Villages on the line of contact between regime and Turkish-backed opposition forces in the southern Afrin countryside live under constant threat of unpredictable shelling. The volatile security situation leaves families choosing between sending their children to school, despite the risks, or depriving them of an education in the hopes of keeping them safe.
Six months after four members of a Kurdish family were shot and killed by Turkish-backed fighters while celebrating the Nowruz holiday in Afrin, the accused killers are still on trial. Surviving family members face constant threats and physical attacks to pressure them to drop the case or leave Afrin.
In Afrin, there is a widespread trade in properties belonging to displaced residents known as “cost houses,” which are sold by Ankara-backed military factions and civilians for “dirt cheap” prices: the cost of repairs.
When Turkish-backed opposition forces took control of most of Afrin in 2018, villages on its outskirts became a line of contact with regime forces. There, residents face repeated shelling and cannot access their farmland, once their main livelihood.
Twelve years after the Syrian revolution began, formal opposition political and service institutions are wholly reliant on Turkey, impacting service provision and governance in the areas they administer.
Many residential buildings in northwestern Syria were already weakened by years of bombing or built in ways that did not meet engineering and construction standards when the February 6 earthquake struck, leaving them prone to collapse.
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham’s expansion into northern Aleppo can be explained not through ideology, but strategic interests. Whether or not the hardline faction holds on to its recently captured territory hinges on how Turkey responds.
Videos and pictures showing tree cutting in Syria’s Afrin district sparked horror and shock on social media this week. Local environmental activists accuse Turkish-backed factions of involvement in “crimes against nature.”
The appalling targeting of a hospital in Afrin immediately triggered accusations against the SDF. However, the location from which the rockets were launched is controlled by both Assad regime and SDF forces.
Al-Shifa Hospital in Afrin in Aleppo province, northern Syria, after it was targeted by missile strikes from positions controlled by government forces and the SDF, which led to deaths and injuries
