Experiencing Syria’s pain first hand

David Adams, based at the Syrian border, is attempting to get into the country to provide much needed aid to its civilians.

David has worked with Goal since 2005 and has been working in Syria since last October documenting the plight of the population and the work they are doing on their behalf. GOAL works in 13 countries, and employs around 2,800 staff.

He shoots video, takes photographs, writes articles and blogs etc about things he has witnessed.

In a recent article he wrote:

“I was in the country the other week when news of the chemical weapons attack in Damascus filtered through to the people in our area.

“They were very angry that yet another atrocity had been committed against innocent civilians. However, they cannot understand why world leaders have, in the context of Syria, made a distinction between chemical weapons and so-called conventional weapons.

“As one woman put it to me: ‘So this means that the regime can butcher more than 100,000 of us with aerial bombs, mortars and bullets, and no one cares. But when it uses chemicals, they suddenly become excited’.

“Aside from ‘conventional’ fighting between rebel groups and government forces, government planes and helicopters frequently blanket-bomb heavily populated villages, towns, and city areas. The people in Northern Syria will not gather in a large crowd out-of-doors, and seem to spend half their time scanning the sky for planes and helicopters. Their fears are well justified.

“I have met countless numbers of people who have lost children, parents, siblings or close friends. In fact, it is quite difficult to meet someone in Syria amongst the displaced and the host communities who hasn’t got a horrific story to tell. You never become immune to the suffering, but some things do make a particular impression.

“I visited a hospital in February where three youngsters were lying in beds next to one another. In the first was a girl of 14, who had been badly wounded all along her right arm and down her right side by shrapnel from a grenade.

“In the next bed lay a young fellow of 12, who had lost his leg from above the knee in a bomb explosion and was fortunate that the surgeons were able to save the other leg.

“He was covered in shrapnel wounds and was in such agony that he couldn’t bear even the weight of a bed-sheet on him.

“In the third bed was a little girl of about four, who had been shot in the stomach. The entire time I was there she kept calling for her mother, ‘Mama, Mama…’ who was at her bedside. I left the hospital in tears, being comforted by, of all people, one of the parents and a surgeon.

“Only the other week I met an old man of 85, who had been arrested by government soldiers as he walked along the street in his hometown (from which he and his family have since fled). They beat and tortured him for a fortnight, before he was released.

“He is now so traumatised, all he would say to his grandson in reference to us was,

“Tell them I know nothing. For God’s sake I know nothing.”

“On the same day, we stopped with two young brothers who were playing together on a large pile of bricks, in an area where an entire heavily populated neighbourhood had been reduced to rubble by a recent, sustained aerial bombing raid by government planes and helicopters. The older boy showed us a large wound on his calf, where a fist-sized lump of flesh had been removed. The younger showed us a wound on his stomach.

“It turned out that the pile of bricks had been their home. Their entire family were killed when it was hit by a bomb, and lay buried somewhere beneath the rubble. The boys, who are now living with an uncle and his family, only escaped because they were playing outside when the bomber planes came.

“The horror stories are endless in Syria. My family are of course concerned about my safety (I’d be a bit concerned if they weren’t) but they fully support GOAL’s work, and the tiny part that I play in it.

There are at least 100,000 killed in Syria in the past two and half years with seven million in dire need of humanitarian aid. There are currently two million refugees with at least 4.25m.

“The last refugees, these people have been through a horrendous ordeal, but they have at least now escaped from the daily hell of Syria. They have shelter, food, water, medicines and medical aid. Most importantly of all, they are now safe.

“None of the above applies to those still stuck inside the country. The internally displaced, the group that GOAL works with, are living in schools, mosques, abandoned buildings, and sometimes out in the open (under trees) in 40C temperatures.

“These people have no ready access to water or electricity (the government has cut off supplies across large swathes of the country - essentially to all but government-supporting areas). They have little food, no money, and medicines and medical care are virtually non-existent.”

In earlier reports he wrote: “I was among a tiny group of GOAL people who entered the country (on GOAL’s second visit, last November) to assess the situation, the needs of the people, and to begin organising our programmes.

“We are working in Northern Syria.

“When we entered the town where we are now based (last November) fighting was still taking place between government troops and Free Syrian Army rebels, including during the time we were there. Gun battles raged throughout every day, and aerial bombs and mortar attacks were common.

“Nearly every building was pock-marked with bullet holes, and/or totally or partially destroyed, and there were numerous bomb craters along the main thoroughfares.

“Ten days before we arrived, a small mosque had been hit by an aerial bomb during Friday prayers, killing more than 70 people. Another bomb at a row of shops had killed 55 people.

“Not surprisingly, by the time we arrived, the entire civilian population of the town (about 20,000 people) had decamped for safety to surrounding villages and countryside.

“Our Syria programme is now the biggest emergency response in GOAL’s 36-year history. Bearing in mind that we responded to such disasters as the Haiti earthquake and the South East Asia tsunami.

“We currently employ 55 Syrian staff. We are providing a monthly food ration to 120,000 internally displaced people (and members of sorely-pressed host communities) each month.

“We are also distributing vouchers that can be redeemed at selected local shops for sundry other items that people need. We constantly monitor the shops to ensure that stocks are maintained and that prices are not being hiked. Soon we will be distributing vouchers to 133,000 people a month.

“I have been to Syria eight or nine times since last November. The longest I have spent here was a month, when we were recruiting local staff and setting up programmes.

“I am currently waiting, close to the border, to go back into Syria.

“Security issues – relating to profiteers and smugglers who have had their activities curtailed recently by the Free Syrian Army, and haven’t taken too kindly to this – have meant that my re-entry has been delayed.”