{"id":38003,"date":"2019-03-29T22:23:21","date_gmt":"2019-03-29T22:23:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=38003"},"modified":"2019-03-29T22:23:21","modified_gmt":"2019-03-29T22:23:21","slug":"a-tragic-life-for-the-displaced-in-al-hol-camp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=38003","title":{"rendered":"A \u2018tragic life\u2019 for the displaced in Al-Hol camp"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\nAL-HOL CAMP: Malnourished children struck down by chronic diarrhea, mothers too weak to breastfeed \u2014 in northeastern Syria\u2019s Al-Hol camp, a humanitarian emergency is unfolding.<\/p>\n

\nArabic, French, German and English voices fill the air in the muddy alleyways, as foreign women who married into Daesh and civilians displaced by the fighting against terroorists seek out assistance.<\/p>\n

\nBut while much divides the two groups, one thing unites them; they despair over the camp\u2019s lack of food and medical care.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cIt is a tragic life,\u201d said Najwa Ali Jolane, a young Syrian mother who has lived at Al-Hol for three and a half months.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWe lack everything,\u201d the 20-year-old said.<\/p>\n

\nFlapping in the springtime breeze, white tents embossed with the UN refugee agency\u2019s acronym UNHCR stretch as far as the eye can see.<\/p>\n

\nBut the threadbare structures cannot cope with the flood of women and children who in recent months have fled a string flattened villages in eastern Syria, including Baghouz, where Daesh\u2019s so-called caliphate was declared defeated on Saturday<\/p>\n

\nThe most fortunate families in Al-Hol have their own tents, while the unlucky ones shelter with dozens of others in warehouses.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cThere are 10,000 people living in large communal tents which lack privacy,\u201d said Paul Donohoe, from the International Rescue Committee.<\/p>\n

\nAn extra 5,000 tents are needed to house people, he said.<\/p>\n

\nThe flood of arrivals in Al-Hol has transformed the camp into a chaotic town.<\/p>\n

\nIt now brims with more than 70,000 people, but was only designed to accommodate a seventh of that number.<\/p>\n

\nKurdish authorities have raised the alarm and called on the international community to step up and help.<\/p>\n

\nIn front of a World Food Programme warehouse, huge lines of women \u2014 all dressed in the full black niqab \u2014 stand in the mud, awaiting rations that the UN agency says are enough for a month.<\/p>\n

\nSome in the line refuse to speak to journalists, but others \u2014 Jolane included \u2014 take the opportunity to rail against their misfortune.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cOn days when it rains, our tent is flooded with water, so we have to move to a neighbors\u2019 tents,\u201d said the former resident of Hajjin, a village near Baghouz that was flattened by fighting in December.<\/p>\n

\nJolane\u2019s son, just a few months old, is dressed in dusty and muddy clothes, his feet exposed.<\/p>\n

\nWFP\u2019s Syria spokesperson Marwa Awad acknowledges that \u201chumanitarian conditions in Al-Hol camp are extremely critical.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWhat is lacking is proper space for the continuous influx of people as well as proper health facilities to treat injuries and diseases,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\nA Syrian woman, who did not want to give her name, said her three-year-old daughter \u201chas been sick since she arrived here\u201d around one month ago.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cShe is vomiting and has persistent diarrhea,\u201d she said angrily.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWe were brought here in uncovered vehicles. The children fell sick (and) many died on the way,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

\nAt least 140 people, mainly children, have died en route to Al-Hol or shortly after arriving since December, according to the IRC.<\/p>\n

\nCordoned off from the main camp and deemed a security threat, the foreign women who joined Daesh complain that their money and cell phones have been confiscated.<\/p>\n

\nMany fear chronic diarrhea could weaken their children beyond the point of no return.<\/p>\n

\nThey told AFP they have been unable to get hold of Flagyl, a drug commonly used to treat persistent cases.<\/p>\n

\nAccording to Save the Children, some 30 percent of children under the age of five screened at the camp since the start of February suffer acute malnutrition and WFP says it has tracked several cases of \u201cdehydration and diarrhea.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nThe future of the 9,000 women and children held in the foreigners\u2019 section of Al-Hol is a constant headache for Kurdish authorities, who want to get rid of them, but Western capitals are reluctant or outright refuse to bring them home.<\/p>\n

\nThe foreign women are monitored closely and Kurdish guards escort them when they go to market in the main part of the camp.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWe cannot stay here, we have no food, no money,\u201d said Romina Scheer, a young German woman.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWe want to go home.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nShe said she traveled to Syria in December 2014 to join Daesh, where she married a fellow German Daesh member.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cI cannot breastfeed because I did not have enough to eat,\u201d said Scheer.<\/p>\n

\nHer children include a three-month-old baby boy and an eight-year-old daughter whose blonde pigtails and earring mark a stark contrast with her mother\u2019s austere attire.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cMy children \u2014 every day they ask: \u2018Mummy when are we going to go home?\u2019\u201d said Scheer.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cAnd I say: \u2018it depends on our country, (and) if they take us back.\u2019\u201c<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AL-HOL CAMP: Malnourished children struck down by chronic diarrhea, mothers too weak to breastfeed \u2014 in northeastern Syria\u2019s Al-Hol camp, a humanitarian emergency is unfolding. Arabic, French, German and English voices fill the air in the muddy alleyways, as foreign women who married into Daesh and civilians displaced by the fighting against terroorists seek out…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":38004,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=38003"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38003\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/38004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=38003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=38003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=38003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}