This is the final of five exclusive extracts relating the story of Mezyan Al Barazi, a Syrian expatriate living and working in the United Arab Emirates, and his efforts to support the revolution in his home country. At turns informative, tragic, and edge-of-your-seat suspenseful, Godfathers and Thieves reminds us that the next revolution, like the last, will likely be crowdfunded. By ELIZABETH DICKINSON.
As violence spread across Syria in 2013, it seeped into humanitarian aid work. That fall, the Syrian government put the Palestine refugee camp of Yarmouk, a thriving suburb just miles from central Damascus, under siege. Syrian rebels had started using the neighborhood as a base to slip into the capital. With more than 150,000 people packed into a single square mile, it was easy to disappear – especially since a growing number of the residents were becoming sympathetic to their cause.
The Syrian army sent in soldiers. Government fighter jets bombed a school. The army set up a ring around the camp, preventing tens of thousands of remaining residents from leaving and stopping others from going in. Soon, Yarmouk began to starve.
Thousands of miles away in Abu Dhabi, Syrian businessman Mezyan Al Barazi — the unofficial head of a diaspora aid group — was scrambling to break the siege. At first, he thought the blockade would last just a few days. But it soon became clear that the troops were there to stay. Local clerics issued fatwas so that cats and dogs could be cooked to eat. Families chewed on grass or boiled it in water. By January 2014, at least 50 people had died from a lack of food and medicine.
Al Barazi reached out to a member of a charity run by Syrian doctors living abroad. Hospitals and medical personnel had been targeted by the Syrian government, and Al Siraj tried to fill the gap, smuggling in some 50 health workers to field hospitals, garages, and basements. Several of the doctors working with the charity had attended events hosted by Al Barazi’s diaspora organizing committee, or Tansiqiya, sharing harrowing stories from their mission.
Beyond their bravery and access, Al Siraj had resources. In December 2013, the group posted a photo of its monthly spending showing a total of $263,400. Indeed, the group had found donor support among some of Syria’s most prominent exiles, including two of the richest men in Doha: brothers Moataz and Ramez Khayyat, whose construction firm Urbacon International had won contracts to build facilities for the 2022 soccer World Cup. Their company’s Syrian offices, equipment, and land had been seized by the regime in 2011, and they claimed their loss to have been at least $200 million. Having relocated permanently to Doha, the brothers said they spent hundreds of thousands on relief work since the revolution had started. In 2014, when several businessmen provided a total of $5 million worth of flour and wheat to Syria, the Khayyats had paid $600,000 of it.
Al Barazi’s contact in Al Siraj said the group could smuggle supplies through the blockade, with payments to guards to look the other way. At first, the operation seemed to have been a success. Al Barazi confirmed that small amounts of supplies had reached their destination. But soon, friends and family members began to complain, claiming that Al Barazi’s intermediary in Yarmouk was mishandling the aid. He had made a list of beneficiaries and was delivering help only to them.
It was not easy to work out what was happening, and Al Siraj said it was unaware of the alleged favoritism. Yet Al Barazi knew that sorting through the tensions was vital. When aid made its way through the blockade, distribution points were at risk of being swarmed by desperate residents, scrambling for supplies.
In the meantime, word got around of Al Barazi’s success at running the blockade. Others in the diaspora began to harass him, asking him to put them in touch with his intermediary. The inquiries grew strangely aggressive. Once, he would have simply assumed that his fellow exiles wanted to send aid through the intermediary as well. Now, though, he was sure something else was going on. Did rivals wish to steal the aid? Or the money?
A few days later, Al Barazi’s phone buzzed with a message. It was a photo of the intermediary in Yarmouk, dead. There was nothing else – no explanation, no context. Since the beginning of the conflict, Al Barazi had seen plenty of pictures of the dead. But this was the first time that death had struck someone because of the work he was doing for Al Barazi.
For weeks, Al Barazi struggled with the implications. His contact’s death forced him to confront the growing ambiguities of the Syrian conflict. Had the murder been a warning from the regime to those trying to break the siege? Had it been carried out by corrupt aid groups or businessmen seeking a monopoly on supplies going into Yarmouk? Or, was it an accident? Al Barazi assumed it was all of these things and none of them. In the end, it didn’t matter because it was a reminder that every possible adversary could equally have pounced.
One day, several weeks later, Al Barazi pulled out his phone and flipped through his pictures until he found a picture of the dead man from happier times. When it was taken, the man was just 43 years old. He wore his brown hair artfully disheveled. Al Barazi kept the picture on his phone as a reminder that death could strike from any direction.
