The first UN aid convoy crosses the border after hundreds of bodies are delivered

A 2.5 Million Prize Gives This Non-Norwegian Group More Power to Stop Human Suffector: The Council for Northern Afghanistan’s humanitarian crisis

Jan Egeland speaks in a calm manner, but he becomes more agitated when discussing the record number of people currently displaced by humanitarian crises.

Last year we helped over 10 million refugees and displaced people; this year we need to reach even more. The enemies are bigger and worse, so we need to be quicker and smarter, responding to crises earlier, providing support for the longer term and helping people to become self-reliant as soon as possible. We can only accomplish that with local colleagues, and the money will help us with staff development. There are 1,400 humanitarian workers in Afghanistan, but only 25 of them are international. In general, most of our staff are non-Norwegian. We will be able to focus on conflict prevention thanks to this funding, because we already have long tradition of mediation between warring ethnic groups, and farmers competing for land and water.

In recognition of these efforts, the council this year has been awarded the world’s largest annual humanitarian award for a nonprofit — worth $2.5 million.

This award could not have come at more important time for us because we are challenged like never before. We’ve become a target for authoritarian regimes and parties to armed conflicts that do not want the truth to be told because of our advocacy for targeted civilians. Thanks to the support of the Hilton Prize, we can do that with more authority and resources. It’s a considerable sum of money, but of equal importance is the recognition and prestige. I view this as a prize for humanitarian work.

Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2022/10/20/1129199362/a-2-5-million-prize-gives-this-humanitarian-group-more-power-to-halt-human-suffe

Frontline Hilfs in Conflict Areas: Refugees in Norway, Central America, Bosnia, South Africa and Horn of Africa, After the 2014 Invasion

Egeland is a former Norwegian foreign minister who held positions at Human Rights Watch, the Red Cross and the United Nations before becoming secretary general of the council. He talked to NPR about overlooked crises, equal protection for all refugees and reasons to hope, after returning from a trip to the Horn of Africa.

We are a frontline humanitarian organization assisting refugees and displaced people in conflict areas. We were established after the liberation of Norway from the Nazis. Our founders realized that the situation in most of Europe was worse than in Norway, even though Norway was receiving assistance from the US. Our early relief efforts focused on refugees in Austria, Germany, Poland and the Balkans — and it grew from there. Today we have 16,000 field workers in most of the biggest crises and wars of our time, from Ukraine to Colombia, from Congo to Myanmar.

An annual report measuring the number of people in greatest need versus international media coverage is issued by us. Last year the top 10 of the most neglected conflicts and displacement crises in the world were in Africa. The Democratic Republic of Congo is a colossal emergency where more than 25 million people are in need, yet it receives scant attention. For all of the above, it is the same.

And now much media attention and global funding is going to Ukrainian refugees. The Russian invasion started in February. What has happened to Ukrainian refugees?

The NRC has been in Ukraine since the 2014 Donbas conflict, but now the situation is much worse, with trench warfare and the destruction of entire cities engulfing millions of civilians. The areas that have become more stable are where we are able to help the internally displaced and Ukrainians are returning from abroad after fleeing. Others continue to be moved out of the south and east of the country. I fear for the winter. We are preparing a winterization program for millions of people who will be frozen in the cold.

It is good to help our neighbor who looks like us, has the same religion, and can integrate in our societies, but we should give protection according to need. People from the Middle East or Afghanistan are not welcome in Europe because of the cold shoulder and barbed wire. In the US, women and children fleeing violence in central America are not always well received. We need to make sure we stand firmly on the side of those who need protection.

We live and breathe on the principles of impartiality, independence and neutrality. We teach our peers not to take sides in the conflict and not to get too close to a government that is in the conflict. But at the same time, we still need to have the respect, and the protection, of those parties. We can’t work in the Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, so it hurts us to always work on all sides.

