As the battle for Syria intensifies, people are struggling to survive, writes MICHAEL JANSENin Damascus
THE SYRIAN Arab Red Crescent’s (Sarc) centre for aid distribution, in Meisat at the foot of Qasyoun mountain, is a temporary facility consisting of a prefab and a large tent. In the prefab sit eight student volunteers creating a computer data base for the 17,000 families registered with the centre, representing roughly 100,000 displaced from Homs, Idlib and Deir al-Zor during fighting between the army and rebels.
In the tent are stacks of hygiene parcels containing soap, toothpaste, washing powder, boxes of kitchen utensils, packages of rice, oil, lentils, sugar, tea, boxes of milk powder, nappies and items for babies contributed by the International Committee of the Red Cross, Sarc’s partner, and the World Food Programme.
From Meisat we proceed fitfully through tight traffic to Midan, the central quarter of the capital from which rebels were driven 10 days ago.
In a narrow street in Old Midan a stack of carved alabaster tombstones lean against the wall of a shop. Damascus is caught up in the carnage that has afflicted provincial towns and cities these last 17 months. This sector of Midan is unscathed, including the massive modern mosque where large anti-government protests once took place on Fridays after prayers.
Damage is concentrated in “New Midan” en route to the Yarmouk quarter where tens of thousands of Palestinians live.
We pause at the Hela City Centre, a mall transformed into a depot next to the Sarc hospital and operations room. Aid parcels are stacked neatly and incongruously among electronic games and rides for children.
Parcels are being loaded on a lorry in front of the building where a clutch of black-clad women from Homs demand aid. But they must go to the distribution centres.
Manager Bassel Diab says: “The mall’s owner offered us the space. It’s good because of the air-conditioning. But everything will be gone by tomorrow to our distribution centres in Maisat and Saida Zeinab”, a separate township on the airport road where 48 Iranians riding in a bus were kidnapped on Saturday by ultra-orthodox Sunni Salafis.
Inside the gate of a nearby school surrounded by a high wall is a man frying batches of potatoes in a cauldron. On the opposite side of the narrow yard men sheltering under an umbrella are peeling enough potatoes to feed the displaced living here and in another school. Lettuces rest in piles waiting to be transformed into salad.
Three hundred and forty people are sheltering here, all refugees from wars in Somalia and Sudan. Even they are not immune to the conflict in this country. The Somalis and Sudanese come from Tal and Harasta, hot areas north of Damascus.
One room houses a dozen women and children, sitting and lying on thick mattresses. Three of the children are severely disabled.
Shoes are scattered over the floor and a folded wheelchair rests against a divan pushed against one wall. The women, dressed in bright flowing robes and head-coverings, rise and press round, hoping we are aid workers.
“We are forgotten. No one comes to help us,” they wail in chorus. Children stand beside their mothers, saucer-eyed, shy.
Mulkie Youssef, a Somali woman who proudly states she has a “BA-pass” from a university in New Delhi, says: “In Tal there were bombs and shooting. We were caught in the middle. We cannot go back there.
“We were told by the Somali community centre to go to Hilal al-Ahmar [Sarc]. We have been here 10 days. We are women and children and few men. If fighting comes here we cannot run, not with all these children. We are women; we cannot carry the handicapped.
“We have been safe in the school but we cannot sleep. We can hear bombing and shooting at night.
“We don’t know what will happen. We want to leave Syria. We are afraid. Let them dump us on the border.
“We cannot go back to Somalia; it is the same situation.”