Palestinians in Israel campaign to shelter freezing Syrian refugees

Scenes of Syrian refugees struggling to survive in freezing temperatures have left Ibraheem Khalil with a heavy heart, Anadolu News Agency reports.

Seeking to provide a helping hand, the 34-year-old Palestinian launched an online campaign to raise funds to build homes for Syrian refugees living in harsh winter conditions.

Khalil, a social activist, said the campaign originally aimed to buy radiators for Syrians displaced from their homes by the 11-year conflict in their country.

“The idea then developed to find sustainable solutions for the refugees, until they can return to their country,” he told Anadolu Agency.

Since the campaign started, Khalil receives, every day, hundreds of messages on his Facebook page from Palestinians in Israel donating for Syrian refugees.

So far, the campaign has collected more than 10 million shekels (around $3,145,297) from Palestinians in Arab cities in Israel.

READ: Snowfall brings down tents in northern Syria, leaving refugees out in the cold

Last week, the activists expanded the fund-raising campaign for Syrian refugees to the West Bank and Jerusalem.

“This campaign shows that the Palestinians and Syrians are one nation,” Khalil, who is also a horse trainer, said.

In Syria, over 6.7 million people have been internally displaced by the country’s civil war, triggered by the Bashar Al-Assad regime’s harsh crackdown on pro-democracy protests in 2011. Another 6.8 million Syrians live as refugees in neighbouring countries such as Jordan, Lebanon and Turkiye.

Most displaced people found shelter in tents, unfinished buildings, leaving them particularly vulnerable to harsh winter conditions.

True face

Jabr Hijaz, a friend of Khalil, joined the fund-raising campaign to ease the misery of Syrian refugees.

“I experienced life in the outdoors. I really feel for Syrian children living in the camps,” Hijaz, from the town of Tamra, 20 kilometres east of Acre, told Anadolu Agency.

“Photos that came from the camps make the stones feel,” he said.

Khalil and Hijazi are both coordinating with relief organisations to build hundreds of houses for Syrian refugees north of Syria, north of Jordan and south of Turkiye.

Hijazi said the campaign for Syrian refugees reflects the true face of the Arab community in Israel.

READ: Syrians in Idlib burn clothes to stay warm

“The (Israeli) occupation wanted us to see our community as a criminal community, but this campaign makes us very proud of ourselves,” added Hijazi, who lost his brother by Israeli fire during protests against organised crime in Israel.

“A few members who work in organised crime aren’t reflecting the reality of us,” he said.

Palestinians who managed to stay in their homes during the Nakba – forced exodus – of 1948 are known as Arab Israelis. They make up around 20 per cent of Israel’s population.

They are centred in a group of Arab towns in central Israel known as the “Little Triangle,” along with the Galilee (north) and Negev regions (south).

Numerous human rights groups decry Israeli policies against Arabs as a form of modern-day apartheid, with Arabs suffering racial discrimination in education, work  and health care.