2023-11-04 19:03:00
Under the light rain falling on the Place de la Bourse this Thursday evening, Hassan (not his real name) scrolls through the Facebook profiles of his family members on the screen of his smartphone. “That’s my uncle. He is dead.” Another photo shows the same man with three children. “They died too.” Hassan scans his screen and continues his macabre enumeration: “My aunt, my mother’s cousin, my cousins, they all died in the Israeli bombings of Jabalyia”, a refugee camp ravaged by Israeli strikes.
Hassan comes to the Place de la Bourse every day around 7 p.m. For two weeks now, since the day of the bombing of Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza, several hundred Palestinians and supporters have been gathering in this square in the center of Brussels. A few Palestinian flags, slogans and sometimes speeches to make their voices heard. “We are suffering and we have nothing. We have no shield and nowhere to go. The whole world knows what is happening there and no one reacts. We Palestinians just want peace,” he confides.
Hassan fled the Gaza Strip a year ago. “I left my country because of the permanent instability. I was an architect, but it was almost impossible to carry out projects. Overnight, the prices of materials could double because of the Israeli blockade.” The man took the road, first towards Greece before arriving in Belgium. Why Belgium? “As there are Flemish, French-speaking, German-speaking and many different communities, I told myself that Belgium should not be a racist country.”
Since October 7, Hassan has been hanging on his cell phone waiting for news from his family. “From time to time, we manage to talk, just long enough to send a message to ask if they are alive. You have to start again every day hoping to receive a response,” he says, before returning to the demonstrators.
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On Facebook, seeing your dead friends
Nareman arrived in Belgium in December 2021. She had lost all hope of leading a normal life in Gaza. She preferred to take the road. First in Spain, where she was able to obtain a work visa. She then submitted an application for international protection in Belgium where she came to join her brother and sister who had arrived a few years earlier. The rest of his family still lives in Gaza. “I’m trying to contact them, but it’s very, very complicated. Connections are rare. I have to try twenty times before I get a little contact. Every time my call goes unanswered, I fear that they have died from the bombs. It’s horrible. We no longer have any hope. Every news coming out of Palestine shows that no one cares about our humanity. I don’t even have words for it. When I log on to Facebook, I see the names of my dead friends,” she says.
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Every time my call goes unanswered, I fear that they have died from the bombs. It’s horrible. We no longer have any hope.
Nareman goes through all the articles on social media every time to make sure his family is not included in the list of victims. “I don’t know what to do to help them anymore. They live in the north of Gaza, they no longer have food. If they want clean water, they have to go to the hospital. Yet they have money, but there is nothing to buy. If they are alive, it is only by miracle. If I could, I would return to Gaza to die with them. But even that, we can’t because the border posts are blocked,” she notes, her voice breaking with sadness.
In addition to the distress caused by her family situation, Nareman is disgusted by the treatment reserved for them, having been waiting for months for a second interview with the asylum authorities. “I live in an apartment, I have a job, I pay my taxes… but I get nothing. I only ask for papers! And, at the same time, we see Ukrainian exiles who received a temporary protection title automatically, almost without any action,” she is indignant.
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Feeling of double standards
Nareman is not the only one to share this reflection on the “double standards” between the situation of Ukrainian exiles and the fate of Palestinian asylum seekers. In an open letter, Ulysses, the mental health service responsible for supporting exiled people, warns of the danger involved. “The extreme political and social context that the Gaza Strip is experiencing, the worry and the feeling of guilt that it generates explains the deterioration of the psychological state of these patients, when it is not the announcement of a disappearance or death”, we can read in the letter.
This while most applicants for international protection have to sleep on the street, due to the saturation of the Fedasil reception network. “We ask that Palestinian nationals benefit from easier and immediate access to reception structures and offers of reinforced psychological support adapted to victims of conflict or organized violence,” continues the Ulysse platform.
Palestine is in third position in the ranking of the countries most represented among applicants for international protection in Belgium, with 2,260 applications registered in 2023. Since October 20, the General Commission for Refugees and Stateless Persons has suspended notifications of decisions of subsidiary protections, this title awarded to people who run a real risk in the event of return to the country of origin.
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Lives of less value
Naïm himself has Palestinian origins. He works at the Citizen Platform which helps refugees. Every day he rubs shoulders with Palestinian exiles who have arrived on Belgian soil and casts a scathing glance at the Belgian and international authorities. “There is the impression that Palestinian lives are less valuable. What kills us is this feeling of double standards. The Palestinians are not Hamas. Innocent civilians are being bombed every day and our authorities continue to support Israel. We feel a lot of rage in the face of this injustice,” expresses this son of an exile. “Some Gazans who recently arrived in Belgium live on the streets, without prospects and have no news from their families. Several told me they wanted to end it. What can we say to someone who has lost thirty members of their family and who hears in all the media that it was self-defense?” he asks.
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