Over a year after the West left Afghanistan, 40 million women and children need our help more than ever. Girl’s education and minority protection are issues that need to be engaged by the defacto authorities and the donor countries. The very wrong response is to impose sanctions that do not take away food from Taliban soldiers but do make women and children starve.

I’m afraid of that. One hundred million people have now for the first time in recorded history been displaced by war and violence. In 2011, it was 40 million. In modern times there has never been so many children going to bed hungry. We need some countries to recognize that while they are struggling with high energy prices and nationalistic tendencies at home, it is significantly worse in the areas where we operate.

It’s dramatic, really. The mothers and fathers were walking for hundreds of kilometers to get food and water. Better use of the existing resources is what we need. The BricS was formed to balance short-term humanitarian needs with long-term community preparedness. People can start feeding their own on their own if bore holes are built with solar-powered pumps.

Donate to the international NGOs. Write to your politicians to let them know we want to live according to rules of compassion and solidarity. Reach out to those refugees and migrants who come to our communities, befriend them, help them integrate.

It is a time of terrible contrasts. Never have there been so many displaced by violence and conflict, and so many with no chance to feed themselves. Climate change, COVID and conflict have merged to create a lethal cocktail. But the good news is that never have there been more effective national and international humanitarian and development organizations, better technological advances and greater resources. There should be a possibility for the people at the bottom of the pyramid to be elevated as there has never been as many billionaires. Those at the top have a lot of resources and they could have helped us with people in need.

I come back an optimist whenever I return from visiting colleagues working in difficult and dangerous circumstances. We have now helped more than a million children go to school and when I ask them what they want to become when they are older, they don’t want to be fighters or soldiers or terrorists or criminals; they all want to be doctors, engineers, farmers and builders.

The World Health Organization’s Distribution of Emergency Medical Supplies to a Critical Population in Turkey and Syria during the Epicenter of the Second Erdoseismology Incident

DUBAI — In a dusty, industrial corner of Dubai, far from the city’s gleaming skyscrapers and marbled buildings, boxes of child-sized body bags are stacked in a massive warehouse. They will be shipped to Syria for survivors of the earthquake.

Like other aid agencies, the World Health Organization is struggling to reach people in need. But from its global logistics hub in Dubai, the U.N. agency tasked with international public health has already loaded two planes with critical medical supplies, enough to help some 70,000 people. One plane is destined for Turkey and the other for Syria.

A color-coded label helps identify which kits are for countries in need. Emergency health kits for Istanbul and Damascus only have green labels.

Robert says trauma and emergency surgery kits were mostly used in the response to the earthquake.

Blanchard is a former firefighter from California who worked in the Foreign Service and U.S. Agency for International Development before joining the WHO in Dubai. The organization has immense logistical challenges reaching the victims of the earthquake, but their warehouses help deliver aid rapidly to countries in need.

Less and fewer survivors were found on Monday despite the authorities sometimes reporting a harrowing rescue. In Turkey and Syria, aid workers largely turned their attention toward the people without food, medicine and homes. In both countries, bad weather and damaged roads have slowed the flow of aid.

“The weather conditions are now not looking so great. So it just depends on the condition of the roads, the availability of the trucks and then the permission to cross the border and deliver the humanitarian aid,” he says.

Turkey has received support and aid from dozens of countries, but this outreach to Syria has been less enthusiastic, raising concerns that victims on the Turkish side of the border may not be taken care of.

The international humanitarian city of Dubai: The humanitarian hub and logistical support for Syria and the aftermath of the September 17th UNICEF earthquake

“They’re not able to go home because their homes have not been cleared by an engineer as being structurally sound,” Blanchard says. “They’re literally sleeping and living in the office and trying to do work at the same time.”

The International Humanitarian City is located in a 1.5 million square ft. zone of Dubai and is the largest humanitarian hub in the world. The zone is also home to warehouses for the U.N. refugee agency, World Food Program, Red Cross and Red Crescent organizations, UNICEF and others.

