Noor & Zee Documentary photography

DISPLACED : A story about Syrian refugees. This is Hayat Abdullah, she has been in the UK for 9 months.

‘Do you have any family members missing or who have been killed because of the war?’

‘I can talk from today to tomorrow, and you wouldn’t be able to understand how much we’ve been through or know how it felt. I’ve lost a lot of people, my brother in law was killed under torture, they left his body in front of our house after they killed him. Once they came into our house and stepped on my son’s head, they told him to praise them as if they were God. They continued to step on his head whilst they had the rest of the family at gunpoint. ‘

This is Imane Bakdaliah, she has been in the UK for 4 years.

‘What would you like to say to people who have a negative view of refugees?’

‘I get nightmares of seeing my family being killed, but we have come to raise our kids to the best we can. We are not here to do something wrong, we just want to live. We want to live simply, we don’t want to be rich. We came here asking for safety, nothing else.
‘

‘Do you have any family members who are missing or who have been killed because of the war?’

‘I have a lot of family members who are missing. I witnessed my brother, brother in-law, sister in-law, my two uncles and my dad being executed. When the soldiers came to our house, they lined them all up and executed them in front of me. I hid in a water canister, so they couldn’t see me. I couldn’t scream or cry loudly as I watched my family, the people I care about, be executed, because they would find me and kill me too.’

This is Majd Al Multaji and her daughter Ghazal. They have been in the UK for 4 years.

‘Do you have a family member who is missing in Syria?’

'My brother in law was killed during the war. My house and my parents house were destroyed along with my husband’s parents house. For two years my sister in law has also been missing, we have no idea if she is alive or dead. Right now, my grandmother is missing. They said she is alive but in prison. But we are all getting different information that this is not true and she has actually been dead for almost six months. I haven’t seen her in 7 years.'

‘What would you like to say to people in the UK that have a negative view of refugees coming to the UK?’

'I don’t know what to say to them, because we didn’t come to this country out of love for Britain, we didn’t come here because we just liked the idea of staying here. We have been forced to come here because it is not safe in Syria. We tried to live in Lebanon when we first left Syria, but they have no respect for Syrians. They treat animals better than they treat Syrians there. We came here looking for the respect that we deserve, even though it is not our country, we are not here begging, we want to work. All we want is to be respected and we respect others if they do the same to us. We cannot change these people’s views of refugees, they can only change it themselves by seeing what we are doing here. '

This is Maydah Al Saleh. After living in a refugee camp for 2-3 years she came with her family to the UK via Jordan.

‘Do you have a family member who is missing in Syria?’

'My two Brothers, Dad and Uncle have been missing for four years till this day, no one knows whether they are alive or dead. Another brother of mine passed away as well. We can only pray that one day someone will call and say they are safe and all together. But honestly, we don’t know, it’s been so long, we have lost all hope.'

This is Families for Freedom

Families for Freedom is an all-women led movement that is spreading awareness for the thousands of Syrians who have been detained, are missing or have been forcibly disappeared. They are the children, husbands, wives, mothers, fathers, and siblings of the Syrian people. Families for Freedom will not stop until their voice is heard, and every Syrian is freed and found. The dream if for the bus they have decorated in portraits of those missing, to travel the world to share their message and the final destination is Damascus. There they hope to not put more pictures on the bus, but to put their family members on it and take them home safely. In each city they visit, a demonstration is held where they invite Syrians who live there to join the movement and put their missing loved one on the bus as well. A minute of silence is held for the missing, the detained and the executed.

‘Do you have one memory that provides you with hope and keeps you committed to searching for your family members?’

‘There is a lot of memories, I don’t know which one I can talk about. I used to live in another city from my family, when I went by bus, Tariq would receive me from the station, he would hold my children, take me with his car to his home, he would take my luggage. He would bring and take me to the station, when I went to my city, this memory will not disappear or be forgotten.

With my father in law, I was the first new member of the family, he respected me too much, he would bring nice food for me and the children.’

This is Farizah. She last saw her husband Nasser on 10th September 2013.

‘Is there one memory that you hold on to, that gives you hopes and keeps you committed to finding your husband?’

‘My husband is with me in every daily detail, in every moment. Everything that happens to me, I link it back to him.
Two things that are tangible, are a book and the second thing that I love so much, is a bottle. The last time we were together in Syria, we had a special evening together, we were drinking a famous alcoholic drink from Syria, we drank the bottle but here was a little bit left. I was fleeing Syria as I was in danger and he said, ‘I won’t drink the rest of the bottle until you are back in Syria safe with me.’

‘What happened was that I had to run away because the electricity kept cutting and it was too dangerous there. Then I went to my first refugee country, Egypt, and Nasser came there and he had the bottle with him. I looked at it, and he had decorated it. It looked like a piece of art, ‘I said what have you done to the bottle?’. He said when the electricity would cut in Syria, he would light a candle and put my picture on the bottle. I took another candle, and it started to drip, it was like the candle was crying. He felt like the candle was crying on his behalf, because he missed me and his family, but he was conflicted because he couldn’t leave his responsibilities in Syria.

When he brought the bottle back, he gave it to me and said keep it, I instantly had a really bad feeling. As happy as I was to see the bottle, I had really bad feeling in my heart. I keep the bottle and the book around, so I can see it often.’

‘In the book he gave me as a present, he wrote a 2-page long note in it. The book is called ‘Love, Freedom and individuality’. I don’t want to memorise the words in the note he left me, because when I read it I want it to be as if it was the first time again. Some of the actual book that I have memorised says, ‘your eyes shine like butterfly are being born, lighting up the dark road ahead’.

This is Fadwa. Mahmoud her son and her husband are missing. She is one of the founding members of Families for Freedom.

‘Do you have one memory of you son and husband that give you hope that you will find them?’

‘As a mother, every movement of his is a memory, when I sees his photos of him smiling, I think that this is a smile that should not be hidden anymore.
For my husband, I remember his beliefs in his political cases and his political opinion before the Syrian crisis. He was detained for 14 years before his disappearance, I look at his pictures and from his eyes I gets strength and encouragement to continue. I come from a divided family, one half supports the regime and the other is against the regime. My first detention of many, in the 80s was by my own brother, he detained me. My family says I am with the revolution because I’m doing this work. I say to them, being part of the revolution or not is irrelevant, I really just want my loved ones back.’