Another Winter, More Fears
Winter, this beautiful season of love, elegance and perfumes, is the time designers race to skin some animals and cover our ego with fur they claim to be natural. It is a season marked with Christmas decorations, travelling and New Year ‘s Eve followed by Valentine’s. For us, winter has always been associated with love, beauty and style, but where does all this glamour leave the Syrian refugees who suffer in a fewmeter- wide tents pitched nowhere.
The world has given up sending them aid after three years of continued suffering. They only survive thanks to few donations made by individuals and NGOs. Things are the same with refugees in Kurdistan, displaced children in South Sudan and hundreds of children who die daily because of diarrhea and hundreds suffering in Yemen because of deteriorating security situations and …the dreadful winter cold! Despite winter’s beauty, it is absolutely impossible to endure by people living in tents. And nowadays, Syrian and Kurds are unfortunately going through disastrous situations.
Winter is approaching while they are still living in fear, anticipation and constant terror that one of their children might get sick, a mother may die leaving unattended children behind or that a father may die, turning them all into orphans as if being homeless is not harsh enough by itself! The most serious winter problems these refugees face are seasonal blizzards hitting Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey the way they did in the 2013 winter where many tent dwellers may freeze to death. The tragedy even gets worse when we fail to provide these refugees with suitable sustenance. We are not asking for the impossible.
All those interested in humanitarian activity, Red Crescent and Red Cross societies must launch campaigns to counter the danger of the upcoming winter due in a month at most. We need a vigorous campaign to provide warmth, winter clothes and all refugees’ sustenance needs. We need to enforce individuals’ trust in these organizations because everybody is afraid that donations might not reach the refugees or get robbed.
Therefore, donors must be given access to travel with volunteers and to document fundraisings through various social media because many people believe that the millions that had already been paid are enough to build Syrians a whole new country. So, where have all those millions gone?! This is how many of the people I met and urged to pay their zakat and charity to Syrians reacted. They always have fears that their aid will not reach due destinations.
Finally, while oil prices are falling, our officials have been making many comical statements, which brings up what we have been always demanding – finding alternative sources of income. This is a country that has been marginalizing youth through futile bureaucracy and prohibiting tourism because of fear from the Islamists. Where will Kuwait be in five years from now? Will we only have memories of a country that will have vanished as predicted by 2020 because of the corruption prevailing in it?
—Translated by Kuwait Times from Al-Jarida
By Arwa Al-Waqian
The world has given up sending them aid after three years of continued suffering. They only survive thanks to few donations made by individuals and NGOs. Things are the same with refugees in Kurdistan, displaced children in South Sudan and hundreds of children who die daily because of diarrhea and hundreds suffering in Yemen because of deteriorating security situations and …the dreadful winter cold! Despite winter’s beauty, it is absolutely impossible to endure by people living in tents. And nowadays, Syrian and Kurds are unfortunately going through disastrous situations.
Winter is approaching while they are still living in fear, anticipation and constant terror that one of their children might get sick, a mother may die leaving unattended children behind or that a father may die, turning them all into orphans as if being homeless is not harsh enough by itself! The most serious winter problems these refugees face are seasonal blizzards hitting Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey the way they did in the 2013 winter where many tent dwellers may freeze to death. The tragedy even gets worse when we fail to provide these refugees with suitable sustenance. We are not asking for the impossible.
All those interested in humanitarian activity, Red Crescent and Red Cross societies must launch campaigns to counter the danger of the upcoming winter due in a month at most. We need a vigorous campaign to provide warmth, winter clothes and all refugees’ sustenance needs. We need to enforce individuals’ trust in these organizations because everybody is afraid that donations might not reach the refugees or get robbed.
Therefore, donors must be given access to travel with volunteers and to document fundraisings through various social media because many people believe that the millions that had already been paid are enough to build Syrians a whole new country. So, where have all those millions gone?! This is how many of the people I met and urged to pay their zakat and charity to Syrians reacted. They always have fears that their aid will not reach due destinations.
Finally, while oil prices are falling, our officials have been making many comical statements, which brings up what we have been always demanding – finding alternative sources of income. This is a country that has been marginalizing youth through futile bureaucracy and prohibiting tourism because of fear from the Islamists. Where will Kuwait be in five years from now? Will we only have memories of a country that will have vanished as predicted by 2020 because of the corruption prevailing in it?
—Translated by Kuwait Times from Al-Jarida
By Arwa Al-Waqian
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