LONDON: Life in regime-held areas of Syria is marked by forced evictions, widespread looting and desperate attempts to avoid military service, according to two Syrian students who lived under regime rule.
Despite regime attempts to project a veneer of normalcy, even in Damascus residents live in near-constant “fear of being arrested or evicted,” said Tareq, a master’s student in London who asked that his real name be withheld to protect family members in Syria.
Regime forces are systematically looting the homes of citizens who fled the war, he added. “They’re robbing empty houses” and “making a fortune” in the process, he said in a talk given at London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) earlier this week on life in regime-held areas.
Moreover, forced evictions of entire neighborhoods are taking place with startling regularity, said Sawsan, a Syrian architect who joined Tareq in the talk, which was held as part of Syria Awareness Week.
Areas whose residents voiced opposition to the regime in the early years of the conflict are being conspicuously targeted for “reconstruction,” even in places such as Damascus where minimal battle damage has been incurred, said Sawsan.
Families are being “forcibly evicted with no compensation and no resettlement plans,” she added, their legally owned homes bulldozed or blown up.
Deeper political currents are shaping Syria’s redevelopment, she said. “Iran is being promised big time with things in Syria,” Sawsan told the audience.
Lucrative contracts to rebuild areas surrounding Shiite holy sites across Syria have been reserved for Iranian companies, she added.
“Iran was given access to develop all the areas surrounding shrines in Syria. There’s actually a specific reconstruction committee for shrines headed by an Iranian,” Sawsan said.
With Shiite militias controlling the shrines and their environs, some Sunni Syrians have converted “just to be protected,” said Tareq, who left Damascus last September to pursue studies in urban planning.
Public buses have been co-opted by the military, leaving severe transportation shortages across the country, he added.
Private companies contracted to fill the gap are often closely linked to the regime and have hiked bus fares, Tareq said.
Military officers posted on roads leading to opposition-held areas require truck drivers carrying food and supplies to pay bribes, causing surges in the cost of living, he added.
Young men, required by law to serve in the military, are going to extreme lengths to avoid conscription, Tareq told the audience.
As Syrian men who have lived outside the country for an extended period are exempt from military service, a black market in forged foreign visas has emerged.
“Some people, and some generals and officers in the military, are taking bribes” to provide desperate Syrian teenagers and young men with fake exit stamps, making it appear as though they have been living abroad, Tareq said.
But often the schemes turn into scams, with officials pocketing the money and refusing to provide the fake documents, he added.
The hapless victims are forced to “remain in their houses, afraid of going outside in the street because if they come across any military (checkpoint) they’d be taken directly to the army,” Tareq said.
Those who are able to leave the country legally have done so already, said Sawsan. “Those who are still there are the poor, the most deprived and the most marginalized,” she added.
“They’re the ones who are suffering (on a) daily basis. They’re just becoming a ticking bomb, with the regime doing everything from selling their properties to using them as bargaining chips… to evicting them from their residences.”
Even if the conflict ended tomorrow, Sawsan said, average Syrians without ties to the regime and its cronies would remain marginalized. “Now it’s their battle, and that’s going to explode,” she added.
Syrian students describe life under regime rule
Syrian students describe life under regime rule
UN Security Council condemns attacks on peacekeeping forces in Lebanon
- Several UN peacekeepers have been injured in southern Lebanon since a year of skirmishes between Israel and Hezbollah escalated into fierce clashes in the past month
- Council members say peacekeepers must never be the target of attacks and urge all involved in the conflict to respect their safety and security
NEW YORK CITY: The UN Security Council on Wednesday condemned attacks in southern Lebanon in recent weeks in which several UN peacekeeping troops have been injured.
The UN Interim Force in Lebanon continues to monitor hostilities in the south of the country along the demarcation line separating it from Israel. A year of skirmishes between Israeli soldiers and Hezbollah fighters in border areas have escalated into fierce clashes in the past month.
Israel accuses the UN peacekeeping forces of providing cover for Hezbollah and has told UNIFIL to withdraw its troops from southern Lebanon for their own safety. The international force has refused to comply, instead vowing to remain and carry out its mandate along the Blue Line of demarcation between the two countries, which was established by the UN in June 2000. It has issued several warnings that the Israeli army’s “deliberate and direct destruction of clearly identifiable UNIFIL property is a flagrant violation of international law” and UN resolutions.
