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.
In the last opposition-controlled parts of Syria, journalists and media activists face restrictions, red lines and retaliation.
This week, the Syrian National Army’s Hamza Division was implicated in the assassination of a prominent opposition activist and his pregnant wife, sparking ongoing clashes, protests and calls for the faction to be eliminated.
Signs of an imminent Turkish operation in northern Syria are not apparent. But amid blistering Turkish rhetoric, the shape of things to come depends on Ankara’s resolve, Washington and Moscow’s stances, and what options the SDF has to fight back.
Between the beginning of 2020 and April 2021, 173 civilians were killed by bombings or gunfire by unidentified armed men in the two areas controlled by the Turkey-backed Syrian National Army (SNA) in northern and western Aleppo province.
