A woman weeps as she waits for humanitarian aid in Zafaraniya on June 7. The woman is part of an influx of 4,000 displaced families that has arrived in the eastern Baghdad district, mostly in the last eight months. (Zeke Minaya / S&S)
A woman weeps as she waits for humanitarian aid in Zafaraniya on June 7. The woman is part of an influx of 4,000 displaced families that has arrived in the eastern Baghdad district, mostly in the last eight months. (Zeke Minaya / S&S)
A crowd of displaced Iraqis waits in line for aid at a government center in Zafaraniya on June 8. (Zeke Minaya / S&S)
Mideast edition, Sunday, June 10, 2007
ZAFARANIYA, Iraq
Many of the stories were similar.
Nagat, a 32-year-old mother who declined to give her full name, left all her possessions in her home city of Baqouba after a group of gunmen burst into her house.
Laila Rashid abandoned her central Baghdad neighborhood of Dora and her job as a bank teller after Sunni fighters drove Shiites from the area.
Salah Muhammad fled a now Sunni-dominated neighborhood in central Baghdad with his wife and five children after receiving a threatening letter that demanded he leave his home or risk death.
"I left the same day," said Muhammad, who has not been able to find work as a truck driver since. "If I stayed I would have been dead."
On Thursday, they found themselves at a Zafaraniya government center, jostling in line for supplies with dozens of similarly displaced families. Local leaders in the eastern Baghdad district say that 4,000 families from all over Iraq have resettled in the area, victims of sectarian purges. And, they added, the flow of newcomers continues unabated, mirroring a nationwide trend that international aid groups have called a humanitarian crisis.
According to the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, more than 2 million Iraqis have been displaced inside Iraq, driven from their homes by violence. The internal migration has taxed provinces, driving at least 10 of the 18 governorates to restrict access to new arrivals, according to the United Nations. Areas that do accept the new arrivals bear the brunt of overburdened social services and stretched resources, according to Iraqi leaders and U.S. military commanders.
In Zafaraniya, the majority of the resettled 4,000 families have arrived during the past eight months, according to 1st Lt. Robyn Jacobs, of the 2nd Battalion, 17th Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division, from Fort Carson, Colo.
"You are upping the population in a few months," said Jacobs, who helps coordinate humanitarian aid for the displaced families. "It affects sewer, water and electricity service. [The displaced families] live in rundown factories and abandoned homes. And it's a growing problem."
At the moment there is little that can be done for the displaced families. U.S. troops and local leaders have organized a monthly food and supply drop for those who have registered with area authorities. The humanitarian aid can feed a family of four for a week, military officials said.
Local councilwoman Madiha Hassan al Musawi said she hopes to bring the families together in a single location — a tent city. So far, however, the provincial government has resisted the idea. "They feel it would look bad to have a tent city," Jacobs said.
Musawi, who has gathered the names of the displaced in a database and helps find them shelter, said newcomers arrive every day. "I never say no," she said.
Her contact with the central government was recently kidnapped, Musawi said, temporarily halting any further plans for assistance for the displaced families.
"It is not enough," she said of the help she is able to provide. "But it is all we have."
According to the U.N., the displaced families in Zafaraniya are fortunate to be acknowledged. The U.N. refugee aid office has received reports of regional authorities refusing to register new arrivals, according to a statement given by spokeswoman Jennifer Pagonis in March. She added that an estimated 47 percent of the displaced have no access to official food distribution channels.
"Many displaced have been evicted from public buildings," Pagonis said in the statement. "Combined with the general lack of resources, this has led to a growing number of impoverished shanty towns."
In conjunction with the launch of the Baghdad security plan in February, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki pledged to get the displaced back into their homes. But for the most part, the promise has gone unfulfilled.
Councilwoman Musawi said that losing one's home was particularly wounding to the pride of the average Iraqi. Many of the displaced chose to migrate to Zafaraniya because it was as close as they could remain to their homes and still be relatively safe.
"When I give somebody a little food or a place to stay they are grateful," she said. "They don’t ask if it comes from the Iraqi government or the Americans, from Sunni or Shia. They are grateful and that's it."
