13.5 Million People Affected: For These Reasons, the Repercussions of the Turkiye Earthquake Will Not End Quickly

Thousands of buildings collapsed in ten Turkish states, and a three-month state of emergency began in those states, according to what Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced.

The horror of the images coming from the destruction of the Turkish cities is terrifying, but it is added to the feelings of anxiety and fear among the victims of the earthquakes, with the loss of a number of their relatives and friends, whether they are Turkish or Syrian, in addition to their displacement and homelessness under a cold night, and their suffering in obtaining services such as health care and food.

At a time when rescue operations are facing various complications, including the widening of the area of destruction and the weather, the Turkish president promised to finish removing the rubble as soon as possible and start the process of rebuilding the cities damaged by the earthquake, which is the most violent in 100 years, according to the United Nations.

 

Tragic Reality

Frost, hunger, and despair all devour the remaining patience of hundreds of thousands of people who have become homeless because of their inability to enter their homes threatened with collapse due to the earthquakes that caused the largest number of victims in the states hit by the earthquakes that occurred in Kahramanmaras in southern Turkiye at dawn Last Monday, with a strength of 7.7 and 7.6, respectively, in addition to Kahramanmaras, Hatay, Adıyaman, Adana, Kilis, Osmaniye, Malatya, Gaziantep, Şanlıurfa, and Diyarbakir, as well as regions in Syria, were affected by it.

The earthquake-affected areas are home to an estimated 13.5 million people, including more than 1.5 million Syrian refugees, while it has so far resulted in 29,605 dead and more than 80,000 wounded, according to what was announced by Fuad Oktay, the Turkish Vice President.

Many houses in the earthquake-stricken area were completely destroyed, cracked, unsuitable for habitation, or forbidden to be used until they are finally examined, and their fate decided on whether it could accommodate residents again.

The repercussions of the catastrophic earthquake and the destruction of tens of thousands of buildings forced many residents of the most affected areas to migrate to other less affected states such as Istanbul, Mersin, Konya, Trabzon, and Kayseri.

On February 11, 2023, the Turkish Emergency and Disaster Management Department (AFAD) announced the evacuation of more than 147,934 people from the states affected by the earthquake, which were declared disaster areas, and a state of emergency was imposed for a period of 3 months.

The Turkish government’s options seem limited in dealing with the crisis, as it says that it has provided more than 50,000 hotel rooms for accommodation, but the capacity of these rooms will not exceed more than a quarter of a million people, which leaves millions of others without shelter, and therefore tents and prefabricated houses must be provided for them so that they are not left to their inevitable fate in light of the severe cold weather and lack of aid.

On its part, the World Health Organization draws attention to a crisis parallel to the catastrophic earthquake, as some deadly diseases began to appear among those displaced by the earthquake, such as respiratory diseases, in addition to the deep psychological trauma with the loss of shelter, water, fuel, and electricity, expressing its fear that many survivors will lose their lives.

Despite the horrific results of what has happened so far, the major crisis awaits millions of afflicted people in Turkiye, for whom urgent assistance must be provided to adapt to post-disaster conditions so that they do not face an unfavorable fate.

 

Government Pledges

Immediately after the earthquake, the Turkish government activated the rapid response mechanism for disasters and mobilized all its capabilities, as it immediately began mobilizing rescue and relief teams, including the Turkish army, police, fire department, and health services, to serve their citizens in the affected areas.

The Turkish government has set up emergency shelters and provided tents, blankets, food, and basic necessities to those who have lost their homes, while the army opened all military headquarters and barracks in the earthquake areas to the afflicted and sent thousands of its personnel to participate in search and rescue work, and to establish air and sea bridges to transport the injured, aid, and heavy equipment.

In addition to Ankara harnessing all its resources, capabilities, and institutions to help those affected by the earthquakes, Turkish citizens played an important role in disaster response efforts. Many volunteers from all over the country flocked to the area to assist in the rescue and relief efforts, providing food, clothing, and medical aid to those affected and helping clear rubble.

A number of Turks also offered their homes, which were prepared for rent on the Sahibinden application (an app used for marketing sales and rentals of real estate), for free to those affected by the earthquakes in the south of the country after their homes were completely destroyed or became uninhabitable.

The campaign was not limited to the cities and areas of earthquakes and their surroundings but spread and included homes that were offered for rent all over Turkiye.

On the other hand, President Erdogan said during his visit to a camp for those affected by the earthquake in Diyarbakir: “The cities hit by the earthquake are home to 13.5 million people. About 20 million people live in the total area where the earthquake terrified the population.”

