=By= Marienna Pope-Weidermann

Syrian refugees at a train station in Budapest, Hungary. Mstyslav Chernov. (CC BY-SA 4.0)

[dropcap]I[/dropcap]n October 1943 Adolf Hitler ordered the deportation of all Jews in Denmark to Nazi concentration camps. More than 99 percent of them were saved because thousands of people risked imprisonment—and worse—to smuggle over 7,500 men, women and children to safety in Sweden in a matter of days.

Similar stakes may now be imposed on volunteers in the Greek islands, as the EU border agency, Frontex, begins to assert its authority over an area that 400 people have drowned trying to reach since the New Year. ‘We do feel as if we are in the resistance in World War Two,’ said Lara, a young Dutch volunteer on Chios. ‘We were “randomly” checked for papers and passports and told not to feed the hungry. Every move we make is being watched now.’

Frontex takes control

At the end of 2015 a storm was brewing. Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia and Macedonia shut their doors, trapping hundreds of people in freezing temperatures at Greece’s northern border. The move triggered hunger strikes and demonstrations, with young men sewing their lips shut to represent their voicelessness, wielding signs that read ‘Shoot Us or Save Us.’ Meanwhile, Greece came under growing pressure from the EU to control the flow of people and was threatened with exclusion from the Schengen free movement.

In response, Syriza has done all it knows how to do—surrender—and now the walls are closing in. With a bankrupt government leaving gaping holes in its aid system and an EU earmarking its wealth for border control, solidarity networks were given an informal go-ahead to do the lifesaving work that no one else was going to do. By working night and day they achieved superhuman feats and became the thin line separating disaster from total barbarism. But now, they are under attack.

2016 started with a move to force all volunteers and charities helping refugees in Greece to register with the police. This might not sound unreasonable, except for three important points. Firstly, a lot of the help people need—whether it’s giving lifts to get vulnerable people out of the cold or cooking for starving families without waiting for Greek bureaucracy to catch up with its paperwork—all this is against the law.

This is part of the reason why independent volunteers are so important. As Lara explained, big aid agencies ‘can’t even provide for the most basic needs because of the rules.’ She continued: ‘Part of what creates this inhumane situation is a lack of self-responsibility. As an independent volunteer with twenty blankets, you know if you don’t distribute them there will be at least 20 people freezing to death and that’s on your conscience. If you work for UNHCR and you have 200 blankets but are forbidden to give them out, the order comes from higher up so your conscience doesn’t come into it. Instead of questioning, they put the responsibility outside of themselves, which is comfortable and convenient.’

The second point is that over half the Greek police force support the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn Party, so volunteers are effectively flipping a coin as to whether they’re sharing sensitive information with an armed fascist. Thirdly, volunteers are now being refused registration left, right and centre. This is not just about elbowing out the political activists; even Clowns Without Borders failed to make the cut, and were denied access to Lesbos’ main refugee camp.

Clearly, when Frontex started throwing volunteers in jail a few weeks ago it was a sign of things to come. The first five—two Danes from Team Humanity and three Proem-Aid lifeguards—were locked up on smuggling charges after they rescued 51 people from a stranded dinghy the coastguard would not look for. ‘They treated us like terrorists,’ one of the Proem-Aid volunteers told the Spanish newspaper El País when they were released on bail for €5-10,000 per head. The custodial sentence is five to ten years.

The weeks that followed have seen a systematic militarisation of the refugee reception system and a move to insulate it from independent witnesses. In the north of the country, border police have been forcing refugees away from volunteer-run food and medical stations and out of heated tents into sub-freezing temperatures—a barbaric practice condemned by Amnesty International. Police have also been demanding fake bribes from refugees: €100 to cross the border. It’s stories like this that highlight the irony of police screening for ‘fake volunteers’ supposedly out to take advantage of vulnerable refugees.

On the island of Chios, where one volunteer was been arrested on espionage charges for photographing a Frontex boat, Greek solidarity workers report that ‘Frontex is now present everywhere.’

‘The deployment has begun without any information given to local politicians or the population,’ they write. ‘Frontex policemen sit together with their Greek colleagues in Greek police cars, permanently patrolling the beaches where refugees land. And they no longer allow fisher boats rented by volunteers to leave the harbour.’ Elsewhere, volunteers have had their accommodation stormed by riot police and have been submitted to full-body searches.

Even food deliveries are being restricted. Sheri Carr, a 21 year old volunteer recently returned to the UK, had tried to deliver sandwiches to three destitute families trapped in a camp because they couldn’t afford a ticket to Athens. She recalled a protracted argument with a UNHCR employee who would not let the food through due to a fear it would ‘bring in mice.’ ‘He told me not to worry, because they had all they needed: two packs of energy biscuits and a bottle of water a day.’ She paused. ‘That’s their food.’

