Yarmouk Palestinians crushed between ISIL and Assad
- 9 years ago
On the periphery of the Syrian capital, Yarmouk Camp, now largely destroyed, is in fact a city, with buildings, not tents.
As a camp, it was established in 1957, becoming the home to some 200,000 of the total number of Palestinians displaced during the creation of the state of Israel in 1948 and who fled to Syria.
With the civil war breaking out in 2011, Yarmouk split into factions on the side of the Assad regime, and factions that are against it.
Damascus felt it had championed the cause of the Palestinians. Now it bombed the refugees.
The first war planes attacked in 2012. A handful of Palestinians were killed. The Syrian Army encircled Yarmouk and has blockaded it since then.
From the West Bank and Gaza, Palestinian authorities condemned this.
Many Palestinian militant Islamists joined rebel brigades against Assad’s forces.
It got worse in 2014, when the crossfire expanded with encroachment into Syria of the radical Islamic State movement (ISIL).
The refugee popu
As a camp, it was established in 1957, becoming the home to some 200,000 of the total number of Palestinians displaced during the creation of the state of Israel in 1948 and who fled to Syria.
With the civil war breaking out in 2011, Yarmouk split into factions on the side of the Assad regime, and factions that are against it.
Damascus felt it had championed the cause of the Palestinians. Now it bombed the refugees.
The first war planes attacked in 2012. A handful of Palestinians were killed. The Syrian Army encircled Yarmouk and has blockaded it since then.
From the West Bank and Gaza, Palestinian authorities condemned this.
Many Palestinian militant Islamists joined rebel brigades against Assad’s forces.
It got worse in 2014, when the crossfire expanded with encroachment into Syria of the radical Islamic State movement (ISIL).
The refugee popu