The government of Dubai covers the cost of storage facilities, utilities and flights carrying relief items into affected areas. The inventory is obtained by the agencies.

$150 million of emergency stock and assistance is dispatched annually to between 120 and 150 countries. That includes personal protective equipment, tents, food and other critical items needed in climate disasters, medical emergencies and global outbreaks, like the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Because of its strategic position, this hub became the largest one in the world, which is a testament to the fact that we are doing quite a lot,” he says. In a few hours’ flight you can serve twothirds of the world’s population residing in Southeast Asia, Middle East and Africa.

Due to a problem with the plane’s engine, WHO supplies for Damascus were still grounded in Dubai as of Wednesday evening. Blanchard says the organization is trying for direct flights to Syria’s government-controlled airport in Aleppo, a situation he describes as “evolving by the hour.”

A version of this story appears in the paper today. CNN broadcasts a three-Times-a-week look inside the biggest stories in the Middle East. Sign up here.

Syrian victims of the devastating earthquake that hit their country and Turkey on Monday may become hostages of the politics that have divided Syria for over a decade, analysts have warned.

Rescue workers are racing against time to get survivors from the rubble of collapsed buildings in freezing winter conditions after the devastating earthquake that killed more than 21,000 people in Turkey and Syria.

“To many in the international community, Syria is just another Arab country mired in war, poverty, and extremism,” he added. We’re tired of the empty statement of solidarity or pointless summits that are supposed to solve our crisis. We need to take action.

Turkey is a NATO member whose international stature has only grown in recent years. Syria, on the other hand, is ruled by a myriad of disparate groups. Iran and Russia are both pariahs of the world due to the regime’s brutal suppression of an uprising there in 2011.

The Syrian regime is shunned by most Western countries. As his former adversaries welcome him back into the fold, leader Bashar al-Assad has begun forging ties with them. Last year the United Arab Arabia welcomed Assad in Abu Dhabi and last month the Turkish president said they might meet for peace talks.

The UN cross-border aid operation has been put back into action. We are proud that we can help the people in northwest Syria. We hope that this operation continues as this is a humanitarian lifeline and the only scalable channel,” Sanjana Quazi, head of OCHA Türkiye said.

Turkey has quickly offered teams of rescuers, donations and aid, whereas the situation in Syria is much different.

Millions of people were already suffering from the effects of poverty when the earthquake hit, so aid groups like UN were needed in rebel-held areas.

There are more difficulties helping survivors in Syria because of years of conflict and slow international aid.

Madevi Sun-Suon, a spokeswoman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance, told CNN on Tuesday that they are exploring all avenues to reach people in need. “We do have aid but this road issue is a big challenge as of now.”

She said that they depend on humanitarian aid provided by the UN through the cross-border mechanism from Turkey.

The Syrian regime has also used the opportunity to call for sanctions against it to be lifted. Its UN envoy Sabbagh said on Tuesday that planes refused to land at Syrian airports because of American and European sanctions. “So even those countries who want to send humanitarian assistance, they cannot use the airplane cargo because of the sanctions,” he said in New York.

The UN appointed human rights expert in November called for the immediate lifting of sanctions against Syria because they are hurting ordinary citizens there.

“It would be quite ironic, if not even counterproductive, for us to reach out to a government that has brutalized its people over the course of a dozen years now,” US State Department spokesperson Ned Price told reporters Monday.

If sanctions were dropped, the ramifications of the situation would change and that is a very convenient time for the regime to make that argument.

An Iranian Air Force Base in the Middle East with Fighters and Drones, and Turkey’s First NATO Resummation After the Turkey-Sudan Arab-Boson Boycott

Iran on Tuesday revealed an underground air force base called “Eagle 44,” the first in the country large enough to house fighter jets, the official IRNA news said. The “Eagle 44” base is capable of storing and operating fighter jets and drones, IRNA said. The base’s location was not explained in the report.

