Israel on Tuesday called on the UN Security Council to act over Syrian military attacks after an Israeli patrol was hit in the buffer zone between the two in the Golan Heights.

An Israeli military patrol was hit by gunfire from Syria on Monday while in the Golan, and Israel’s UN ambassador Ron Prosor said his country viewed the heightened tensions with “utmost concern.”

Prosor said Syrian tanks remain in the Golan in “grave violation” of a 1974 agreement on security in the buffer zone. He said there had been a string of violations of the accord in recent months.

“This represents a dangerous escalation that could have far-reaching implications for the security and stability of our region,” Prosor said in a letter to the Security Council.

“Israel has shown maximum restraint. However, Israel views the continued violations of the Separation of Forces agreement by the Syrian military forces with the utmost concern,” the ambassador added.

“The international community and the Security Council should address this alarming development without delay to prevent further escalation,” Prosor said.

A military spokesman said an Israeli vehicle was hit by stray bullets on Monday while it was near the Golan central demarcation line. There were no injuries.

Israel’s armed forces chief, Lieutenant General Benny Gantz, said Sunday his country could become involved in the Syrian conflict, as fighting between the army and rebels raged near Israeli positions on the strategic heights.

Syria remains formally at war with Israel, which captured part of the Golan Heights in a 1967 war and annexed it in 1981 in a move the international community does not recognize.

Since the 1974 agreement between the two countries was reached, a 1,200-strong unarmed UN force has patrolled the Golan buffer zone.

-AFP

(CNN) — Syria’s government is waging “a war of extermination” against its own people, the prime minister of Qatar said Tuesday, according to state media, hours after a failed four-day ceasefire during a Muslim holiday left hundreds dead.

In strongly worded comments to the Al Jazeera Arabic network, Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem Al Thani also accused foreign powers of standing by while President Bashar al-Assad’s forces carried out a slaughter.

“What is happening in Syria is not a civil war but a genocide, a war of extermination with a license to kill by the Syrian government and the international community,” he said, according to the official Qatar News Agency.

Al Thani, who’s also Qatar’s foreign minister, said he had confidence in U.N.-Arab League envoy to Syria Lakhdar Brahimi — but that his country did not trust Al-Assad’s government.

Brahimi had pushed for government forces and rebels to stop fighting during Eid al-Adha, a major Muslim holiday that began Friday and ended Monday. But it soon became clear the violence was continuing almost unabated.

Syria rebels, Kurdish militia discuss cease-fire

“When the Syrian government announced that it would comply with the truce, it also announced that its military would respond to anything that took place on the ground, and it was clear from this rhetoric that there was no truce,” said Al Thani, according to QNA.

“Everyone knows what the solution is and what the Syrian people want. Everything that is happening now is a waste of time and just buying time to kill the Syrian people and to destroy the Syrian infrastructure.”

The prime minister said he sensed “a bigger awakening” among Arab nations and in the wider international community over the crisis in Syria, despite moves by Russia and China to block tougher U.N. Security Council action. But, he said, a “paralysis” would prevent action until after the outcome of the U.S. elections.

A group that documents the names of those killed in Syria’s conflict, the Violation Documenting Center, calculated the total number of those killed during the failed ceasefire as 407.

The report from the VDC, which works closely with the opposition Local Coordination Committees of Syria, put the total civilian toll at 32,013 over some 20 months of violence, with 2,900 government soldiers killed in the same period.

The LCC said the death toll so far Tuesday was 61. About half the deaths were in Idlib province, where airstrikes pummeled a residential neighborhood in the city of Maarat-al-Numan Tuesday, the LCC said.

Regime forces inflicted “heavy losses” on rebel fighters in clashes in the Damascus countryside and Hama provinces and near the city of Deir Ezzor, the Syrian Arab News Agency reported.

CNN cannot independently confirm reports of violence or casualties as the government has severely restricted the access of international journalists. The numbers reported by the LCC do not include deaths from security forces or the military.

In other developments Tuesday:

General assassinated in Damascus

An air force general was assassinated Tuesday in the Syrian capital, Damascus, Syrian state media reported. Pilot Maj. Gen. Abdullah al-Khalidi was killed by “an armed terrorist group” in the Rukn-Eddin neighborhood of Damascus, SANA said.

He was shot to death as he got out of his car, SANA reported.

