Syrian family's US dream gone sour

Damascus - The Christian family of eight had waited more than 13 years since first applying for the immigration visas.

After nearly 24 hours of exhausting travel from war-ravaged Syria, the Abu Assaleh family arrived in Philadelphia, brimming with excitement to begin their new life in the United States.
The Christian family of eight had waited more than 13 years since first applying for the immigration visas now stamped neatly into their Syrian passports. On Friday, they travelled from Damascus to Beirut, then Amman and on to Doha, before finally landing at Philadelphia International Airport.
"The whole trip took more than 20 hours of travel," 60-year-old Josephine Abu Assaleh said at her home in the Tijarah district of Damascus, just hours after arriving back in Syria with her relatives.
She travelled to the US with her husband Bassam, his brother Has-saan and Hassaan's wife and four children. But as they shuffled through the airport, an immigration official approached them and asked to see the family's passports.
"They took us into a special hallway and I started to get nervous," Josephine said, her voice halting as she recalled the nerve-wracking moment.
"The officer came back and told us that our visas had been cancelled and we wouldn't be allowed to enter the United States."
In a split second, hopeful antici-pation turned to shock and devas-tation, as the family was informed they would be sent back to Syria after US President Donald Trump's new restrictions on immigration.
"I told the officer 'You're kidding, right?', and he responded 'Do I look like I'm kidding?'," Josephine said.
Josephine rubbed at the dark circles under her eyes and gestured to nearly 20 packed suitcases scat-tered across the house.
"We spent around 15 days shopping, buying gifts for our friends there. We were so happy while we were packing our suitcases," she said.
"After this exhausting trip, I can't bring myself to open the suitcases and take out the gifts, but I know I have to."
Her grey-haired husband Bassam, 62, showed the US visa printed into his passport - now marred with a thin blue line to show it had been cancelled."It was such a happy feeling to get a visa to America, considering so many countries are fighting us and won't give us visas," he said.
His family had been applying to emigrate to the US since 2003, and the visas were finally issued in October.
"We travelled on January 27 and Syrian family's US dream gone sourarrived in Philadelphia where we found, to our surprise, that a decision had been issued to cancel our visas while we were in the air," he said. "We thought it was something personal against us," he said.
Their 20-year-old niece Sara was glued to her cellphone on a nearby sofa, reading news of fellow Syrians being turned back at other US airports. After receiving their im-migration visas in October, Sara's parents sold their home and their car in Damascus.
"I said goodbye to my friends in school, my neigh-bours, and all the places that I love," and began imagining a new life, Sara said.
"It was a beautiful dream that started turning into reality. I started to read a lot about America, the university that I wanted to enrol in and the places I would visit as soon as I arrived," she said. - AFP

• MENA