Shelter and stability elude Syrians made homeless by Feb. 6 Turkiye-Syria earthquakes

Special Shelter and stability elude Syrians made homeless by Feb. 6 Turkiye-Syria earthquakes
Locals affected by the February 6 earthquake attending a mass Iftar in the town of Atareb in the western countryside of Aleppo province, on March 31, 2023. (AFP)
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Updated 11 May 2023

Shelter and stability elude Syrians made homeless by Feb. 6 Turkiye-Syria earthquakes

Shelter and stability elude Syrians made homeless by Feb. 6 Turkiye-Syria earthquakes
  • Around 1,900 buildings were destroyed in Syria’s northwest and more than 8,800 others left unusable
  • The sheer scale of housing shortage has overwhelmed authorities, keeping many families in limbo

LONDON: Since two devastating earthquakes struck northwest Syria and southern Turkiye on February 6, survivors have been living in temporary shelters and unofficial camps awaiting news of resettlement.

The sheer scale of shortage of accommodation has overwhelmed NGOs and local authorities, keeping families who lost their homes in limbo. Many traumatized survivors of the disaster are still too afraid to return indoors.

When the tremors struck Syria’s western city of Aleppo in the early hours of the fateful day, “people took refuge in parks and cemeteries, reassuring their children it was no more than a prolonged picnic,” Fatima Mardini, who volunteers in the unofficial camps, told Arab News. “So long as nothing but the sky was over their heads.”

The earthquakes compounded an already dire situation in northwest Syria, where 12 years of civil war had reduced many homes and public buildings to rubble, with some households and communities displaced multiple times by the fighting.

The UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR, estimated in February that some 5.37 million people in Syria were in need of shelter assistance in the earthquakes’ aftermath.

About 1,900 buildings were destroyed in the country’s northwest and more than 8,800 others rendered unusable, according to the Global Shelter Cluster, an inter-agency standing committee that coordinates shelter responses.

The earthquakes caused an estimated $5.1 billion in direct physical damage in Syria, according to a World Bank Global Rapid Assessment report published on March 3. Residential buildings accounted for almost half of those damaged.

A recent report by the UK-based NGO Action for Humanity found that 98 percent of people now living in camps had been displaced by the earthquakes.




People walk along an alley between tents at a camp for the displaced erected in the aftermath of the February 6 deadly earthquake, in Jindayris, northwestern Syria on February 19, 2023. (AFP)

The report, published in March, revealed that nine out of 10 people in the northwest’s camps “had already been displaced by the conflict at least once when they were displaced by the earthquakes.”

Some 12 percent of these camp residents had been displaced once or twice, 65 percent between three to seven times, and about 23 percent forced to flee their homes eight or more times, the report added.

In rebel-controlled areas of Syria’s northwest, tents have become almost a luxury, with prices ranging from $150 to $300, and sometimes even $500, at a time when the average monthly income is $50 to $75, Yaser Alshhada, country director at SKT Welfare, told Arab News.

Meanwhile, more than four million people in Syria’s northwest continue to depend on humanitarian assistance to meet their most basic needs, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, OCHA.

The majority of these temporary shelters are schools, mosques and stadiums, where overcrowding, a lack of access to clean water and a damaged sewage system have increased the risk of disease.

FASTFACTS

  • More than 7,000 deaths and 10,400 injuries recorded in Syria from earthquake impact.
  • 4.1 million people in northwest Syria were reliant on humanitarian aid.
  • UN has distributed more than $16.56m to 500,000 affected Syrians in the northwestern regions since January.

Recently, the World Health Organization and the UN children’s fund, UNICEF, in partnership with other international NGOs and local health authorities, launched a cholera vaccination campaign in the most hard-hit areas for fear of a new outbreak.

Things were perhaps only slightly better in government-controlled areas. Aleppo-based volunteer Mardini told Arab News that she had spoken with young women who had not been able to bathe for a month since the earthquakes.

“One of them proudly told me she showered two days ago. When I asked how, she said that, although she feared another aftershock, she had quickly washed herself in the bathroom of their half-destroyed home before running back to the shelter.”

During the weeks immediately after the earthquakes, shelter conditions were catastrophic, Mohammad Al-Jaddou, a civil activist who founded the Ammerha Foundation to provide emergency response in Jableh, south of Latakia, and Aleppo, told Arab News.

“Large numbers of people were crammed into rooms,” he said, adding that the shelters in both Jableh and Aleppo were not equipped with sufficient facilities.




