`Two States’: Caught between wars, Syrian-Ukrainian girl struggles for identity

DAMASCUS:  Victoria Naji, 24, is confused.  Born to a Palestinian-Syrian father and Ukrainian mother, Naji has always lived under the shadow of guns and bombs.

A resident of Syria, Naji recently graduated in fine arts from Damascus University. Her travel plans to Ukraine came a cropper when Russia launched an invasion.

 “I said to myself ‘I can move to Ukraine in the future.’ Now the future is very confused,” said Naji. “I see war everywhere. There is no safe place for me.”

Naji says her friends and family had been forced to flee Kyiv to safer areas. “God willing nothing more than this happens to Ukraine,” she said, as she reflected on happy memories of visits to the country.

Naji’s parents married in 1983 and travelled between Ukraine and Syria before settling in Damascus in 1995. Her grandfather on her mother’s side fought in World War Two.

On her father’s side, the family fled the town of Nazareth in 1948 when Israel was created and 700,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled. They were granted citizenship in Syria.

“I should be happy to have three countries to live in, but I can’t live in any of them,” Naji said.

Naji has lived in relative safety since the war in Syria broke out, in an area outside Damascus that was not badly affected. One of her friends came to stay for this reason, after her brother was killed in shelling, she added.

The main frontlines of the conflict have been largely frozen for several years. But poverty and hardship are worse than at any point since the war erupted.

Speaking about the start of the war, she said: “The problem is we were young when these things began. We grew older and got used to them.”

The Ukraine invasion marks the biggest attack on a European state since World War Two. “I am an artist … I don’t understand why this is happening and I don’t want to understand, but I have to because it is my cause — as is Palestine … and of course Syria,” she said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by The Kashmir Monitor staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)