Syrian refugees in Lebanon express mixed feelings about Geneva II

The Syrian refugees in Lebanon have spent most of their days recently following up news related to the ongoing Geneva II peace talks in Switzerland's Montreux. The success of the international political efforts to solve the Syrian crisis means for the refugees the hope to end violence, return to their homes and put an end to their misery of displacement. But they are divided in their feelings between hope and pessimism due to the complications of the conflict in their home country. Mohammad Al Satti who has been displaced from Syria's devastated city of Aleppo to Al Rafid area in Lebanon's Bekaa region, hopes the Geneva II talks will succeed to "open a small window in the wall of this tragedy." Al Satti told Xinhua "we are waiting for any good news from these talks to give us a slim hope in ending our nightmare that we cannot survive anymore." But AL Satti's wife, Fatima, believes that "nothing is to be expected from these talks unless the super powers are willing to end their dispute on our land." "The great powers are responsible for the destruction and killings in Syria and our displacement," she said, adding "our problems lie now in the hands of those who are controlling the fate of nations and we have no power to confront them." For his part, Nawaf Al Hatoumi, a refugee displaced from Syria' s Idlib, sees a light of hope "from the government and opposition sitting in one room." He believes that both sides and the conference organizers can " break all the barriers between them," calling on the International and Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi as well as the United States, Russia and China to "exercise the maximum efforts that would lead to the success of Geneva II." For his part, Salwa Al Hassanieh, a displaced lecturer at the Aleppo University, pointed to the "difficulties accompanying the negotiations as all sides are pushing up their demands." "The negotiations would be hard and take a long time and probably will need more rounds of talks in Geneva," she said. According to the latest UN report, the war in Syria caused the displacement of around two million refugees to the neighboring countries.