On Tuesday, the Prime Minister of Sweden said that he was ready to restart negotiations on Sweden’s membership in NATO when Turkey was ready.

Background: Finland and Sweden sought NATO membership shortly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year, and while most member states have ratified the applications, Turkey has yet to give its approval in what must be a unanimous process. Turkey last week said it would support Sweden if they joined at the same time, even though other Nordic neighbors were trying to do the same.

Last year, the three nations reached an agreement on a way forward, but last month Ankara put talks on hold after protests in Sweden where a far-right politician burned a Quran. There are elections in Turkey in May.

The move comes as a result of an apparent thaw in relations. Bahrain’s crown prince spoke with Qatar’s emir in a phone call last month, in a sign the two Gulf states could move towards repairing relations two years after the Arab boycott was lifted. After the small Arab summit in Abu Dhabi, a conversation came up with the emir of the country and his king.

A three-year political and economic boycott of Qatar ended in January 2021, by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Sheikhs and four other Arab countries. There have been no bilateral talks since then to try to resolve the differences. Travel and trade links are restored in 2021, but not all.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/08/middleeast/syria-left-behind-earthquake-mime-intl/index.html

The Suspension of a Quranic Video Account About the Syria-Syria Humanitarian Crossroads: Concerns about the Status of the Disaster

Before the account was taken down, it had more than 13 million followers.

The user who addressed Musk said that he didn’t think it had broken the rules because it quoted the Holy Quran. We demand the lifting of the suspension of this account.”

Not all users were upset with the suspension. Some decried the account’s use of incomplete Quranic verses that they said are taken out of context and thus change the meaning of the text.

The account owner appears to run sister accounts in English, French and German, on which it posts translations of Quranic verses. The account that shows Quranic videos is campaigning for the original account to be unblocked.

There were 10.9 million people affected by the disaster in Syria, and the situation is worse now that there is snow on the ground.

A convoy of shelter items and non food items went through the only humanitarian aid corridor between Turkey and Syria on Thursday.

The delivery ended a three-day period during which no aid arrived – just 300 bodies, according to the administration that controls the only access point between the two countries.

The UN said the roads to the crossing had been blocked, but as of Wednesday they were clear, raising questions on why it took so long for help to arrive.

The Idlib Crisis: The first year since the UNSC voted to keep the border crossing open in Syria, and the number will need to be revised

Abu Muhammad Sakhour is a former merchant and is helping out in the rebel-held city of Idlib by dressing victims of the earthquakes and looking after the injured who have left crowded hospitals.

At the Bab al-Hawa border crossing, protesters hold signs asking why only bodies are being allowed through. The Syrian refugees who were killed in Turkey are being sent back to their homeland, so they can be buried.

Muhammad Munther Atqi, from the Independent Doctor’s Association, is living out of his car with his family in Gaziantep, Turkey, but he is still in contact with his colleagues in Syria. He said hospitals there have been overrun with bodies and that staff waited for families to show up to identify them so they could be taken away.

Each day, survivors are facing their own challenges while water supplies dwindle and disease threatens to spread. Moutaz Adham, Oxfam’s country director for Syria, said residents are struggling to find food – even bread is hard to come by because so many bakeries collapsed in the quake.

The number of crossing has been reduced since 2021, thanks to the veto power of Russia and China. In January, less than one month before the quake, the UNSC unanimously voted to keep it open, a vote reluctantly backed by China and Russia, whose ambassador said it enabled aid to flow to a Syrian enclave “inundated with terrorists.”

We don’t need politics. We don’t need the game playing that’s going on. What we do need is for the international community to focus on the border crossing staying open,” Barnes added. We are now going into the humanitarian phase since we are past the first phase of finding people. We have to provide people with food, water and shelter.

Before the earthquake struck, there were 15.3 million people who needed aid, but now that number will need to be revised, El- Mostafa Benlamlih said.

