Miraculously found beneath the rubble of a building destroyed by the deadly February 6, 2023 northwest earthquake Syria, Little Afraa, who was orphaned by the earthquake, was one year old. She was found hours after she was born.She was still connected by the umbilical cord to her mother, who, like her father and siblings, lost her life when the building collapsed.
Her town of Jandairis, near the Turkish border, was among the hardest hit by the earthquake, which killed at least 6,000 people in Syria and more than 53,000 in Turkey. The girl was rescued by her uncle Khalil Sawadi, who named her Afraa after her mother. “I have seven children, eight of them with Afraa,” Sawadi, 35, told AFP. “I named her Afraa to keep her mother’s name alive and so that she wouldn’t forget her family.”
Khalil Sawadi, who is also the cousin of the little girl’s father, lovingly cradles Afraa and her biological daughter Aataa, who was born a few days earlier. “My wife breastfeeds both of them, they are like twins,” he says. “When he started saying his first words, he called me dad and he called his aunt ‘mom,'” he explains excitedly. The man, a displaced person who fled eastern Syria and does not have a permanent job, recognizes that raising Afraa is a great responsibility for him. As he says, he wishes the girl a bright future, a good education and that she would even be “better off than her own children.”
At home, Sawadi’s daughters play with the little girl, with red cheeks and well wrapped up, who is already starting to crawl. They put her in a rocking chair and take turns rocking her.
35 hours under the rubble
In Jandairis, a city ruled by pro-Turkey Syrian factions, the earthquake left serious consequences and many buildings were not rebuilt. Hundreds of affected families continue to live in tents. The luckiest were resettled in permanent refugee camps. According to the UN, around 265,000 people lost their homes in rebel-held areas in northwest Syria. At least 43,000 of them remain in emergency accommodation a year later.
The majority of the population in these rebel areas is made up of displaced people from other regions of the country, which has been fragmented by the war that broke out in 2011 and left more than half a million dead.
Hamza al Ahmed, 15, walks on crutches through the streets of Jandairis, where he lives with his brother, who is older than him and married. “I lost my mother, my father and four of my brothers and sisters“At the earthquake he told AFP. “I lay under the rubble for 35 hours, our building collapsed and there is nothing left.” Hamza had to have his leg amputated and is now trying to get used to his prosthesis. His arm is also damaged. He was mutilated but has no way to pay for medical treatment. “For me, the anniversary of the earthquake (…) is the day of separation.” “I feel like life stopped on that day and we lost everything we loved,” says the teenager.
“Life without parents is hard”
“Life without parents is hard, but it goes on,” he adds, looking at some children playing football. “I dream of recovering and being able to stand again” without the help of crutches. On the terrible night of February 6th, Yasmin al Sham, now 10 years old, lost her father and her pregnant mother; and his three brothers and sisters, including his twin. She miraculously survived after lying under the rubble for more than 18 hours.
“I was sleeping when the earthquake happened (…), my older brother grabbed me and ran to the front door, which collapsed behind him,” says the girl. What he misses most is his twin sister. “We were together all the time, we went to the same class, we played together,” says Yasmin, who likes to draw. He is now in the care of his grandmother Samira al Yasin, 62, who lost 47 relatives, including her husband and son, when her building collapsed. “We lost our entire family. Only a few survived. The earthquake destroyed us,” complains the woman, a displaced person from central Syria.