With every week that goes by in the Syria crisis, hundreds more lives are lost, policy options narrow and the chances of post-conflict stability grow worse. What started as a demand for internal reform has become a regional conflagration. Foreign fighters from across the Middle East and North Africa are pouring into Syria to train and fight, while refugees are flooding by the hundreds of thousands into Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and Turkey.

The Western political debate has focused on military options — and the arguments are complex and finely balanced. But no one believes that under any scenario the war will end quickly.

Meanwhile, the gap between humanitarian need and international response grows by the day. My three days in Jordan last week do not provide a complete picture, but they do allow for stories to be combined with data to reveal a deeply alarming situation.

Inside Syria, the International Rescue Committee has talked with refugees who reported that life-threatening shortages of medicines and food and fuel shortages are a daily reality. Doctors told me of colleagues and relatives who have been targeted, and killed, in the war. There are allegations of truly horrific human rights abuse. Nearly seven million Syrians are living in desperate conditions.