On Lesbos, seven international volunteers were even arrested for ‘stealing’ discarded lifejackets. And a volunteer-run spotting station guiding boats at sea has been shut down by Frontex in collaboration with the Hellenic Police, who’ve also arrested and barred volunteers from Camp Moria, which the latter had diligently spent months improving.

A refugee/volunteer transit camp on Platanos. Photo by Marienna Pope-Weidemann.

A coup by land, sea and air

But the crackdown on land is only half the story. A growing chorus of grassroots organisations condemn the deadly consequences of Frontex interfering with emergency volunteer rescue operations at sea. And as volunteer operations are curtailed they are not being replaced, reportedly leaving boats sinking at night, their passengers drowning quietly in the darkness.

According to numerous reports, refugees are no longer allowed to access self-organised coastal support services like those on Platanos, now threatened with demolition for building without a permit. The Platanos Refugee Solidarity group write that things have changed radically in recent weeks, as Frontex once more makes its presence felt: ‘Frontex vessels appeared and together with the Greek coastguard are barricading the sea the whole day. Very few refugees reach the shore [and so] no support from the frontline camps can be offered to these people, leading them to spend many hours without food, dry clothes and medical attention. Platanos sea rescue team was stopped several times from providing help or guidance to refugee boats and we were ordered to back away. In some cases the refugees had to wait for over an hour in the middle of the sea for the bigger Frontex ships to arrive and pick them up.’ Often, they are left waiting too long, or help never comes.

When survivors surface, it’s left—like everything else—to the volunteers to help reunite families and identify the dead. Even in this their efforts are increasingly frustrated. One volunteer describes how the formal family tracing service, ran by the Red Cross, requires forms to be printed, filled out in English and returned, which is impossible for many refugees in the camps.

‘We have more than 60 families we’ve helped submit paperwork and they get no reply,’ she told me. ‘We know they are building a database but it doesn’t seem to lead to any investigations. And we are ignored by Red Cross Athens, UNHCR, the police, the Hellenic Coastguard, everyone. And the system here is a mess. Back in the Autumn, they weren’t even trying to identify the bodies, just burying them in 24 hours in unmarked graves, or charging €6,000 for the bodies to be returned to family in Turkey! And no one is allowed to help us get information back to the families. “I want to help you but I need to think about my job”—that’s something we hear a lot from doctors in the hospitals.’

The crackdown on independent volunteers—by police repression or simply a bureaucratic system determined to freeze them out—has been ordered from the highest levels. The Council of the European Union is preparing plans to legally equate humanitarian assistance with smuggling and trafficking, thus criminalising those working to save lives and minimise suffering in the Aegean.

One lifeguard, on condition of anonymity and filled with shame, told me tearfully: ‘You can’t imagine what it’s like . . . to have a mother hold out her baby to you from a waterlogged boat, and to tell her that you can’t take the child into safety because you’ll go to prison.’

The gatekeepers

Now, the authorities are reaching out to strangle the airways. Flights for volunteers, scheduled by the humanitarian aid organisation Movement on the Ground, have been cancelled to allow authorities time to organise the registration process. As one volunteer whose flight was cancelled pointed out, the registration system means ‘there are a few NGOs on the island who will get total control.’

Presumably, these will be the ‘impartial’ NGOs that don’t concern themselves with the unsavoury political interests at play here, that won’t pass out blankets or beans when they’re not supposed to nor pass comment on the daily brutality of border controls and illegal pushbacks. The International Rescue Committee (IRC), for example, is one of the largest refugee agencies in the world. Active in over 40 countries, it gets funding from the US and UK governments and, according to the US historian Eric Thomas Chester, it has close ties to the CIA. Its overseers include prominent empire-builders like Henry Kissinger, Madeline Albright and Condoleezza Rice, and it is one of those ‘non-profit organisations’ whose CEO (none other than David Milliband) rakes in a cool £425,000 salary.

The IRC describes itself as ‘working closely’ with local volunteers. Although by its own admission it ‘does not have any special permission’ to operate on the island, sources on the ground report that it is playing a pivotal role enforcing the new registration system and clearing the beaches of independent volunteers.

Eric and Philippa Kempson have for years co-ordinated rescue and relief efforts from Eftalou beach and Eric has publicly complained about what he describes as the ‘bullying tactics’ of the IRC. ‘The IRC are kicking my volunteers off the beaches,’ he protested. ‘They’re in charge now, they say. This is the Americans taking over Lesbos in conjunction with the right-wing.’

Right-wing elements in the local community have been a persistent thorn in the side of the Kempson’s efforts, burning down their medical tent and pushing for local government to ban independent volunteers from the island and to forbid any aid work ‘within settled areas.’

