DAMASCUS, 10 April 2008 (IRIN) - After his sister was kidnapped in Iraq, 15-year-old Ibrahim Sayyid and his family fled Baghdad for the Syrian border in the summer of 2006. Staying in the no-man's land camp at al-Tanf, Ibrahim focused on his studies, braving freezing winters, scorching summers and a fire in his tent. He eventually won a scholarship and is now in Syria, unlike the rest of his family.

"I have always been at the top of my class," said Ibrahim as he described his journey from Baghdad to Damascus.

"I attended school up to seventh grade in the Baladiyat suburb of Baghdad. Then my sister was kidnapped. Her captors demanded US$50,000 for her release. My father used to be quite well-off and had two stores before the war, but his savings were drained, and he could only pay $5,000 of the ransom. The kidnappers accepted that and she was released the same day.

"When my father began to receive death threats from a Shia militia, we decided that living in the desert was safer than being Palestinian in Baghdad. He bought a tent and we left along with my four siblings in the summer of 2006. We knew that we couldn't get into Syria because we were Palestinians. We hadn't heard about al-Tanf. When we heard about it, we decided to go there.

"I studied for the Syrian ninth grade exams for three months in a tent provided by UNRWA at al-Tanf. A fire broke out in the camp and partially destroyed my family's tent. But I still passed - I was one of two students from al-Tanf who passed the Syrian Ministry of Education exams. Now I study plumbing at the Damascus Training Centre. But I want to become a doctor. You have to study hard to escape life in a tent."

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