Thirteen years after fleeing Assad’s bombs, our Syrian friends who had found refuge in Lebanon were now able to return home. We visited them there – and prepared the first reconstruction projects.
Visit in Buwaydah in front of Abu Feyrous’ house
By Simon Bethlehem
Bonn, January 18, 2025 – “Ahlan wa sahlan,” Abu Feyrous calls out warmly as we step out of the car — welcome. In Buwaydah, barely a stone stands upon another. Destruction as far as the eye can see: buckled concrete pillars, bent reinforcement steel, collapsed concrete ceilings, broken cement blocks. And yet a smile beams across Abu Feyrous’s entire face as he leads us through *his* village.
For almost thirteen years, he couldn’t be here, hadn’t seen his house or the olive trees. And even though his house is now just a pile of rubble, the relief of being home again is much greater than the sadness over the destruction and the uncertainty about the future.
Al-Buwaydah al-Sharqiyahwar was once a place with around 8,000 people. It lies about 20 kilometers south of Homs, near the main road to Al-Qusseir. When protests against the Assad regime began in April 2011, Al-Qusseir was one of the first places in the country to participate, and civil resistance also stirred in Buwaydah, just seven kilometers away.
After the regime-loyal Syrian army took control of Al-Qusseir in November of that same year, armed resistance began in February 2012 by residents who had joined the Free Syrian Army (FSA). For months, bitter fighting continued over Al-Qusseir and Buwaydah before the areas fell completely under the control of the Syrian army and Lebanese Hezbollah. Buwaydah was then completely evacuated, and Hezbollah established a base here. Meanwhile, the Syrian army set about destroying the houses: With bulldozers, they systematically attacked the concrete pillars of the houses, causing the buildings to collapse.
Abu Feyrous fled with his family, like many others. Initially, they sought refuge in the nearby Qalamoun mountains on the Syrian-Lebanese border. When it became too dangerous there in 2013 after an attack by the Syrian army, they moved on to Lebanese Aarsal.
This is where we met Abu Feyrous’s family and many other people from Buwaydah in 2017, when we winterized their camp *Wadi Swed*. Subsequently, the residents of Wadi Swed became our employees: They helped us prepare numerous camps for winter, installed new electrical systems in the 10,000 tents in Aarsal, built classrooms for informal Syrian and state Lebanese schools. Some of them also completed training in our “Carpentry For Future” workshop.
However, the people from Buwaydah never felt at home in Aarsal. Life in tents, the lack of educational and professional prospects for both adults and children, the often exploitative working conditions, the constant fear of harassment by Lebanese soldiers, and complete lack of legal rights in Lebanon made Syrian refugees view Aarsal with a mixture of contempt and cynicism.
From day one, they wanted to return home as quickly as possible. Weeks turned into months, months into years — and even when return became theoretically possible again in 2021 after clearance by the Syrian army, many feared returning to the country still ruled by Assad, fearing retribution, military conscription, and economic hopelessness.
Stay or Return?
When the militia alliance *Hayat Tahrir al-Sham* (HTS) began its advance on Aleppo in late November 2024 and brought down the Assad regime within a very short time, the euphoria among the Aarsal refugees was enormous. At the same time, the question arose: Stay or return?
In Aarsal, people had settled in, here were the tents that had already survived numerous winters. Here there was diesel for the stoves, stable food supplies, at least small payments from the United Nations, and reasonably functioning schools. Even though poverty was widespread because hardly anyone had permanent employment, returning to Syria would mean uncertainty: Where to live when everything is destroyed, how will the supply of food and medicine be, can our children go to school, is there paid work, will peace last?
Opinions differ on this in the Syrian community in Aarsal. While people from the Qalamoun mountains have mostly already returned, as few villages there were destroyed, many people from the Homs region (which includes Al-Qusseir and Buwaydah) are still waiting and want to at least spend the winter in Aarsal.
The people from Camp Wadi Swed, however, have turned their backs on Aarsal. Shortly before, during another raid by the Lebanese army in Wadi Swed, several men had been arrested and mistreated. Additionally, the owner of the land where the camp was built was pushing for departure and additional payments.
Life in tents, now also in Buwaydah
Back Home
The people who had already returned to Buwaydah in 2021 had cleared the streets of debris, laid power lines, and gradually rebuilt houses. Even today, they are still rather basic structures, but they provide protection from winter weather. At the entrance to the village, two old houses still stand. They were spared from destruction because Hezbollah soldiers had lived there.
