As part of 2011’s uprising against Assad regime, Alaa Arsheed fought for his country’s freedom before he was forced to flee to Beirut. Now safely in Italy, he plays to forget.
Tag: syria
With ISIS terror reigning in Palmyra, where treasured Roman ruins are at risk, reflections on a fascinating if less ancient part of its history: the Zenobia Cham Palace Hotel.
MORE VOLATILITY IN CHINA Chinese stocks continued to fall for a fifth consecutive day, despite the People’s Bank of China cutting its key lending rate in a bid to restore calm to the stock markets. A volatile Shanghai Composite index eventually fell by 1.3%, after rising by as much as 4.3% and dropping 3.9%. After […]
Nearly one in five people in Lebanon is a Syrian national who fled the war, the world’s highest per capita refugee population. Like on the borders of Europe, they are largely unwelcome.
ALEPPO — With Syria’s civil war now its fifth year and showing no sign of ending, virtually all sides have been recruiting and training children to kill. Situated in the opposition-controlled outskirts of Aleppo, the Abdul Razzaq Military Academy is one of the most organized programs for preparing youngsters for the battlefield. Established by Sergeant Abdul Razzaq, a Syrian army defector, the academy’s instructors train some 150 children from surrounding areas on the grounds of an abandoned school in the village of Ehtemlat for two hours a day. Other than saying that the academy is “the achievement of his lifetime,” […]
BANGKOK BOMBER STILL AT LARGE Bangkok police are still looking for a man in a yellow T-shirt who was shown on CCTV footage dumping a backpack Monday at the scene of the Bangkok Erawan shrine bombing that killed at least 20. VERBATIM “Is it even possible that four men can rape a woman? It’s not […]
A Turkish journalist travels with an Alawite fixer to Damascus to understand what life is like in the Syrian capital as war in the country rages. Life goes on, but it’s not all grim.
Syria Deeply had a rare opportunity to hear from Palestinians facing violence and starvation in the Yarmouk refugee camp in southwestern Syria.
ISTANBUL — The end of the ceasefire between Turkey and the PKK (The Kurdistan Worker’s Party) is a development that will undermine both sides’ bigger plans in the region. The Turkish government may be hoping to gain the nationalist vote and weaken the legal pro-Kurdish party (The People’s Democratic Party or HDP) by going after […]
Locals in the Syrian city of Idlib were happy when rebel forces overturned regime forces. But now the rebels are enforcing their own version of military rule.
The European Union’s failure to provide desperate asylum seekers with legal routes leaves them with no option but to risk their lives on smugglers’ boats.
BRUSSELS — Moved by the dramatic situation of the Christian population in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, a group of Belgian activists, with support from the government, orchestrated a remarkable rescue operation to save nearly 250 Syrian Christians. In Aleppo, the Christians were under continuous assault by ISIS, the al-Qaeda-aligned al-Nusra front and the Assad regime. […]
Among the families in war-ravaged Syria are many being held together by women alone, as their husbands have left to try to cross into Europe and prepare a life for their families. The wait is long, and often futile.
QAMISHLI — Syrian President Bashar al-Assad“s smiling face beams down from a large billboard on the central artery of Qamishli, a city in northeast Syria. But further down the road towards the city’s eastern suburbs, what looks imposingly over the avenue is a portrait of a triumphant-looking Abdullah Ocalan, the anointed leader of Turkey’s Kurdish […]
ANKARA — Turkey is still struggling to form a coalition government weeks after the Parliamentary elections that denied an outright majority to the ruling AKP party of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. But in the meantime, another pressing question has been raised in the halls of Ankara: Will Turkey enter Syria to create a so-called “buffer […]
Locals in the city of Palmyra speak out as ISIS threatens the treasured ancient ruins of their city, after destroying its notorious Assad regime prison that scarred so many.
As the conflict between Assad’s military and Syrian opposition forces escalates around the southern city of Daraa, religious minorities fear persecution from all sides.