U.N. envoy visits Beijing

Brahimi headed to Beijing Tuesday to meet senior Chinese officials, a day after he held talks with Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov for the first time on what to do about the Syrian civil war.

The state-run China Daily newspaper quoted Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei as saying the envoy would have “in depth communication” with Chinese officials during his two-day visit.

China backs Brahimi’s efforts to find a political solution to the crisis, rather than the use of force, Hong is quoted as saying.

Following Monday’s meeting in Moscow, Russia accused the United Nations of double standards for failing to condemn a car bombing in a pro-Assad stronghold near the capital, Damascus.

Syria’s foreign ministry also wrote to U.N Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to criticize the United Nation’s failure to condemn such attacks — an omission it said “encouraged terrorists to continue committing crimes against the Syrian people.”

Lavrov said on his own Twitter feed that Russia was disappointed at the lack of support for Brahimi’s call for a holiday truce, but that it appreciated his efforts to try to “find potential collaborative ways for the international community” to help stabilize Syria.

The Russian-French Security Cooperation Council will meet in Paris October 31, the foreign ministry said.

Speaking after his meeting with Lavrov, Brahimi said neither side in Syria is showing signs of backing down.

“The government says they are fighting terrorists and only terrorists, and that it is their duty to do so — to protect their people. And the other side says we’re fighting a very cruel government that is persecuting us, and we’re defending ourselves,” Brahimi said after the meeting.

He recalled speaking with a woman who has one son in the Syrian military and another son in the rebel Free Syrian Army. “If that is not civil war, I don’t know what is,” Brahimi said.

Diplomacy with Russia is a delicate dance. Russia, along with China, has repeatedly vetoed attempts at the U.N. Security Council to take stronger action against al-Assad.

Many have accused Russia of backing the Syrian government, but Russia says it just wants a political solution for Syria determined by its own people.

Envoy to Syria meets with Russian minister after truce unravels

22/10/12

By: Al Bawaba News

Fighting flared up Monday in Syria with new attempts of the army to remove the rebels from their strongholds, as an Arab diplomat expected there are slim chances of achieving a cease-fire this week.

On Sunday, after talks in Damascus with President Bashar al-Assad, the UN and Arab League envoy and Lakhdar Brahimi called on the belligerents to “unilaterally” cease fire “from today or tomorrow “for the Muslim feast of Eid Al-Adha, which is celebrated from October 26 to 29.

He stressed that it was a “personal initiative” and not a detailed plan of peace to stop the bloodshed that killed 34,000 people, according to an NGO.

On his part, Deputy Secretary General of the Arab League Ahmad bin Hilli said Monday that “unfortunately, the hope of establishing a truce in Syria for the holiday is weak.”

“The signs on the ground and the reaction of the Syrian government (…) do not show a real willingness to respond positively to this initiative,” he said.

Echoing these remarks, the Syrian regime’s troops, backed by tanks, have been trying to retake control on several towns, which fell into the hands of rebels in Idleb, Aleppo (north), in the province of Damascus, Deraa (south ) and Homs (center), said the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights (SOHR).

Loyalist forces also bombarded with artillery Harasta twon where rebels are holed up near the Syrian capital, and tried to take it by storm, the NGO said in the wake of a new suicide car bomb in Damascus that killed at least 13 people.

In the province of Idleb (northwest), fighting took place near the military base in Wadi Deif, besieged for days by rebels, added the NGO.

This base is located on the eastern outskirts of the strategic town of Maaret al-Noomane, bombed since the dawn by the regime forces. Taken on October 9, this achievement helped the rebels to cut the main road used by the army to send reinforcements to the north.

Elsewhere, a Jordanian soldier was killed during clashes with Islamist militants trying to cross the border with Syria , confirmed Monday the Jordanian Minister of Information. Samih Maaytah said that it was the first death recorded in the ranks of the Jordanian army since the beginning of the Syrian crisis, in March 2011.

Political efforts

During the talks with Mr. Brahimi, Assad reiterated that any political initiative should be based on the “halt of terrorism (..) with the commitment of some countries involved to cease hosting, supporting and arming terrorists in Syria ”

In a related development, the Special Representative of the Russian President Vladimir Putin, Mikhail Bogdanov, was on Monday in Iran to discuss Syria. Tehran and Moscow support the Assad regime and reject any foreign interference in the country.