Without mentioning Israel by name, the 15 members of the UN Security Council on Wednesday urged all parties involved in the conflict to take all possible steps to respect the safety and security of UNIFIL personnel and facilities, and said peacekeepers must never be the target of attacks.
The council reiterated its “full support” for UNIFIL, underscored “its role in supporting regional stability,” and expressed “deep appreciation” to the countries that contribute troops to the force.
Council members also expressed “deep concern for civilian casualties and suffering, the destruction of civilian infrastructure, the damage to cultural heritage sites in Lebanon, and endangerment of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Baalbeck and Tyre, and the rising number of internally displaced people.”
They called on “all parties” to abide by international humanitarian law and fully implement Security Council resolutions.
Israeli airforce bombs Syria-Lebanon border
- A leading monitor said that 15 people had been wounded in the strikes in an area of Syria’s Homs region
- “Earlier today, with the direction of IDF (military) intelligence, the IAF (Israeli airforce) struck smuggling routes between Syria and Lebanon,” the army said
JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said that it carried out air strikes on Wednesday along the border with Syria and Lebanon, with state media in Damascus saying that key infrastructure had been targeted.
A leading monitor said that 15 people had been wounded in the strikes in an area of Syria’s Homs region which is a known stronghold of Lebanon’s Hezbollah although there was no immediate confirmation from Syrian authorities.
Israel rarely comments on its military operations in Syria but it did confirm the strikes which had been first reported by the Syrian state news agency Sana.
“Earlier today, with the direction of IDF (military) intelligence, the IAF (Israeli airforce) struck smuggling routes between Syria and Lebanon,” the army said in a statement.
“These routes coming from the Syrian side of the border into Lebanon are used to smuggle weapons to the Hezbollah terrorist organization.”
The Sana news agency said that “the Israeli aggression” on the Homs region had been met with a barrage of anti-aircraft fire.
Citing a military source, Sana said that the Israeli planes had targeted bridges along the Orontes river and roads around the Syria-Lebanon border.
The strikes had caused “significant damage,” according to the source, putting some of the infrastructure out of action, without giving details.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor also said that Israeli military aircraft had hit Syrian bridges and military checkpoints.
Fifteen members of the Syrian armed forces or allied groups had been wounded in the strikes, said the observatory which has a vast network of contacts throughout Syria.
But since civil war broke out in Syria in 2011, it has carried out hundreds of air strikes on Syrian government forces and groups supported by its arch-foe Iran, notably Hezbollah troops that have been deployed to assist Assad’s regime.
Israel has carried out frequent raids on highways on the Lebanese side of the border with Syria to cut off potential weapons supplies since a major escalation of its conflict with Hezbollah in September.
How Syrians in war-torn Lebanon are coping with double displacement
- Syrians face increasing barriers to shelter and aid access in Lebanon due to overcrowding and mounting hostility
- Lebanon has the highest refugee population per capita globally, hosting 1.5 million Syrians prior the current escalation
LONDON: Syrians displaced to Lebanon by the civil war in their home country have found themselves on the move once again, as Israel’s targeting of the Iran-backed Lebanese Hezbollah militia has forced more than a million people from their homes.
Many Syrians, unable to return home for fear of conscription or arrest, face a difficult dilemma — whether to ride out the conflict in Lebanon, despite deepening poverty and mounting hostility, or even risk the irregular sea crossing to Cyprus or beyond.
Hezbollah and the Israeli military have been trading blows along the Lebanese border since Oct. 8, 2023, when the militia began rocketing northern Israel in solidarity with Hamas, its Palestinian militia ally, which had just attacked southern Israel, sparking the Gaza war.
However, in September this year, the Israeli military suddenly ramped up its attacks on Hezbollah positions across Lebanon, disrupting its communications network, destroying arms caches, and eliminating much of its senior leadership.
Israeli jets have pounded Hezbollah positions in towns and villages across southern Lebanon and its strongholds in the suburbs of the capital, Beirut, while ground forces have mounted “limited” incursions into Lebanese territory.