An effort that had started as humanitarian aid had become entangled in the war economy. Those struggling in Syria were no longer battling only for the future of their country; millions of dollars were at play, and the opportunities for greed, envy, and violence were endless. Reaching out to the wrong person at the wrong time with the wrong information could get someone killed.
But not reaching out seemed worse. On January 17 2014, Al Barazi posted an account from inside the blockade on his Facebook wall. “I asked my [friend] in the besieged camp Al Yarmouk yesterday: ‘Did you get any assistance?’ He said, ‘We got a barrel [bomb] that resulted in eight martyrs and 20 wounded,’” he replied.” Al Barazi’s next message was directed at Bashar al-Assad: “Damn your soul,” he wrote.
Yarmouk would prove only the beginning of how the violence tore apart the diaspora’s humanitarian operations. Each time they put together a shipment of food or medicine or clothes the Tansiquiya had to check and double check who, if anyone, was left to receive it inside Syria.
One recent container had been ready to go when Syrian government planes bombed its destination, the small town of Morek. The residents fled down the road, joining other displaced Syrians in a squalid makeshift camp, but as Al Barazi was preparing to redirect the shipment, the planes struck again. Having spotted the tents and roadside fires, they attacked, killing fifty-two women and children who had survived the destruction of their village. The aid intended for the village sat in a warehouse in Dubai, in need of a new recipient.
Getting cash to family and friends, meanwhile, had become nearly impossible. In order to limit the risks of terror financing, the UAE had shut down most money wiring services to Syria. One exchange house still conducted transactions, but sending money was risky. The Syrian government monitored the banking system for transactions that might indicate the recipient was an opposition liaison. In order to avoid detection, donations had to be split into dozens of smaller transfers and sent indirectly via people in cities and towns surrounding the final destination.
Businessmen could serve as unofficial brokers, but that was costly and difficult to arrange. “There are people fleeing the country, and they want to get their money out [of Syria],” explained Rani, an expat involved in a Tansiqiya in Dubai. “We say, ‘we’ll give you money here [in the UAE]’, and they release the [equivalent amount of] money inside.” By late 2014, the war had cost the Syrian currency, the pound, three-quarters of its value, and people outside Syria could disguise money for the rebellion as an opportunistic currency play.
Yet even as sending aid became harder, Al Barazi’s family in Syria grew more dependent on him, not just for help, but survival. Since the beginning of the conflict, 24 members of his extended family have died fighting the regime – and their sons, daughters, wives, and mothers turn to Al Barazi as a lifeline, fleeing to housing he arranges in planes or buses he pays for. A sister-in-law lives in an apartment he owns in central Damascus, a vestige from better days. Armed men recently came knocking on the door demanding she leave. Through a lawyer in Damascus, Al Barazi was able to forestay her eviction – for how long he can never be sure. “At any moment, they are waiting to take her,” he says, as if adding, that’s just how it is.
Meanwhile, in Abu Dhabi, the tension was beginning to rip through the diaspora. After watching four years of endless atrocities, some expats’ views about the war had radicalized or grown deeply religious. Others fell to more venal temptations. A member of the Abu Dhabi Tansiqiya was caught skimming. In order to preserve unity, the group expelled him – but quietly. “The man was a thief in Syria,” says Al Barazi. “And he is a thief now.”
Amidst it all, Abu Dhabi’s Tansiqiya is expanding as the existing diaspora absorbs hundreds of thousands more Syrians, fleeing to the Gulf and Europe, as well as millions in neighboring countries like Turkey, Jordan, and Lebanon. In the UAE alone, expats estimate that some 100,000 Syrians have recently arrived. In countries like Jordan, the pre-existing Syrian diaspora has been outnumbered ten times.
Unlike the middle class businessmen who fled decades ago, the new arrivals are often destitute – and increasingly dependent on their more established relatives and friends. “Each one of us here is sustaining 50 people,” Abu Akhram of the Abu Dhabi group said. “The diaspora has been able to help the people and the revolution to survive.”
***
Every Friday afternoon, Abu Dhabi’s seaside corniche bustles with families picnicking in the sun. A few times a year, the Tansiqiya posts a call on Facebook for its ranks to gather on a shady patch of grass, where they dine on mezze and grilled meat and sip cool yoghurt drinks. Al Barazi shows up early; he pitches his chair toward the front of the lawn to watch the crowds arrive.
After everyone has accepted a glass of juice and eaten at least a handful of dates, the wallets snap open. A doctor from Dubai counts bills, pausing to tell his son not to ride his kid-bike across the picnic blanket. A mother of three hands over several hundred dirhams. Tansiqiya members collect the donations in unlabeled envelopes without ever saying a word about the bills changing hands.
