Al-Hasakah

‘Shadow of a human’: Syria’s stateless Kurds navigate shifting authorities decades after losing citizenship

Oct. 18, 2018

A market in the Hasakah city of Amouda in September. Photo courtesy of ARTA FM. AMMAN: It took 31 years before Syrian-Kurdish lawyer Bassa Othman was finally given the right to become a citizen of the only country she had ever known. With unrest quickly spreading across Syria in early 2011, President Bashar al-Assad passed a three-sentence-long presidential decree granting nationality to O...

‘Religious freedoms, political restrictions’: Amid dispute over local education policy, Assyrian writer reflects on minority rights in Syria’s northeast

Oct. 10, 2018

Women, children face legal limbos and statelessness following collapse of Islamic State ‘caliphate’

Aug. 1, 2018

US-backed opposition authorities in northern Syria push for ‘de-centralization’ agreement with Damascus: SDF

Jul. 30, 2018

Members of the SDC meet in Tabqa on July 16. Photo by Delil Souleiman/AFP. AMMAN: US-backed, majority-Kurdish authorities in the de facto autonomous region of northeastern Syria ...

Cyber attacks and surveillance in Assad’s Syria: ‘They can do whatever they want, they own the infrastructure’

Jul. 26, 2018

Dlshad Othman speaks at the UN in 2012. Photo courtesy of Eric Bridiers/Creative Commons. Cybersecurity expert Dlshad Othman remembers a joke among Syrian activists after un...

Grain shortages and financial ruin plague Hasakah farmers as crops fail after devastating drought

Jul. 10, 2018

AMMAN: For 40 days after sowing their crops last autumn, farmers in Syria’s rural, northeastern Hasakah province gazed towards the heavens for a sign from above. But the wi...

Elections in Kurdish-held northern Syria postponed with no date set

Jan. 8, 2018

The third and final round of elections to choose political leaders in Syria’s majority-Kurdish north were slated for later this month. But now, one official says, the race i...

SDF, Iraqi forces ‘coordinating’ border security ahead of IS downfall

Dec. 11, 2017

AMMAN: United States-backed Iraqi and Kurdish-led Syrian forces are “coordinating” security against remaining Islamic State (IS) contingents along Syria’s northe...

Photo Essay: Displaced Deir e-Zor residents head home

Dec. 3, 2017

Umm Muhammad sits hunched over in a blue plastic chair, holding one of her ten children on her lap. Tucked beneath her seat, a single purse holds everything she owns. Her other ch...

Politicians from Iraqi Kurdistan in northern Syria to observe local elections

Nov. 30, 2017

AMMAN: A delegation from Iraqi Kurdistan arrived in northern Syria’s Kurdish-led territories this week to observe local elections slated for Friday, in what may signal warmi...

Kurdish residents in Syria’s north find linguistic freedom after decades of state suppression

Nov. 29, 2017

AMMAN: It still feels like a dream for Younis Hami every time he stands before an audience and recites his poetry in his native Kurmanji, a dialect of the Kurdish language. It is...

Displaced people from Raqqa, Deir e-Zor strain limited resources in northern camps

Nov. 28, 2017

AMMAN: Standing near the patch of ground where she and her eight children sleep at an overcrowded displacement camp in northeastern Syria, her face framed by a black hijab, Hediya...

Photo Essay: The morning market in Ras al-Ain

Nov. 21, 2017

The market in downtown Ras al-Ain comes to life each morning at 6am. Vegetable and fruit vendors open their stalls, piling tables high with lemons, cabbages, tomatoes and onions. ...