As sites like the Armenian Bethel Church and the Great Mosque of Aleppo undergo renovations in formerly rebel-held territories, narratives of the Syrian government’s victory are reinforced.
Samir al-Homsi’s single-room mud house is thirty meters apart from his nearest neighbor in al-Rukban camp for displaced Syrians. “Most of the neighbors have left,” al-Homsi told Syria Direct, making “the neighborhood a depressing place.”
AMMAN - Since the “caliphate” that the self-proclaimed ‘Islamic State’ (ISIS) declared over wide swathes of Syria and Iraq in July 2014 was officially eliminated, the terrorist group’s remaining presence in Syria has been shrouded in controversy.
Amman- Al-Rukban camp has been without flour for three days, a consequence of Damascus’s tightening siege on it, leaving the 12,000 residents who remain there to rely on smugglers for food.
Amman- A 26 year-old man stands in front of his house, built out of mud, and watches what has become a regular sight: a crowded convoy of trucks preparing to depart from the Rukban refugee camp. The trucks are filled to the brim with furniture, odds-and-ends, and of course, people.
Monday saw the latest convoy to leave Rukban camp, an isolated informal camp settlement of mud homes housing up to 40,000 displaced Syrians on the Syrian-Jordanian border.
The rumors were unconfirmed: two men who had returned to Syrian government territory from Rukban camp via a Russian-backed “humanitarian corridor” were reportedly shot dead by security personnel over the weekend, after attempting to escape a government holding center in Homs province.
The photos are scarce. In one, a dozen or so women, young children and elderly men bite down on sandwiches as they crowd the inside of a bus. One of the passengers wears a red vest bearing the logo of the Syrian government’s Red Crescent organization, also known as SARC.
There were no details in the announcement on where the supposed meeting would take place, or even if American officials had been notified ahead of time.Either way, that meeting went ahead on Tuesday.
Just outside Damascus’ Old City in what was once the sprawling working-class suburb of Jobar, Abdel Rahman* had a home and a family.But it’s been eight years since he last saw that house.
