Over 2 million in besieged rural Damascus and Homs suffer critical shortage in food supplies. The situation is no better for hundreds of thousands in Aleppo and Idlib. Intensified blockade has taken lives of many starving citizens, while reports estimate hundreds to faint because of malnutrition and severe hunger. In Turkey, the economic situation of Syrian refugees is similarly dire. The grotesque increase in food prices challenge families’ limited and quickly eroding finances.
The fifth Ramadan reaches Syria amidst persistent blockade, economic impoverishment, and ongoing clashes between warriors who deny people the right to simplest life-saving necessities. As three million Syrians break their fast on empty tables, Beyaz Eller launched a project to distribute food baskets to besieged families in rural Damascus, Aleppo, and Idlib, as well as refugee families in Turkey. The total number of distributed baskets reached 10,530. Each basket contained basic food supplies that Syrian families, of five memebrs, consume every day. Baskets were piled in quantities that sustain a family throughout a month. The relative availability of products was considered in sourcing items from each city. Each basket costed only $50. The project provided quick food aids to afflicted families to avoid aggravating their humanitarian crisis.