The subsequent series of actions and reactions led to the deaths of over 600,000 Syrians and forced 14 million more to flee the country. More than 660,000 of these refugees traveled south to neighboring Jordan. Most Jordan-bound refugees pass through the Zaatari camp, whose current population of 83,000 makes it the third largest refugee camp in the world. The rest have spread throughout Jordan, settling in for what they believe to be a long separation from their homes and communities as they wait out a war with no end in sight.
‘If Bashar goes away we would go to Syria, sit by the olive trees and we would sleep and eat and drink there.’
Abdul Rahman Mounir Al-Zalem. 22 years old. From Herak in Dera’a.
I defected from the military and joined the FSA because of the killing, the crimes and the destruction. A protest would start and the regime would start firing and arresting people. I was serving in Aleppo, but when I went on leave I just stayed home in Dera’a. My friends in the military, they all defected as well. Nearly 80 or 90 percent of the people I knew in the military defected.
There was a siege on my town that lasted for five days. On the fifth day I was hit. I stayed there for two days without getting medical treatment, until the FSA could retreat. There were field hospitals. We stayed with the FSA wherever they went, but there was no more ammunition, and I had relatives and my brothers with me.
Three days later I came to Jordan.
The bone in my arm was shattered. I had steadied my arm with a splint and I tried not to move it, but when I moved it, the pieces of bone would start rubbing against each other. It was coming out from the flesh. They didn't know what to do with it. They cut it and they sewed it up. There was shrapnel in it but doctors said it would be dangerous to try to remove, so they left the it in.
If the regime falls I would go back. Now in our area there is a government base, they (the FSA) want to liberate the area. Once they liberate it then it is done. Once the brigade is done then that is all of it... Now the people are returning.
I was there fighting for a year and a half. If I wasn't hit I wouldn't have come here, and I will go back.
We came to Jordan because of all of the violence and strikes by the Regime. My nieces and nephews were very afraid when the shooting would start so we left and have been here since February 2012.
The camp was very strange to me. People surround you and you can’t leave. It is like a prison. I was very sad, and so I escaped and went to live with my family.
I want there to be safety and security in Syria. I want to return to my homeland, have no one attack me, and not hear guns firing. But there will be no security until the regime falls and this regime will stay a long time.
I will give birth this week and I think that by the time my unborn son is able to return to Syria, he will be aware of the world and at least 4 or 5 years old. I will name him Mohamed after my brother, who was martyred while fighting with the FSA.
My daughters are frightened because of all that they have witnessed. They feel scared at night. When they hear an airplane over our house, they tell me “Dad, they are going to hit us with bombs!” When they hear fireworks from a wedding, they ask, “Is that the army, are they coming here?”
When I arrived they took my phone and wallet and blind folded me. I was led into an office and there a man started questioning me about what I had posted on Facebook. He started to read my posts to me and said that they were against Assad. But I was just describing demonstrations that I saw and I was quoting from the songs they were singing there, I wasn’t saying anything against Assad. That made him laugh and so I laughed too.
“I’m not making you laugh, you bastard!” he said. “Go and kneel on the ground.”
Then they brought in the flying carpet. It is a wooden board with straps and a joint. They tie you to it and then bend you until you can’t breath. Then they took off my shoes and socks and beat my feat with a metal rod until they were both broken.
At first I made no noise, but finally I screamed.
“Stop screaming like a bitch!” he yelled at me.
“You are the bitch,” I told him. “You are not a man. If you were a man, you would have beat me while I was standing, not while strapped to a board.”
Then they beat me for three more hours and then kept me in prison for 11 days. When I was released I had lost almost 30 pounds. I went home to Dara’a and two weeks later the secret police called saying they had more questions. I fled to Jordan the next day.
Zidan Abdullah Zidan
We lived in a tornado. At one point we thought that Assad may be gone in a month or two and now this is the third year and he has yet to go
We hope that things will calm down and go home. We don't want to live in Jordan. There's nothing like home.
It would be quiet and we would go get bread and then an air strike would start. You would hide anywhere you could, in any home or neighborhood, until you could get home.
Our neighborhood was in the center of town and was full of people. It had the court, the national hospital and much more. Out of everyone who lives there, the only people who remain there are my cousin and four young men who are taking care of the houses.
Everything has changed. In your own house you feel at rest, but here is not our home. The neighbors are good, but it is different in your own country. We miss our family and our homeland.