More than 1.2 million people have been displaced since the hostilities began more than a year ago, according to UN figures. Among them, the UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR, has identified 34,000 Syrians who have been secondarily displaced since October 2023.
For Lebanese civilians, the conflict has revived grim memories of the devastating 2006 war with Israel and the civil war years of 1975-90. For Syrians, though, the memories of conflict and displacement are even more raw, with the 13-year civil war in their home country still ongoing.
Hezbollah fighters from Lebanon took part in the Syrian civil war, which began in 2011, on the side of the Bashar Assad regime against armed opposition groups, thereby contributing to the mass displacement of Syrians that followed.
“Refugees who have fled their homeland in search of safety and security are now facing the reality of being displaced once again in Lebanon due to ongoing hostilities,” Lisa Abou Khaled, a UNHCR spokesperson, told Arab News.
“This double displacement exacerbates their vulnerability.”
UNHCR reported that more than 400,000 people, at least 70 percent of them Syrians, have crossed the border into Syria to escape the escalating violence in Lebanon. However, for many, returning home is not an option.
Rescue workers remove rubble, as they search for victims at the site that was hit by Israeli airstrikes in Qana village, south Lebanon, on Oct. 16, 2024. (AP)
The alternative is to remain in Lebanon, where Syrians have reportedly been denied access to work, housing, and services amid the country’s economic crisis, and mounting hostility from Lebanese citizens who believe their own needs have been overlooked.
Rabab, whose name has been changed to protect her identity, spent several nights sleeping rough in Sidon’s Martyrs’ Square last month before locals offered her and her husband a place to stay.
“When we visited the municipality, they refused to register our names and said priority was given to displaced Lebanese families,” Rabab, who is originally from northwest Syria, told Arab News.
“Returning to Syria now is out of the question as I have no family left there, and my husband will face conscription.”
INNUMBERS
• 1.2 million: People displaced by conflict in Lebanon since October 2023.
• 34,000: Syrians in Lebanon who have been secondarily displaced.
• 400,000: Displaced people, 70 percent of them Syrians, who have fled to Syria.
(Source: UNHCR)
The result has been a growing number of Syrian families displaced from southern Lebanon sleeping rough on the streets of Sidon and other cities, with the buzz of Israeli drones and jets overhead and winter temperatures fast approaching.
“Many displaced Syrians in Lebanon, particularly those newly displaced due to recent escalations, face significant challenges in accessing shelters,” Tania Baban, the Lebanon country director of the US-based charity MedGlobal, told Arab News.
Recounting an incident in Sidon, where displaced Syrians had been turned away “due to a lack of shelter capacity,” Baban said: “Municipalities in regions have implemented restrictions, often barring entry to Syrian displaced people, citing overcrowding or security concerns.
“As a result, some families are sleeping in informal makeshift camps, abandoned buildings, or even out in the open parking lots in Sidon,” she added, stressing that the situation is particularly dire in areas like the capital, Beirut, which was already overpopulated prior to the escalation.
Hector Hajjar, Lebanon’s caretaker minister of social affairs, has denied accusations of discrimination against displaced Syrians. According to Lebanon’s National News Agency, Hajjar said earlier this month that his government was committed to safeguarding all affected groups.
Stressing that “UNHCR appreciates Lebanon’s generous hospitality in hosting so many refugees and understands the challenges this adds at this very delicate juncture,” the UN agency’s spokesperson Abou Khaled called on “all actors to maintain and apply humanitarian principles and allow equal access to assistance.”
“Newly displaced Syrians and Lebanese in several regions tell us that they have had to sleep in the open,” she said, adding that “UNHCR and partners are working with the relevant authorities on finding urgent solutions to this issue.”
Lebanon has the most refugees per capita in the world, hosting some 1.5 million Syrians prior to the current escalation, according to government estimates.
Zaher Sahloul, president of MedGlobal, called on humanitarian agencies to “act swiftly to provide the protection and support these refugees urgently need.”
“Every person, regardless of nationality, deserves to be treated with dignity and compassion during this crisis,” he said in a statement in late September.
Unfortunately, this has not been the case for many Syrians in Lebanon.
Footage has emerged on social media showing the purported abuse of Syrians. In one such video, a man was seen tied to a post on a city street while the person filming claims this was done because people in Syria’s Idlib had celebrated the death of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah.