Erdogan revealed that the government is preparing a comprehensive program that will ensure the country’s revival, especially the area affected by the earthquake, and he also directed orders to Turkish Airlines to transport passengers to and from the earthquake areas for free.

“Just as we carried out campaigns to build housing in other disaster areas, we will complete the same projects in the ten affected states within one year,” Erdogan said.

Erdogan also noted the possibility of those affected by the earthquakes staying in student housing units and hotels that were contracted within the states of Antalya, Mersin, Alanya, and Mugla, adding that education will be remote until further notice.

He pointed to the continuation of installing prefabricated housing in the region to house the earthquake victims, explaining that a batch of housing will arrive from outside the country and be distributed to the ten affected states.

Erdogan’s statements came hours after the Turkish Minister of Environment and Urban Development, Murat Kurum, announced that his country was preparing to launch the largest housing campaign in its history in the ten states affected by the earthquake disaster.

“The number of collapsed or severely damaged buildings across the affected areas reached 24,921 buildings,” Kurum said.

In turn, the program director of the Turkish Red Crescent said that more than a million earthquake victims were sheltered in temporary shelters, and about 160,000 people were housed in hotels.

The World Bank had announced the provision of $1.78 billion in aid to Turkiye in support of rescue and recovery efforts after the huge earthquake that hit it.

 

New Exodus

The damage caused by the earthquake in Turkiye was not limited to Turkish citizens only but also affected the Syrian refugees living in the areas affected by the earthquake at dawn last Monday.

The UNHCR says that the total number of Syrian refugees in Turkiye is about 3.5 million, and about 1,750,000 people reside in the cities of southern Turkiye, where the earthquake occurred.

Osama is one of the tens of thousands of Syrians who were forced to move from their place of residence in southern Turkiye, where they were hit by the earthquake. They wandered to other Turkish states to find a place to stay until they absorbed the shock.

This displacement is also added to a long list of displacement movements that Syrians have suffered from over the past 12 years.

“Other Syrian refugees were unable to leave the earthquake-damaged neighborhoods in which they were staying because they do not have the financial means to do so or because they have not yet found their missing relatives under the rubble,” Osama said in an interview with Al-Estiklal.

After a day of suffering, Osama decided to leave Antakya to secure his family, and he went to Mersin, but his suffering began there to search for a place to live away from the exploitation of merchants and brokers.

“Mersin is full of tents prepared by the city’s municipality and charitable organizations to house families, but I was shocked when one of those responsible for the tents asked me for 200 Turkish liras as a daily wage in order to stay in them,” Osama added.

On the other hand, Al-Estiklal monitored many initiatives of Syrian and Turkish citizens who drove their cars to the affected areas to deliver urgent aid and donations to the people in need and to give a ride to citizens from those areas on their way back.

Other initiatives included providing shelters, blankets, foodstuffs, and financial assistance to a large number of Syrian refugees displaced from the affected areas.

Like Osama, Syrian refugees arrived in Ankara, Istanbul, and other areas far from danger, but many of them did not benefit from government facilities and began searching for homes to rent amid a housing crisis whose features began to become clear with the first days of the disaster.

In order to facilitate the movement of Syrians from the affected areas, the Turkish Presidency of Immigration canceled the requirement to obtain a travel permit and considered the refugee’s residence in another city legal for a period of 90 days, but it excluded the city of Istanbul from the decision.

Recently, media sources circulated new decisions regarding the Syrian refugees affected by the earthquake, which stipulate the necessity for them to register with AFAD and then go to the states that have been designated for them in order to live in them while paying house rent and providing them with food aid for a year.

Those of them who lived in Kahramanmaraş and Diyarbakir must move to Antalya, the residents of Adıyaman to Eden, those who were in Gaziantep will go to Izmir, the refugees in Urfa to Mardin, the Syrians in Hatay and Osmaniye will be transferred to Mugla, and the residents of Adana to Mersin.

It was also noted that the Syrian refugees could move to other states different from what was mentioned, but at that time, they would not receive any government assistance.

In another context, a large number of Syrian refugees in Turkiye died as a result of the earthquake, as Syrians mourned on social media for the victims of their relatives in Turkiye, including those who lost their entire families under the rubble.

So far, about 1,176 bodies of Syrians who died as a result of the earthquake in southern Turkiye have arrived at the Bab al-Hawa border crossing between Turkiye and northern Syria, according to the crossing administration.

It has become difficult to know the fate of many of the missing Syrians following the outage of electricity and the communications network in the earthquake zones in Turkiye, as the fate of a number of Syrian families remained unknown.