucket challenge, a UNICEF campaign is opening people's eyes to the crisis facing children in Syria.

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Image: unicef

It's time to open your eyes to the crisis facing Syrian children with the #WakeUpCall, which takes inspiration from the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and #NoMakeUpSelfie. It involves posting a selfie or video of yourself when you have woken up on social media and to donate £5 to wakeupcall.org.uk. The idea is then to nominate three other people to continue the trend.

It was started by journalist and campaigner Jemima Khan to help UNICEF raise money for children fleeing from violence in Syria. With 6.5 million children in Syria, Khan who is a UNICEF UK ambassador aims to raise money for the Zaatari Refugee Camp in Jordan.

The trend is getting celebrities out of their beds for a good cause.

Emma Watson, Tom Cruise, Alexa Chung, John Cleese have also been nominated, but they had not tweeted #WakeUpCall photos as of Wednesday (8.10.2014) 13:45 GMT.