Syria’s White Helmets are famous for rescuing people from bombed buildings. When the earthquake struck, they knew what to do.

Syrian civilians and members of the White Helmets conduct search and rescue operations in the rubble of a collapsed building in Harem, Syria, after a 7.8 magnitude earthquake. Anas Alkharboutli/Picture Alliance via Getty Images

• Syria’s White Helmets searched for survivors and bodies after the earthquake.

• The volunteer group has criticized the UN for its slow response in sending aid to rebel-held areas.

• A rescuer at the scene told Insiders they searched through the rubble with their bare hands.

With bare hands and primitive equipment, volunteers from Syria’s White Helmets organization dug through the rubble after the devastating earthquake to find survivors and bodies.

“We didn’t have the sophisticated equipment needed to respond immediately to the massive amount of debris. But with the limited capabilities that we have, we have responded,” Ismail Alabdullah, a White Helmet volunteer in rebel-held territory in Syria, told Insider.

The death toll from the 7.8-magnitude earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria rose to more than 41,000 on Friday, officials said.

The White Helmets and others on the ground have criticized the slow delivery of aid to rebel-held parts of Syria, which Alabdullah said has hampered their recovery efforts and cost lives.

“We don’t know why the United Nations was slow and why they supported Turkey but did not support Northwest Syria in the beginning. This is a question for the United Nations,” Alabdullah said.

Death and destruction are no strangers to the war-weary people of Syria.

And after more than a decade of civil war, the White Helmets volunteer group, which gained international fame for their work rescuing people from bombed buildings, was well prepared to respond quickly to the earthquake.

“Our experience over the past few years in dealing with bombing and bombing has given us great experience to respond and that is why we responded immediately after just seconds after the earthquake,” Alabdullah said, speaking from the Idlib countryside in the north-west of Syria.

However, the devastation caused by the earthquake was greater than anything Syria has seen in the war so far. The organization with around 3,000 people is trying to deal with around four million people affected.

“In an airstrike, the number of people under the rubble would be maybe 100 to 200, but we are now talking about thousands of people,” Alabdullah said.

He estimates that more than 580 buildings have collapsed completely, more than 1,500 have been partially damaged and more than 40,000 people are now homeless.

Displaced people in the city of Jenderes, Syria, after the earthquake.Rami Alsayed/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Part of the reason the damage was so great is that years of Russian and Syrian bombing have damaged buildings and many in the region were already displaced before the earthquake.

After 13 days is the The chances of finding more survivors are slim to zero.

Still getting calls about missing persons, the group focuses their energies on retrieving bodies from the rubble.

The forgotten people of Syria

While aid reached Syria’s largest cities in the days after the earthquake controlled by the Assad regime, the opposition-held northwest was largely neglected.

The White Helmets have criticized the UN for its slow response in sending aid to rebel-held parts of Syria and for asking permission to deliver aid through two additional border crossings with Turkey.

“We asked for help from the beginning, they didn’t answer. We don’t know why,” Alabdullah said.

Martin Griffiths, the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, acknowledged and apologized for the delay on Sunday and continued to write Twitter: “So far we have failed the people of north-west Syria. You are right to feel let down. They are looking for international aid that has not arrived.”

Civil defense workers and local residents search the rubble of collapsed buildings in the town of Harem near the Turkish border in Idlib province, Syria, Monday February 6, 2023. Ghaith Alsayed/AP Photo

The UN was not immediately available for comment.

As aid is now arriving in north-west Syria, Alabdullah said the delays would likely cost countless lives.

“The White Helmets are no strangers to digging people out of the rubble”

The White Helmets have received praise for their work during the civil war and were even nominated for the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize.

The Assad regime and its supporters have denigrated them, saying the volunteer group has ties to jihadist groups.

Oubadah Alwan, the group’s media coordinator, told Insider that the group’s priority is the well-being of the people of Syria and that they work wherever they can.

“The White Helmets are no strangers to digging people out of the rubble,” he said.

“We are willing to work in Syria in any area we can and we have tried,” he said. “In the past when we worked in government areas, our volunteers were either killed or arrested and imprisoned and never seen again.”

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