The Syrian diaspora is fast running out of money. Fundraisers that once would have pulled in more than $10,000 now barely top a couple thousand. By some estimates the fighting in Syria has destroyed nearly half of the country’s economy, and attending to the accompanying suffering has cost the diaspora most of its accumulated wealth. Four years of neglect has driven Al Barazi’s company into the ground. Consumed with Skype calls to Syria and requests for assistance, Al Barazi failed to seek out new contracts, and one by one the old ones expired. Once again, Syria has claimed his life savings and destroyed the business he built. Where he once contributed $1,000 a month to the cause, he now struggles to send even $300. “This conflict is getting long,” he says.
Even if the fighting were to end today, the depleted savings of thousands of Syrian expatriates will slow down the country’s recovery. Four years ago, Al Barazi would have been well placed to expand his business back into a stable Syria; he could have invested in a showroom, re-cultivated abandoned farms, and helped resuscitate the country’s agricultural industry. Instead, he and fellow exiles spend their money shipping seeds to besieged areas of Syria, where subsistence farming is the latest survival strategy.
Al Barazi may have been bankrupted once again, but this time he got something for his money. The conflict in Syria has destroyed the country he came from, but in doing so, it created a community where there was none, built a nation – of exiles, yes, but a nation – that did not exist before.
These days for the Syrians gathered at the seaside, the funds being raised are of only secondary importance, says Al Barazi. In exile, the Tansiqiya can build an ideal of Syria that no longer exists back home. In the memories of the diaspora, the country takes on an a luminescence tinged with nostalgia: the recollection of a land foreign to war and violent death. That idea of Syria long existed in their imaginations, but only now, abroad, does it have ground to sit on.
For a few Friday mornings a year, Al Barazi lives in the country he always dreamed of. Sunnis, Druze, Christians – there’s even a family of Allawites – sit and eat together. They leave their bags unwatched and entrust their children to friends they have just met. Here on the corniche crowded with picnickers, there’s no trace of the conflict tearing apart their homeland. They are simply friends, enjoying lunch on a lazy afternoon. DM
Read Part One here. [link does not work, sorry]
Read Part Two here.
Read Part Three here.
Read Part Four here.
Godfathers and Thieves is published by Deca. Download the full story here.
Elizabeth Dickinson is a Gulf-based American journalist whose writing has appeared in The New Yorker, Foreign Policy, The Economist, The Christian Science Monitor, and The National, among other publications. She is the author of the Kindle SingleWho Shot Ahmed, an account of a young videographer shot in cold blood at the height of Bahrain’s Arab Spring. She is also co-editor of the recent book The Southern Tiger, a narrative memoir by Chilean President Ricardo Lagos. She has reported from five continents and speaks French, Spanish, and Krio (Sierra Leone), as well as basic Yoruba and Arabic.
ABOUT DECA
Launched in June 2014, Deca is a journalism cooperative that creates long-form stories about the world to read on mobile devices. The group’s members have authored acclaimed books and published magazine articles in such outlets as Harper’s, The Atlantic, The New Yorker, GQ, National Geographic, and The New York Times Magazine. Deca’s writers include Pulitzer Prize, National Magazine Award, Livingston Award, Kurt Schork Award, George Polk Award, Michael Kelly Award, and Frontline Club winners and finalists. Learn more atwww.decastories.com.
Photo: Syrian troops on patrol in the town of al-Mleiha, ten kilometres south east of Damascus 15 2014 during a government-organized trip for journalists. Syrian troops captured the town a day earlier from armed groups following five months of heavy fighting. EPA/YOUSSEF BADAWI.
The Lahore Times reviews
The following review of my newly released book is written by Robert J. Burrowes and appears in The Lahore Times:
In his just-released book, ‘Disaster Capitalism: Making a Killing out of Catastrophe‘, Antony Loewenstein offers us a superb description of the diminishing power of national governments and international organisations to exercise power in the modern world as multinational corporations consolidate their control over the political and economic life of the planet.
While ostensibly a book about how national governments increasingly abrogate their duty to provide ‘public’ services to their domestic constituencies by paying corporations to provide a privatized version of the same service – which is invariably inferior and exploitative, and often explicitly violent as well – the book’s subtext is easy to read: in order to maximize corporate profits, major corporations are engaged in a struggle to wrest all power from ordinary people and those institutions that supposedly represent them. And the cost to ordinary people (including their own corporate employees) and the environment is irrelevant, from the corporate perspective.