GREECE IS GIVEN FINAL ULTIMATUM Fruitless talks between the Greek government and its international creditors to obtain a new rescue funding plan resumed yesterday and lasted through the night, ending in the lenders giving Greece an ultimatum to offer a new reforms proposal this morning, To Vima reports. NATO TO RETHINK NUCLEAR POLICY Tensions between […]
Amid growing ties, the youths of the Arab Spring could come between Beijing and its local partners
-OpEd- Caliphate, Islamic State, ISIS, Sunnistan, Jihadistan … Whatever name we give it, an entity is emerging in the heart of the Middle East, a sprawling swath of territory located between Mosul and Baghdad (Iraq) in the east, and Aleppo and Damascus (Syria) in the west. Inside this zone, as borders are disappearing and populations […]
Kos is one of the Greek islands closest to the Turkish coast and receives hundreds of Syrian and Afghan refugees every day, a heavy burden for a country already ravaged by economic crisis.
KURDS RETAKE KEY SYRIAN TOWN A Turkish soldier holds a child as Syrian refugees flee Tal Abyad — Photo: Ibrahim Khader/Pacific Press/ZUMA Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Syria have seized the town of Tal Abyad, formerly held by ISIS, cutting off a major supply route for the terrorist organization. Huseyin Kocher, a Kurdish commander […]
It is politically reasonable for President Obama to want to focus on problems at home. But his fainthearted foreign policy approach has contributed to global volatility.
DEIR EZ-ZOR — As soon as ISIS fighters fully seized Deir ez-Zor, they made a number of draconian changes, one of which was to close schools. After a lengthy period, during which teachers were required to attend training courses in Islamic education, the schools reopened. The city’s schools are no longer housed in public buildings. Residents instead have volunteered their houses as classrooms and supplies, such as desks and boards, have been moved there from the schools. The curriculum has been modified — many subjects were omitted, while others were added — and the number of schools is limited, as […]
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Why I Married An ISIS Fighter
An Eastern European woman who wanted to be the wife of an ISIS fighter in Raqqa speaks to Syria Deeply about her motivations and experience.
Kurdish commanders have broken earlier pledges to stop the forced recruitment of children, saying it is necessary to protect individual homes.
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Extra! Palmyra Falls To ISIS
After days of fighting, “Palmyra’s fate is now in the hands of IS,” L’Orient Le Jour writes on Thursday’s front page. Coalition forces thought a few days ago that they had managed to beat back the ISIS terror group from the ancient Syrian city, but the jihadists came back stronger than before. Government and rebel […]
When Islamic terror groups arrived in their Syrian hometown of Al-Hasakah, Assyrian Christians were systematically victimized. The lucky managed to flee.
“We were exposed to hunger, electrocution, beating and insults. We got sick, we got lice and scabies, and were often strip searched, which was the worst part.”
Led by new Saudi King Salman, an alliance of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey is aiding rebels, including jihadists, in new victories against Syrian President Assad’s regime.
War has compromised the mental health of millions of Syrians. The problem is also transcending borders, following people as they seek safety abroad.
By satellite phone and email, people living in ISIS-controlled Raqqa, Syria, say fighters have stolen their houses, killed family members and even forced them to pay rent on properties they already own.
A growing number of Syrians have been trying to escape to Europe over the past year, some meeting their tragic ends after paying smugglers to cross the Mediterranean in overcrowded boats.
Syria Deeply met with some young Syrians who have recently made it to Europe to seek asylum. With so much at stake, no two viewpoints are quite the same.
Kurdish fighters and the forces loyal to the Syrian regime have settled into a delicate coexistence against jihadists in this city marked by chaos and competing interests.
To gauge the ways the civil war has affected all of Syria, a look at seven cities on the fourth anniversary of the first uprising against the regime. A chronicle of death and life going on.
What was once a simple and relatively quick commute through Aleppo now takes up to 12 hours, as battered roads, endless checkpoints and ISIS violence take their toll. A bus driver’s view.
Countless displaced by the war in Syria include those forced to move from one part of the country to another. Misery tends to follow.
Khaled walked into an ISIS recruiting office and volunteered to fight — for $30 a month. Now he’s a refugee in Turkey. Here’s how he got from there to here.
Syria’s tangled web grows even more intricate. Hezbollah is key to Assad’s strategy, moderate rebels avoid ISIS and al-Nusra at all cost, and Israel helps the Free Syrian Army.