Syrian innocents go home to land they’ve never seen
In trucks piled high with belongings and their livestock safely tethered, hundreds of Syrian refugees made their journey home yesterday after years in makeshift camps.
More than 300 people displaced by the nation’s seven-year civil war set off on their journey across dusty mountain tracks from the remote border town of Arsal in Lebanon.
They were among 25,000 Syrians who have volunteered to return as part of a scheme agreed by President Bashar Assad. They include children setting foot in their homeland for the first time, having been born in refugee camps.
But as many spoke of their relief to be heading back to their bombed-out villages, other families were torn apart as some relatives had not got approval to go back.
Sobbing, nouha Bo Ali Haj, 14, said she was returning from a camp on the outskirts of Arsal with her father – but not her mother, who is waiting for approval.
Asked why she was crying, she said: ‘I am going to miss my mother.’
Rimi Bo Ali, 50, said: ‘I registered but my name has not come back.’
She said her family had been forced to leave their home in the town of Fleta, just across the border, in 2014 and added: ‘We are living in a camp – it is better for us to live in a house. Over there is our country and our home.’
One father, who did not want to be named, said he was saying goodbye to his wife and children because he had not yet been given permission to return.
Asked why not, his friend responded: ‘Because Bashar [Assad] is not happy with him.’
The president, who has the backing of Russia and Iran, is claiming victory in the civil war, having retaken most of the territory rebels seized during the war that has killed more than 400,000 and driven millions from their homes.
He has declared the country safe for Syrians again, but thousands of his countrymen have applied to return, only to be rejected by the dictator’s government.
Families gathered from 6am in a heavily guarded parking area as they waited for the military to cross their names off a register. Tanks and dozens of troops kept watch from the hillside as lorries, trucks, tractors and cars crammed full of refugees waited to be let through the checkpoint.
One woman said her husband had been killed and she was returning to her home in Yabroud, southern Syria, adding: ‘I don’t have any other choice but to go back.’
Moments later the army told her she was not on the list and could not pass.
Some 320 Syrians were expected to return home yesterday. Among them was Mahmood Jarboa, his five children, and his 100-year- old grandmother. In his truck he also had a horse he had brought to Lebanon with him from Syria, a dog, a sheep and 15 goats.
Speaking about his grandmother, he said: ‘She was of course afraid she might never have made it back to Syria. She is very happy. All of us are feeling the same.’
Hiba, 27, her husband Wasim, 30, and their three children are
‘We are all very happy’
returning to Yabroud after spending four years in Lebanon, where their one-year-old twins, Joud and Juliana, were born.
Speaking about why they left, Hiba said: ‘‘We left after the first battle – there was a lot of bombing. We came straight to Arsal.’
Asked why they were returning, she said: ‘We hope God gives us what is best for Syria. We just want peace.’