Loewenstein spent five years researching this book so that he could report ‘the ways in which our world is being sold to the highest bidder without public consent’. In my view, he does this job admirably.
Taking as his starting point the observation of famed future studies and limits to growth expert Professor Jørgen Randers that ‘It is profitable to let the world go to hell’, Loewenstein set out to describe precisely how this is happening. He went to Pakistan and Afghanistan to explore the world of ‘private military companies’, Greece to listen to refugees imprisoned in ‘brutal’ privatized detention centres, Haiti to investigate its ‘occupation’ by the United Nations and ‘aid’ organizations following the earthquake in 2010, and Bougainville to understand the dilemma faced by those who want progress without the price of further corporate environmental vandalism (for which they have paid heavily already).
Loewenstein also checked out the ‘outsourced incarceration’ that now ensures that the US rate of imprisonment far exceeds that in all other countries, the privatized asylum seeker detention centres in the UK which are the end product of ‘a system that demonizes the vulnerable’, and the equivalent centres in Australia which ‘warehouse’ many asylum seekers in appalling privatized detention centres, including those located on offshore islands.
It is easy and appropriate to be outraged by some of the details Loewenstein provides, like the ‘three strike’ laws in the United States ‘that put people behind bars for life for stealing a chocolate bar’, but it is obviously important to comprehend the nature of the systemic crisis in which we are being enveloped by ‘disaster capitalism’ if we are to have any chance of resisting it effectively. So what are it’s key features?
In essence, predatory corporations (which usually keep a low profile) are financed by government money (that is, your taxes), supported by tax concessions and insulated from genuine accountability, political criticism and media scrutiny while being given enormous power to provide the infrastructure and labor to conduct a function, domestically or internationally, which has previously been performed by a government or international organization. If this happens at the expense of a nation truly exercising its independence, then too bad.
Moreover, because the corporate function is being performed ‘solely to benefit international shareholders’ which means that maximum profit is the primary aim, both the people who are supposedly being served by the corporation (citizens, refugees, prisoners…) and the corporation’s own employees are invariably subjected to far greater levels of abuse, exploitation, violence and/or corruption than they would have experienced under a public service equivalent.
Loewenstein provides the evidence to demonstrate this fact in one case after another. The ones that I found most interesting are the use of mercenaries in Afghanistan which provided further evidence that US policy, and even its military strategy and tactics ‘on the ground’, is being progressively taken over by corporations, and the ‘occupation’ of Haiti, post-earthquake in 2010, by the UN and NGO ‘aid’ agencies which forced locals into the perpetual victimhood of corporate-skewed ‘development’.
The use of private military companies (jargon for government-contracted companies that hire and deploy mercenary soldiers, ‘intelligence’ personnel, private security staff, construction teams, training personnel and provide base services such as food, laundry and maintenance) in Afghanistan has meant that there are far more US contractors than US soldiers in Afghanistan and ‘troop withdrawal’ means just that: troops not contractors. The occupation is far from over, Loewenstein notes.
Moreover, he asserts, the US mission in Afghanistan is ‘intimately tied to these unaccountable forces’. As many of us have been observing for considerable time, with control of US government policy now largely in the hands of the US elite (a select group compared with the military-industrial complex of which departing president Eisenhower warned us in 1961), its controlling tentacles reach ever more deeply into US actions at all levels. This is reflected in the way that military tactics are often designed in response to the development of weapons (such as drones) rather than, as should be the case, policy and strategy determining the nature of the tactics and weapons (if any) designed and used. It’s not so much that the corporate ‘tail’ is now wagging the government ‘dog’: the ‘tail’ is now bigger and more powerful than the ‘dog’ itself. In essence, the ‘US government interest’ means the ‘US corporate interest’.
Unfortunately, Afghanistan is not the only ‘horror story’ in Loewenstein’s book. I was particularly pained by his account of the multi-faceted violence that has been inflicted on Haiti since the devastating earthquake on 12 January 2010 that affected three million Haitians, killing more than 300,000. On 1 February 2010, US Ambassador Kenneth Merton headlined his cable ‘The Gold Rush Is On’ and went on to explain his excitement: ‘As Haiti digs out from the earthquake, different companies are moving in to sell their concepts, products and services.’ Merton’s lack of compassion for those killed, injured or left homeless by the earthquake is breathtaking.
Tragically, it isn’t just corporate exploitation of Haitians that exacerbated the adverse impact of the earthquake. The United Nations was horrific too. The evidence clearly pointed to its responsibility for a cholera epidemic shortly after the earthquake, which affected more than 700,000 people, killing 9,000. And given the responsibility of UN troops, allegedly present to enhance safety, for previous violence against Haitians, most Haitians simply regarded the presence of UN troops as ‘another occupation’ following the French colonization, which they overthrew in 1794, and the US occupation which led to the Duvalier dictatorships, that were resisted until their defeat in 1986.
