Friday, March 29, 2024 | Ramadan 18, 1445 H
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EDITOR IN CHIEF- ABDULLAH BIN SALIM AL SHUEILI

We need more of kindness like Spanish for refugees

Rasha-al-Raisi
Rasha-al-Raisi
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Rasha al Raisi -


Since I’ve started my regular visits to Spain in 2014, the issue that seems to occupy everyone’s mind is the status of the migrants and the refugees in Europe. Almost every week, one of the language students would deliver a presentation about the topic, mentioning the efforts that his country is doing to contain the problem.


Then a discussion would open among the European students of who’s doing what. The Italians would say that they’re taking more than their quota while eyeing the Germans. The Germans would blame it on the French and so on.


What I really admire is the Spanish stance in this issue. They still remember that eighty years back when the civil war erupted in their country, more than fifteen thousand of them fled to France, living on the fields and streets. So, when it comes to migrants and refugees issues, nobody understands it better than them.


Last week, I decided to attend a presentation about the theme in the Parish of San Juan de la Cruz in Malaga.


The presentation was delivered by two humanitarian aid workers, Mariola Palma and Paco Guzman who worked in refugee camps in Idomeni, Greece and in Melilla’s Centre for Temporary Stay of Immigrants (CETI), Morocco.


Around twenty people — mostly elderly ladies — gathered in the cool and peaceful atmosphere of the parish to listen to the presentation, along with me. Mariola explained her choice of title “The Tragedy of the Migrants and Refugees”, as what they go through from the day they decide to leave cannot be expressed in any other word. She then explained reasons for people deciding to leave their countries forcefully, and not by choice as others think. War, poverty, violence and persecution were the main reasons.


She and Paco divided the presentation into: before, during and after, explaining at each stage the suffering that migrants go through. From dealing with road mafias to making the decision of crossing the Mediterranean to Europe, the most dangerous route that had claimed more than four thousand lives this year alone.


Mariola focused on the feelings that migrants go through during this long journey: the solitary and the uncertainty of what lies ahead. The thoughts of families divided in different countries, not knowing their fates but hoping for the miracle of reunion somewhere safe. She spoke of the ‘invisibles’, Africans who died trying to cross the desert and were never found again. At this point, I heard the old ladies sniffle and dab the corners of their eyes.


Paco spoke of the after part, when the refugees arrive to the camps in hope to cross to Europe. He described camp Idomeni as a small valley on the Macedonian frontiers, that hosts twenty thousand refugees. He described the despair that refugees would feel while waiting to cross to Europe. With the help of different NGOs, a typical working day for him involved bathing and feeding hundreds of babies, preparing thousands of meals, and delivering simple maths and language classes to children.


In Melilla, most of the arrivals are of parent less children who’ll end up living on the streets because they don’t carry documents. Mariola ended the presentation saying that it’s a social responsibility to welcome the migrants and offer them help, till they reach their country of destination.


The Q&A session then revolved around how migration rules should change to be in favour of the migrants and what Spanish political parties support the cause. I left at that point with a mixture of feelings. But with a certainty that we needed more of human kindness, similar to that of the Spanish.


Rasha al Raisi is a certified skills trainer and the author of: The World According to Bahja. rashabooks@yahoo.com


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