After 14 years of warfare, Syria has entered a brand new and unsure chapter. The nation is devastated – 90 per cent of Syrians stay in poverty.
Regardless of the challenges as much as a million folks dwelling in camps and displacement websites throughout the nation’s northwest intend to return house throughout the subsequent yr.
As these Syrians put together to return house, they’re starting the troublesome means of rebuilding and confronting the previous.
Ms. Al-Kateab, the filmmaker behind the award-winning documentary, For Sama, captured life underneath siege in Aleppo earlier than fleeing the nation in 2016.
Since then, she has remained a robust advocate for the Syrian folks, co-founding Motion For Sama, a marketing campaign, advocating for human rights, dignity, and accountability for all.
On this interview with UN Information, as Syria stands at a crossroads, she shares her willpower to verify justice shouldn’t be forgotten within the nation’s subsequent chapter.
This interview has been edited for readability and brevity.
UN Information: Waad, how have you ever been processing the previous few months?
Waad Al-Kateab: I feel it’s actually complicated. We’re over the moon, however on the identical time, it was one thing that appeared so far-off.
I assumed the ending of my story was dying in exile, not with the ability to return, by no means with the ability to see this lovely day. And it simply occurred out of the blue, with none indication.
We weren’t prepared, however that doesn’t matter. It occurred, and we’re actually joyful.
On the identical time, the ache and grief we needed to undergo for the final 14 years – and for thus many people, even 50 years, when Hafez al-Assad was president – it was simply an excessive amount of to deal with.
I’m nonetheless considering, is that this actual? Am I simply having an extended, lovely dream?
UN Information: Have you ever been involved with folks on the bottom in Syria? What have they been telling you?
Waad Al-Kateab: Till now, due to my refugee standing, I used to be not in a position to return. However I am engaged on this, and hopefully, at any second I’ll get citizenship within the UK, so I can transfer freely.
© UNICEF/Rami Nader
My mother and father went again in January, and a few of our associates too. I used to be additionally in a position to talk with my household who had been in Syria the entire time, whereas earlier than, I could not even name or ship a message as a result of I used to be anxious of what the regime may do to them.
It’s not simple – the nation is drained, the economic system could be very unhealthy, there’s no electrical energy, no water however what everybody has in widespread is the sensation that it’s positively a brand new starting.
We’re afraid, however we’re probably not scared. We will do something we wish.
UN Information: If you nonetheless lived in Aleppo, you spent years capturing each the resilience of individuals and the devastation round them. What moments have stayed with you from that point?
Waad Al-Kateab: To be trustworthy, the state of affairs I couldn’t settle for was once we had been displaced out of Aleppo.
I understood early on that we had been combating towards a dictatorship that may cease at nothing. I used to be okay with that. I knew the chance I used to be taking, the chance my husband Hamza was taking, even our personal daughter.
© UNOCHA/Mohanad Zayat
We had been combating in our personal means – me, with my digital camera, my husband, together with his work within the hospital.
Then got here the siege – six months with no remedy, no meals, no primary companies. After which, compelled displacement. That, for me, was probably the most merciless factor: throw us out from our personal nation the place we needed to be.
It was the second which actually broke me. Saying goodbye to every part – my house there, the hospital, the folks we knew.
For the previous few years, I’ve compelled myself to not image going again as a result of it didn’t appear doable. However now, it’s.
So many individuals I do know went again. They ship me footage from the neighbourhood, the college: “See, it’s there. We’re again.”
And I can’t wait to be there myself.
UN Information: You discuss your pleasure, your loved ones’s pleasure, and this chapter closing. Do you suppose the toughest a part of the work has been completed now?
Waad Al-Kateab: Positively. The toughest work has been completed.
Now, with this new chapter, there’s loads to do, and it’s troublesome in a really totally different means. However the shelling, the bombings – that’s over.
There are such a lot of vital points – transitional justice, detainees, the disappeared. There are very troublesome conversations to have about revenge; and the economic system – it has greater than crashed.
There are such a lot of authorities, agendas and worldwide gamers in a rustic ranging from scratch. However now, we’re in cost. It’s very heavy to hold however we’re right here and we’re going to do it.
I’m very hopeful and excited.
UN Information: You point out transitional justice, what does actual accountability seem like to you now?
Waad Al-Kateab: Bashar Al-Assad was accountable, however there are numerous others – those that ordered killings, those that carried them out, those that helped him. And I’m not simply speaking about people, but in addition international governments and armies.
There isn’t a approach to have a future in Syria if we don’t face what occurred. For everybody accountable, it should begin with an apology and finish with accountability.
Proper now, militias and former regime troopers nonetheless have weapons, attempting to cover or defend themselves. That is very critical, and all weapons needs to be handed to the brand new authorities.
For victims like us, now it’s about asking: what do we wish? What can occur? How can we return to regular life? There’s a lot to be completed.
UN Information: You’ve lived within the UK for nearly a decade now. You mentioned you’d wish to return. Would that be long-term?
Waad Al-Kateab: To be trustworthy, we by no means imagined this second would occur, so we constructed a life away from Syria.
Even in our conversations with our daughters, I needed them to like Syria and perceive what occurred but in addition, I needed to guard them.
Now, I see they picked up far more than we realised, they picked up what we felt. For them, Syria was a spot the place folks die.
They don’t perceive they usually ask: “What if Assad remains to be hiding there? What if he’s ready for us to go after which he kills us?”
The dialogue of going again has triggered many troublesome issues for them.
For me and Hamza, we don’t have to consider it, we need to return in fact. So, we agreed on one go to and once we come again, we’ll discuss – what we wish, what they need. They positively have an equal say.
No matter resolution we take, a method or one other, we will probably be again.
UN Information: Along with your advocacy, what position do you see your self having within the rebuilding of Syria?
Waad Al-Kateab: We’ve completed a lot world wide – working with communities who know Syria properly and others who know nothing about it.
© WFP
For us, the largest achievement has at all times been consciousness and preserving the narrative of what occurred. Now, greater than ever, that’s a precedence on the bottom in Syria.
For me, it’s not nearly For Sama as a movie, however about every part I’ve discovered as a filmmaker – years of telling my very own story and others’. Now, I need to carry it again to Syria by way of screenings and conversations, not simply as a movie occasion, however as an area to listen to from folks.
That is a part of transitional justice, particularly acknowledgment – serving to native communities discuss to one another, perceive one another’s experiences and begin therapeutic.
UN Information: What can be your message to the worldwide group at this time?
Waad Al-Kateab: Syria shouldn’t be like every other battle. Individuals tried to check it to Iraq or Afghanistan, however that is totally different. Even how the regime fell and what comes subsequent is unknown.
Because the U.S. slashes international assist, Syrian civil society is susceptible to collapse. Organizations that fought for justice and guarded civilians for over a decade are actually struggling. The worldwide group should step up.
A profitable transition should be Syrian-led, free from armed teams or international affect.
The world has a duty to help this in a means that displays Syrians’ aspirations for peace, justice and accountability.