Displaced Syrians living in war-damaged buildings, are pictured in Syria’s northern city of Raqa on March 1, 2023, amid fears that the already fragile dwellings will not withstand an earthquake. (AFP)

In Jableh, Al-Jaddou’s team distributed meals and shelter kits to displaced families, many of whom, fearing aftershocks, were staying in mosques and parks despite the harsh winter weather.

Entire neighborhoods had vacated their homes, even those that were still intact, for weeks after the initial earthquakes because of the absence of utilities and the residual trauma.

“In well-serviced parts of the capital, Damascus, we merely get two hours of power every four hours at best,” Al-Jaddou said. “But things are even worse in quake-hit areas in Jableh and Aleppo.”

Three months after the earthquakes, local associations have managed to rehouse a few families, while others have chosen to move in with relatives.




Syrians who were made homeless after the devastating earthquake hit their country, receive humanitarian aid as they settle in a makeshift camp set up in a school in the town of Atareb in the western countryside of Aleppo province, on February 10, 2023. (AFP)

However, these associations are only able to provide housing support for six months. After that, households have to find a way to pay their rent amid tight financial conditions and a collapsed economy. Many people have been left homeless.

Al-Jaddou does not see the housing situation improving in the foreseeable future. “There are buildings that have been destroyed since 2011 with no efforts to restore them,” he said.

According to Aleppo-based volunteer Mardini, in government-controlled parts of the governorate, individual initiatives have managed to rehouse about 100 families, while those who can afford rent have resorted to cheap housing in poorer neighborhoods.

The government has also provided year-long grants to a number of households, while temporarily accommodating others in unfinished apartments, Marwan Alrez, general manager of the Mart Volunteer Team, told Arab News.

However, after an initial flurry of goodwill, state assistance soon dried up. “There used to be many shelters, including schools, to accommodate families,” Alrez said. “There were many tents. This is not the case anymore.




Syrians build a temporary camp, to house families made homeless by the deadly earthquake, in the town of Harim in Syria’s northwestern Idlib province on the border with Turkiye, on February 8, 2023. (AFP)

“Shelters inside Aleppo city have been suspended. There are now only two shelters outside the city in the countryside — in Jibrin and in another town.

“Two days ago, I visited a school on a campaign to support about 150 children, but I have been told that the facility was scheduled to shut soon,” even though many of the families sheltered there are unemployed and have lost everything.

On March 24, Action for Humanity opened the Massa Village in the Al-Bab district of northwest Syria to accommodate 500 displaced families who have been living in tents and informal shelters.

Despite local and international efforts to house people in the wake of the earthquakes, the scale of need remains massive. Yet funding from international donors has fallen far short.

In a statement issued on March 7, a group of 47 Syrian and international NGOs, including Action for Humanity, Hand in Hand and the Danish Refugee Council, said “funding for the humanitarian response in Syria has been lagging.”

The agencies said that the Syria Earthquake Flash Appeal was “only 52 percent pledged, while only a third of the $206 million pledged has been obligated to partners and is available for response.

“Syrian NGOs are disproportionately neglected in funding allocations despite providing the bulk of the response in Syria, whether directly or as partners of the UN and international NGOs.”

 


Palestinian toddler shot by Israeli troops in West Bank dies of wounds

Palestinian toddler shot by Israeli troops in West Bank dies of wounds
Updated 58 min 9 sec ago

Palestinian toddler shot by Israeli troops in West Bank dies of wounds

Palestinian toddler shot by Israeli troops in West Bank dies of wounds
  • Mohammed Al-Tamimi was shot in the head near his village of Nebi Saleh
  • The Israeli military has opened an investigation into the incident

A 3-year-old Palestinian boy who was shot by Israeli troops in the occupied West Bank last week died of his wounds, Israeli hospital officials said Monday.
Mohammed Al-Tamimi was shot in the head last Thursday near his village of Nebi Saleh while riding in a car with his father. He was airlifted to Israel’s Sheba Hospital, which announced the boy’s death.
The Israeli military has said it opened fire after gunmen in the area shot at an Israeli guard post at a nearby Jewish settlement.
But the boy’s father, Haitham Al-Tamimi, told The Associated Press that he had just buckled up his son in the car and they were driving to visit an uncle when the bullet struck. The father was also shot and treated at a Palestinian hospital.
The Israeli military has opened an investigation into the incident.
Rights groups, however, say that such investigations rarely lead to prosecution or disciplinary action against soldiers.
The shooting was the latest bloodshed in a more than yearlong surge of violence in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem. That fighting has picked up since Israel’s new far-right government took office in late December.
Nearly 120 Palestinians have been killed in the two areas this year, with nearly half of them members of armed militant groups, according to an AP tally. The military says the number of militants is much higher. But stone-throwing youths and people uninvolved in violence have also been killed.
Meanwhile, Palestinian attacks targeting Israelis in those areas have killed at least 21 people.
Israel captured the West Bank and east Jerusalem, along with the Gaza Strip, in the 1967 Mideast war. Palestinians seek these territories for a future state.
Some 700,000 Israelis now live in settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem. Most of the international community considers these settlements illegal or obstacles to peace.


