An Inconsistent Return to Yalda Neighbouring Yarmouk Camp

The Rural Damascus Governorate agreed this past March to allow the return of displaced residents to various sites in Yalda, a town south of Damascus bordering the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp. Though months have gone by, only a few families have returned.

Opposition factions took control of the bordering area in 2012, then the Islamic State took over in November 2017. The area turned into a frontline between the opposition in Yalda and fighters of the Islamic State (ISIS) in the Yarmouk camp, and also witnessed intense barrel bombs and airstrikes. Those frontline sites remain closed off since regime forces recaptured Yarmouk camp in May 2018 following an agreement with ISIS that would see the latter withdraw to the eastern Badia region of the Suweida Governorate.

In March 2021, the Yalda Municipal Council announced that people could return to the Tuesday Market and Daboul Street areas, both of which contain informally built housing. More than 10,000 families were expected to return to those areas while requesting that local notables help rehabilitate them. However, civilian sources told The Syria Report that only a few families affiliated with influential parties in Yalda have returned. The sources said that these families returned to their homes in the area surrounding the Mothers of the Believers Mosque, while property owners from other Yalda neighbourhoods were only allowed to inspect their properties without restoring or returning to them.

According to a local correspondent for The Syria Report, the mayor of Yalda met with a delegation of residents from the area adjacent to the Yarmouk camp in early September 2018, informing them that he had submitted a letter to “the relevant authorities” to remove rubble. The mayor added that those “relevant authorities” had responded to the letter and that a “private company” would remove rubble from the streets before starting repair work on the electricity networks. The “relevant authorities” may be in reference to one of the branches of the Military Intelligence Division, which controls the area.

One man who owns property in the Tuesday Market neighbourhood told The Syria Report that though his house is only a few hundred metres from the Mothers of the Believers Mosque, a checkpoint erected near the mosque has prevented him from reaching the area recently. After paying a bribe to checkpoint personnel, he was permitted to enter accompanied by a security official. The man said that the municipality had not removed the rubble from the Tuesday Market area, nor had it rehabilitated infrastructure or drawn up lists of those wishing to return.

The Rural Damascus Governorate may wish to avoid rehabilitating the area, which largely consists of informal housing, preferring instead to demolish it completely and perhaps even re-zone it in a manner similar to Marota City and Basilia City. However, the governorate lacks the funds both to re-zone the area and to rehabilitate it with the minimum necessary services, not least rubble removal. The issue of returns, therefore, remains dependent on arbitrary municipal decisions. An internal conflict between different security apparatuses may also explain the impediments to returns to the area, which is controlled by the local branch of Military Intelligence. Remaining parts of Yalda, however, are controlled by the patrols branch, which is also affiliated with Military Intelligence.

Yalda suffers poor services, power cuts, drinking water shortages, weak cell coverage, piles of uncollected garbage, stray dogs, and few transportation options to and from Damascus. In October, two buses were allocated to transport residents between Damascus and Yalda, but they have only worked for a few hours since then. In late November, the Ministry of Local Administration and Environment approved the start of zoning and organisational studies for Yalda under Urban Planning Law No. 5 of 1982.