Palestinian refugees’ escape to Chile

Ahmad and Mustafa are proud Palestinians — but they have never lived in Palestine. The two brothers — 19 and 15 years old, respectively — have spent much of their lives in refugee camps across Iraq, suffering poor conditions, sandstorms and the threat of reprisals from Shia militia as the country continued its descent into sectarian violence.
Now Ahmad and Mustafa live with their family in the leafy Santiago suburb of Ñuñoa. In 2008, the Chilean government gave them and more than 100 other compatriots and fellow refugees asylum in the country, believed to already have the largest Palestinian community outside of the Middle East.

“In 2003, following the beginning of the war, we were discriminated against and abused by various Iraqi criminal groups,” Ahmad said. “They killed a lot of young Palestinians and destroyed our houses and shops.”

The situation for many in the Palestinian community in Iraq only got worse in the following years, according to Ahmad. Sectarian violence was on the increase and Baghdad became increasingly dangerous. In 2006, militant Sunni’s bombed Askariya Shrine — one of the most important religious sites for the country’s Shiite majority — sparking a cycle of retaliatory violence which was often directed at the vulnerable and principally Sunni Palestinian refugee population.

After six years in Santiago, Ahmad and Mustafa are well integrated in the Chilean-Palestinian society, especially through organizations such as General Union for Palestinian Students in Chile (UGEP). Like many Palestinians across the world, Ahmad and Mustafa follow current events in the Middle East closely and continue to voice their opposition to Israeli military strikes on the Gaza Strip following the recent outbreak of violence. On Saturday July 19 Palestinian solidarity groups will protest outside the Israeli Embassy in Santiago.