22/10/12

Michael Astor

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations is already planning for a peacekeeping force in Syria should a cease-fire in that country take hold and pending a Security Council mandate, the U.N. peacekeeping chief said Monday.

Herve Ladsous said, however, it was still too early to say how many peacekeepers might be deployed in such an eventual force.

“I would confirm that, of course, we are giving a lot of thought to what would happen if and when a political solution or at least a ceasefire would emerge,” Ladsous told reporters a U.N. briefing.

U.N. and Arab League envoy to Syria Lakhdar Brahimi met with Syrian President Bashar Assad in Damascus Sunday as part of his push for a cease-fire between rebels and government forces for the Eid al-Adha holiday, which begins Oct. 26.

Syria’s state-run news agency SANA said Damascus supports the truce proposal, but would not commit to halting fire during a four-day Muslim holiday until Western countries and their Gulf allies stop supporting rebels and halt their weapons supplies to the anti-regime fighters.

Brahmini told reporters, following a closed-door meeting, that he also had held talks earlier with opposition groups inside and outside the country and received “promises” but not a “commitment” from them to honor the cease-fire.

Brahimi replaced Kofi Annan as envoy to Syria after the former U.N. secretary-general resigned last August, frustrated by a lack of progress.

Under Annan’s peace plan the U.N. sent a 300-strong unarmed observer mission to Syria to oversee the cessation of violence but the team was forced to withdraw in August because of escalating fighting which has continued until today.

“It’s a shocking fact that everyday 150 to 200 civilians are killed and it has almost become part of the background noise and it is simply unacceptable,” Ladsous said.

Diplomats say that Ladsous has told Brahmini he could put together a force of up to 3,000 peacekeepers in the event a longer truce took hold.

But Ladsous said, “it certainly would be premature to mention a figure because it would depend on the situation.”

The deployment of any U.N. peacekeeping force would be contingent on the approval of the 15-member Security Council, which has long been deadlocked over the issue of Syria. Permanent members Russia and China have to date vetoed three resolutions on Syria because they threatened sanctions against Assad’s government.

11/10/12

The UN’s chief humanitarian coordinators for Syria, on a Gulf tour to seek aid, have warned that already scarce resources for the growing number of displaced in the war-torn country are quickly drying up.

The UN’s regional refugee coordinator, Panos Mumtzis, told AFP in Dubai that the aid effort was hit by a “significant funding shortfall,” adding that financial support is needed for shelter, winter preparation, health and water.

The UN estimates some half a million Syrians have fled the country. About 335,000 of them are registered refugees who have escaped to neighboring Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey and Iraq.

By the end of the year, the UN expects the number to registered refugees to more than double to around 710,000 refugees.

Inside Syria, there are an estimated 1.2 million displaced Syrians living in ill-equipped public buildings.

“This is no longer business as usual. We have moved into an emergency situation. It is a crisis,” said Mumtzis of the 18-month uprising against President Bashar al-Assad’s regime that shows no signs of abating.

“When we get 2,000 to 3,000 refugees per day crossing the border continuously now for two months, this is really serious.”

The UN has requested $488 million for Syrian refugee assistance alone. So far $142 million, only 29 percent, has been provided.

The situation is just as grim for the UN’s humanitarian agencies assisting Syria’s internally displaced and other vulnerable populations within the country.

A UN call for $348 million for those still trapped within the country’s war-ravaged borders is only 38 percent funded.

The biggest reason for the funding shortage is that the Syrian crisis is unfolding “a lot faster than anyone had thought,” Mumtzis added.

The UN has been forced to revise its humanitarian appeals on three separate occasions in the past six months.

The “speed [of escalation] is reaching levels where we need to have an equally speedy funding mechanism,” said Mumtzis.

But time is one thing the aid agencies don’t have.

Winter is fast approaching, refugee numbers are rising every day and funds are being depleted at an ever-faster rate.

Even more alarming is the fact that at least three quarters of the refugees are women and children, raising fears that a persistent shortage of funds could put the conflict’s most vulnerable populations at even greater risk.

The most urgent need right now is “to be ready for winter,” the UN’s regional humanitarian coordinator Radhoune Nouicer told AFP, adding that the aid community’s level of preparedness “will depend on funding.”

In total, more than 2.5 million Syrians are in need of humanitarian assistance. So far, more than 32,000 people have been killed in the revolt, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

“Today we are coping… from hand to mouth,” said Mumtzis, who warned the UN “absolutely [does] not” have enough for the increasing demands of the deadly conflict.

