DERIK, Syria (North Press) – Ibrahim Muhammad, 46, has been living for several days in a reception tent in Newroz Camp in the countryside of Derik (al-Malikiyah), a city in Syria’s far northeast, with dozens of families who fled their villages recently due to shelling by Turkish forces.
The Turkish forces and their affiliated armed opposition factions, also known as Syrian National Army (SNA), has recently intensified their shelling on inhabited villages and vital facilities in the countryside of the towns of Tel Tamr and Abu Rasin north of Hasakah, causing huge displacement from these areas to Newroz Camp.
However, because there are no available tents, these families are forced to live in the two reception tents, which are two large tents, containing about 17 rooms. Each room houses several families, amid lack of air conditioning means.
Women lay down on the floor of these rooms whatever they managed to take out with them while fleeing, including mats and blankets to sit on.
While others swing a piece of cardboard over their children to cool them in these scalding tents.
Muhammad, an Internally Displaced Person (IDP) from Qabir Kabir, a village east of Tel Tamr, said that they were forced to flee along with other families to the camp after intense shelling on their village.
Other families from the village were displaced to different areas of Hasakah, Tel Tamr and other places.
“We could no longer stay under the shelling, fearing for the lives of our children,” he added.
Qabir Kabir and other villages in the countryside of Tel Tamr and Abu Rasin have been repeatedly subjected to Turkish bombardment since Turkey and the SNA took control of Sere kaniye (Ras al-Ain) and Tel Abyad in 2019.
The residents of these villages would usually flee their homes and stay outdoors, and go back when the shelling stops.
However, after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced on May 23 a new military operation in northern Syria, the shelling has intensified, causing human casualties and material damage.
On June 2, a child from the village of Umm Harmala in Abu Rasin countryside was injured as a result of intense Turkish shelling on the countryside of Tel Tamr and Abu Rasin.
Last week, 27 families from the countryside of Tel Tamr and Abu Rasin were displaced to Newroz Camp, bringing the number of families in the camp to 1,020, comprising 5,460 individuals, according to Nadim Omar, head of the camp’s relation office.
Omar told North Press that the tents have not been provided to the camp for several months, leaving the new IDPs without shelter. According to the camp’s management, 200 families are living without private tents.
Omar said that several days earlier they had received new tents from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). He noted that the tents would be distributed to the IDPs after they finish preparing them, without specifying the time of completion.
Nevertheless, the new tents lack electricity, water, kitchens and bathrooms.
According to Omar, during the coming period the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) will expand the camp and build about 22 units, each comprising 23 tents, and provide them with sanitation and private kitchens and bathrooms.
The situation of Abdulkarim Taha, 28, an IDP from the village of Tel al-Thiyab in Sere Kaniye countryside, is not much better than the other IDPs’, as he has been living in one room in the reception tents for one month.
Taha was displaced from Sere kaniye during the Turkish military operation against his city in October 2019 to villages in Abu Rasin countryside, and with the repeated shelling, he fled with his family to Newroz Camp.
“There is no life here, but what could we do? We fled the Turkish shelling,” he said.