Two children sit on opposite sides of a room in Benghazi, Libya. Both are nine years old. One is Hamza Jawish, a boy from Syria, and the other is Waad Anwar, a girl from Libya. And they are both refugees.

 “This is the first time I have been outside Syria,” says Jawish, who comes from Syria’s eastern Deir Ezzor province. “I left with my mother, brother and sister. We were fleeing the regime men who wanted to kill my brother after he joined the Free Syrian Army.” The family made it to Libya via Egypt – although Jawish’s father stayed behind in Syria.

Two children sit on opposite sides of a room in Benghazi, Libya. Both are nine years old. One is Hamza Jawish, a boy from Syria, and the other is Waad Anwar, a girl from Libya. And they are both refugees.

 “This is the first time I have been outside Syria,” says Jawish, who comes from Syria’s eastern Deir Ezzor province. “I left with my mother, brother and sister. We were fleeing the regime men who wanted to kill my brother after he joined the Free Syrian Army.” The family made it to Libya via Egypt – although Jawish’s father stayed behind in Syria.

 Meanwhile the little girl, Waad Anwar, comes from the town of Tawerga, about 700 km west of Benghazi. The nearest town to Tawerga is Misrata and when Misrata rose up against the regime of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, the town of Tawerga was used as a launching point for actions against the rebels. And it is true that many residents in Tawerga were loyal to Gaddafi. But after Gaddafi was overthrown, Misrata’s rebels attacked the inhabitants of the town of Tawerga; there have been accusations of ethnic cleansing and war crimes committed there. Reports also suggest that Libya’s rebels are still hunting for people from Tawerga right around the country.

 Anwar’s family was one of those driven out of Tawerga; they made their way to Benghazi in a pick-up truck. “The rebels of Misrata forced us to leave our city,” the little girl says sadly. “I went with my mother and father in a truck. We stayed with my aunt in Jufra but we had to leave behind most of our furniture and most of our clothes and toys.”

But her family couldn’t stay in Jufra, in central Libya, for long. Because everyone thought that all of the people from Tawerga had been loyal to Gaddafi, locals started to harass them. “They thought everyone from Tawerga was for Gaddafi but it’s not true,” Anwar says. “Taxi drivers have refused to take us when they found out we were from Tawerga.”

Anwar’s father then decided to leave Jufra and head to the coastal city of Sirte, halfway between Benghazi and Tripoli, where he hoped it would be safer. For some time they stayed in special settlements for refugees from Tawerga – the town had previously had 30,000 inhabitants. But they had to keep moving and the family also spent about a month sleeping in the desert. Eventually they reached Benghazi.   

The young Syrian refugee’s story is no less sad. Jawish remembers things from his homeland, such as the sounds he heard. “I always woke up when there was shooting or gunfire. And I was so scared of helicopter sounds,” Jawish says. “I’d always go to my Mum and Dad and ask them what was happening. They would always say it was just fireworks or people firing guns for celebrations.”

But Jawish found out that they were not telling the truth. A sniper shot the little boy’s neighbour in front of their house. “My friend [the neighbour’s son] became an orphan,” Jawish remembers. “It wasn’t any kind of celebration.”

Having arrived in Beghnazi now though, Jawish’s mother says she feels relatively safe – that’s despite the fact that they had to leave Jawish’s father behind in Syria. “We believe in God; he will protect us,” she says.

Anwar’s father, who used to work in agriculture in Misrata, doesn’t feel quite the same way. He says what happened in Tawerga was truly terrifying. “People think they saw the war here but unless they saw what happened in the west, they didn’t see anything,” he explains. “That war has ended – but for the people of Tawerga it goes on.”

He also knows that his little girl is still frightened. Anwar says she doesn’t ever want to go back home. And her father says she still has nightmares all the time and wakes up crying, saying she’s heard the sounds of missiles.

The one bright spot for Anwar is that some of her friends from Tawerga are among the refugees here in Benghazi – so at least she has someone to play with, she says.

And therein lies the biggest difference between the two sad children. Where Anwar has no hope of ever returning home, Jawish would love to go back to Syria if he could. He says he misses his school and his cousins and his foster sister.

“I love them so much and I hope I see them soon,” he says.