The suffering of Syrian earthquake survivors a year after the disaster

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Northern Syria -

The night of February 6, a year ago, was not like other nights that the residents of northern Syria and southern Turkey experienced, following the devastating earthquake that killed 4,256 people and injured 11,774 others.

The Syrian girl, Maryam Al-Ahmad (12 years old), suffered from “mass syndrome.” She said: "The artificial legs (crutches) have accompanied me at all times. At first I had great difficulty walking, but now, after a year, I have adapted to them. But I want to get rid of them and return to playing and running with my colleagues and brothers."

Maryam insists on going to school on crutches to share desks and time with her classmates, before returning to her tent, which was built on the ruins of her home, where she lives with her family.

Her wishes are limited to getting rid of crutches, and being able to walk to her school, run and play with her classmates, and she wishes recovery for all children affected by the earthquake disaster.

In the same disaster, Mrs. Najwa Al-Saloum survived with her family, but she lost her home in the city of Idlib and became homeless, and moved to the village of “Al-Zuhur” in Jabal Kili in the northern countryside of Idlib.

She says, "Residential apartments are still better than tents, but their distance from the city center causes a lot of problems in terms of health, education, and services."

Syrian Abu Hussam adds: “There are moments when we transport pregnant women on motorcycles before giving birth, because there is no ambulance or 24-hour medical point in this residential village, which has 5,000 people. We transport our children to school by motorcycle or on foot.” Feet.

Regarding the first moments of the earthquake, Abu Hussam mentions: “We did not know where to go. There was destruction everywhere. Houses collapsed on top of their owners’ heads.” He added, "After great suffering, we received this residential apartment in Mount Killi, but we lost everything under the rubble, and now we need everything."

The child, Maryam Al-Ahmad, excels in her studies and insists on going to school on crutches (Al-Jazeera)

Moments of first response

Mounir Mustafa, Deputy Director General of the Syrian Civil Defense, says that the Civil Defense pulled out 2,950 people trapped under the rubble, provided them with first aid, and transported them to hospitals. He also contributed to equipping a village housing 7,000 families, contributed to preparing the infrastructure of water and sanitation networks, and provided other assistance with the participation of several organizations.

The director of Human Appeal, Thaer Najjar, said: “Our teams rushed to provide services to those affected from the first moments of the earthquake, and after that there was direct coordination with the main office to assess the situation of those affected on the ground and provide a rapid response, and conduct statistics and questionnaires for a number of those affected in the areas of Jarabulus, Jindires and Idlib.” Salqin and Armanaz.

He added: “Due to the great need to secure urgent housing for those affected, we worked to transform a housing project that we had started in mid-2022 to host displaced people living in tents, into a shelter to which the families of those affected by the earthquake were transferred, and a thousand families consisting of 5 thousand people were transferred from areas Jindires and the Idlib countryside.”

A year after its occurrence, the effects of the earthquake still remain on residential buildings in the city of Jenderes (Al Jazeera).

Compensation attempts

Response coordinators in Syria documented the damage to 334,821 families, with a population of 1,843,911 individuals. The earthquake caused the displacement of 48,122 families, with a population of 311,662 individuals. Children, women, and special cases constituted 67% of the total displaced people.

Director of the Response Coordinators, Muhammad Hallaj, said in an interview with Al Jazeera Net: “The earthquake caused the displacement of hundreds of thousands without having shelter or a place to go to. After the organizations responded and restored some of the homes, approximately 51 thousand people remained in camps and shelter centers without a response.”

Hallaj added that a donor conference was held twice in 2023 to discuss the response to those affected by the earthquake, the first in April, in which it collected 1.1 billion US dollars, of which 400 million dollars were allocated to northwestern Syria, and although the amount was fully distributed among the projects, the response rate that It was achieved by 53.73% of those affected by the earthquake.

As for the second conference, it was held in Brussels and was dedicated to those affected by the earthquake in Syria. The value of donations amounted to 5.41 billion dollars, and the humanitarian response to the 2023 plan was implemented by 33%, which is the lowest response rate since 2014, due to the failure of the Security Council to extend the cross-border aid delivery mechanism. to Syria.

Source: Al Jazeera