UN Aid Deliveries to Syria from Turkey Extended until January

United Nations Security Council members have agreed to extend for six months a system for bringing aid through Turkey and the Bab al-Hawa border crossing, shown here in July 2022, into war-ravaged Syria OMAR HAJ KADOUR AFP/File
United Nations Security Council members have agreed to extend for six months a system for bringing aid through Turkey and the Bab al-Hawa border crossing, shown here in July 2022, into war-ravaged Syria OMAR HAJ KADOUR AFP/File
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UN Aid Deliveries to Syria from Turkey Extended until January

United Nations Security Council members have agreed to extend for six months a system for bringing aid through Turkey and the Bab al-Hawa border crossing, shown here in July 2022, into war-ravaged Syria OMAR HAJ KADOUR AFP/File
United Nations Security Council members have agreed to extend for six months a system for bringing aid through Turkey and the Bab al-Hawa border crossing, shown here in July 2022, into war-ravaged Syria OMAR HAJ KADOUR AFP/File

The United Nations Security Council voted on Tuesday to allow UN aid deliveries from Turkey to some 4 million people in northwest Syria to continue until Jan. 10, reaching a deal on its third attempt after the mandate for the operation expired.

The United States, Britain and France abstained from the vote because they wanted to extend the long-running humanitarian aid operation for one year. Russia vetoed that move in a vote on Friday and then failed in its own push for a six-month renewal.

Deputy US Ambassador Richard Mills accused Russia of holding the council hostage. The United States, Britain and France said six months was not long enough for aid groups to plan and operate effectively. The United Nations wanted one year.

"Russia does not care," Mills said. "Russia stood alone in complete isolation and used their veto to punish the Syrian people. It bullied council members and continued its merciless approach toward the most vulnerable."

Russia had said it would veto any text other than its own.

"Russia was trying to get the best deal possible," Russia's Deputy UN Ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy told reporters after the meeting. "The world is bigger than Western countries ... they have to take into consideration interest of the countries first and foremost affected by Security Council decisions."

Council approval for the aid deliveries expired on Sunday. That authorization is needed because Syrian authorities did not agree to the operation, which has been delivering aid including food, medicine and shelter to the opposition-controlled area of Syria since 2014.

Turkey's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that continuation of the aid deliveries "without interruption is essential for an effective international response" and regional stability.

Ukraine tensions

Russia argues that the UN aid operation violates Syria's sovereignty and territorial integrity. It says more aid should be delivered from inside the country, raising opposition fears that food and other aid would fall under government control.

The resolution adopted on Tuesday was put forward by Ireland and Norway. It essentially mirrors the failed Russian text, which only Russia and China supported on Friday.

The Security Council vote on the authorization of the aid operation has long been a contentious issue, but this year also comes amid heightened tensions between Russia and Western powers over Moscow's Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine.

"We're dealing with a very difficult geo-political context and the dynamic around the table is very different," Ireland's UN Ambassador Geraldine Byrne Nason told reporters. "In that context ... you have to see this as a very significant result."

Norway's UN Ambassador Mona Juul noted: "The Russian position this year, as it has been in the previous year, is that they don't want to have this mechanism. That's their starting point. We have managed now to have it renewed."

In 2014, the Security Council authorized humanitarian aid deliveries into opposition-held areas of Syria from Iraq, Jordan and two points in Turkey. But Russia and China, which have veto powers, have whittled that down to just one Turkish border point.

The council on Tuesday committed to further extend the aid operation until July 10, 2023, but another resolution would be required in January to do so. UN chief Antonio Guterres also has to submit a special report on the humanitarian needs in Syria to the Security Council in December.

"I strongly hope that after the six months it will be renewed," Guterres told reporters after the vote.



Anxiety Clouds Easter for West Bank Christians

Residents of the West Bank town of Zababdeh say its church bells are often drowned out by the roar of Israeli air force jets headed for action nearby. - AFP
Residents of the West Bank town of Zababdeh say its church bells are often drowned out by the roar of Israeli air force jets headed for action nearby. - AFP
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Anxiety Clouds Easter for West Bank Christians

Residents of the West Bank town of Zababdeh say its church bells are often drowned out by the roar of Israeli air force jets headed for action nearby. - AFP
Residents of the West Bank town of Zababdeh say its church bells are often drowned out by the roar of Israeli air force jets headed for action nearby. - AFP

In the mainly Christian Palestinian town of Zababdeh, the runup to Easter has been overshadowed by nearby Israeli military operations, which have proliferated in the occupied West Bank alongside the Gaza war.

This year unusually Easter falls on the same weekend for all of the town's main Christian communities -- Catholic, Orthodox and Anglican --- and residents have attempted to busy themselves with holiday traditions like making date cakes or getting ready for the scout parade.

But their minds have been elsewhere.

Dozens of families from nearby Jenin have found refuge in Zababdeh from the continual Israeli military operations that have devastated the city and its adjacent refugee camp this year.

"The other day, the (Israeli) army entered Jenin, people were panicking, families were running to pick up their children," said Zababdeh resident Janet Ghanam.

"There is a constant fear, you go to bed with it, you wake up with it," the 57-year-old Anglican added, before rushing off to one of the last Lenten prayers before Easter.

Ghanam said her son had told her he would not be able to visit her for Easter this year, for fear of being stuck at the Israeli military roadblocks that have mushroomed across the territory.

Zabadeh's Anglican church was busy in the runup to Easter but across the West Bank Christian communities have been in sharp decline as people emigrate in search of a better life abroad.

Zabadeh looks idyllic, nestled in the hills of the northern West Bank, but the roar of Israeli air force jets sometimes drowns out the sound of its church bells.

"It led to a lot of people to think: 'Okay, am I going to stay in my home for the next five years?'" said Saleem Kasabreh, an Anglican deacon in the town.

"Would my home be taken away? Would they bomb my home?"

- 'Existential threat' -

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967 and in recent months far-right ministers in its coalition government have called for the annexation of swathes of the territory.

Kasabreh said this "existential threat" was compounded by constant "depression" at the news from Gaza, where the death toll from the Israel's response to Hamas's October 2023 attack now tops 51,000, according to the Hamas-run territory's health ministry.

Work has been hard to find for Zababdeh's mainly Christian residents since Israel rescinded Palestinian work permits following the October 2023 attack by Hamas that sparked the Gaza war.

Zababdeh has been spared the devastation wreaked on Gaza, but the mayor's office says nearly 450 townspeople lost their jobs in Israel when Palestinian work permits were rescinded after the Hamas attack.

"Israel had never completely closed us in the West Bank before this war," said 73-year-old farmer Ibrahim Daoud. "Nobody knows what will happen".

Many say they are stalked by the spectre of exile, with departures abroad fuelling fears that Christians may disappear from the Holy Land.

"People can't stay without work and life isn't easy," said 60-year-old maths teacher Tareq Ibrahim.

Mayor Ghassan Daibes echoed his point.

"For a Christian community to survive, there must be stability, security and decent living conditions. It's a reality, not a call for emigration," he said.

"But I´m speaking from lived experience: Christians used to make up 30 percent of the population in Palestine; today, they are less than one percent.

"And this number keeps decreasing. In my own family, I have three brothers abroad -- one in Germany, the other two in the United States."

Catholic priest Father Elias Tabban insists the hard times his congregation has been going though have deepened their faith.

Catholic priest Elias Tabban adopted a more stoical attitude, insisting his congregation's spirituality had never been so vibrant.

"Whenever the Church is in hard times... (that's when) you see the faith is growing," Tabban said.