An aid worker told CNN that homeless people have been sleeping in their cars in northern Syria as he distributed supplies.

“Those who are still alive under the rubble might die from the cold weather,”  Dr. Mostafa Edo, the Country Director for the US-based NGO MedGlobal said.

Bringing Help to Syria with the Earthquake: The Case for a Rescue Mission in the Iron-Heavy And Cold Winters of Karam Kellieh

Several countries, including the United Arab Emirates, Iraq and Russia have sent relief to airports controlled by the regime. China, Saudi Arabia, Canada and other countries have pledged aid.

The executive director of Deir al-Zour 24, a research organization that delivers news from Syria, said the man was using the disaster to remove sanctions. If we are going to bring help to Syria, we can. Time is critical. We are playing with life and death.”

In the US, the earthquake – compounded by 12 years of devastating war – is also taking an emotional toll on Syrians who feel helpless watching from afar.

Syrians are not sure where their next meal comes from. When we say meal, it’s not about vegetables, not about meat… it’s about simple bread,” said Moutaz Adham, Oxfam’s country director for Syria.

Over the course of a week, voice messages from people sharing traumatizing stories from the ground kept flooding Al-Dahhan’s phone.

Rescue efforts continue as untold others remain trapped under the rubble. Stories of miraculous rescues, like that of a baby girl born under the rubble, are a bullhorn for what’s at stake.

The world knows of these rescues because of Karam Kellieh, a resident and photojournalist who lives in the opposition-controlled territory. Four million people were displaced by the Syrian civil war. Even before the earthquake, the area was devastated by bombs and poverty. Politics and the Syrian government were obstacles to aid.

“Humanitarian aid and international aid haven’t appeared 72 hours after the catastrophic earthquake,” he said, describing the little help that is trickling into the region as a haphazard grassroots effort by individual groups.

“Rescue efforts are being carried out by poorly equipped civil defense groups and civilians are trying to help,” Kelliah said. Everyone is waiting for aid and rescue to help them understand what’s happened.

“The situation remains grim in north-west Syria where only five percent of reported sites are being covered by search and rescue,” the U.N.’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a report.

The scale of the challenge is amplified by the fact that areas in Syria and Turkey are facing cold winter weather. For example, the Syrian city of Aleppo is forecast to have lows of -3°C to -2°C (27°F to 28°F) through this weekend, whereas February low are normally 2.5°C (36°F).

Governments around the world are pledging assistance, deploying search teams, medical squads and equipment, and offering aid, as families who have lost their homes endure near-freezing temperatures.

Tax-deductible Donations for Nonprofits: Investigation of Errors by Organizations Using Guidestar and Internal Revenue Service Databases

Before making a donation to an organization that is unfamiliar, you should do some research to make sure it is legit. Charity Navigator and Guidestar have ratings for nonprofits based on transparency and effectiveness. You can use the Internal Revenue Service database to search for organizations that are eligible for tax-deductible contributions.

If you believe an organization or individual has committed fraud, you can report it to the National Center for Disaster Fraud.

Global Giving, which helps local nonprofit agencies, is collecting donations to help fund emergency medical workers’ ability to provide food, shelter and medicine, among other necessities. As needs in Turkey and Syria change, the organization will focus on long-term assistance, it said.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies is requesting donations for its Disaster Response Emergency Fund so it can send “immediate cash assistance.”

OXFAM, an organization that fights poverty, is working with a women’s cooperative in Turkey to come up with an appropriate response plan. It is accepting donations.

CARE, an organization that works with impoverished communities, is accepting donations that will go toward food, shelter and hygiene kits, among other items.

The Union of Medical Care and Relief Organizations has been helping Syrian refugees in Turkey since 2012 with medical relief and health care services.