“The funds are going out very very quickly because more and more people keep on coming [for help],” said Mumtzis.

The largest donors through the UN system are the United States and the European Union. Arab countries have been primarily donating through local and regional charities, or bilaterally.

Few of the Arab donations, with the exception of a million-dollar pledge by Kuwait and a $7.5 million pledge by Saudi Arabia, have gone through UN agencies.

Saudi Arabia also held a five-day public fundraiser in July raising more than $72.33 million, $5.3 million of which was from King Abdullah himself, though most of it has yet to be allocated and it remains unclear how much of it will go through the UN.

The UN coordinators said they hoped their tour of the oil-rich Arab states of the Gulf which will include Qatar, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia will result in pledges of both aid and greater cooperation.

-AFP

Paulo Pinheiro present sreport of the Independent Commission of Inquiry on Syria at the 21st Session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva. UN Photo/Jean-Marc Ferré

17 September 2012 – The scale and frequency of gross human rights violations in Syria has significantly increased in recent weeks, according to a new report by the United Nations independent panel probing abuses committed during the country’s ongoing conflict.

The report of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry (CoI) on Syria, which was mandated by the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council, states that indiscriminate attacks against civilians are now occurring on a daily basis in many areas of the country including Aleppo, Damascus, Dera, Larakia, Idlib and Homs.

“Gross violations of human rights have grown in number, in pace and in scale,” the Chair of the Commission, Paulo Pinheiro, told the Council this morning. “Civilians, many of them children, are bearing the brunt of the spiralling violence.”

Syria has been wracked by violence, with an estimated 19,000 people, mostly civilians, killed since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began some 18 months ago.

Mr. Pinheiro said the report, which is based on the Commission’s investigations and interviews conducted up until two weeks ago, had found reasonable grounds to believe that Government forces and members of the Government-controlled militia known as the Shabiha, had committed war crimes, gross violations against human rights and crimes against humanity.

Violations conducted by Government forces include murder, summary executions, torture, arbitrary arrest and detention, sexual violence, violations of children’s rights, pillaging and destruction of civilian objects – including hospitals and schools.

Anti-Government armed groups have also committed war crimes, including murder and torture, Mr. Pinheiro said. In addition, children under 18 years of age are fighting and performing auxiliary roles for anti-Government armed groups.

A confidential list of individuals and units that are believed to be responsible for violations will be provided to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay. However, Mr. Pinheiro said the names would not be publicly released because suspects were entitled to the presumption of innocence and because there is no mechanism in place yet to hold perpetrators responsible where allegations could be contested.

The report also states that the socio-economic situation has further deteriorated, with 2.5 million people in need of humanitarian aid, and more than 1.2 million people internally displaced, half of which are children, according to the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Mr. Pinheiro stressed that the situation was worsening in part due to the cumulative effect of conflict and economic sanctions. “The Commission maintains that sanctions result in a denial of the most basic human rights to Syrians. Scarcity of basic human needs such as potable water food, electricity, petrol and cooking fuel is causing rampant inflation,” he said.

In addition, Mr. Pinheiro warned that the conflict is spilling over into neighbouring countries, threatening stability and security in the region, and called on the international community to deploy renewed efforts to support the mission of the Joint Special Representative of the UN and the League of Arab States, Lakhdar Brahimi, to stop the violence and find a durable solution to the crisis.

Faysal Khabbaz Hamoui of Syria said the Government regretted that the Commission’s report was “neither accurate nor objective” and that many testimonies in the report have no legal value. He also stated that many international parties are working to worsen the crisis by “instigating the media and training, funding and sending mercenaries to Syria.”

Mr. Hamoui added that Syria had cooperated with all initiatives to settle the crisis but terrorist groups in the country had no interest in reform or democracy and sought only to fragment the Middle East.

During the same meeting, High Commissioner Navi Pillay introduced the report of the Secretary-General on the human rights situation in Syria and called on all parties to immediately stop the violence. She also echoed Mr. Pinheiro’s remarks by urging cooperation with Mr. Brahimi to find a solution to the crisis.

Established in September last year, the Commission has conducted more than 1,100 interviews and has delivered six reports and updates to the Human Rights Council on the situation in Syria.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton yesterday said a new UN resolution on Syria would be pointless if it had “no teeth”, as President Bashar al-Assad would ignore it.

