Sanctions hit aid for beleaguered Syrians

Donations from crisis-ridden Lebanon yesterday continued to flow into Syria for victims of the devastating February 6th earthquakes which killed 46,000 in Turkey and Syria. At least 16 Lebanese were killed and Lebanon itself was shaken both physically and psychologically. Since the quakes, Lebanese search and rescue teams and warm clothing and blankets have been rushed to Syria.

Instead of these items, L’Orient Today cited Rami of the charity, Syrian Eyes, as saying, “There is a huge need for infant milk, and we are trying to find as much as we can. But unfortunately, this product is also lacking in Lebanon…. In addition to baby milk, the priority is now given to medicines, especially those for chronic diseases such as diabetes and hypertension but also batteries, flashlights, first kits, and hygiene products.”

Both infant milk and medicines are in short supply in Lebanon due to the country’s four-year economic and social meltdown. Nevertheless, Lebanese are donating whatever they can afford. Although 80 per cent of Lebanese live in poverty, they are sharing scarce resources with Syrians, 90 per cent of whom were below the poverty line before the quake struck Aleppo, Latakia, Hama and Tartous.

Lebanon’s quake relief aid is collected by a host of civil society organisations and is sent to Aleppo and coastal Latakia. “It is impossible to reach Idlib from Lebanon,” stated Nation Station’s Hussein Kazoun. Aid deliveries via Syrian government-held territory for devastated Idlib have been rejected by Al-Qaeda offshoot Hay ‘at Tahrir al-Sham which controls the province and is branded a “terrorist” organisation by the UN and US.

The Syrian government reported 1,414 fatalities in the 70 per cent of the country it controls while the UN said there were 4,400 deaths in Idlib. The borders of Lebanon and Syria remain porous despite the carve-up of post-Ottoman Arab lands by colonial powers Britain following World War I. While families and communities were divided by the artificially drawn border between Lebanon and Syria, ties remain strong more than a century later.

Borders between Syria and Jordan and Syria and Palestine also fail to erase family and communal connections. Arab-to-Arab ties on the personal, family, community and country levels also remain a determinant of inter-Arab relations despite political differences.

While the West, the UN and major Western charities have delivered to Turkey earthmoving equipment, search and rescue teams, funds, and material aid, ostracised and heavily sanctioned Syria has depended on the Arabs for most aid. More than 120 aircraft laden with tents, food, clothing, and medicine have landed at Syrian airports, half of them from the UAE which resumed diplomatic relations with Syria in 2018. Since then, the Federation has promoted normalisation with Damascus with the aim of reconstructing war damaged cities, towns, and villages. Saudi Arabia has sent two aircraft laden with aid while Iraq has dispatched both flights and lorry convoys and Algeria aid flights. Tens of millions of dollars are being donated in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and other Gulf Cooperation Council countries.

While the UN called for $400 million in donations for 8.8 million Syrians, the estimate of the number living in Idlib has been inflated to four or, even, five million (perhaps, to attract financial aid) when the estimated figure has been about 3.5 million.

By contrast with the massive flow of aid into Turkey, where death and devastation was greatest, Syria was an afterthought until Idlib, which was heavily hit, gained attention by constant complaining about being ignored. Three days after the quake, the first convoy of aid crossed into Idlib via the Turkish Bab al-Hawa crossing, the sole entry point for aid in the Tahrir al-Sham-held province.

Under pressure to open two additional crossings from Turkey, the Syrian government authorised passage for three months and aid began to arrive on the 14th in Idlib from Bab al-Salam. No aid has passed through reopened al-Raee crossing as it is far from Idlib.

World Food Programme head David Beasley said on Saturday that while the Syrian and Turkish governments were cooperating well, the “authorities” in Idlib were blocking access to his agency’s operations. The group seems to be shooting itself in the foot. The Western powers have handed Tahrir al-Sham the opportunity to oversee the dispersal of aid, thereby gaining credit for providing essential goods for the people who live in Idlib.

Syrians who have continued to live in Syria through war, impoverishment by sanctions, and now earthquakes stay on because they have no choice or no desire to leave their beloved, beleaguered country.

Many have to depend on relatives abroad for the cash to provide them with a living. However, even money transfer firms have been inundated with so many demands to send funds to Syria that their systems are blocked. To make matters worse, transfer firms closed in Aleppo during the fighting so people from Syria’s largest city must travel to Damascus or Latakia to receive funds – if they arrive and sometimes they do not. Local recipients – who must stand in long lines in the cold – do not welcome outsiders.

While the Biden administration stuck by its punitive sanctions regime imposed on the Syria for several days, the US relented by lifting sanctions on humanitarian goods for six months. There should never have been a question of imposing sanctions on such material – food, medicine, and other essential items – because they were supposed, in theory, to be exempt from sanctions but were, in fact, included. Unilateral US sanctions have always amounted to collective punishment of targeted communities because the US Treasury Department has threatened to impose punishments and fines on individuals, firms and governments which dared to do business with Damascus. Collective punishment is illegal under international law.

Sanctions have deprived Syrians who live in government-held areas of funds and materials for post-war reconstruction, medicines (including Covid and cholera vaccines), spare parts for infrastructure machinery, fertilisers for agriculture, and scores of other items required to provide a decent living for Syrians who are the victims of a dozen years of war and three years of drought which has driven farmers from their land and severely reduced food production.