France seeks removal of Lebanese ambassador’s immunity after rape accusation

France seeks removal of Lebanese ambassador’s immunity after rape accusation
Updated 05 June 2023

France seeks removal of Lebanese ambassador’s immunity after rape accusation

France seeks removal of Lebanese ambassador’s immunity after rape accusation
  • Ambassador Rami Adwan is being investigated in France following complaints by two former embassy employees
  • Lebanon said it would send an investigation team to the embassy in Paris to question the ambassador

PARIS: French authorities will on Monday ask Lebanon to lift the immunity of Beirut’s ambassador to Paris after an investigation was opened into alleged rape and intentional violence by the envoy, a source said.
“Steps in this direction will be taken during the day,” a French diplomatic source, who asked not to be named, told AFP.
The ambassador, Rami Adwan, is being investigated in France following complaints by two former embassy employees. He has diplomatic immunity but could face trial if Lebanon agrees to France’s request.


Israel jails Palestinian for life over West Bank killing

Israel jails Palestinian for life over West Bank killing
Updated 05 June 2023

Israel jails Palestinian for life over West Bank killing

Israel jails Palestinian for life over West Bank killing
  • The Israeli military court sentenced Moath Hamed, 39, to two life sentences for the attack

Jerusalem: An Israeli court on Sunday sentenced a Palestinian to life in prison for the 2015 killing of an Israeli settler in the occupied West Bank, the military said Monday.
The Israeli military court sentenced Moath Hamed, 39, to two life sentences for the attack, which he admitted to carrying out on behalf of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, the army said.
On June 29, 2015 Hamed fired at a vehicle, killing Malachi Rosenfeld, 25, who was returning from a basketball game near Shilo, an illegal settlement in the West Bank.
Three other Israelis were also injured in the attack.
In July 2015, Israel’s Shin Bet internal security agency said it had arrested seven Palestinians in connection with the attack.
The Palestinian Prisoners’ Club said Hamed had been arrested by Israeli forces in April 2022 after being “pursued by the occupation (Israel) for seven years.”
Israel has occupied the West Bank since the Six-Day War of 1967.
Cases involving events in the West Bank are tried by Israeli military tribunals.
Nearly three million Palestinians live in the West Bank, as do around 490,000 Israelis in settlements that are considered illegal under international law.


Sudan battle rages as Saudi Arabia, US urge new truce talks

Sudan battle rages as Saudi Arabia, US urge new truce talks
Updated 05 June 2023

Sudan battle rages as Saudi Arabia, US urge new truce talks

Sudan battle rages as Saudi Arabia, US urge new truce talks

JEDDAH: Saudi Arabia and the US on Sunday made a renewed push for truce talks between Sudan’s warring generals as deadly fighting raged into its eighth week.

Envoys of Sudan’s regular army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces or RSF have remained in Jeddah despite the earlier collapse of ceasefire talks, the Kingdom’s Foreign Ministry said.

The foreign mediators called for “the parties to agree to and effectively implement a new ceasefire, with the aim of building to a permanent cessation of hostilities,” it said.

Saudi Arabia and the US are keen to resume formal talks between the delegations, the ministry said.

Saudi Arabia and the US remain steadfast in their commitment to the people of Sudan, the statement added.

The Sudanese delegations in Jeddah continue to engage in daily negotiations, the ministry said.

“Those discussions are focused on facilitating humanitarian assistance and reaching agreement on near term steps the party must take before the Jeddah talks resume,” according to the statement.

It added: “Facilitators stand ready to resume formal talks and remind parties that they must implement their obligations under the May 11 Jeddah Declaration of Commitment to protect the civilians of Sudan.”

A five-day extension of a truce formally expired on Saturday with no signs of the conflict abating.

Upwards of 1,800 people have been killed, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, and the UN says 1.2 million have been displaced with more than 425,000 fleeing abroad.

