One face of the Iraqi Refugee Crisis
Just under a million Iraqis are living in Jordan, well over a million in Syria with more in Egypt and Lebanon, as well as about 2 million internally displaced this is a sadly underaddressed consequence of the war. The family in that video were typical of those actually leaving the country in that they had the income to support themselves without working temporarily, but those savings run out quick and some Iraqis have been in exile since the start of the war. Jordan meanwhile is buckling under the strain of hosting what is equivalent to one sixth of its total population and Iraqis are no longer welcome there. 50,000 Iraqis are still leaving their homes per month and it’s becoming less clear where they could go. Syria’s also tightening its restrictions and recently Human Rights Watch noted that Iraqis in Amman are subject to random deportation to their death back home, sectarian discrimination, as well as families being broken up at the border.
As for Europe, well some countries have been decent (Sweden and Ireland,) others like France, Germany and the Netherlands were taking to giving asylum to very small numbers of Iraqis that applied. Germany, Holland and some other countries have recently taken to loosening regulations with regards to granting asylum to Iraqis and the EU has pledged to take in more refugees, but the total number of asylum claims filed in Europe was about 20,000 and the UNHCR hopes to resettle this many Iraqi refugees in the coming year.
Britain and the US have been even worse what with the UK’s highly publicized deportation flights for failed asylum seekers. The United States took in less than 500 Iraqis since the war started though they recently have seen th error of their ways and said they could take in as many as 20,000 this year.
But what about the rest of them? The ones living in abject poverty outside Iraq and the ones in abject poverty and under threat inside that can’t afford the trip or the passports? Amazingly not even that aspect was being addressed. Last year at the height of the displacement the UNHCR’s budget shortfall (2/3 of the $29million they requested) for the middle east was so great that their staff had to cut even their most basic of operations. Since that the US ponied up just under $18 million of their $60 million annual budget while the war costs $8 billion a month.
The conference on humanitarian relief for the war last week brought a lot of promises but we’ll see how many of them get fulfilled.
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We in the US should certainly take in as many refugees as want to come, especially if we cut and run and leave them hanging in the resulting chaos.
Isn’t that what US has been consistent at. Creating chaos and then closing doors to those who need help as a result of that chaos.