But whatever damage the UN has done, it is the governments of the US, France and Canada, whose aid dollars via many corporations never reach those in need, NGOs like the Clinton Foundation, and the predatory corporations that truly know how to exploit a country. This is why the civil infrastructure in Port-au-Prince remains unrepaired nearly six years after the earthquake and the average city resident still lives in ‘rubbish, filth, and squalor’. Somehow, the corporations that were given the aid money to rebuild Haiti or provide other services were able to absorb billions of dollars without doing much at all. Although, it should be noted, company profits have been healthy. Are they held accountable? Of course not. Disaster capitalism at its best.
So can we predict the outcome for Nepal following its earthquakes earlier this year? We certainly can. The corrupt diversion of aid funds to corporate bank accounts. And ordinary Nepalese will continue to suffer.
I could go on but you will be better off checking out the book yourself. Loewenstein writes well and he has fascinating material with which to hold your interest. By the way, his personal website if you want to keep track of his journalism is here. He has recently been doing research in South Sudan.
So is there anything I didn’t like? Well, given my own passion for analysis and strategy, I would have liked to read more about Loewenstein’s thoughts on why, precisely, this all happens and how we can get out of this mess. He is an astute observer of reality and hopefully, in future, he will be more forthcoming in making suggestions.
In the meantime, if you are interested in understanding why many individuals have a dysfunctional compulsion to make profits at the expense of human and environmental needs, my own analysis is briefly outlined in this article: ‘Love Denied: The Psychology of Materialism, Violence and War‘. But there is much more detail explaining the psychological origins of violent and exploitative behaviours in ‘Why Violence?‘
And if you are someone who does not outsource your own responsibility to play a role in ending the elite-driven violence and exploitation in our world, you might like to sign the online pledge of ‘The People’s Charter to Create a Nonviolent World‘. The Nonviolence Charter references other documents for action if you are so inclined.
Anyway, apart from this observation, the main reason why I think this is such a good book is because it gave me much new and carefully researched information that got me thinking, more deeply, about issues that I often ponder. There is a good chance that it will enlighten you too.
Robert J. Burrowes has a lifetime commitment to understanding and ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in an effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a nonviolent activist since 1981. He is the author of ‘Why Violence?‘ His email address is flametree@riseup.net and his website is at http://robertjburrowes.wordpress.com
Any attempt to solve a conflict has to touch upon the very core of this conflict and the core more often than not lies in its history.
A distorted or manipulated history can explain quite well a failure to end a conflict whereas a truthful and comprehensive look at the past can facilitate a lasting peace and solution. A distorted history can in fact do more harm, as the particular case study of Israel and Palestine shows: it can protect oppression, colonization and occupation.
The wide acceptance in the world of the Zionist narrative is based on a cluster of mythologies that, in the end, cast doubt on the Palestinian moral right, ethical behavior and chances for any just peace in the future. The reason for this is that these mythologies are accepted by the mainstream media in the West, and by the political elites there as truth. Once accepted as a truth, these mythologies become a justification, not so much for the Israeli actions, but for the West’s inclination to interfere. Listed below are these ten common myths that provided an immunity shield for impunity and inhumanity in the land of Palestine.
Plans to extend 175 km razor wire border fence with Serbia eastwards towards Romania
PUBLISHED15/09/2015 | 15:42
2Hungary is to split up families found illegally crossing its borders following state of emergency declarations in two of its southern counties.
Any minor found without the correct documents will be taken from their parents and placed in “children’s institutions”.
Meanwhile the parents will be put in one of two holding areas called “transit zones” while they await trial for illegally crossing the border – a crime now punishable with a prison sentence.
The new law came into effect at midnight on Monday as authorities sealed a railway crossing point that had been used by tens of thousands of migrants.
Hundreds of migrants are thought to be stranded at the Serbia-Hungary border after the Hungarian government closed the frontier with a new razor-wire fence.
On Monday night, Hungarian military trucks cleared the makeshift refugee camp near the village of Roszke, as part of the government’s effort to tighten up border controls.
Figures showed that a record 7,437 people entered Hungary from Serbia on Monday.
2Hungary’s government has also started work on extending its 175 km border fence with Serbia eastwards towards Romania, in case migrants start taking other routes into its territory, its foreign minister said on Tuesday.
