ATHENS: Raghad Al-Fara is struggling to rebuild her teenage life in Athens, not least because she now moves around with crutches because of injuries suffered in the Gaza war.
Evacuated from the besieged Palestinian territory in February she now lives in a shelter for refugee women. “I never thought I would survive, let alone set foot on European soil,” the 15-year-old said.
Raghad is one of 10 Gazan minors suffering from “complex” orthopaedic and psychological injuries, according to Heracles Moskoff, secretary general for vulnerable persons at the migration ministry.
Injured during an Israeli bombing, she was evacuated with her mother Shadia and her younger sister Argwan.
The rest of the family — three other children and the father — remain in Gaza.
In total, 26 Palestinians arrived in Athens at the end of February, according to the Greek foreign ministry.
“When we learned that Greece agreed to host us, it was a relief,” said Shadia Al-Fara, the teenager’s mother.
‘Not just a survivor’
Sara Al-Sweirki, 20, who now also lives in Athens, is determined to “not just be a survivor.”
“I want to be a girl my age like others, learn guitar and piano, and study,” stressed the young woman, who left Gaza in September with her mother and brother.
Accepted by the private Deree American College of Greece, Al-Sweirki will begin her studies in January.
She chose psychology “to help others overcome their traumas,” she said.
Raghad could use such expertise. Her mother noted that the teenager still has not received psychological support “even though she wet the bed for months” due to the severe shock she experienced.
Raghad was injured in a July 2024 Israeli bombing in the Gaza city of Khan Younis that caused hundreds of casualties.
Her right leg and back were crushed under the rubble of a building.
“For two months, my daughter was on a respirator and for seven months, bedridden, unable to move,” Al-Fara recalled painfully.
Upon her arrival in Greece, Raghad was treated by an orthopedist and a physiotherapist at a children’s hospital.
But she had to wait months for a support belt, and her mother, a former hairdresser, had to find orthopedic shoes on her own.
“Greece took responsibility for us but then abandoned us,” Raghad’s mother said, stating that the Greek state provides no financial assistance.
Even though the Palestinian community in Athens has asked the government to host more injured Gazans, there is “no political will” by the conservative Greek government, said Palestinian official Latif Darwesh.
“The current government has forgotten its historic friendship with the Palestinian people,” Darwesh said.
Many Palestinian students found refuge in Greece in the 1980s, under the socialist administration of Andreas Papandreou, who cultivated close relations with late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
Popular solidarity
Israel’s tactics used against Gaza since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023 set off the war, has heightened solidarity toward Palestinians among the Greek population.
The government of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has yet to recognize a Palestinian state, even though 74 percent of Greeks would support such a move, according to a recent study by aboutpeople, a Greek social research group.
Sara Al-Sweirki does not know if she will stay in Athens “forever,” though she acknowledges that “the future in Gaza remains very uncertain.”
A truce agreement that came into effect on October 10 “does not mean reconstruction,” said Shadia Al-Fara, who has enrolled her daughters in Greek school.
“We cannot return to live under tents with the fear of bombings resuming!” said the mother.
“My three other children in Gaza ask me to get them out of this hell” but Al-Fara says she feels “powerless” to help them.
Sara Al-Sweirki, meanwhile, looks to the future.
“My dream was interrupted” after October 7. “But now I am more determined than ever to pursue my goal (of studying),” she said.
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Palestinians evacuated from Gaza face tough adjustment in Greece
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Palestinians evacuated from Gaza face tough adjustment in Greece
- Israel’s tactics used against Gaza since the Hamas attack has heightened solidarity toward Palestinians among the Greek population
After wins abroad, Syria leader must gain trust at home
BEIRUT: One year after ousting Bashar Assad, Ahmed Al-Sharaa has restored Syria’s international standing and won sanctions relief.
But analysts warn the former jihadist still needs to secure trust on the home front.
Sectarian bloodshed in the country’s Alawite and Druze minority heartlands — alongside ongoing Israeli military operations — have shaken Syria as President Sharaa tries to lead the country out of 14 years of war.
“Syria has opened a new chapter that many once thought impossible,” said Nanar Hawach, senior Syria analyst at the International Crisis Group, citing relaunched diplomatic ties and foreign investment.
But he added: “International rehabilitation means little if all Syrians don’t feel safe walking their own streets.”
US President Donald Trump has taken a particular shining to the 43-year-old, a surprise political victory for a former militant who once had a US bounty on his head due to his ties to Al-Qaeda.
Sharaa has toured capitals from the Gulf to Europe to Washington since his Islamist alliance toppled Assad on December 8 last year, ending more than half a century of the family’s iron-fisted rule.
Washington and the UN Security Council have removed him from their respective “terrorism” and sanctions lists, and a delegation from the world body visited Damascus for the first time this week.
The United States, the European Union and Britain have lifted major economic sanctions on Syria, and Damascus has announced investment deals for infrastructure, transport and energy.
Sharaa has even visited Russia, whose military pounded his forces during the war and which is now home to an exiled Assad.
“Sharaa won abroad, but the real verdict comes at home,” Hawach said.
- ‘Real accountability’ -
Critics say Syria’s temporary constitution fails to reflect the country’s ethnic and religious diversity and concentrates power in the hands of a president appointed for a five-year transition.
The new authorities have disbanded armed factions, including Islamist and militant fighters, but absorbed most into the new-look army and security forces, including some foreign fighters.
