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search of the rape victims among the refugees
Everybody, it seemed, had heard the stories, and could relay the same horrific
details about syrian soldiers allegedly raping women and girls with cruel
impunity.There were ugly accounts, told by many refugees from the northern
syrian town of jisr al-Shughour, some of whom had crossed into nearby turkey,
and by others who remained in a strip of syrian territory hugging the turkish
border. Soldiers had abducted several beautiful young women from the town, they
said, enslaved them in the sugar refinery, raped them and forced them to remain
naked and serve them tea and coffee.There were other, uglier stories of several
women reportedly mutilated after being gang-Raped by soldiers, their breasts
sliced off in a final sadistic act.But few had encountered any of the alleged
victims, and fewer still knew their names. That's hardly surprising.Sexual
assault is a difficult subject to raise in any society, but especially so in
conservative rural arab communities like those of northern syria where a
family's honor is often tied to the virtue of its women.The mere suggestion of
compromised chastity, even if it was stolen, is a shameful stain, one that can
make the victim and her entire family outcasts.The refugees on the syrian side
who spoke of these acts said they heard the victims had been taken to a
particular turkish camp.Calls to several camp residents seemed to confirm the
claims.They had heard that there were raped women among them. It's not usually
that difficult to get into a refugee camp, but these days, there is nothing
about covering the syria story that is not difficult.Barred from the tightly
controlled country, foreign journalists have been forced to rely on telephone
calls, tweets, facebook posts, youtube videos and stray secondhand testimony in
a bid to piece together what has been happening since antigovernment protests
first http://www.bencrawford.co.uk/
erupted in mid-March. So when thousands of syrian refugees started streaming
inTo southern turkey recently, the opportunity To conduct face-To-Face
interviews, to hear firsthand testimony and see how it was conveyed was just
what we had been waiting for.They have blocked media from entering the refugee
camps in southern turkey's hatay province on grounds of protecting the privacy
of the more than 9, 500 syrians quartered there. (See pictures of syrians
fleeing into turkey. ) On june 16, a female arabic-Speaking colleague and i
sneaked into the camp, posing as the relatives of a particular male refugee who
had been shot.The turkish guards at the gate bought the story.They knew the
young man and his wife we were asking for and called them over to the fence.We
were let in.The ruse was just to help us enter.We were hoping to speak with
alleged rape victims. Although the turks manning the gates left us alone with
our"Relatives"Once we entered, the syrians were another thing altogether.Perhaps
it was because syria is a society raised on fear, a country where mukhabarat, Or
secret police, are on every cOrner, and emotions like paranoia and suspicion can
be just as lifesaving as the body's fight-Or-Flight response.Or perhaps it was
because the camps contain mukhabarat posing as refugees.Either way, old
suspicions died hard. At least eight men stood within earshot of us.They weren't
the harmless, inquisitive types wondering who the new girls in the camp
were.They showed no shame and didn't look away, even when directly asked to.They
were like the not-So-Secret police all over the syrian capital damascus, the men
who don't even pretend to be doing anything except standing there, trying to
watch and listen to you.After 10 minutes or so, one of North Face Jackets UK Sale
the men,
who had white hair and a bushy beard, went up to our male"Relative"And warned
him that he knew the rules:Nobody was allowed to speak with anyone, unless this
particular gentleman agreed to it.We were going to be searched, he said, to make
sure we weren't journalists or spies.That was our cue to leave, and
fast.Although we had emptied our bags of notebooks, hotel keys, business cards,
passports anything that may suggest that we were journalists we had smuggled in
small digital recorders and a camera in our clothing. (See"Refugees in the
dark:Fleeing a devastated syrian town. ") We wished our"Relatives"Well, told
them we didn't want to cause them any trouble, and quickly made for the gate but
not before slipping a small flip video camera into our female"Relative's"Purse
and asking the couple to find the raped or mutilated women.Relatively speaking,
it's not a large camp, with just several thousand residents.Still, after days of
searching, the syrians told us they had nothing.Everybody, it seemed, had heard
the stories, but nobody knew who the victims were.Not even those in the
hospitals of the turkish city of antakya, where some 70 wounded syrians are
being treated, could aid our investigations. I headed back down the difficult,
mountainous smuggling route across the turkish border into syria.The plum
orchard where a week ago i had spent a chilly night with thousands of men, women
and children huddled together in makeshift shelters or out in the open was
nearly empty.Most of the families had crossed over into turkey.But those who
remained said they knew of a man from the village of al-Serminiyye, a few
kilometers away from jisr al-Shughour, whose four teenage daughters were all
raped by syrian soldiers. "Yes, it's true, but i don't know the family's
name,"Said mohammad merhi, a 30-Year-Old pharmacist who has become the makeshift
clinic's de facto physician, dispensing pills for children with diarrhea and
treating gunshot wounds with whatever he can find in the few boxes of medicinal
products scattered around his open tent. "You know, we are an eastern society,
we don't speak openly about such things,"He said, trying to explain why nobody
knew who these girls were. The strikingly handsome young man was one of four men
in this makeshift camp who had offered toMarry the teenage rape victims, even
though they had never met any of them.In this traditional culture of shame where
virginity is prized, rape victims cannot easily(If ever)Marry.The 32-Year-Old
bassam al-Masry, whose younger brother basil was shot dead by security forces in
jisr al-Shughour on june 3(His funeral the following day reportedly ended in a
massacre by security forces), was another of the young men who had heard the
story. "I hope that I will have the honor ofMarrying one of these girls, "He
said, as merhi treated an almost healed gunshot wound in al-Masry's upper right
thigh. "I know that these girls suffered, they were taken against their will.I
don't care what they look like, the point is to stand by them, and i do with all
of my heart. " The family was likely in another informal encampment of refugees,
several kilometers away from this one, the young men said.And so, we trekked
over there.But there too, nobody, it seemed, knew the family. "We are all
hearing the stories of rape,"Said one woman, em mustafa, a 34-Year-Old from the
syrian border village of khirbet al-Jouz, who despite the fact that her home was
just a few kilometers away, was staying in a tent closer to the turkish
border.Hundreds of residents of khirbet al-Jouz were doing the same, abandoning
their homes and sleeping out in the fields, for fear that the syrian army might
sweep through their town at night. "Most of all, we fear rape,"The mother of
three young daughters, all under 10, said. "We have heard a lot of stories. "
Everybody, it seemed, had heard the stories, but nobody knew any
victims.Separating fact from fiction is only one hurdle to telling the syria
story.Overcoming the people's fears, suspicions and feelings of shame is perhaps
an even bigger obstacle.