“We have made the decision to start preparatory works for the construction of a fence starting from the Hungarian-Serbian-Romanian border at a reasonable length should migration pressure shift in the direction of Romania,” said Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto.
The Government announced the plans as it said its two southern counties bordering Serbia were now officially in a state of emergency due to the sheer number of refugees entering the country.
The state of emergency gives police extra powers and would allow troop to be deployed if the country’s parliament approves.
The declarations give police the power to search homes without a warrant if they suspect migrants may be hiding there.
Also, courts will now be forced to prioritise cases involving people caught entering Hungary illegally as border crossing
Police said they had arrested 60 people accused of trying to breach a razor-wire fence on the border with Serbia
Read More: Merkel ‘does not want to solve migration crisis with threats’
Prime Minister Viktor Orban said this morning his Government had been forced to officially declare a state of emergency in the face of his “nation being engulfed”.
A government spokesman said: “It’s the fundamental interest of everyone to put an end to the illegal immigration process.
“It is possible migrants will accumulate on the Serbian side of the border.
“Every single country where the migrants are crossing should take its part in the joint European efforts, including Serbia.”
Read More: ‘My gut says 1 in 50 Syrian refugees in Europe could be ISIS’ – Lebanese minister warns
Starting Tuesday, Hungary will start implementing tougher border measures that may see those who cross Hungary’s border illegally arrested.
On Monday night, Hungarian military trucks cleared the makeshift refugee camp near the village of Roszke, as part of the government’s effort to tighten up border controls.
Figures showed that a record 7,437 people entered Hungary from Serbia on Monday.
Read More: Twenty-two migrants drown as boat capsizes in Aegean Sea
Many of the refugees, who have been fleeing war zones including Syria, have been heading west to Germany, which said it expected a million migrants to enter the country this year – 200,000 more than previous estimates.
Over the weekend, Germany tightened controls along its border with Austria creating traffic jams at major crossings.
The European Commission confirmed on Tuesday it had received a notification from Austrian authorities of their intention to temporarily reintroduce border controls with Hungary, Italy, Slovakia and Slovenia.
The commission said Austria’s move, like that of Germany, was in keeping with the provisions of the Schengen agreement.
“The temporary reintroduction of border controls between Member States is an exceptional possibility explicitly foreseen in and regulated by the Schengen Borders Code, in case of a crisis situation.
“The current situation in Austria, prima facie, appears to be a situation covered by the rules,” the Commission said.
The White House said Tuesday evening that it is up to European nations to determine the best way to deal with the flood of refugees fleeing violence in Syria, and said the United States remains committed to taking more refugees to help.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest did not directly comment on whether the United States supports mandatory quotas for refugees in Europe, saying it was up to countries to work together to find solutions.
Online Editors
Having spent the greater part of the last couple of days at Westbahnhof, and at the border at Nickelsdorf on Sunday, I hesitate when I claim emotional tiredness after having heard Syrian refugees’ stories about their long road to Vienna and seen the state they were in. What they have lived is incredible, and painful to hear. Every person and every family stays with you, and you find yourself wondering how much more they will endure, and how many more will follow in their path.
This week was better organized overall, and the many Austrian volunteers, donors and helpers who continue to show such solidarity and compassion are truly a shining example of the power of civil society, especially when coordinated with and facilitated by authorities. Metal barriers have been brought in to organize arrivals and departures, and Platform 1 has become the transit area. In the midst of the main arrival hall, a new makeshift area for children to rest, snack and play amid a pile of plush toys has been set up and the scenes are heartwarming.
The Caritas operation nerve center has begun to issue badges for volunteers, listing spoken languages. This enables paramedics and police to call for help easily, especially when the inevitable rush happens as long awaited trains to Munich are about to leave, and volunteers are asked to explain the process – and to calm rising tensions amongst exhausted people. There have been slight scuffles and complaints about people cutting the long lines and positioning themselves in front; police and volunteers always try to bring families with young children to the front, but young men travelling alone are faster and less patient, especially when their journey has begun way beyond Syria.
Arrivals to the station can also be chaotic; most refugees are now mostly being brought in by buses from the border (yesterday alone there were 50 buses and 2,500 refugees, and many had not arrived by the time I left), and they are often unsure about what will happen next to them. Cordons of police officers line the platform, and volunteers guide them to the area where food and drinks – and another long waiting period – await them. Yesterday, a lovely choir of some 20 adults moved along the platform singing inspirational songs to bemused refugees. And when Austrian President Heinz Fischer made an unannounced visit as well, thanking officials and volunteers and chatting with some refugees, I can say with great confidence that at least 99% of them had no idea who he was.