On a visit to Russia, Hillary Clinton said she was willing to work with Moscow on a new UN resolution on Syria but warned that the United States would step up support to end Assad’s regime if the measure did not carry consequences.

“There is no point to passing a resolution with no teeth because we’ve seen time and time again that Assad will ignore it and keep attacking his own people,” Hillary told reporters at the end of an Asia-Pacific summit.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Saturday after talks with Hillary that he hoped to seek UN Security Council approval for a peace plan agreed in June in Geneva that called for a ceasefire and political transition.

Hillary said she hoped for progress but was “realistic” that the United States and Russia had differences on Syria.

The United States has said it is providing non-lethal assistance to the opposition in Syria, which has been a Moscow ally since the Cold War.

Meanwhile, Syrian warplanes bombed a residential district of Aleppo yesterday, killing and wounding dozens of people, a day after rebels overran army barracks in the neighbourhood, opposition activists in Syria’s largest city said.

They said the air raid destroyed a residential building in the Hananu neighbourhood, one of several in eastern Aleppo under insurgent control. The death toll was not immediately clear but bodies and wounded people were being dug out from the rubble.

The aerial bombardment has burst a main water pipeline, causing serious shortages of water in Aleppo, activists added.

The eastern sector of Aleppo, Syria’s commercial and industrial capital, has drawn air strikes since rebels attacked the Hananu barracks and freed scores of army deserters, according to opposition campaigners reached by telephone.

GENEVA: The UN-backed Syrian Humanitarian Forum launched an appeal on Friday for more countries to give aid to alleviate the suffering in conflict-torn Syria.

“We are in a crisis mode, we are in an emergency mode,” said John Ging, chairman of the forum that groups different UN agencies’ aid efforts.

“We have authorised our operations to the maximum with the funds available. We urgently need additional resources to be able to cope with the situation.”

Ging said some 2.5 million people were in need of aid in Syria — twice the number given in March.

More than 1.2 million, over half of them children, have become internally displaced, and 250,000 have fled to neighbouring countries, some 100,000 of them last month alone.

“There are too few donors,” he stressed after the forum’s fifth meeting since the violence erupted 18 months ago. “The base of donors has to be broadened. Now there is just a handful of countries.”

Participants also stressed the danger facing aid workers in the conflict zone, and the need to improve access to people in need, said a source with knowledge about the closed session.

The United States said Wednesday it would boost Syria aid to over $100 million.

Of this, $14.3 million would be food aid inside Syria and $6.7 million would help Syrian refugees abroad, said the State Department.

Washington is already providing $48.5 million to the UN World Food Programme, $23.1 million to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, and funding to non-government groups, UNICEF and the Red Cross.

The European Commission meanwhile announced the release of another 50 million euros in humanitarian aid to help Syrian civilians caught up in the worsening violence between rebels and the Damascus regime.

The latest aid, which still needs the green light from the European Parliament, brings the total aid available from the Commission to 119 million euros ($152 million) and the EU contribution in all to 200 million euros, which amounts to half of all international help offered so far.

Syrian refugees arriving in Jordan are being sheltered at Za’atari camp. Photo: UNHCR/A. Eurdolian

7 September 2012 – The United Nations and its partners today increased their humanitarian appeal for Syria from $180 million to $347 million, given that the number of people in need has doubled since July to 2.5 million.

The revised Syria Humanitarian Response Plan focuses on the priority areas of health, food, livelihoods, infrastructure rehabilitation, community services, education and shelter, in Homs, Hama, Idlib, Damascus, rural Damascus, Deir Ezzor and Aleppo, as well as areas hosting large numbers of internally displaced people.

It was launched at the Syria Humanitarian Forum in Geneva which brought together over 350 participants from Member States, regional organizations, international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and UN humanitarian agencies to mobilize the necessary resources to provide assistance to the hundreds of thousands of people uprooted by the conflict.

“At the moment, the entire civilian population inside Syria is gripped by fear and despair,” John Ging, the Director of the Coordination and Response Division of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told reporters after the Forum. “The basis for that fear is very real.”

UN officials have been calling for enhanced international support to respond to the growing crisis, which has been escalating in recent weeks in many towns and villages, as well as the country’s two biggest cities, Damascus and Aleppo. More than 18,000 people, mostly civilians, have died since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began some 18 months ago.