Meanwhile, some Lebanese politicians have seized upon the worsening situation in Lebanon to advance an anti-Syrian agenda, insisting Syria is now safe for them to return.
Last month, Bachir Khodr, the governor of Baalbek-Hermel, told Al-Jadeed TV that “the reason for the Syrians’ presence is the war in Syria. This war has ended, so they must now leave Lebanon, as the war is here now.”
Lebanon has endured a crippling economic crisis since 2019, which has plunged much of the population into poverty. In recent years, Lebanese politicians have characterized displaced Syrians as a burden on society and called for their deportation.
Despite human rights organizations unanimously agreeing in May that no part of Syria is safe for returnees, a UNHCR report in March highlighted that 13,772 Syrians had been deported from Lebanon or pushed back at the border with Syria in about 300 incidents in 2023.
Human Rights Watch also reported in April that Lebanese authorities “have arbitrarily detained, tortured, and forcibly returned Syrians to Syria,” including activists and army defectors.
Disputing the findings, Khodr, the governor of Baalbek-Hermel, argued that the return of some “235,000 displaced Syrians” to their country “challenges the theory that the Syrian authorities might arrest those returning to it.”
“We have repeatedly said that the Syrian side has not harassed any of its citizens who have returned since the start of the voluntary return campaigns in 2018, but rather they have been treated in the best possible way,” Khodr posted on the social platform X on Oct. 8.
However, the UK-based Syrian Network for Human Rights reported that Syrian authorities have arrested 23 individuals who had returned from Lebanon since September.
For those Syrians who have chosen to remain in Lebanon, despite its many challenges, assistance provided by humanitarian aid agencies has become a vital lifeline.
Abou Khaled of UNHCR said her agency “is working relentlessly with humanitarian partners and Lebanese authorities to urgently find safe shelter for those without any.”
“A comprehensive emergency shelter strategy has been shared with proposed shelter solutions in all Lebanese regions and work is ongoing at the cadastre and district levels to implement parts of it.”
She added: “Current hostilities, compounded by the ongoing socio-economic situation, create challenges for all communities, all of whom deserve equal access to safety and dignity.”
Israel’s ban on UN agency for Palestinian refugees will have ‘catastrophic consequences’
- UNRWA commissioner-general Philippe Lazzarini says entire generation of Palestinians will be denied right to an education
- UN member states urged to consider the effects Israel’s decision on the ‘international rules-based order’
An Israeli law banning the UN agency that helps Palestinian refugees will have “catastrophic consequences” that threaten regional stability, the head of the organization warned on Wednesday.
In an impassioned plea to the General Assembly, Philippe Lazzarini, the commissioner general of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, urged member states to take action to prevent Israel’s move against his organization.
The Israeli parliament voted last month to cut ties with UNRWA and ban it from operating in Israel. The law, which is expected to be implemented within three months, will severely limit the agency’s ability to operate in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza, where millions of Palestinians rely on its services.
Meanwhile, the appalling humanitarian situation in Gaza continues to deteriorate, with international aid groups accusing Israel this week of failing to meet US demands to alleviate the suffering.
Lazzarini spelled out the severity of the situation in his address to the General Assembly as he issued stark warnings about the far-reaching implications of the decision to ban UNRWA. He said it would not only cause the humanitarian response in Gaza to collapse but also deal a blow to the international rules-based order under which all UN agencies must operate.
“The risk of the agency’s collapse threatens the lives and futures of individuals and communities, the stability of the region, and the integrity of our multilateral system,” Lazzarini said.
UNRWA, he added, has become another casualty of the war in Gaza, during which Israeli forces have killed more than 43,000 people, the majority of them women and children. He said famine has probably already taken hold in the territory, and hunger and disease are widespread.
“The implementation of the Knesset (Israeli parliament) legislation will have catastrophic consequences,” Lazzarini said.
“In Gaza, dismantling UNRWA will collapse the United Nations’ humanitarian response, which relies heavily on the agency’s infrastructure.”
He went on to highlight the devastating effects the ban would have on education in Gaza, where “in the absence of a capable public administration or state, only UNRWA can deliver education to more than 660,000 girls and boys.
