Lebanese
Refugees Crowd Damascus
By Dahr Jamail
20 July, 2006
Inter Press Service
DAMASCUS, Jul 20
(IPS) - Syrian capital Damascus is being flooded with refugees.
The devastation in Beirut is beginning to show in another capital.
The disaster response director
at the Damascus headquarters of the Red Crescent, Raed al-Tollin, told
IPS that while he does not have exact figures, their shelter has been
deluged with refugees since the crisis began.
"The citizens of Syria
are helping with water, food and beds," he said. "Already
we are lodging refugees in schools, cathedrals, college dormitories
and anywhere else we can find for them."
One of the biggest difficulties
at the moment is lack of baby food, Tollin said. "So far we are
managing to cope with this crisis, but we don't know how much more to
expect. Eventually, at this rate, we could run out of everything.."
Tollin said he and his 150
volunteers would continue to do all they can to help the refugees "until
we are out of everything or have completely exhausted ourselves."
A 22-year-old volunteer at
the headquarters, Ramez al-Rowaz, said the centre is running out of
beds and supplies for the growing number of refugees.
The United Nations has said
that at least 900,000 Lebanese have been displaced by the Israeli bombing.
Lebanon has a population of 3.8 million.
"We are trying to prepare
ourselves for a long crisis," Rowaz told IPS while handing a loaf
of bread to a family that had just arrived from southern Lebanon. "Now
there are orphanages and schools taking people, but the problem is how
long can they stay at the schools, especially when classes begin again."
Rowaz said she had to assist
more than 100 people Wednesday to find lodging. Some of the first people
to have arrived were fleeing tourists, but now it is mostly Lebanese
families.
"The journey to the
border, which used to take two to three hours is now taking 10-12 hours,"
Rowaz said. "We have aid stations at the borders that are doing
everything they can to help these suffering people."
Hassan Hamdan, a 60-year-old
man who left southern Lebanon Wednesday, described a scene of total
devastation.
"The Israelis are bombing
everything; buildings, civilian homes, the water, electricity, all is
destroyed now," he told IPS. "Even the Red Cross there was
bombed by these murderers. Then they bombed near the UN building, near
my destroyed home."
Article 48 from the 1949
Geneva Conventions states the need to protect the civilian population.
"In order to ensure
respect for and protection of the civilian population and civilian objects,
the Parties to the conflict shall at all times distinguish between the
civilian population and combatants and between civilian objects and
military objectives and accordingly shall direct their operations only
against military objectives."
Israeli bombing of the civilian
infrastructure of Lebanon is a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions.
That makes Israeli actions a war crime.
Hamdan said the Israeli attacks
were not killing any of the Hezbollah resistance fighters, but were
focused on the civilian infrastructure.
"They shredded our city,"
he said. "They thought this would turn us against Hezbollah, but
now everyone is with Hezbollah. How could they be otherwise?"
Diala Hayda, another volunteer
for the Red Crescent at the headquarters building in Damascus, told
IPS that many of the refugees she is assisting were so desperate to
leave that they left everything behind.
"So many are arriving
here with only the clothes they wear and whatever money they had in
their wallet," she said, "So of course they are desperate
and angry."
Countless refugees are headed
for shelters all over Damascus. At a centre set up by the Syrian Personal
Relations Association, a non-governmental organisation, refugee Walid
al-Hammad described scenes of utter destruction caused by Israeli bombings.
"They have cut the roads
to pieces and are bombing everywhere," he told IPS. "We left
yesterday, with our six kids and our neighbours -- we ran for our lives.
Nothing is left of where we lived. Our city is demolished, yet they
aren't killing any resistance fighters."
Affaf, a 21-year-old mother
holding her one-month-old baby, fled Baalbek city in the Beka Valley
of Lebanon.
"Baalbek is destroyed
and they cut our water and electricity," she said. "They are
bombing only civilians, so now most Lebanese are with Hezbollah."
Since the Israeli attacks
on Lebanon began, more than 330 Lebanese, the vast majority of them
civilians, have been killed. The death toll in Israel is 25, 13 of them
civilians.