Following the crackdown on volunteers was a blockade against the boats themselves. With NATO warships now deployed in the Aegean and returning stranded boats to Turkey—whose own attempts to stop boats reaching Greece appear increasingly violent—the flow of people has all but stopped. This is unlikely to be permanent, but may last long enough to drive out unregistered volunteers and militarise the islands under a new Frontex-led hotspot-detention system. It is a bid to re-establish government control of Europe’s borderlands, particularly Lesbos, an island which, at last, the world is watching.

But with fewer refugees crossing and fewer independent voices speaking out of what they endure, the world will turn away. Ultimately, booting independent volunteers off the island and pushing boats back to Turkey both serve to sweep the refugee crisis off European soil—and under a Turkish carpet. At the same time it re-directs donations back to the big agencies and destroys perhaps the most important achievement of independent volunteering: a network of whistle-blowers ready to scrutinise human rights abuses, who educate and humanise this crisis for people back home—the communities which vote in the governments of Fortress Europe.

But the crackdown is also politicising them. Confronted with the brutality of border control on one hand, and the tacit compliance of aid agencies on the other, they are looking elsewhere for answers. To quote 21-year-old James from Australia: ‘Seeing the agencies stand around, still waiting for the solution to yesterday’s problem to be approved, while a bunch of young people were working together, moving mountains with less funding… it’s what made me realise direct democracy can work.’

If they can bring that conviction and clear-sightedness back with them they will be powerful agents for political change at home. And ultimately, that’s what it will take to bring justice and humanity back to the frontlines: a moral revolution at Europe’s heart.

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Nauseated by the
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Had enough of their lies, escapism,
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=By= Mahboob Khawaja, PhD

Zatari Refugee Camp, Jordan. Foreign & Commonwealth. (CC BY-ND 2.0)

Once the Arabs were leaders in knowledge, creativity, science and human manifestation, progress and future-making – the Islamic civilization lasting for eight hundred years in Al-Andalusia- Spain. But when they replaced Islam – the power and core value of their advancements with petro-dollars transitory economic prosperity, they failed to THINK intelligently and fell in disgrace and lost what was gained over the centuries. They relied on Western mythologies of change and materialistic development which resulted in their self- geared anarchy, corruption, military defeats and disconnected authoritarianism. The Western strategists ran planned scams of economic prosperity to destroy the Arab culture with their own oil and their own money turning them redundant for the 21st century world. Today, the Arab leaders are so irrational and cruel that they reject all voices of REASON for Change and Human Development only to bring more deaths and destructions to their societies.  (Mahboob A. Khawaja, “Arab Leaders:  Waiting to Count the Dead Bodies.” 01/2013).

[dropcap]M[/dropcap]oncef Marzouki is no stranger to contemporary Arab politics. As a former President of Tunisia, he shared transformational leadership to envisage a new era of ‘Tunisian Arab Spring’ – a revulsion against dictatorship and leading to free elections and emergence of democracy.  Talking to the DW Germany TV moderator Brent Gofft (3/8/2016), Marzouki felt ashamed that despite immense resources, the Arab world could not provide safety and protection to Syrian and Iraqi refugees dispersed and helpless at European borders. At least, Marzouki had the courage and intellect to speak of Arab leadership failure and indifference towards a catastrophic humanitarian crisis. Hardly any other Arab leaders can utter few words of knowledge-based reason and wisdom to any international journalist or news network. . This week, under the OIC, Arab leaders held a conference in Indonesia to boycott the Israeli products and businesses. Whereas, the priority should have been to discuss the Two State solution and how to reason the unreason with the Israeli leaders. Palestine and Israel both exist in fear of the unknown and open prison and need a rational solution and it must come out of a dialogue and peaceful meeting of minds, not bloodbath as going on in Jerusalem and elsewhere in Palestine. While the Arab masses are haunted by the swindles and perversion of the radical Islamists, the authoritarian Arab leaders show a vivid image of bloodstained tyranny against their own masses. Recall that few centuries earlier there were no demarcations of borders, gimmick of nationalities and flags but One people – One Ummah freely moving across the Arabian Peninsula. Arabs were poverty stricken but courageous and idealistic to enhance the unity of the faith and treat everyone fairly and in a humane way. How strange that with the discovery of oil, and fake economic prosperity, the Arab world has changed into abstract dummies and leaders who live in far away palaces, not with people to understand the human agony and tormenting pains of being ignored by their own brethren. With the time and resources Arab oil exporting leaders possess, settling few millions Syrian-Iraqi humanitarian asylum seekers would have been no big problem. In essence, this would have been a temporary shelter until Syrian-Iraqi conflicts were resolved to restore peace and normalcy for the refugees to return to their homes. Arab leaders had the resources and capacity to do what Marzouki was talking about. What a shame, there are no Arab leaders to think of the common people and the onslaught of military tyranny imposed on them.

