IRBID, Jordan: Struggling to make ends meet, Syrian refugee Umm Iman and her family spent years moving from house to house in Jordan. Now, they have finally found a place to settle.
The Norwegian Refugee Council, an NGO, is paying Jordanian landowners grants to help them build or renovate housing.
In exchange, the landlords offer free housing to Syrian refugees for a specified period.
“We used to have to move house every month for various reasons,” said Umm Iman.
In contrast to the high rents and dilapidated buildings of previous lodgings, Umm Iman, 29, said her new home is “clean, spacious and comfortable.”
She shares the apartment in the northern city of Irbid, near the Syrian border, with her husband and their four daughters, her sister-in-law and her children.
It is one of 6,000 homes made available to Syrian refugees in Jordan through the NRC program.
Around 25,000 refugees are accommodated for free or very low rents, depending on their level of need.
Umm Iman’s family fled Syria in 2012, finding shelter in a refugee camp in northern Jordan before leaving to settle elsewhere at their own expense.
“Our situation was really bad,” her husband Mohammed Ghazal said.
The places they could afford “were unhealthy, cramped and some were falling down. Once, the roof of one of the houses collapsed on us,” he said.
“We were faced with a hard choice: either return to the refugee camp or return to Syria. This project saved us.”
The UN says it has registered more than 650,000 Syrian refugees in Jordan, but the kingdom says more than 1.4 million Syrians are on its territory.
More than 80 percent of them are living under the poverty line, according to UN figures.
Located in a residential neighborhood surrounded by trees, the apartment opens onto a main street and is part of a building with eight apartments, each with two bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen and a toilet.
The family is living in it for free on a contract that expires in March 2018.
The apartment is owned by Mustafa Shatwani, a retired Jordanian engineer who said the NRC program benefits both parties.
The NGO has covered 25 percent of the costs of the apartments he owns, where he now hosts several Syrian families.
“The costs of construction are high in Jordan,” he said. “If I don’t rent out my place, I can’t get the money back.”
Rodrigo Melo, who runs the program for the NRC, said it is allocated between $3 million and $5 million every year and benefits the local economy.
Launched in 2014, it now has 10,000 Syrians on its waiting list.
Families assessed as “vulnerable” pay no rent, while others pay a small sum.
NRC, backed by the UN and international donors, also offers work opportunities to refugees, often in the construction sector.
It “encourages human interaction and preserves the dignity of the Syrians,” he said.
Ghazal’s niece Aya, seven, said she was “very happy” in the new home.
“It’s bigger and nicer than the other place we lived, and I have lots of Syrian friends here,” she said.
Aid project helps Syria refugees feel at home in Jordan
Aid project helps Syria refugees feel at home in Jordan
Aoun seeks French support for Israeli troop withdrawal
- Joseph Aoun called for pressure to be applied to halt daily violations and to work toward the release of Lebanese prisoners within the specified timeframe
- Israeli forces are positioned behind earthen barriers and barbed wire, with a warning sign reading Do not approach, at the entrances of Yaroun and Maroun Al-Ras
BEIRUT: Lebanon’s President Joseph Aoun has urged France to back demands for a complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from Lebanese border areas occupied during the recent conflict.
In a meeting with the French Ambassador to Lebanon, Herve Magro, on Wednesday, Aoun also called for “pressure to be applied to halt daily violations and to work toward the release of Lebanese prisoners within the specified timeframe.”
Israeli forces are still entrenched behind an earthen barrier created a week ago west of the town of Mays Al-Jabal, while Lebanese troops are deployed dozens of meters away.
Several houses in the town of Rab El Thalathine in the Marjeyoun district were destroyed by Israeli troops a day after homes in the town of Yaroun in the Bint Jbeil district were also razed.
Israeli forces are positioned behind earthen barriers and barbed wire, with a warning sign reading “Do not approach,” at the entrances of Yaroun and Maroun Al-Ras.
They are supported by snipers hidden among the trees, while elements of the Lebanese army are deployed just meters away.
Israeli forces are expected to withdraw from the border area on Feb, 18, following a 23-day extension of the withdrawal deadline with the approval of the US.
Wajih Zahwi, 7, from Majdal Selem, on Wednesday died from head injuries sustained in an Israeli military drone strike on Jan. 29 while civilians were returning to their villages. The attack was in violation of the ceasefire agreement.
The border municipality of Ramiyah said that it was “informed by the military intelligence that two army posts will be established within the town. Additionally, efforts will be made to open several secondary roads, and on Friday, engineering teams from the army will conduct surveys and inspections for remnants of the Israeli aggression in the area.”
Meanwhile, a foreign photojournalist working in the Middle East claimed that she was threatened by the Israeli army in southern Lebanon.
Courtney Bonneau posted on Instagram that at around 11:45 a.m. on Tuesday, while she was in a building in the town of Taybeh in southern Lebanon, where the Lebanese army has redeployed, the Israeli army called UNIFIL to inform her and another photographer that if they did not vacate the premises, they would be shot.
As part of military and security agencies’ efforts to combat illegal weapons, the General Directorate of Internal Security Forces said that it had seized a four-wheel-drive vehicle driven by a 43-year-old Lebanese man, whose name was not disclosed.
