The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimated the number of arrivals from Lebanon to northwest Syria (areas under opposition control) to be about 7,800 people.
The Director of Operations and Advocacy at OCHA, Edem Wosornu, stated in her briefing before the Security Council regarding the situation in Syria, on Thursday, November 21, that the influx of arrivals from Lebanon to northwest Syria is accompanied by a shortage of needs, displacement, and increased civilian casualties due to “hostilities”.
There are no official estimates from the de facto authorities in the region regarding the number of arrivals from Lebanon and the size of their needs.
The Syria Civil Defence reported that the Syrian families fleeing the war in Lebanon and entering northwest Syria are facing “significant” difficulties.
The Civil Defence, which operates in northwest Syria, noted the presence of a number of patients suffering from chronic illnesses, pregnant women, and cases of childbirth that were transferred by teams to hospitals, as well as general fatigue and psychological stress caused by the war and displacement.
The Syria Response Coordination Group (SRCG) mentioned that as of November 7, the number of arrivals reached 7,892 people.
The arrivals from Lebanon entered opposition-controlled areas through the Aoun al-Dadat crossing, which connects the city of Jarablus, under the influence of the Syrian Interim Government (SIG), with Manbij, under the control of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the only official crossing between northwest Syria and other Syrian regions.
Initially, those coming from Lebanon faced difficulties until they were allowed entry through Aoun al-Dadat, after measures were taken by the Interim Government to organize the crossing.
According to what the media office of the Interim Government clarified to Enab Baladi earlier, the entry of families is occurring gradually based on measures that started to be taken by the government to facilitate and organize their entry.
There are teams from the Civil Registry that were sent by the government to the Aoun al-Dadat crossing to document the arriving individuals, collect their personal information, take personal photos, fingerprint them, and issue them civil registration documents, so that they can move around in various opposition-controlled areas and also contact organizations operating in the region and government agencies.
Through this process, the arrivals from Lebanon will have documents issued by the Civil Registry, to complete these procedures later by obtaining official personal identification issued by the civil registry centers in the area they are located in.
According to a report from the UNHCR, the number of people who crossed the border from Lebanon to Syria since September 24 has reached 557,000, distributed across various Syrian provinces.