Once the Arab heartland was a place of knowledge, moral, scientific and intellectual advancements and Europeans used to come there for learning to envisage the Age of Renaissance. But European colonization divided and destroyed the Arab unity, their culture, and Islamically democratic systems of people’s governance of reason and accountability. One feels impelled to blame  European imperialism and subsequent American hegemonic control over the Arab world and excessive militarization of the entire region. Authoritarianism is the net outcome of this historic legacy. Most Arab leaders are puppets installed by the foreign powers. They betrayed Islam and violated the basic civilized norms to respect freedom, human dignity and justice that Islam guaranteed to all the citizens. This appears to be the focal issue that Arabs are fighting amongst themselves without a rationale just to appease America and Israel.

Western Militarization is the primary cause of the Arab Political Crises

For over a decade, the unending and bogus War on Terrorism continues throughout the Arab world onward to Afghanistan and Pakistan. It is primarily to support the faltering US economy of war and the ruling elite with vested interests. In a way, the US and naïve Arab rulers view it as a success but rationally speaking, this success is claimed at the cost of unimaginable atrocities, dehumanization of the Arab-Muslim people and their culture, military ruthlessness and degeneration  of many to come. There is no accountability for these crimes against the helpless humanity as the wars linger on across the Arab world. The doctrine of militarization was in direct support and enhancement of the Arab authoritarianism causing people’s uprising in Tunis, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen, Syria, Libya and elsewhere in the Arabian Peninsula. Daily bloodbaths and torture of the people paint a picture of the Arabs as if living in the draconian age without any recourse to civilization, reason and Islamic system of governance. Was the discovery of oil a conspiracy (“Fitna”) to dehumanize the Arabs and Muslim people and to destroy their sense of originality, culture and values?   But in some parts of the Middle East, people are getting organized and rising up to the political challenges which have been imposed on them by the sadistic rulers. Ostensibly, the Arab world of today will not be the same for tomorrow.  Today’s Arab world is being dismantled arbitrarily for a purpose but Arab’s destiny for future is shrouded by dark clouds. Out of a terrible sense of helplessness, people have emerged with political imagination, courage and strength to challenge the authoritarian rulers on solid grounds and reasoning and attract global support and appreciation for their cause of peace and freedom from oppression. That was “Arab Spring” – the people’s movement for political change, human rights and new responsible leadership across the Arab world.

‘Change’ is a reality for Human Progress but a Fake Simplicity for the Arab world

The world is changing but not fast enough for the authoritarian Arab rulers – fattish fed by the oil revenues and stupid and mindless in thoughts and behaviors if you view them in the real world of political actions and prevalent deplorable atrocities imposed on the Arab people. The affluent and oil enriched indulged in conspiracy to assume power and institutionalize corruption simply to maintain a few tribal powerhouses favored by the ex-colonial masters managing the power centers from distance. Now, the Arab people have awakened after long slumber of complacency and disorder. The problem was well defined by Shakespeare “the destiny of peoples coincided with the destiny of their monarch and nobles.”  The knowledge-based, information age has dismantled some of the illusory borders and demarcation of nobilities and has challenged to bridge the conflicting time zones between the palaces and the people with the internet, cell phones, facebook, twitter and instant communication technologies. For all corners in the Arab world, political change is much desired and inspirational goal for the young and new educated generations. Form Palestine to North Africa, Arab people hope for new visions, new political imagination and energetic 21st century knowledge-based leadership. This was the progressive aim of the 2011 Arab Spring which is still alive in spirit and political activism.

The Arab people’s revolutionary movements for change and freedom is not dead but slow and alive on the horizon but the authoritarian rulers and their history makes no sense on any rational criterion of analysis and objective assessment. How should history see them in a broader global context? What kind of picture do these leaders paint about the nature, moral and historical values of the Islamic-Arab societies? Would they all be tried in public courts of law? Would they run away with accumulated wealth and hide in secret palaces somewhere under the protection of the US, Britain or others?  How would they compensate the innocent people targeted by their guns and bullets? How would they return the time, opportunities and wealth stolen from the people and hopes for a value-oriented democratic culture and promising future to co-exist in a global community?

Refugees Deserve Humanitarian Compassion and Priority for Protection from the Savagery of Wars

If the Arab leaders are not morally and intellectually bankrupt, rationality demands that they should demonstrate a sense of moral and political responsibility to rethink about the emerging crises in their own dwelling. Millions are forcibly evicted from their homes because they oppose dictators like Bashar al-Assad, Shiite Al- Abaidi or Sissi or others. How come Russia, America and Europeans are bombing the innocent civilians and causing massive influx of refugees across Europe? Why can’t the Arab leaders challenge the foreign interventionists and stop the unwarranted wars against the Arab citizens? Are the Arab leaders waiting for Divine help to fix the crisis?  Do they have the trust and support of the people and legitimacy to attract any Divine consideration? Do they anticipate any miracles to happen out of the nothing? Do they imagine that the humanitarian problems will disappear out of the nothing? It is the foremost Arab leadership role and responsibility to extend humanitarian compassion to fellow Arabs in extreme distress and sufferings as they find nowhere to seek protection and safety from the wars.