The RSF on Sunday claimed it had shot down a fighter jet after the army “launched an audacious airborne assault upon our forces’ positions” in northern Khartoum.

A military source told AFP a Chinese-made jet crashed near Wadi Seidna base north of Khartoum because of a “technical malfunction.”

Witnesses said they saw an aircraft traveling from the south to the north of the capital with flames erupting from it.

Other witnesses spoke of airstrikes on RSF positions in the east of the city, with some civilian casualties reported.

Fighting in the capital has led to widespread damage and looting, a collapse in health services, power and water cuts, and dwindling food supplies.

Beyond the capital, deadly fighting has also broken out in the remote western region of Darfur, already grappling with long-running unrest and huge humanitarian challenges.


US, UK navies say they responded to distress call as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard ‘harassed’ ship

US, UK navies say they responded to distress call as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard ‘harassed’ ship
Updated 05 June 2023

US, UK navies say they responded to distress call as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard ‘harassed’ ship

US, UK navies say they responded to distress call as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard ‘harassed’ ship
  • The recent seizures have put new pressure on the US, long the security guarantor for Gulf Arab nations

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates: The US Navy said Monday its sailors and the United Kingdom Royal Navy came to the aid of a ship in the crucial Strait of Hormuz after Iran’s Revolutionary Guard “harassed” it.
Three fast-attack Guard vessels with armed troops aboard approached the merchant ship at a close distance Sunday afternoon, the US Navy said in a statement. It offered black-and-white images it said came from a US Navy Boeing P-8 Poseidon overhead, which showed three small ships close to the commercial ship.
The US Navy’s guided-missile destroyer USS McFaul and the Royal Navy’s frigate HMS Lancaster responded to the incident, with the Lancaster launching a helicopter.
“The situation deescalated approximately an hour later when the merchant vessel confirmed the fast-attack craft departed the scene,” the Navy said. “The merchant ship continued transiting the Strait of Hormuz without further incident.”
The Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Arabian Gulf, sees 20 percent of the world’s oil pass through it.
While the Navy did not identify the vessel involved, ship-tracking data from MarineTraffic.com analyzed by The Associated Press showed the Marshall Islands-flagged bulk carrier Venture erratically changed course as it traveled through the strait at the time of the incident. Its location also matched information about the incident given by the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations, a British military operation overseeing traffic in the region. The vessel also resembled the images released by the Navy.
The ship’s registered manager, Trust Bulkers of Athens, Greece, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Iranian state media and the Revolutionary Guard did not immediately acknowledge the incident. Iran’s mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
This latest incident comes after a series of maritime incidents involving Iran following the US unilaterally withdrawing from Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers in 2018.
The suspected American seizure of the Suez Rajan, a tanker linked to a US private equity firm believed to have been carrying sanctioned Iranian crude oil off Singapore, likely sparked Tehran to recently take the Marshall Islands-flagged tanker Advantage Sweet. That ship carried Kuwaiti crude oil for energy firm Chevron Corp. of San Ramon, California.
While authorities have not acknowledged the Suez Rajan’s seizure, the vessel is now off the coast of Galveston, Texas, according to ship-tracking data analyzed by the AP.
Meanwhile, Iran separately seized the Niovi, a Panama-flagged tanker, as it left a dry dock in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, bound for Fujairah on the UAE’s eastern coast. While not carrying any cargo, data from S&P Global Market Intelligence seen by the AP showed the Niovi in July 2020 received oil from a ship known then as the Oman Pride.
The US Treasury in August 2021 sanctioned the Oman Pride and others associated with the vessel over it being “involved in an international oil smuggling network” that supported the Quds Force, the expeditionary unit of the Guard that operates across the Mideast. Purported emails published online by Wikiran, a website that solicits leaked documents from the Islamic Republic, suggest that cargo carried by the Niovi was sold on to firms in China without permission.
Satellite images analyzed by the AP show those two vessels anchored off Bandar Abbas, Iran.
The recent seizures have put new pressure on the US, long the security guarantor for Gulf Arab nations. The United Arab Emirates claimed last week it earlier “withdrew its participation” from a joint naval command called the Combined Maritime Forces though the US Navy said it was still in the group. Meanwhile, the US military’s Central Command said Saturday its chief visited the region, met with Emirati leader Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan and “discussed shared regional security concerns as well as US and UAE security partnerships.”
The Mideast-based commanders of the US, British and French navies last month also transited the Strait of Hormuz on Friday aboard an American warship, a sign of their unified approach to keep the crucial waterway open after Iran seized the two oil tankers.