One of these houses belongs to the uncle of Sammi, Abu Feyrous’s wife. Here, the family has occupied a room that is furnished very similarly to their previous tent in Wadi Swed: a carpet, a diesel stove in the middle, mats for sitting on the sides. Sammi invites us to a small lunch with bread, scrambled eggs, cucumbers, and yogurt. We drink tea and coffee, listen to stories about their first experiences and encounters after returning.
Abu Feyrous and Sammi are happy to be back, to be able to live self-determined lives again in the future. They are aware of the tremendous effort required from them, from the village, from the whole country to make this a good place to live again, and that this will take years. But they are bursting with energy and looking forward to their new, old life.
Meal at Abu Feyrous and Sammi’s | Leen (left) and Sara
Sarah and Leen are the two youngest daughters. They were two and three years old when the family left Buwaydah and have no memories of pre-war Syria. For the two 15- and 16-year-olds, life in Buwaydah doesn’t mean returning home, but being torn from a familiar environment where they had their friends and could attend a Lebanese school. They have no connection to Buwaydah except for their parents’ stories and longings. They had partly adopted these, but now find themselves in a completely destroyed place that has little to do with the promises that were built up over years. Here there are only a few hours of electricity per day, no stable internet, not the vibrancy that Aarsal had. They miss Aarsal, also because their parents had mostly kept the many hardships and worries there away from them. They don’t radiate this joy, but are disappointed and resigned — they are still searching for their place in Buwaydah.
Abu Abdu, who had also worked for us in Aarsal, stands with outstretched arms in front of his broken house, also smiling. Whenever we sat together in the evening in Wadi Swed in the smoky hut of camp leader Abu Abdullah, Abu Abdu had asked: “What do you think, when can we go back home?” Of course, we had no answer to that. While many other Syrians had already given up believing in a return, Abu Abdu remained optimistic. “Boukra ahla!” he always said, tomorrow will be better.
Abu Abdullah was the Shawish, the camp leader in Wadi Swed, responsible for the coexistence of 38 families in the 59 tents. He conducted negotiations with the landowner, spoke with aid organizations, attended camp leader meetings, and mediated disputes in the camp. When I meet him in front of his destroyed house and somewhat provocatively ask if he is now also the Shawish in Buwaydah, he dismisses it with a warm laugh: The same day Assad left Syria, he too had taken his hat — eleven years had been enough.
Destroyed Infrastructure
The infrastructure in Buwaydah also needs to be rebuilt. Overhead power lines are already in place, the main road has been cleared of debris and is passable, and there are water connections in the village.
The primary school building (grades 1-6) has remained structurally intact. Since 2022, classes have been running again in a few rooms that were makeshift prepared for this purpose. The middle school (grades 7-9) has also found space in the building. But since Assad’s fall and the return of many families to Buwaydah, the space is no longer sufficient and school benches are also lacking. The number of 150 children has more than doubled and will continue to rise in the coming months.
The actual middle school building stands abandoned. Although it too was spared from major destruction, all windows and doors are missing, paint and plaster are crumbling from the walls. Some toilets have been torn out. The principal wants to return here with the three grade levels as soon as possible, also to make room for additional classes in the primary school. Furthermore, the number of middle school students will rise rapidly, as Bawaydah is a central location for the secondary school serving twelve surrounding villages.
The local medical center is completely destroyed. Before the war, a general practitioner, a gynecologist, and a dentist were based here. For medical care, people currently have to travel to the provincial capital Homs, where capacities are already severely overstretched. For the mayor of Buwaydah, rebuilding the medical center has highest priority.
Dilapidated middle school of Buwaydah
First Green Helmets Projects Planned
As Green Helmets, we want to first restore the middle school classrooms. We have already begun building school benches for the primary and middle school. For this, we can rely on our experienced Aarsal team around Abu Feyrous, who will weld the benches and renovate the classrooms. This way, we can provide additional classrooms in the coming months and contribute to ensuring that all children in Buwaydah can go to school. Positive side effect: We create urgently needed jobs. With their earnings, our employees’ families can begin rebuilding their private houses.
As a follow-up project, we have our eyes on rebuilding the medical center. Discussions with the responsible health authorities are planned for the coming weeks and months.
For us, it is a matter close to our hearts to support the people in Buwaydah in rebuilding their town. We have accompanied many of them over the last seven years and built close relationships. Abu Feyrous and his family are mentioned here only as representatives of the many others with whom we have worked and lived in Aarsal. For the implementation of the reconstruction projects, we urgently depend on donations. This way, we can make a small contribution to making one thing come true: “Boukra ahla” — tomorrow will be better.