Imagine, if the Arab world had public institutions and Islamic system of people-based governance, there was no scope for the Western oil importing nations and their military forces to intervene, bomb, destroy and subjugate those already living under half of a century of authoritarian oppression. It is the same story in Syria, Libya, Iraq, Bahrain, Yemen, Egypt and in other parts of the Arab societies – common people are gunned down, their rights and human dignity is purged, the only voices of reason are coming out of the Western thinking people and human organizations, not of the Arab ruling elite. All of the Arab individualistic absolute rulers have institutionalized secretive police apparatus and Rapid Deployment military units to maintain “fear game” and to keep the herd under control by force and torture. This was business as usual for almost sixty years but nobody spoke against it in the so called free world, not even the Western pro-democracy proponents claiming to be optimists and peacemakers. The Arab ruler’s solidarity stems from their own circle of monsters managing the governance – solidarity of the fittest of the few to survive and not to undermine anybody’s harem – palace life.

After the Palestinian refugees, why are there millions of more Arab refugees displaced and drowning in the Aegean sea? Who will deal with the pressing problems of life and deaths facing the Arab masses?  Who will deal with restoration of peace, normalcy and conflict management? Do these leaders have any moral and intellectual capacity to extend security and sense of protection to the helpless people? Rationality is replaced by insanity. The coward and sadistic Arab rulers preoccupied with their greed and need are crossing the limits of the Laws of the Nature in killing the innocent masses just because they demands rights, human dignity and a voice to reason the unreason. Time and history are not on the side of the authoritarian dictators doomed to be crushed by the power of reason and political imagination of the new generation of Arab people.
(Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja specializes in global security, peace and conflict resolution with keen interests in Islamic-Western comparative cultures and civilizations, and author of several publications including the latest: Global Peace and Conflict Management: Man and Humanity in Search of New Thinking. Lambert Publishing Germany, May 2012).

Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja specializes in global security, peace and conflict resolution with keen interests in Islamic-Western comparative cultures and civilizations, and author of several publications including the latest: Global Peace and Conflict Management: Man and Humanity in Search of New Thinking. Lambert Publishing Germany, May 2012.

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Nauseated by the
vile corporate media?
Had enough of their lies, escapism,
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=By= Gaither Stewart

Eritreans attempting a crossing.

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he dream of a united Europe, in fact, a United States of Europe, stands today at another crossroads. In fact, it always has stood at a crossroads. And what in each crisis has been described as a crossroads has now become more a roundabout or a mix master, a multiple choice puzzle as individual countries pull in the direction most suitable to their national interests. No need to restate the missing elements that Europeanists have long lamented: e.g. a real President with presidential powers, a united foreign policy guided by a strong foreign minister, and a European military force.

Today’s crossroads concerns specifically the Schengen Agreement—which eliminated internal border controls—and the crisis caused by the arrival at the gates of Europe of hundreds of thousands of refugees chiefly from the war torn Middle East, thanks to the meddling of the USA/NATO driven by the smell of oil.

An Italian journalist reporting from Berlin has described the current crisis as a choice between policies of Berlin Chancellor Angela Merkel who has declared Germany will receive a million refugees if necessary and those of Viktor Orban, the extreme right-wing conservative Prime Minister of Hungary who wants no refugees and is building walls to keep them out.

At the same time walls are going up across all of Europe as again lights dim for hopes for the survival of the union that never was.

Last Saturday and Sunday refugees from Syria battled with Macedonian police and border guards, tore down the barbed wire fences and were surging through, destination Deutschland, until Macedonian counterattacks using tear gas and bludgeons beat them back while the masses of refugee children wailed in terror.

Such events are not history. This is happening today, right here in our midst, in modern Europe, the home of state welfare and social justice, in the Europe that has bragged for decades that its union has prevented the former continental wars for 70 years. European Union leaders and supporters, the Europeanists, conveniently forget NATO’s Bosnian wars, the detachment of Kosovo from Serbia and the three months long bombing of Serbia and its capital, Belgrade.

The refugee crisis exposes the fragility of this Europe and the ease with which Europeans forget that the Germans French, Spanish, Italians and English have spent all those centuries you study in “European History” classes killing each other. It shows the illusion of Italians who were once so proud they were not racists; there were relatively few foreigners in Italy. Now that refugees count in the millions, Italians have learned that they too are racists. The same in most other countries.

This is happening in what little remains of the European Union, in which the so-called Euro-skeptics already are, or soon will be, in the majority. Ironically, today, a firm anti-European platform (that is, anti-European Union), is a guarantee for emerging populist parties to garner electoral victories. European individuals, political parties, national governments and political groups in the European Parliament and EU Council today must decide with a great Yes or a Great No to the idea of Europe.