The badges also encouraged incoming refugees to ask for help. While most Syrians I met were hoping to start a new life in Germany, many are desperate to know the rules and logistics of asylum requests in different countries, asking a myriad of questions which we simply could not answer, to their frustration. It would be so helpful if relevant NGOs could establish a reliable information base, allowing refugees to understand legal positions across the EU. Refugees arriving here are welcomed with huge posters from the City of Vienna telling them “You are safe” in English and in Arabic, and volunteers continue to explain that they will be taken by train to Munich for free, should they wish to continue beyond Austria.
I happened to spend quite some time taking newly arrived people to the Ambulatorium and translating for the paramedics, whose professionalism and kindness with refugees is to be saluted. At Nickelsdorf on Sunday, we were lucky to have an extended conversation with the official spokesperson of the Austrian police force, who told us of many cases of exhaustion, of extended walking and falling (and worse) related bruising and aches, but also of dehydration and lack of nutrition (that day alone, for instance, 7 small children had to be hospitalized because of severe dehydration), and Austrian medics at the border have been taking care of the most urgent cases.
Vienna doctors were busy too. The situation in Macedonia and especially Hungary has gotten much worse over the last week, the effect evident on the faces of many. On Thursday, l was led to a small Syrian boy who had headaches and had been feverish for several days. I touched his forehead and went straight into the anxiety mode most mothers feel when a child is that hot. After l accompanied little Ahmad and his mother Nour to a doctor, she wept on my shoulder as she recounted their ordeal from Bab Al Hawa to Vienna – from Assad’s bombs to a camp in Turkey, to a terrifying sea crossing, to the long journey through Greece, Macedonia, Serbia and finally through Hungary. And that is when Nour cried.
If there is one common denominator to the conversations I have had with Syrians refugees this week, and I am sure this is the case with most volunteers, it is their shock at the surreal violent and degrading treatment they received in Hungary. Most thought we didn’t know, that this was not being reported in the media, and they were shaken to their core and bursting to tell those who would listen. I took a young woman limping on one crutch to the paramedics; she had been pushed to the ground in Hungary and seemed to be in great pain. Dima, however, categorically refused to let the Viennese doctor touch her swollen leg (to his shock), traumatized by the Hungarian nurses and doctors who handled roughly and rudely. After she shared some shocking details with me (including bruises on her arms after they woke her up by pinching her), I asked her father to convince her that she was in good hands here and that I would be by her side the whole time; he was in his late sixties and trembled with indignation as he gave me details of “what they did to us in Hungary” – a sentence I heard repeatedly. Dima looked for me half an hour later, still in pain and still traumatized, and told me her father was now crying. After holding back for so long, he was finally able to break down, in the safety of Vienna.
He was not the only grown man crying. On one side of the platform, a Syrian man tried unsuccessfully to control his tears as he told us how he was separated from his wife and children as they were led into buses. This refugee had no phone and could only wait, and save for a few comforting words, I could only think of our own impotence in the face of a catastrophe of this magnitude. How many Syrians will be looking for family members across the world in the years to come, just as people, Jews in particular, did for years after WWII?
While despair was palpable in many refugees, so was a definite sense of determination in most. Two young couples (from Aleppo and from Hama) chatted with me about their plans in Germany. One man was a mechanical engineer, the other a graphic designer, and as their pregnant wives sat by a pillar resting their aching backs, both told me they couldn’t wait to settle down, learn German and start anew. In a world where there are inevitably haves and have-nots, they were clearly of the former, turned into the latter when barrel bombs pushed them into exile with a only small bag to their name. Likewise, a grandmother from Deraa tearfully explained her family had no choice but to flee the barrel bombs (“al barameel”), worried that one of her disappeared sons would not be able to find them. Her young grandson listened to us chatting as he munched on some peanuts handed out by volunteers; I told him that he looked like a very bright boy who would learn German quickly and do very well in school; he nodded smilingly and, as any Syrian would, offered me some of his peanuts.
Each refugee is a story of hardship, of tragedy, of a desperate attempt for safety and dignity and of hope that the next generation would at least have a chance for a normal life. The one who will stay with me forever is Loujeyn, a little 8-year old Syrian girl from Damascus whose little bag sank into the sea during a storm, taking with it the few possessions she had chosen. She had been in the same clothes for weeks, and was given some old sneakers when her wet ones finally gave out. She was sneezing, was clearly exhausted, and incredibly sweet as she patiently waited to go on to Germany while her mother Salwa recounted their journey to me; still outraged about what was done to them Hungary, she told me it had been the first time since they left Damascus that she had nearly regretted leaving.
