Palestinian refugee camp in Syria virtually destroyed

[OrbitalDawn]

Yarmouk residents dying of starvation as siege continues.

More than 40 Palestinians have now died of starvation in the Yarmouk refugee camp in Damascus, say activists who are calling on the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) to intervene. Three quarters of the dead have perished in the last three weeks as the situation in the camp, which is home to much of Syria's Palestinian population, reaches a crisis point after six months of a crippling siege which have seen supplies of food and medical aid blocked from reaching the camp. Abu Muhammed, an activist who works in the camp, told the Media Line that more people were currently at risk: “There are another ten people (dying) and there is nothing we can do for them.”

An estimated 170,000 people were previously living in the camp, with most leaving during the year long partial-siege before movement in and out of the camp became completely cut off. Conditions in the refugee camp have become desperate since the full government siege began in July 2013. The blockade of the area has meant no aid has been able to reach the estimated 18,000 residents of the camp. Christopher Gunness of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees said it isn't just the lack of food and medicine that is making the situation untenable for residents.

“Residents are having to rely on going out on terraces and burning furniture and branches to warm themselves in the open because wood fires cannot be used indoors. There is a very infrequent supply of tap water – reportedly available for four hours only at intervals of three days.”

Many of Yarmouk's residents are of Palestinian origin and tensions within the Palestinian community reached Ramallah over the weekend as young protestors staged a sit-in at the PLO headquarters in the city over what they believe is a failure by the Palestinian administration to assist in relieving conditions in the camp. Abu Muhammad believes the PLO should listen and take action on behalf of their people.

“I am Palestinian. We want to tell the PLO that if they don't do anything the revolution will arrive to Ramallah and Gaza,” he said. The United Nations is gravely concerned about the appalling conditions in the camp, Gunness told the Media Line.

“There is profound civilian suffering with widespread incidence of malnutrition with the absence of medical care; including for those who have severe conflict-related injuries, and including for women in childbirth – there have been fatal consequences for some of these women. Residents including infants and children are subsisting for long periods on diets of stale vegetables, herbs, powdered tomato paste, animal feed and cooking spices dissolved in water. “ The Syrian regime’s campaign has seen suburbs of Damascus and small towns essentially choked of food and supplies until residents either starve or surrender. However, in other suburbs a peace deal has been brokered by rebel groups and government forces which has allowed civilians to be evacuated or relief to be brought in. Despite peace talks toward the end of 2013 and ongoing negotiations between partied, such an agreement has not been reached in Yarmouk, Abu Muhammed said. Abu Muhammed says aid convoys and deliveries have been blocked from entering the camp. In November an activist told the Media Line that a convoy he was delivering was shelled twice as it approached the camp and this pattern has continued.

“From a humanitarian perspective, Yarmouk remains closed to humanitarian access and remains a place where extreme human suffering in primitively harsh conditions is the norm for Palestinian and Syrian civilians living there,” Gunness of the UN said. “I emphasize that the imperative remains that Syrian authorities and other parties must allow and facilitate safe and open humanitarian access into Yarmouk to enable us to assist civilians trapped there.”

In addition to the humanitarian conditions in the camp there are continuing clashes with the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reporting that several surface to surface missiles were fired into the camp last week.

Guess if it ain't Israel doing it it's okay, right?

 

[ponder]

Guess if it ain't Israel or USA doing it it's okay, right?

ftfy

 

[OrbitalDawn]

Syria: dozens die of starvation in Damascus after being 'denied food'

Residents cut off from food and water as troops surround districts in capital

Dozens of people in the southern suburbs of Damascus have died of starvation after spending months living on scraps of food, trapped in one of the worst sieges of the civil war, activists claim.

For more than a year, nothing has been allowed in or out of a number of districts in the the sourthern suburbs of Damascus.

It is thought as many as tens of thousands living in Yarmouk Camp, home to settled Palestinian refugees, and Tadamon, have been stopped by the army from leaving and are struggling to get enough food.

John Kerry, the US secretary of state, said that President Bashar al-Assad might finally allow in some humanitarian convoys to parts of Damascus.

“The proof will be in the actions that may or may not be taken in the days ahead.”
For many that may be too little too late. Malnutrition has reached critical levels in recent months and now children and the elderly are dying, local residents have said.

“I’m pleased to say that Foreign Minister Lavrov indicated that he’s had some conversations with the regime, that the regime may be prepared to open up a number of areas,” Mr Kerry said.

“Today a mother and her three children died after eating food that had gone off. They had nothing else. For weeks children have been dying,” said Susan Ahmed, an activist living in the suburbs of Damascus.

Syrian opposition activists said they have recorded the names of 68 people who have starved to death in recent weeks. While the exact death toll cannot be independently verified, disturbing video footage has been uploaded to the Internet, showing skeletal men, women and children lying on stretchers, too weak to walk.

Britain said yesterday that Royal Navy frigate HMS Montrose is assisting in the international effort to remove chemical stocks from Syria and that it planned to give the US £2.5 million specialist equipment and training to help it destroy the arsenal more quickly.

William Hague, the Foreign Secretary, also said yesterday that Iran could attend peace talks on Syria next week if it gives a “strong signal” that it will embrace a political transition to replace the current regime.

 

[Seriously]

Israel have more "repore" with or compassion for a Palestinian than any Arab nation! Palestinians are the outcasts of the Arabs and they are only tolerated to get back at Israel.

 

[Alan]

You obviously missed the mass protests down here in CT...

 

[Paul Hjul]

As I've repeatedly advanced the Palestinian people are horribly oppressed by the powers of the region who regard them as pawns in a very ugly game. Unfortunately an anti-Israel agenda very strongly moves to present propaganda casting blame onto Israel and it is important to identify the grotesque and inhumane actions of the governments of Syria, Egypt and Jordan as well as the corruption that is the House al Saud.

The Palestinians as a self-identifying ethnicity are an oppressed people and any person with a genuine interest in their cause (that of a peaceful existence) will be strong in their condemnation of oppression from wherever it may come, this idea of Palestinians as inherently terrorists is nonsense as is the toleration of Arabic states treating them as second class Arabs and pawns with which to conduct tribal disputes.

 

[Seriously]

As I've repeatedly advanced the Palestinian people are horribly oppressed by the powers of the region who regard them as pawns in a very ugly game. Unfortunately an anti-Israel agenda very strongly moves to present propaganda casting blame onto Israel and it is important to identify the grotesque and inhumane actions of the governments of Syria, Egypt and Jordan as well as the corruption that is the House al Saud.

The Palestinians as a self-identifying ethnicity are an oppressed people and any person with a genuine interest in their cause (that of a peaceful existence) will be strong in their condemnation of oppression from wherever it may come, this idea of Palestinians as inherently terrorists is nonsense as is the toleration of Arabic states treating them as second class Arabs and pawns with which to conduct tribal disputes.

Well summarized!