This is an enigma, a terrible enigma why the idea of a union of European peoples has proven to be impossible to realize, even in its present limited form. Maybe the European Union has always been more dream than reality. A poll in the United Kingdom showed that 51% favor leaving the EU; major pockets in other countries favor abandoning the EU as it is today. The impression is that in general Euro-skepticism is growing steadily while nothing on the horizon holds the promise of a change in direction.

Some suggest suspending the Schengen Accords, that is, the free movement of people within the European Union member states (and this approval of the erection of border walls and fences) until the refugee crisis ends. It requires very little realism to understand that the flow of refugees from the Middle East, North and sub-Sahara Africa, Asia will not end as long as the USA and its big-four oil companies continue their attack on the world.

Senior Editor Gaither Stewart, based in Rome, serves—inter alia—as our European correspondent. A veteran journalist and essayist on a broad palette of topics from culture to history and politics, he is also the author of the Europe Trilogy, celebrated spy thrillers whose latest volume, Time of Exile, was recently published by Punto Press.

Note to Commenters
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Nauseated by the
vile corporate media?
Had enough of their lies, escapism,
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=By= Ramzy Baroud, PhD

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he 12 million Syrian refugees may differ regarding the reasons why they had to flee their homes and country in the last five years. Yet, they are united in their plight and in the collective trauma of the violent dislocation they have all experienced. Half of those refugees are estimated to be children, which complicates the psychological toll suffered by the Syrian people since their uprising-turned war took place.

According to a German study released in late 2015, half of the Syrian refugees who made it to Germany are suffering from trauma that has already produced psychological distress and mental illness.

The president of the Chamber of Psychotherapists, which carried out the research, said that more than 70 per cent of the refugees had witnessed violence and more than 50 per cent were themselves victims of violence. Nearly half of them have nightmares and flashbacks as if their terrible ordeals “were happening all over again”.

These details indicate the short-term effects of such trauma, however, what would take years to verify is the long-term impact of such massive distress and the shattering of the sense of identity which once united the Syrian people.

Before the war, Syrians, despite their sectarian, religious or even political backgrounds, saw themselves as part of the same modern national identity. However, the war redefined that identity based on the whims of several actors — the regional and international war parties — and the re-writing of Syria’s history by various powers that now share control of large swathes of that country. One of these powers is Daesh (the self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant).

Apart from these concerns, there is the issue of six million children, many of whom are being raised in other countries, and are learning alternative languages, cultures and other value-systems in order to survive. The impact of that alone shall prove consequential in how the Syrian people are redefined in the future.

Palestinian exile is particularly important for Syrians. Its trials and valuable lessons can shed light on the issue of collective identity for a nation that has subsisted for the most part in exile for nearly seven decades.

Ebrahim Mahmoud is a 77-year-old man who lives with his family, which includes 11 children, in the Baharka Refugee Camp in Iraq’s northern Kurdish region.

During his lifetime, he became a refugee twice: Once, when he was nine years old living in Haifa, Palestine, and a second, more recent exile in Mosul, Iraq. Just weeks before Israel declared its independence in 1948, Ebrahim lost his homeland and fled Haifa, along with tens of thousands of Palestinian Muslims and Christians after Israeli militias conquered the city in a military operation they called Bi’ur Hametz, or ‘Passover Cleaning’.

Throughout Palestine, over 750,000 Palestinians were expelled or fled the horrors of the militia-instigated war. Those who are still alive, along with their descendants, number more than five million refugees. When Daesh militias swept into Mosul, Iraq, in June 2014, Ebrahim plotted his flight, along with his entire family. Between 1948 and 2014, life was anything but kind to them. At first, they sold falafel, and Ebrahim’s children left school to join the work force at a young age. They all had cards that identified them as ‘Palestinian refugees’, and they have never known any other identity.

When the Americans invaded Iraq in 2003, they granted their soldiers and the Shiite-militias a free hand in that country. The once relatively thriving and peaceful Palestinian community of refugees in Iraq was shattered. Now, according to the United Nations Refugees Agency, no more than 3,000 Palestinian refugees are still living in Iraq, many of them in refugee camps.

Ebrahim has finally managed to escape Mosul and is living in a dirty and crowded refugee camp within Kurdish-controlled territories in the north. Considering his old age and faltering health, his story could possibly end there, but certainly not that of his children and grandchildren.

Ebrahim’s tragedy is not unique within the overall Middle East refugee crisis. It is in fact being lived and experienced by millions of Syrians. Nonetheless, if seen within its painfully protracted historical context, Palestinian exile is almost unprecedented in its complexity and duration. Few other refugee populations have struggled with exile and were defined by it, one generation after the other, as Palestinians have.

