SIBELIA AL-IBRAHIM

Raqqa- The Raqqa canton of North and East Syria hosts tens of thousands of people forcibly displaced from Aleppo, Shahba and Til Rifat due to the attacks launched by the Turkish state and Turkish-backed factions on November 27, 2024. The Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) established a humanitarian corridor for the people of Shahba, Aleppo and Til Rifat to protect them from potential massacres and a crisis desk. The crisis desk has turned 55 public schools in Raqqa and its countryside into shelters for the families displaced from Aleppo, Shahba and Til Rifat.

‘We have been displaced multiple times’

“It’s like I’m in a dream, a bad nightmare,” said Adla Jadil, one woman displaced from Aleppo to the Raqqa canton. “I did not expect such an attack. The Turkish state uses armed groups for its own interests. The Syrian people will unite to build a safe, stable and free life. We have been displaced multiple times since the beginning of the Syrian crisis.”

 Many missile attacks

“We had to leave Shahba to protect our children and families from many missile attacks,” said Farah Süleyman, a displaced woman from Shahba. Kadifa Salih Nabu and her family were displaced from Afrin to Shahba in 2018 due to the Turkish invasion attacks.

“The attacks of the Turkish state and Turkish-backed factions forced us to leave Shahba. At first, the armed factions did not allow us to cross the safe areas of North and East Syria. After agreements, they allowed us.

More than 10,000 people from Aleppo take shelter in Raqqa

 The Education Committee of Raqqa began to turn schools into shelters for the displaced people from Aleppo, Shahba and Til Temir upon the call for public mobilization by the AANES.

“We worked very hard to turn the schools into shelters for the displaced people,” said Zulekha Abdi, Co-chair of the Education Committee of Raqqa. “We worked coordinately with the municipality and the relevant authorities to prevent water and power outages in schools. There are no statistics on the number of people who have already arrived in the city of Raqqa; however, the number of the people fleeing from Aleppo to Raqqa is more than 10,000. 48,000 students were receiving education in 55 schools, including three in the Al-Kasraat area consisting of a group of villages. Education in these schools has been suspended.”

‘People are in solidarity with the displaced people’

The Planning and Statistics Office of Raqqa will form teams to count the number of the people fleeing from Aleppo, Shahba and Til Temir to Raqqa. “We need statistics to learn the number of patients suffering from cancer, diabetes, blood pressure and many other diseases. The Kurdish, Assyrian, Arab, Circassian and Turkmen people living in Syria have united to be in solidarity with the displaced people.”

‘The Turkish state aims to revive the Ottoman Empire’

All political parties in North and East Syria also mobilize to support the displaced people. The Democratic Union Party (PYD) is one of them. “We work hard to meet the basic needs of the displaced families,” said Fayrouz Xelil, Co-chair of the PYD in Raqqa. “We are always at the Municipal Stadium to place the displaced families in schools. The Turkish state aims to revive the Ottoman Empire by attacking the people uniting around the system established by the AANES.”