Settling down in the city of Heidelberg, the parents comforted their four children as the reality of what they had just endured struck like a thunderclap and the tears flowed freely. They were tears of trauma, loss and flickering hope. “We used to have a home. A fine life. We used to have money and never needed anyone,” said the mother, Bessi Qasim, who uses her father’s surname. Dabbing at her eyes, the 42-year-old homemaker said her job now was to make a new home. “I just want my children to be happy and see them growing up. I want to be able to replace the bad memories with new good ones.”Those bad memories include at least three brushes with death- with murderous invaders, the fear of drowning, a daughter’s cancer.
The Qasus escaped as IS forces seized the city on Aug. 3, 2014. All six Bessi, husband Samir, daughters Delphine and Dunia, sons Dilshad and Dildar climbed aboard a truck heading north for the Turkish border. They soon heard word of wholesale slaughter, rapes and kidnappings back home as thousands behind them retreated without food or water to Mount Sinjar. “We took nothing with us. I didn’t need to see IS to know how horrifying they are,” said Samir, 45, who abandoned his convenience store in Sinjar. He said cousins who stayed behind have vanished. For 15 months, the Qasus existed on the fringe of Turkish society. As a refugee, Samir was barred from working legally and said his children faced intimidation at school because of their Yazidi identity.
“We had a miserable life,” said Samir, who kept his family out of Turkish refugee camps and rented an apartment, but struggled to pay bills by working illegally part-time in construction jobs. “I reached a point where I couldn’t take it anymore. We had no dignity. I just wanted my children to live in a safe, peaceful place.” The smuggler in Istanbul demanded $10,000 for the six of them to join 26 others on a cabin cruiser designed to carry perhaps a quarter that many. They left the Turkish coast before dawn on Dec. 3 bound for the island of Lesbos, the first port of EU call for nearly 400,000 asylum seekers this year. Scores have drowned as boats, typically helmed by novice refugees, are swamped or overturned.
Samir paid in part with money provided by his brother, who had already made it to Sweden. The boat appeared more substantial than the typical rigid inflatables that smugglers deploy as one-use throwaway items. That didn’t stop the engine of the overloaded boat from breaking down midway, leaving the Qasus to bob helplessly on the choppy Aegean. “I was 95 per cent certain that death would take us,” said Samir, who said he prayed for God to claim him and save his loved ones.