Search for bodies in the crushes of a young boy and his wife in Jinderis, Syria, as reported by the White Helmets

JINDERIS, Syria — Mohammed Juma sleeps on the heap of rubble that crushed his family as he survived. In the freezing nights, the 20-year-old and others in this town — still dazed and in shock — burn possessions found in the debris for heat.

By contrast, across the border in the northwest of Syria, residents of the town of Jinderis heard the screams of those trapped under the rubble but, without the right machinery and equipment, were powerless to save them.

Mohammed Juma said his wife, Alia, and his two children — 20-month old Ali and 6-month old Hussein — were alive after their home collapsed on top of them. The effort to pull at the shattered concrete was futile because Juma and his neighbors had blood on their hands.

The civil defense teams are using the few excavators they do have to recover corpses. There were at least 850 bodies found on Friday in Jinderis. A man named Zakaria Tabak remembers laying his toddler in his bed as he was killed by falling debris. Tabaka’s wife was dead in the bed. He said that few friends were able to come to the burial because they were too busy burying their own loved ones.

They’ve been left with no possessions after years of war. Tens of thousands now live with almost no access to basic services in makeshift tents set up in the olive groves where the mud clogs and weighs down the legs of children playing outside.

The town of Sawran is less than an hour’s drive away from one of the open border crossings. The destroyed home of the Turki family is on the other side of the main street. Across the road a family of seven were killed. Neighbors said they had moved to Sawran after fleeing their home in Khan Sheikhoun, where in 2017 the Syrian government attacked the population with the nerve agent Sarin, killing 89 people.

There are 3,576 deaths in Syria, which include 2,168 deaths in the northwest, according to the White Helmets civil defense group.

The White Helmets, who announced the end of their search and rescue operations on Friday, told CNN on Saturday that the total number of dead was expected to rise much higher.

German Emergency Operations in Turkey after the June 11th Earthquake: A Conversation with Al-Dahhan and a Team of Medics

German rescue operations in Turkey, which were halted on Saturday due to security concerns, “in general” remain suspended for these reasons, the German Federal Agency for Technical Relief (THW) told CNN on Sunday.

The United Hatzalah also announced on Sunday that it was leaving Turkey due to a security threat.

United Hatzalah chief executive Eli Pollack and vice president of operations Dov Maisel said in a statement they had “received intelligence of a concrete and immediate threat on the Israeli delegation and we have to put the security of our personnel first.”

“We knew that there was a certain level of risk in sending our team to this area of Turkey, which is close to the Syrian border but we took the necessary steps in order to mitigate the threat for the sake of our lifesaving mission,” Maisel said.

Turkish rescue workers are assisted by a rescue dog handler with Turkish forces helping in the searched areas, according to the Austrian Forces Disaster Relief Unit.

The team of Palestinians along with local volunteers is also providing mental health services to about 300 children and their families in shelters and hospitals, who are suffering from severe trauma and depression as a result of the earthquake.

Children have experienced difficult times since the earthquake. Some of them miraculously escaped death, but after their physical survival, psychological support teams of the Palestinian Red Crescent are working for their psychological survival,” the statement continued.

The voice messages he’s received chronicling their pain make it impossible to sleep, he says. He feels guilty because he is haunted by their cries. Thousands of people are buried alive in the rubble of Syria when he rests.

According to Al-Dahhan, it is destroying him. “When it happened, I was receiving constant voice messages, jumping from number to number on WhatsApp, each one is someone crying, telling me they are seeing people dying around them. I cannot stop listening to them.

As Al-Dahhan travels to raise money in person, Alsamman is using social media, so far raising over $1,000 for reputable international organizations on the ground and 10 food boxes that were delivered directly to those affected.

On the ground, his colleagues who survived have been in a race against time to save those trapped under the rubble and deliver aid to shell-shocked survivors.

Since the earthquake, Al-Dahhan says he has not properly eaten and can’t sleep for more than 10 minutes at a time, the exhaustion evident in his voice.