And some government forces or their allies have been implicated in outbreaks of sectarian violence.
The Alawite community massacres in March, killed more than 1,700 people, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
And clashes in July in south Syria’s Druze-majority Sweida province left more than 2,000 dead, including hundreds of Druze civilians.
Authorities have announced investigations into the bloodshed and have arrested and put some suspects on trial.
Nicholas Heras, from the New Lines Institute, said Sharaa “has twice failed as a leader of national reconciliation” — during the violence against the Alawites and the Druze.
Heras told AFP questions remain over “the extent to which he personally wants to rein in the militant Islamist militias that played the strongest role in bringing him to power in Damascus.”
Sharaa’s position, he said, remains precarious “because he does not command a unified security apparatus that can enforce the rules made by his government.”
- ‘Terrifying’ -
Gamal Mansour, a researcher at the University of Toronto, said “factional leaders who are essentially warlords” have taken up official roles, contributing to a “crisis of trust” among minorities.
However, “most Syrians believe Sharaa is the only option that provides guarantees,” he said, calling the prospect of a power vacuum “terrifying.”
Just keeping the country together is a major task, with some on the coast and in Sweida urging succession and the Kurds seeking decentralization, which Damascus has rejected.
A Kurdish administration in the northeast has agreed to integrate its institutions into the central government by year-end but progress has stalled.
Adding to pressures is neighboring Israel, which has repeatedly bombed Syria and wants to impose a demilitarised zone in the south.
Israel’s forces remain in a UN-patrolled buffer zone on the occupied Golan Heights and conduct regular incursions deeper into Syria despite the two sides holding direct talks.
On Monday, Trump told Israel to avoid destabilising Syria and its new leadership.
In October, committees selected new members of parliament, but the process excluded areas outside government control and Sharaa is still to appoint 70 of the 210 representatives.
lar/lg/dc
But analysts warn the former jihadist still needs to secure trust on the home front.
Sectarian bloodshed in the country’s Alawite and Druze minority heartlands — alongside ongoing Israeli military operations — have shaken Syria as President Sharaa tries to lead the country out of 14 years of war.
“Syria has opened a new chapter that many once thought impossible,” said Nanar Hawach, senior Syria analyst at the International Crisis Group, citing relaunched diplomatic ties and foreign investment.
But he added: “International rehabilitation means little if all Syrians don’t feel safe walking their own streets.”
US President Donald Trump has taken a particular shining to the 43-year-old, a surprise political victory for a former militant who once had a US bounty on his head due to his ties to Al-Qaeda.
Sharaa has toured capitals from the Gulf to Europe to Washington since his Islamist alliance toppled Assad on December 8 last year, ending more than half a century of the family’s iron-fisted rule.
Washington and the UN Security Council have removed him from their respective “terrorism” and sanctions lists, and a delegation from the world body visited Damascus for the first time this week.
The United States, the European Union and Britain have lifted major economic sanctions on Syria, and Damascus has announced investment deals for infrastructure, transport and energy.
Sharaa has even visited Russia, whose military pounded his forces during the war and which is now home to an exiled Assad.
“Sharaa won abroad, but the real verdict comes at home,” Hawach said.
- ‘Real accountability’ -
Critics say Syria’s temporary constitution fails to reflect the country’s ethnic and religious diversity and concentrates power in the hands of a president appointed for a five-year transition.
The new authorities have disbanded armed factions, including Islamist and militant fighters, but absorbed most into the new-look army and security forces, including some foreign fighters.
And some government forces or their allies have been implicated in outbreaks of sectarian violence.
The Alawite community massacres in March, killed more than 1,700 people, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
And clashes in July in south Syria’s Druze-majority Sweida province left more than 2,000 dead, including hundreds of Druze civilians.
Authorities have announced investigations into the bloodshed and have arrested and put some suspects on trial.
Nicholas Heras, from the New Lines Institute, said Sharaa “has twice failed as a leader of national reconciliation” — during the violence against the Alawites and the Druze.
Heras told AFP questions remain over “the extent to which he personally wants to rein in the militant Islamist militias that played the strongest role in bringing him to power in Damascus.”
Sharaa’s position, he said, remains precarious “because he does not command a unified security apparatus that can enforce the rules made by his government.”
- ‘Terrifying’ -
Gamal Mansour, a researcher at the University of Toronto, said “factional leaders who are essentially warlords” have taken up official roles, contributing to a “crisis of trust” among minorities.
However, “most Syrians believe Sharaa is the only option that provides guarantees,” he said, calling the prospect of a power vacuum “terrifying.”
Just keeping the country together is a major task, with some on the coast and in Sweida urging succession and the Kurds seeking decentralization, which Damascus has rejected.
A Kurdish administration in the northeast has agreed to integrate its institutions into the central government by year-end but progress has stalled.
Adding to pressures is neighboring Israel, which has repeatedly bombed Syria and wants to impose a demilitarised zone in the south.
Israel’s forces remain in a UN-patrolled buffer zone on the occupied Golan Heights and conduct regular incursions deeper into Syria despite the two sides holding direct talks.
On Monday, Trump told Israel to avoid destabilising Syria and its new leadership.
In October, committees selected new members of parliament, but the process excluded areas outside government control and Sharaa is still to appoint 70 of the 210 representatives.
lar/lg/dc
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