When refugees were expelled from their land in 1947-48, exile then was first seen as a political crisis that could only be remedied with the return of refugees, as instructed in United Nations Resolution 194. When that possibility grew dim, other resolutions followed, all expressing the political contexts of each era: in 1950, 74, 82, 83, etc.

Regardless of the nature of the discussion pertaining to Palestinian refugees — whether legal, political or moral — the refugees themselves were rarely consulted, except as subjects of selective and sometimes dehumanising poll questions, drawing their conclusion from refugees selecting “Yes” or “No”, or checking a box or two in a poll.

For Israel, the key concern is for the Palestinians to simply disconnect from their historic homeland; for refugee advocates the struggle has always been to demonstrate that the refugees’ desire to return remains as strong today as it was nearly 68 years ago.

But between Israeli laws aimed at punishing Palestinians for commemorating their Nakba, and efforts to keep the Right of Return central to the debate, an actual disconnect happened between the likes of Ebrahim Mahmoud of Haifa/Mosul, along with millions like him and the rest of us.

For Ebrahim, as is the case for Palestinian refugees in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and in Palestine itself across the region and the world, the matter of exile is neither a political nor a legal point. It is an everyday reality that has left numerous scars and manifestations on the refugees’ identities as people, their perception of themselves, of their surroundings, of ‘home’, their internalisation of the past, their understanding of the present and their aspirations for the future.

It is an ongoing story, a journey that ended neither at a psychological nor practical ones. Those who were expelled from Safad, Palestine, in 1948, for example, fled Jordan in 1970, then Lebanon in 1982 and, finally, Yarmouk, Syria in 2012. They are a testament to the fact that, unlike common wisdom, exile for Palestinians is not specific in time or space, but a cyclical process that is experienced by every single Palestinian, even those who would declare that they have no intentions of returning to Palestine.

The repercussions of this trauma is likely to carry on for generations. Even when a just solution is reached, it will take time for the trauma to transform into an exclusively historical topic of discussion.

Syrian refugees are now taking the first step towards their own journey of exile. While one hopes that their collective trauma ends much sooner, it is important that discussions reach far beyond a question of humanitarian and political crises. While political disputes eventually conclude, collective traumas do not magically end with the signing of political agreements.

Contributing Editor Dr. Ramzy Baroud has been writing about the Middle East for over 20 years. He is an internationally-syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an author of several books and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. His books include ‘Searching Jenin’, ‘The Second Palestinian Intifada’ and his latest ‘My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story’. His website is: www.ramzybaroud.net.

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=By= Ramzy Baroud, PhD

[dropcap]W[/dropcap]hen ISIS militias swept into Mosel, Iraq, in June 2014, Ibrahim Mahmoud plotted his flight, along with his whole family, which included 11 children. Once upon a time, Ibrahim was himself a child escaping another violent campaign carried out by equally angry militias.

In his life-time, Ibrahim became a refugee twice once when he was nine-years-old living in Haifa, Palestine, and yet again and more recently, in Mosel.

Just weeks before Israel declared its independence in 1948, Ibrahim lost his homeland, and fled Haifa, along with tens of thousands of Palestinian Muslims and Christians, after Israeli militias conquered the city in a military operation they called Bi’ur Hametz, or Passover Cleaning.

Over 750,000 Palestinians were expelled from or fled the horrors of the militias-instigated war, and those who are still alive along with their descendants, number over five million refugees.

Between 1948 and 2014, life was anything but kind to Ibrahim and his family. At first, they sold falafel, and his children left school to join the work force at a young age. They all had cards that listed them as ‘Palestinian refugees’, and to date know of no other identity.

When the Americans invaded Iraq in 2003, they granted their soldiers and the Shia-militias a free hand in that Arab country. The once relatively thriving and peaceful Palestinian community of refugees in Iraq was shattered. Now, according to the UN Refugee’s Agency, no more than 3,000 Palestinian refugees are still living in Iraq, many of them in refugee camps.

Ibrahim has finally managed to escape Mosel, and now lives in a dirty and crowded refugee camp within Kurdish-controlled territories in the north. Considering his old age and faltering health, his story could possibly, and most likely end there, but certainly not that of his children and grandchildren.

Ibrahim’s tragedy is not unique within the overall Middle East refugee crisis. Nonetheless, if seen within its painfully protracted historical context, Palestinian exile is almost unprecedented in its complexity and duration. Few other refugee populations had struggled with an exile which defined them, one generation after the other, as Palestinians have.

To offer a new perspective on this issue, about a year ago, I led a group of Palestinian researchers with the aim of offering a unique and modern study of Palestinian exile, wherein the 1948 Nakba (or Catastrophe) was examined within a larger context of space and time, not only in Palestine itself, but throughout the region, and the world as well. The stories borne out of this research will appear in a book that is tentatively entitled: Exiled.

Since the first refugee was expelled from his land in 1948, international aid workers, politicians, journalists, and eventually, historians, examined the Palestinian experience seemingly from all angles.

