Yarmouk_camp – Syria Report

In March, activists, local leaders and NGOs launched an initiative to facilitate the return of residents to the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus. Their campaign included removing rubble from some streets, albeit without a legal framework to regulate it and without any simultaneous effort to document who owns the debris.

Damascus Governor Muhammad Kreishati visited Yarmouk on March 11 to launch a campaign called Hand in Hand, meant to help revitalise the camp, in partnership with the Initiative of the Civil Society body, which includes a group of local leaders, NGOs, and civil associations and relief groups active in the camp. According to officials in charge, the goal of the Initiative is to coordinate efforts between civil society and the Damascus governorate to rehabilitate infrastructure in Yarmouk.

As part of the Hand in Hand campaign, various civil and relief associations in the camp helped install solar-powered street lighting, set drinking water tanks, planted ornamental trees and distributed free bread to residents, among other tasks. The campaign aims to clean the main street of Yarmouk camp and Loubia and Palestine streets, maintain and construct road medians and sidewalks, and fill in holes. Other initiatives are planned to follow this one, focused on rebuilding the camp and allowing residents to return. Officials in charge did not disclose further details on the duration of the campaigns or funding.

Mr Kreishati said 3,000 civil society volunteers took part in the Hand in Hand campaign, in addition to governorate work crews. The campaign cleared rubble from a large portion of the nearby streets and between buildings. He added that the governorate made significant progress in providing water and sewage services to all the main streets in the camp and was currently coordinating with Damascus’s Directorate of Electricity to activate two electrical substations to meet the needs of the 1,800 families in Yarmouk.

A well-informed source told The Syria Report that the Damascus governorate is the entity that oversees rubble removal. Meanwhile, NGOs and civil and relief organisations provide work crews and secure financial liquidity to cover operating costs. One of the most prominent organisations involved in this work has been the Al-Quds Charitable Association, which brought in 36-member work crews along with three vehicles: a medium-sized truck and two small trucks meant to assist with ten days of rubble removal. The association later said on its Facebook account that it would keep working until it cleared the entire camp of rubble.

Al-Quds Charitable Association was established in 2011. Most of its members were part of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement. The association’s work receives official media coverage. The Ministry of Local Administration has also honoured its members several times. It has been responsible for the most significant activities related to rubble removal, street lighting and the provision of water tanks in the camp.

According to the well-informed source, most NGOs working in Yarmouk are affiliated with pro-regime Palestinian factions. Despite their aid efforts in the camp, their primary focus is collecting donations to fund these factions. This explains the different names of these NGOs and the existence of multiple similar NGOs affiliated with a single faction.

In any case, camp residents have complained about the slow and irregular pace of debris removal. In several instances, debris was moved from one site to another within the camp without being taken away, such as in the Waseem Project neighbourhood. Moreover, roads remain blocked between the camp and adjacent areas due to debris and earthen berms, including Al-Tadhamon, Yalda, and Al-Hajar Al-Aswad. Homes under restoration and repair work have also been targeted by theft, including the removal of iron rebar from ceilings and walls. Such thefts are especially rampant in the March 8th neighbourhood and some areas between Yarmouk and Al-Hajar Al-Aswad.

The Action Group for Palestinians of Syria reported on April 10 that the Damascus governorate changed various signage and symbols in Yarmouk after finishing restoration and rehabilitation work at the camp’s entrance. This included removing Palestinian flags and symbols from the main entrance, replacing the word “camp” with “street” and using the term Yarmouk area instead of Yarmouk camp. Meanwhile, the pro-opposition news site Saut Al-Asima reported on March 16 that residents wishing to return to Yarmouk and Al-Hajar Al-Aswad would no longer be required to visit the Palestine Branch of Military Security or the National Security Office to obtain approval. Instead, they must submit a written request to a recently established military security detachment located on Yarmouk’s Thalatheen Street.

On January 23, the Damascus governor announced new procedures for buildings in the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp that have fallen or are at risk of either partial or total collapse. However, the announcement was unclear and ambiguous and appeared to have no legal basis.

The announcement, which was issued in the state-owned Al-Baath Newspaper, included a request by the Damascus governor for residents and property owners in Yarmouk to “visit the Yarmouk Services Department to remove their collapsed buildings or demolish buildings at risk of total or partial collapse. An announcement will be made in the Official Gazette and affiliated websites for one month, after which the buildings will be removed, and their owners charged the costs of removal.” It is unclear what is required of the residents, i.e. whether they must remove their buildings themselves, or if the Yarmouk Services Department will do so.

The Yarmouk Services Department was established by Damascus Governor’s Decree No. 61 of 2018 to replace the semi-independent Yarmouk Camp Local Committee that had administered the camp since 1964. The new services department operates directly under the Damascus governorate and has its headquarters in the same building once occupied by the now-defunct local committee on Palestine Street.

The governor’s announcement was unclear in several ways. First, regarding the one-month deadline, it was unclear whether that one month was the period the announcement would appear in the Official Gazette and news websites, the deadline for property owners to visit the services department, or the deadline for demolishing and removing the buildings.

Second, the announcement had no legal basis in Law No. 3 of 2018, which concerns removing the rubble of damaged buildings and buildings subject to laws requiring demolition. Law No. 3 grants the governor the power to determine real estate zones and damaged buildings that must be removed while giving property owners one month to prove their rights to ownership of the rubble.

Law No. 3 also requires the governor to form a committee to assess the damaged buildings and identify the owners. The committee has five members, including a real estate judge who heads it, the Land Registry’s Surveying Department president, a real estate expert, a representative from the Directorate of Cadastral Affairs, and a representative from the local residents. The committee is tasked with determining the condition of the buildings and the extent of damage and structural integrity, as well as recommending full, partial, or no demolition.

Although Law No. 3 is already very problematic and poses risks to housing, land, and property rights, local administrative units tend to more often address issues related to rubble, fallen buildings, or buildings at risk of collapse, according to administrative decisions and circulars they have issued in the past. This process is also extremely problematic, as it allows administrative units, especially those operating in informal settlements, to demolish buildings without assuming any responsibility towards their owners.

This process resembles what is currently underway in Darayya, a city in the Rural Damascus governorate. There, the executive office is carrying out a campaign to demolish buildings it deems at risk of collapse, uninhabitable or a risk to passers-by and neighbours. The demolitions have no legal basis, and no committee is in place to ascertain ownership rights over the properties.

Lastly, the Damascus governor’s recent announcement is unclear about its threat to impose fines on people whose rubble the governorate will remove. The announcement does not outline any criteria for how the governorate will calculate these fines or how they will be implemented.

Announcement issued by Damascus governor regarding buildings in the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp that have fallen or are at risk of either partial or total collapse. Source: The official Al-Baath newspaper.

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