“In the absence of UNRWA, an entire generation will be denied the right to education. Their future will be sacrificed, sowing the seeds for marginalization and extremism.”
Schooling for a further 50,000 children in the West Bank would also be under threat, along with primary health care for half a million Palestinian refugees.
Lazzarini repeated previous requests for UN member states to do whatever they can to halt the implementation of the Israeli ban and maintain funding for UNRWA. He painted Israel’s actions targeting the agency as representing a wider threat to the UN and the multilateral world order under which it operates.
“The United Nations and its staff are in an increasingly untenable position; if the legal and political framework within which we operate does not hold, we cannot stay and deliver,” he said.
Speaking later to the press, Lazzarini said there had been much anger and condemnation in response to the Israeli law and he hopes there might still be some pathway to prevent its implementation. But he conceded this might be “wishful thinking.”
The Israeli law was widely criticized in the region and the wider international community. Saudi Arabia described it as a “flagrant violation of international law and a direct violation of the rules of international legitimacy.”
On Tuesday, the US said Israeli authorities had made some progress in increasing the flow of aid to Gaza and, as a result, Washington would not limit weapons transfers to the country. However, this came as a report published by eight international aid agencies said conditions in the territory were worse than at any point in the war.
Israel claims that some UNRWA staff took part in the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas on Israel last year, which killed about 1,200 people and sparked the war in Gaza. The UN reacted by firing nine of the agency’s workers that might have been involved. Lazzarini said the agency has a “zero-tolerance approach” to any breaches of its neutrality.
Why is only limited aid getting to Palestinians inside Gaza?
- Aid groups accuse the Israeli military of hindering and even blocking shipments in Gaza
JERUSALEM: The US decided not to punish Israel over the dire humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip after giving it an ultimatum to increase aid entering the territory. But the flow of food, medicine and other supplies to Palestinians is still at nearly its lowest level of the entire 13-month-old war.
The White House last month gave Israel 30 days to improve conditions or risk losing military support. As the deadline expired Tuesday, leading international aid groups said Israel had fallen far short.
But the US State Department announced it would not take any punitive action, saying Israel has made limited progress. However, it called for more steps.
Aid groups accuse the Israeli military of hindering and even blocking shipments in Gaza. Almost the entire population of around 2.3 million Palestinians relies on international aid for survival, and doctors and aid groups say malnutrition is rampant. Food security experts say famine may already be underway in hard-hit north Gaza.
“It’s really frustrating because by almost every objective metric, all agencies say that the humanitarian situation has gotten worse in that time frame that the US has specified,” Aseel Baidoun, a senior manager of the aid group Medical Aid for Palestinians, said.
“Even though we have provided all the evidence that there is a risk of famine ... still the U.S. miraculously finds Israel not violating the humanitarian aid law.”
Israel, which controls all crossings into Gaza, says it is committed to delivering humanitarian assistance and has scrambled to ramp up aid.
COGAT, the military body in charge of aid passage, said they had taken a number of steps over the past month to increase the amount entering the territory, including opening a fifth crossing — into central Gaza — this week.
Israel says the UN and international aid groups need to do a better job of distributing supplies.
Aid into Gaza is typically measured in terms of truckloads of food and supplies entering the territory. The US has demanded 350 trucks daily — still below the 500 a day that entered before the war.
In October, aid entry plunged to its lowest level since the first month of the war. Israeli government figures show roughly 57 trucks a day entering on average. The average has risen to 100 a day so far in November, slightly lower than the same month last year.
The UN, however, says even less is entering. It reports receiving an average of 39 trucks daily since the beginning of October. This is largely because it says it cannot reach the main crossing point in the south to collect cargos due to Israeli military restrictions and lawlessness. The UN says virtually no food or other aid has reached the northernmost part of Gaza since the beginning of October. That’s when the Israeli military launched a major offensive against Hamas fighters in the area of Jabaliya, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun, cutting them off.
Israel says October’s drop in aid was because it closed crossings into Gaza during the Jewish high holidays. It said it couldn’t allow deliveries to the far north in October because of the fighting.
Under international pressure, COGAT allowed two deliveries to the far north this month.
But little of it got through. Last week, the World Food Programme said troops on the ground ordered its trucks to unload their cargo before reaching their destination.