Exile was then first seen as a political crisis to which the only solution was the return of refugees, as instructed in United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) Resolution 194.

When that possibility grew dim, other resolutions followed, all expressing the political contexts of each era: in 1950, ‘74, ‘82, ‘83, etc. (An article by Ben Zakkai in Mondoweiss, entitled: “Notes on international law and the right of return” is most insightful in this regard.)

Regardless of the nature of the discussion pertaining to Palestinian refugees – be it legal, political or moral – the refugees themselves were rarely consulted, except as subjects of selective and sometimes dehumanizing poll questions, which draw their conclusions from refuges voting either “Yes” or “No”, or even neither.

Many conclusions were drawn from various polls that were often commissioned to reach political conclusions, and each time such results are published, academic, media and political storms often ensue. For Israel, the key concern is for the Palestinians to simply disconnect from their historic homeland. In contrast, for refugee advocates the struggle has always been to demonstrate that the refugees’ desire to return remains as strong today as it was nearly 68 years ago.

But between Israeli laws aimed at punishing Palestinians for commemorating their Nakba, and efforts to keep the Right of Return central to the debate, an actual disconnect happened between the likes of Ibrahim Mahmoud of Haifa/Mosel, along with millions like him and the rest of us. However, this disconnect was not in keeping with Israeli hopes; instead it was based on a very real, human perspective

For Ibrahim, as is the case for Palestinian refugees in Syrian, Lebanon, Iraq, Palestine itself, and all over the world, the matter of exile is regarded from neither a political nor a legal perspective. It is an everyday reality that has left numerous scars and manifestations on the refugee’s identities as people, their perception of themselves, of their surroundings, of ‘home’, their internalization of the past, their understanding of the present and their aspirations for their futures.

After examining profiles, reviewing hundreds of answered questionnaires and conducting thorough interviews with many refugees, it became clear to us that in the minds of all Palestinians, the Nakba is not a separate question to be discussed and resolved through political concessions or pressures. Nor was it a legal question either, one so convoluted that it needed to be assigned to the ‘final status negotiations’ between Israel and the PLO – negotiations which never happened anyway.

Even Palestinians who seem unlikely to exercise their right of return consider their lives within the context of the Nakba and exile as an essential one.

Our study, Exiled, which will be presented in a narrative, non-academic format centers on the assumption that the question of identity can better be examined through the accumulation of personal narratives which could eventually help us isolate collective common denominators, so that we can offer answers to such question as: “What are the group identifiers of Palestinians in the modern era?” and “How strong is the common Palestinian identity in an age of geographic, political and ideological splits, regional turmoil and divisive military occupation?”

One of our findings so far is that Palestinians, including those who had relatively stable lives and successful careers in exile, are unified by a common tragedy, and that neither Muslims nor Christians, despite their unique narratives and claim to identity, are in fact much different in terms of that collective self-perception. The Nakba and exile seem to hover above Palestinians as the most common foundation for the modern Palestinian narrative.

According to this narrative, the Nakba was not an historical event that existed sometime between 1947 and ‘48, and ended with UNGA Resolution 194, which is yet to be implemented.

In fact, it is an ongoing story, a journey that neither ended at a psychological nor practical levels. Those who were expelled from Safad in 1948, for example, then fled Jordan in 1970, then Lebanon in 1982 and finally Yarmouk in 2012, are testament to the reality that, unlike common wisdom, exile for Palestinians is not specific in time or space, but a cyclical process that is experienced by every single Palestinian, even those who would declare that they have no intentions of returning to Palestine.

In other words, the study of Palestinian exile, and the collective aspiration of the Palestinian people when it comes to their right of return is far more complex than a simple question that can be addressed based on a “Yes” or “No’ answer. Nor is it a matter that is open for political negotiations.

It is far more encompassing and is best articulated by the refugees themselves; without it Ibrahim Mahmoud, his children and all of his descendants will always be exiled, always refugee.

Contributing Editor, Dr. Ramzy Baroud, has been writing about the Middle East for over 20 years. He is an internationally-syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an author of several books and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. His books include ‘Searching Jenin’, ‘The Second Palestinian Intifada’ and his latest ‘My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story’. His website is: www.ramzybaroud.net.

Note to Commenters
Due to severe hacking attacks in the recent past that brought our site down for up to 11 days with considerable loss of circulation, we exercise extreme caution in the comments we publish, as the comment box has been one of the main arteries to inject malicious code. Because of that comments may not appear immediately, but rest assured that if you are a legitimate commenter your opinion will be published within 24 hours. If your comment fails to appear, and you wish to reach us directly, send us a mail at: editor@greanvillepost.com

We apologize for this inconvenience.

Nauseated by the
vile corporate media?
Had enough of their lies, escapism,
omissions and relentless manipulation?