Hardly any heavy equipment: residents and volunteers are trying to rescue people from the rubble in Idlib.
Image: Getty
In northern Syria, the disaster hit a traumatized population ruled by Islamist militias. Hardly anyone here harbors any hope of international aid. Politically, too, the country is a catastrophe.
Ahen Malik al-Abdeh rushed out of his room on the night of the disaster to get to safety, he stopped short in amazement. The small mud-brick shack in which he slept shook, but in the midst of all the chaos his hosts settled down on the trembling ground. they prayed The Syrian political adviser reports on the phone how he experienced the great earthquake in Tell Abyad, a town on the border with Turkey that is part of the Ankara-controlled regions of northern Syria.
He was lucky in his misfortune, because the area where he was staying has only poor low-rise buildings that don’t easily become death traps. But even if the backwardness had ensured that the apocalypse in Tell Abyad did not happen, it quickly became clear to him that this earthquake would stick in the bones of the country for a while – if only as a hope killer.