Weapons and ammunition were found after the vehicle was stopped at the Dahr Al-Baydar checkpoint on the Bekaa-Beirut road. The man admitted bringing the weapons from Syria, and another Lebanese man accompanying him was also arrested.
Military police on Tuesday also intercepted a weapons shipment in Wardaniyeh that was being moved from a Hezbollah warehouse to an undisclosed location.
In a related development, Iran’s Tasnim News Agency reported that Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has designated Hezbollah Secretary-General Sheikh Naim Qassem as his “representative for Hussainiyah affairs and religious administration in Lebanon.”
Qassem is believed to have remained in Iran since assuming his new role.
His appointment was announced by Hezbollah on Oct. 29, following the death of Hassan Nasrallah in Israeli airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs.
Nasrallah had served as Khamenei’s representative in Lebanon before his death.
Indonesia ‘strongly rejects’ Trump’s Gaza plan
- “Indonesia strongly rejects any attempt to forcibly displace Palestinians or alter the demographic composition of the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” the Foreign Ministry said
- Jakarta also called on the international community to respect international law
JAKARTA: Indonesia “strongly rejects” the proposal made by President Donald Trump for the United States to assume control of Gaza and resettle Palestinians elsewhere, the Foreign Ministry said Wednesday.
Trump announced the stunning proposal Tuesday, without detailing his plans on how to move out nearly two million Palestinians from the enclave, claiming that the US will rebuild the territory and turn it into the “the Riviera of the Middle East.”
Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation, has consistently called for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
“Indonesia strongly rejects any attempt to forcibly displace Palestinians or alter the demographic composition of the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement posted on social media X, formerly Twitter.
Jakarta also called on the international community to respect international law, “particularly the right to self-determination of the Palestinians as well as their inalienable right to return to their homeland,” the ministry added.
Trump claimed there was support from the “highest leadership” in the Middle East and upped pressure on Egypt and Jordan to take displaced Palestinians — despite both countries flatly rejecting the idea.
Jakarta said addressing the “root cause” of the conflict, namely “the illegal and prolonged Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territory,” was the only path to achieve a lasting peace in the region, the statement added.
Kuwaiti emir appoints new defense minister
- Sheikh Abdullah Ali Abdullah Al-Salem Al-Sabah took the oath as minister of defense
LONDON: Emir of Kuwait Sheikh Meshaal Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah appointed a new defense minister to succeed Sheikh Fahad Youssef Saud Al-Sabah.
During the swearing-in ceremony at Bayan Palace on Tuesday, Sheikh Abdullah Ali Abdullah Al-Salem Al-Sabah took the oath as minister of defense.
Sheikh Fahad has assumed the position of first deputy prime minister and minister of interior following an emiri decree, according to the Kuwait News Agency.
Crown Prince Sheikh Sabah Khaled Al-Hamad Al-Sabah and other senior Kuwaiti officials attended the ceremony.
Deportation from occupied territory ‘strictly prohibited’: UN on Gaza
- “The right to self-determination is a fundamental principle of international law and must be protected by all states,” Turk said
GENEVA: UN rights chief Volker Turk insisted Wednesday that deporting people from occupied territory was strictly prohibited, after US President Donald Trump’s shock proposal for the United States to take over Gaza and resettle its people.
“The right to self-determination is a fundamental principle of international law and must be protected by all states, as the International Court of Justice recently underlined afresh. Any forcible transfer in or deportation of people from occupied territory is strictly prohibited,” Turk said in a statement.
Iraq restoration work brought back Mosul’s ‘identity’: UNESCO chief
- The director-general of United Nations heritage body UNESCO hailed the completion of their restoration work in the Iraqi city of Mosul, saying on Wednesday it had allowed it to recover its “identity”
MOSUL: The director-general of United Nations heritage body UNESCO hailed the completion of their restoration work in the Iraqi city of Mosul, saying on Wednesday it had allowed it to recover its “identity” after destruction inflicted by the Daesh group.
Mosul’s historic Al-Nuri Mosque with its famed leaning minaret, nicknamed Al-Hadba or “hunchback,” has been restored using its original brickwork, years after it was reduced to rubble under Daesh group rule.
“I am very happy to stand before you and before the minaret over 850 years old... and the fact to have it here behind me in front of you is like history coming back... is like the identity of the city coming back,” Audrey Azoulay said.
The mosque and minaret were destroyed in June 2017 during the battle to oust IS from Mosul, and Iraq’s authorities accused the jihadists of planting explosives before their withdrawal.
They are the latest landmarks in Mosul to be restored by UNESCO, whose teams have worked for five years to revive several sites.
“The reconstruction of this minaret needed to reuse nearly 45,000 original bricks,” the UNESCO chief said, adding that traditional techniques were used to rebuild the iconic structure.
Azouley said residents had wanted the rebuilt minaret to resemble the original. “The people of Mosul wanted it tilted,” she said.
Eighty percent of Mosul’s old city was destroyed in the fight against IS.
UNESCO restoration project also include Al-Tahira and Our Lady of the Hour churches and 124 heritage houses.
Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani will inaugurate the restored landmarks in the coming weeks.