“At least I get a little bit of relief, knowing what I’m doing matters, because the more I can fundraise here, the more it helps out there,” he said. I need to keep going because I am in constant stress and I am not doing enough. When I sleep, I feel guilty. I need to be awake every second. I have to be doing my job. I want to get more updates. I feel like I’m doing something here, but my mind and soul are not.

The tragic loss of a family of two killed by an air strike in Syria and its impact on human mental health: Syria’s response to the earthquake and the need for relief

A family that lost two sisters in the earthquake has no other children of their own. When Al-Dahhan found out of his sisters deaths, he died of a heart attack and left his children without a father.

Alsamman thought it was an Israeli air strike since we have had a few of the ones there over the past few years. When I saw reports of a large earthquake in the middle of the night, I wish it had been an airstrike.

He spent the next hours in agony, he said, watching images of death and devastation pour into his phone with no way of knowing if his friends or family were trapped under the rubble.

The only organizations that were capable of providing aid for them were the ones already there.

Syrians in the US rushed to raise funds for organizations on the ground when the chance to rescue survivors decreased as the clock ran out.

After fleeing the civil war in Syria, Nour Al Ghraowi came to the US to work for the Karam Foundation.

Despite the fact that the world has been quiet and no one has spoken about them, there are organizations who still fight for them and never give up.

Zahra emphasized the urgency of donations to provide immediate needs, including food, shelter, non-food items, and medicine, but said providing Syrians with mental-health care is also critical.

She says that the feeling of being left out is one of the main causes of Syrians’ mental health issues in the US.

It is understandable that people ask themselves if they matter or be forgotten again. Will I be another picture that is circulating but not humanized?

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/13/us/syrian-american-earthquake-raise-money-rescue-relief/index.html

The earthquake that killed 12 children in Aleppo, Idlib, Latakia, and Hama: how many Syrians have died in the past?

Photographs of buildings falling during the earthquake and eerily similar to the aftermath of bombs dropped during the war, have triggered a psychological reaction for some including Al-Dahhan.

The war that happened messed me up so I rebuilt walls several years ago. I didn’t want to get hurt like that again,” Al-Dahhan said. “But with this earthquake, I feel those walls crumbling. I am remembering things I don’t want to remember, and I can’t think of anything else.

Others, like Zahra and Alsamman, say they are struggling with survivor’s guilt, possessed with a relentless, sinking feeling that no matter how much they help it won’t be enough.

“Don’t move on and forget about us,” he begged. “In three weeks, when it isn’t as trendy to post and talk about Syria, know that the people of Aleppo, Idlib, Latakia, and Hama don’t have the option of moving on.”

We have no time to heal those wounds, we are shouting from rooftops, please don’t get distracted, please share, please help, please help.

Every hour brings more news of death, children orphaned, entire families still buried under the rubble, as survivors remain in the streets holding onto diminishing glimmers of hope.

Across the street, workers searched for bodies in the rubble, their hopes of finding survivors dimming so long after the building fell. Ms Omac said that her husband’s nephew and niece were under the debris. She was waiting for the rescuers to pull her relatives out.

Turkey’s national emergency management agency, AFAD, has distributed a huge quantity of tents — with the help of more than 238,000 relief workers — but the sheer scale of the disaster has meant many still lack shelter.

Many people cobbled debris together to erect what they could: One family, numbering about a dozen, built a shelter of cardboard and tarp over a flatbed truck, with blankets and thin mattresses in the beds.

The Turkish Red Crescent, a humanitarian group, said it was speeding up the production of tents to house people after Turkish news media reported a shortage of temporary housing and poor sanitary conditions for the homeless.

The UN refugee’s window for rescue was closing: the comments of the UN’s top humanitarian chief Xi Jinping-Mills

The focus was on providing homes, food, schooling and psychological care for the victims, as the window for rescue was coming to an end, according to the UN’s top humanitarian chief.