Christians fleeing from Syria
Mission East supports all refugees irrespective of their ethnic or religious affiliation, but during my last visit I mainly concentrated on circa 8,000 Christian refugees from Syria who have been driven out of their home towns. Among those refugees are Armenians from the historic town of Kessab that in March was stormed by radical rebel groups. In Syria, the Christian Armenians make up an ethnic and religious minority that for many years have lived peacefully in their towns and villages in Syria. At this time, however, they are being driven away from their homes.
In Syria, the Christians are subject to persecution and atrocities because of their faith. “We help them as well as we can, but we need outside support,” says the Armenian bishop of Lebanon.
Please spend a few minutes and read the story about the people helping the refugees from Syria, as well as eyewitness accounts from the refugees themselves.
Kim Hartzner, MD, Managing Director
‘Mr Asbed, do you think that you will ever come back to your village Kessab, do you think you will ever return to the village where you lived for decades and your family lived for generations?’
‘Everybody wants to go back to his birthplace but to us it will only be possible if the Government reoccupies Kessab and manages to clean it from weapons and mines. Everybody wants to go back to what they own. But to us it is impossible because everything has been looted and stolen. There is nothing left, they took everything in trucks and emptied the homes. They stole everything. Now no one dares to go back, and we are spread all over: In the Armenian town of Anjar in Lebanon and in Latakia in Syria.
The day the opposition forces attacked our town they told us to put our hands up. All of us put our hands up. My aunt’s head was not covered, so therefore they said: ‘Cover your heads, cover your heads’, and they covered her head with a bed sheet. Then someone came and asked if we had a weapon? We said we had a hunting rifle. My nephew Kevork went and brought the gun. At that moment one of the opposition forces said: ‘This man is fighting against us.’ He hit his face and when he fell down, he shot him and killed him. We said: ‘What are you doing?’, and in response they said: ‘Shut up and don’t say anything or we will kill you too.’
