(Reuters) -
After months of despair that the international community would ever act to help
them, Syrian refugees in Turkey say they are now optimistic that the world is
ready to take action at last.
"Before,
people were frustrated that their camp stay would last too long, and felt it
was no life in a camp, when the international community seemed paralyzed and
hesitant," said Ibrahim Ali, a contractor from a Syrian village, now
living in a tented camp in Yayladag on the Turkish side of the border.
"But
now it's different. People are staying here and morale is high. Assad's days
are numbered."
In the
eight months since President Bashar al-Assad's security forces began their
crackdown on protests, the West and regional neighbors seemed resolutely
opposed to getting entangled in one of the core countries of the Middle East.
But two
weeks ago the Arab League suspended Syria for refusing to halt the violence,
and the news has reinvigorated refugees in camps here on the border.
This week,
France called for a humanitarian corridor to be set up in Syria, guarded by
international monitors, with Assad's permission or organized by international
observers.
The prime
minister of Turkey - a regional heavyweight with the military strength to mount
a cross-border operation -compared Assad to Hitler and Mussolini and called for
him to quit. Its land forces commander visited the border region.
On
Thursday, Arab League ministers meeting in Cairo said they would impose harsh
economic sanctions if Assad did not allow in monitors.
Yamen
Fadel, a 30-year-old cook from Dama village, was watching the news from the
League meeting in Cairo on a large flat screen TV in a tent with other
refugees.
"From
morning till now people have been glued to the news. We have a lot of hope the decisions
of the Arab League will encourage Turkey to set up a safe zone to allow our men
to go and fight the regime from there," he said.
"People
want to go and fight with the revolutionaries and leave the women behind in the
camp."
PAINTINGS
About 8,200
Syrian refugees are registered in five camps in Turkey's Hatay province, a
panhandle of territory jutting south along the Mediterranean coast toward
Syria.
A Turkish
foreign ministry official in the area reckoned that the number of refugees
registered peaked at nearly 20,000 a few months ago, but fell as families left
the camps.
Some have
found lodging with families in villages in the area, which share kinship ties
with villages in Syria's Idlib province across the hilly, forested frontier.
In better
times Hatay, site of the ancient city of Antioch, formed a trade route to the
Levant. The Turkish and Syrian governments agreed visa-free travel in 2009, a
time of friendship between Assad and Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan.
Refugees in
the two camps at Yayladag, the first set up months ago by the Turkish Red
Crescent, say they have been well looked after by their Turkish hosts but are
still homesick for Syria. The border is within walking distance.
"I
spend my time either painting or killing time playing cards and there is no
work to do," said Abdelkarim Haj Yousuf, 57, an artist.
His
grizzled face filled with sadness and he broke into sobs over the actions of
Assad's government.
"This
is not a regime it's a gang, or it wouldn't be doing this to us. Is there a
regime that humiliates and kills its people this way?" he cried.
Kneeling on
the floor of his tent, he worked on a pastel portrait of a blue-eyed young
woman with long brown hair. Other portraits lay scattered around. None of the
faces bore smiles.
A relative,
Mariam Haj Yousef, 57, said refugees wanted to go home but would not return as
long as Assad remained in power.
"We
want Allah and the help of all the countries to return to Syria," she said
outside her tent. "If Bashar stays, we will not go back. We will never go
back."
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