{"id":2304,"date":"2025-02-17T15:54:32","date_gmt":"2025-02-17T15:54:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/haella.nl\/foundation\/?post_type=news&#038;p=2304"},"modified":"2025-02-17T15:54:33","modified_gmt":"2025-02-17T15:54:33","slug":"waiting-in-uncertainty-the-harsh-reality-for-syrians-in-greece","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/haella.nl\/foundation\/news\/waiting-in-uncertainty-the-harsh-reality-for-syrians-in-greece\/","title":{"rendered":"Waiting in Uncertainty: The Harsh Reality for Syrians in Greece"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>\u201cIt\u2019s cruel.\u201d<\/em> X from Syria barely holds back his tears. When I spoke to him in April last year, he had finally made it to Athens after enduring abuse in Turkey, being pushed back from Bulgaria, and making two attempts to reach Greece. He was finally in the right procedure, with a strong chance of obtaining papers. But no\u2014procedural errors delayed the process, and now the decision-making for Syrians has been put on hold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Every policy you read about has far-reaching consequences for real people. All Syrians currently in the procedure are now stuck in this country, including those on Lesbos. They are not allowed to leave the island. Germany is preparing to start deporting Syrians who traveled through Greece, their first country of arrival. And then what?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This is about X and that five-year-old boy traveling alone. It\u2019s about families who have already endured so much. A single sentence\u2014<em>\u201cdecision-making postponed\u201d<\/em>\u2014suspends people\u2019s lives in limbo, with no one knowing how it will end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I was in Athens this weekend, visiting some partners and taking a moment to admire everything this city has to offer. <em>\u201cHow are things on Lesbos?\u201d<\/em> was a recurring question. The pastor of the Anglican church, where I briefly stopped yesterday with Cees from the embassy, immediately invited me to speak one evening. <em>\u201cWe barely hear about it anymore.\u201d<\/em> The mainland camps are far from inhabited areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I sent a piece to <em>Trouw<\/em>. The response was that it was very compelling, but they already covered Greece enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And of course, a drawn-out issue loses to the language of war and threats. But that rhetoric fuels the silence\u2014not just by making it less newsworthy, but also by increasing its invisibility and that of its consequences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Every day, I realize more how much we don\u2019t know. And how too little knowledge always leads to bad plans, cruel policies, and a lack of awareness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Dutch legislative proposals are partly based on Greek procedures, as Greece is the testing ground. But in some ways, Greece does things better than the Netherlands. Two months after arrival, whether or not they have received papers, people are allowed to work. Not in the Netherlands. Every European country is coming up with stricter measures\u2014Minister Faber stacks them on top of each other and ties them up with a bow. And no matter what the Council of State says, it all drowns in Trumpian rhetoric.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>\u201cI\u2019ll come back,\u201d<\/em> I tell X. Not that it helps him in any way. But maybe his story will help people understand what seemingly simple measures do to a person. A young man whose eyes are less hopeful than ten months ago. But who keeps going, refusing to surrender to a cruel system that leaves no room for humanity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cIt\u2019s cruel.\u201d X from Syria barely holds back his tears. When I spoke to him in April last year, he had finally made it to Athens after enduring abuse in Turkey, being pushed back from Bulgaria, and making two attempts to reach Greece. He was finally in the right procedure, with a strong chance of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":2305,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","tags":[95,118,97,40,119,22,120,62,85,104],"news-category":[121],"class_list":["post-2304","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-asylum-policy","tag-european-union","tag-greece","tag-human-rights","tag-invisible-suffering","tag-lesbos","tag-limbo","tag-migration","tag-refugees","tag-syria","news-category-asylum-policy"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Waiting in Uncertainty: The Harsh Reality for Syrians in Greece - Haella Foundation<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/haella.nl\/foundation\/news\/waiting-in-uncertainty-the-harsh-reality-for-syrians-in-greece\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Waiting in Uncertainty: The Harsh Reality for Syrians in Greece - Haella Foundation\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u201cIt\u2019s cruel.\u201d X from Syria barely holds back his tears. 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