I felt an immediate attachment to them, perhaps because Loujeyn was nearly my own daughter’s age, and perhaps because Salwa was a fellow Damascene with a shared environment and roots, and I arranged to have some clean clothes and a Barbie doll brought to her later that day and to Loujeyn’s priceless smile. As I prepared to leave them, Salwa reached into her handbag and tried to give me the one “luxury” item still with her: a small bag of Arabic coffee, carefully wrapped in plastic. She was pained when I refused, insisting “please, it’s from Syria.” I told her it would make me much happier to know she will drink it when she has a roof over her head, safe from the Air Force Intelligence unit which had taken her older son and prompted the family to flee when they got him out, and that one day I would accept her hospitality in Germany.
As I left the station, my badge already removed, I suddenly noticed many more people than usual begging. A young woman who appeared to be Gypsy approached me; out of habit after talking to so many refugees in the last week, I asked her where she was from as I reached into my purse. She replied: Syria. I was stunned for a second and furiously told her: No you’re not! Ask for money but do not pretend to be a Syrian refugee.
I make no apology for being protective of the people who have shown so much dignity throughout their ordeal, and who have endured every calamity as most of the world watched in silence. That others should exploit their plight adds insult to injury and distorts the reality, and we have gone from having to explain where Syria is, to having our mostly useless passports stolen, our identities borrowed and our tragedy abused. And yet, even in their time of need, Syrians’ generosity – and generosity of spirit – remained legendary.
It took a flood of refugees and dozens of encounters with my Syrian compatriots in the most unexpected of circumstances, here where they saw real solidarity and compassion for the first time in weeks, but I am beginning to think that the cliche just may be right: Vienna really is the heart of Europe.
Ari Kiro, center, leads his family through the border into Roszke, Hungary. Kiro was elected to lead a group of 42 family members, friends and neighbors from Alepo that included boat, bus, train and walking. (Robert Samuels/TWP)
By Robert Samuels September 9
ROSZKE, HUNGARY — Down the rusty train tracks littered with crushed water bottles and candy bar wrappers, a mass of red and orange hats emerged from the distance. Ari Kiro, dressed in a sleeveless green T-shirt and white sweatpants, marched in the shallow grass beside them, a whistle in his mouth. He blew. They all stopped.
Kiro counted the children: 11. He counted the adults: 34. Forty-five in all — extended family and some new friends — marching together to seek asylum from the war in Syria.
Their past was another land, but they had no idea where their future would be. What they had known, back in Syria — in Aleppo, where most of them were from — was that colder weather and choppier waters were coming, and that the Hungarian prime minister was seeking to seal off this border with Serbia as early as Sept. 15. Not quite two weeks ago, they made a decision thousands in the Middle East are making, to run for the border, while it is still possible.
The family elected Kiro, a masseur, to lead the way. They picked up their new friends in Turkey.
“We thought it would be easier if we all worked together,” said Mohamed Ismael, 30, a pharmacist. “Macedonia was the hardest. Two days without food and water. We had to walk in the dark.”
Migrants’ desperate quest to cross into Europe
View Photos More than 332,000 people have reached Europe this year. see full article here
DSEI is coming to London’s ExCeL arena and is bringing with it 30,000 attendees to inspect the wares of 1,500 arms dealers.
The capital will, overnight, become the focal point of the global arms trade, an exhibition which in 2013 attracted guests from such countries as Afghanistan, Colombia, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Vietnam – all listed as human rights priority countries by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
A petition has been set up by Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) and Global Justice Nowto be presented to Prime Minister David Cameron, calling for the arms fair to be shut down as it brings “military buyers from countries propagating war and repressing their populations, together with the weapons manufacturers who fuel conflict and insecurity”.
At present, the petition has 10,000 signatures. It states:
David Cameron has said Britain will fulfil its ‘moral responsibilities’ to refugees and that he ‘wants peace in the Middle East’.
Let’s tell him to put his words into action and shut down the arms fair. The UK should be making #refugeeswelcome, not arms dealers. #stopDSEI.
Earlier this week, Cameron announced that Britain will take 20,000 refugees over five years, having previously stood in front of an empty field and said that “taking more and more refugees” was not the answer.
The message seems fairly clear – you’re more welcome in this country if we think you’ll buy our weapons.
Speaking to i100.co.uk, Andrew Smith of CAAT said:
DSEI brings some of the most repressive regimes in the world together with some of the biggest arms companies. The government is turning away refugees fleeing from some of the worst war zones at the same time as it is welcoming arms dealers from around the world to an event that will fuel more war and conflict.
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