In a hospital in north-west Syria, eight-year-old Hanaa asks her parents and little sister for news every day: Little does she know that she is the only one who survived the earthquake.
The earthquake that devastated entire regions of Syria and Turkey on February 6 and killed almost 40,000 people left countless orphans in its wake.
Given the catastrophic and ever-increasing death toll, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) fears “an appalling number” of orphans because “many, many children will have lost their parents” in the tragedy.
Hanaa was pulled from the rubble 33 hours after the earthquake in the village of Harim, near the border with Turkey, where the building where she lived with her family collapsed.
“We tried to save her father, a rescuer, her mother and her sister, but they all died,” said Abdallah Charif, the girl’s uncle, at nearby Maarrat Misrine Hospital, where she was admitted.
“She keeps asking about her father, her mother and her four-year-old sister” Waad. “We don’t dare to tell him the truth, we answer that they are in another ward of the hospital,” he adds.
On her hospital bed surrounded by Valentine’s Day balloons, the bright-eyed little girl tries to smile despite her facial injuries and her hand in a cast.
Bassel Stefi, the doctor accompanying the survivor, explains that she arrived in critical condition.
“She was dehydrated after spending more than 30 hours under the rubble without eating or drinking in the cold.” “She has since been released from the intensive care unit, her condition is stable, but she is at risk of arm amputation,” he says.
Hanaa’s uncle fears that the girl’s condition will worsen when she learns of the death of her loved ones and prefers to call in specialists to break the news to her.
“Children are at serious psychological risk because of the magnitude of the shock,” Samah Hadid, an official with the Norwegian Council for Refugees in the Middle East, told AFP.
Hanaa is left with only her grandparents and uncles raising her in this rebel-held region, where much of the population has itself been displaced from other war-torn areas of Syria.
According to UNICEF, more than seven million children were affected by the earthquake in both countries, including 2.5 million in Syria.
For many children in this country, “it’s trauma on top of other trauma,” UNICEF spokesman James Elder told AFP.
“Every child under the age of 12 in Syria has experienced nothing but conflict, violence and displacement,” he adds.
In the same city of Harim, where about 35 buildings did not survive the earthquake, three-year-old Arslan Berri was the only one to survive the collapse of his building.
“The building where my sister lived collapsed. We dug for three days, we found his lifeless father hugging him and holding his other two children’s hands,” says his uncle Ezzat Hamidi, 30.
Her mother was found about two meters away, he said.
“My nephew lost his father, mother and brothers. He risks having his legs amputated,” adds the young man, who, in shock, runs from hospital to hospital with the child to get him the care he needs.
“The child’s lower limbs were crushed” under the rubble, says doctor Omar al-Ali of Sarmada Children’s Hospital, adding that he also suffers from problems with internal organs.
“We have rescued many children who are still alive, but also others who have died,” Obada Zikra, a White Helmet leader who leads rescue operations in rebel-held areas in Syria, told AFP.
Among them was a newborn who was still connected by the umbilical cord to his deceased mother, who lost all of his family members in a building in Jandairis, near the Turkish border.
“We have felt great joy each time we have pulled out a living child,” adds the rescuer. “But we hope that the children in our region who have only known bombings and displacement and have never enjoyed stability can grow up and go to school like other children around the world.”