OCHA estimates that over 1.2 million people are internally displaced, more than half of whom are children forced from their homes. There are also more than 245,000 Syrian refugees in neighbouring countries, with more than 100,000 people registered as refugees in August alone.

“This begins to give you a sense of the scale of the tragedy that is unfolding, and the fact that it’s escalating, rather than dissipating,” said Mr. Ging, who chaired the Forum.

“It also presents for us on the humanitarian side an enormous challenge,” he added. “Humanitarian action is not a solution in conflict. The solution in conflict is political resolution that ends the conflict and takes the issues into a political process.

“But while there is failure to find that process even to bring about a political resolution to this conflict and end to the violence, we in the humanitarian community have to step up and do more in evermore dangerous circumstances to help people who are suffering more.”

Syrian refugees queue for relief items earlier this week at Jordan’s Za’atri camp. Photo: UNHCR/S. Malkawi

7 September 2012 – The United Nations refugee agency announced today it is scaling up its emergency response for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Syria, with its share of the UN’s revised Syria Humanitarian Response Plan now seeking $41.7 million – more than double the amount sought previously.

“The help we are seeking includes for household items, financial assistance for 200,000 people considered vulnerable, medical assistance, counselling of displaced populations, rehabilitation of shelters and support to encourage refugee and displaced Syrian children to return to school,” a spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Adrian Edwards, told a news briefing in Geneva.

The revised Syria Humanitarian Response Plan was presented to donors in Geneva earlier Friday, and is separate to the so-called Regional Response Plan, which applies to relief efforts for Syrians displaced in neighbouring countries. In addition to financial and medical assistance, the $41.7 million in funds is also aimed at providing the Syrian population with access to basic services such as shelter, water and sanitation.

More than 18,000 people, mostly civilians, have died since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began some 18 months ago. Amidst reports of an escalation in violence in recent weeks in many towns and villages, as well as the country’s two biggest cities, Damascus and Aleppo, UN agencies now estimate that some 2.5 million Syrians are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance.

Over the past two weeks, UNHCR teams have visited 29 communal shelters in the capital, Damascus, as well as the surrounding district, known as Rural Damascus, delivering mattresses and blankets and carrying out counselling, Mr. Edwards said. This week, the agency also participated in a three day inter-agency mission to the city of Homs.

In addition, UNHCR has received tens of thousands of calls to its hotlines since July, and thousands of refugees have approached its offices in the Syrian capital. Last week alone, nearly 3,000 refugees went to the agency’s office in Damascus expressing their concerns about security, financial difficulties and the need for resettlement.

Mr. Edwards said resettlement activities are ongoing, but that they are occurring at a slow pace, as departures to resettlement countries planned this week had been delayed due to cancellation of flights from Damascus’ airport.

The refugee agency is also concerned about relocating people who are living in schools, as the academic year is due to start on 16 September.

“The relocation of people living in schools is urgent,” Mr. Edwards said, noting however that many of the buildings identified as alternative communal shelters need work done before people can be relocated to them.

Addressing the same news briefing, a spokesperson for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Marixie Mercado, said that the Syrian Government estimates that some 2,072 schools – out of 22,000 across the country – have been damaged or destroyed, and over 600 are occupied by displaced persons. UNICEF is currently supporting repairs in 64 schools in Deraa, Rural Damascus and Lattakia.

Syria’s neighbouring countries are also struggling to deal with the increasing number of refugees as the start of the school year nears, Ms. Mercado said.

In Jordan, it had initially been planned for Syrian children to go to schools, but this proved unfeasible due to the sheer number of children involved. Instead, UNICEF is now working to set up a school in the Za’atari refugee camp, in northern Jordan, and to bring in 15 prefabricated classrooms for Syrian students in the Ramtha camp, in northwestern Jordan.

In Lebanon, schools will accept Syrian refugee children when they open on 24 September and UNICEF will be providing those children with education kits, remedial education, recreational and psychosocial activities. In Turkey, refugee children are being educated in camps set up by the Government, and in Iraq, UNICEF will be providing prefabricated classroom and education supplies, Ms. Mercado said.

Overall, UNHCR has stated that the total number of Syrians who have registered as refugees or are awaiting registration, as of 7 September, stands at 246,267 – with more than half seeking safety in Turkey and Jordan.