JORDAN – Ghala Khalaf, a 9-year-old Saudi girl, and her mother, recently managed to escape Syrian President Bashar Assad's brutal military clampdown on a nationwide uprising against his rule. However, Ghala, who was born in Syria to a Saudi father and Syrian mother, is currently stranded in Jordan as she and her mother struggle to prove her Saudi citizenship. In comments made to Al-Madinah newspaper, Ghala's mother said she married a Saudi man in 2001. The marriage was registered in Syria. Two years later, Ghala was born and the birth was registered at the Saudi Embassy in Damascus. She remained in contact with her husband and his family until her husband's death in 2006. “After my husband's death, his brother came to me and asked me to give him power of attorney so he could act as the executor of my late husband's estate. He showed me a document that showed me and Ghala as the principle inheritors of the estate. Six year later, we haven't received our share of the inheritance and my daughter still does not have a Saudi passport,” explained Ghala's mother. After regime forces stormed their house twice, Ghala's mother said she called her late husband's family in the Kingdom and asked them to send the necessary documents so she and Ghala could cross the border into Jordan and go the Saudi Embassy there and apply for a passport. “All my efforts were in vain. They didn't send us anything,” she said. “I went to the Syrian-Jordanian border and pleaded with them to help me leave Syria, but they refused because my daughter does not hold identification papers. After several attempts, officials in Syria were sympathetic to our situation and, as a final solution, asked me to obtain a family document. I returned to Aleppo, obtained the document and had it attested from the Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a court and district chief. Then, I returned to the border in Daraa Province, presented the document and the Syria border guards let us cross into Jordan.” After arriving in Jordan, Ghala and her mother went to the Saudi Embassy in Amman. There, embassy officials confirmed the documents were valid and gave the mother and daughter 200 Jordanian dinars (SR1,060) in the form of a housing allowance, 50 Jordanian dinars (SR265) for expenses and SR6,000 from the Saudi Charitable Society for the Welfare of Saudi Families Abroad (Awassir), a Saudi-based charity that helps children born to Saudi fathers in foreign countries. “The money is only a temporary solution. Ghala still does not have an identity card or passport that will allow her to return to Syria when the situation improves. Nor can she enter Saudi Arabia or even neighboring Lebanon.” “The Saudi Embassy in Damascus earlier told me that the only solution is to send my daughter on an exit visa to her uncle while I remain behind. How can I do this when Ghala's uncle does not even recognize her as his brother's daughter? Ghala is still a child and she cannot travel alone.” Ghala's mother has appealed to officials to rectify her daughter's status and issue her a passport and grant them their share of her late husband's inheritance. Saad Al-Suwayid, Director of the National Committee for Supporting Syrian Brethren in Jordan, said the committee visited the mother and daughter in Jordan and provided them with food and furniture as a temporary solution.
