Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières
Up to recently, it had seemed that many people in the west think that the Russian War in Ukraine is qualitatively different from the one it has been leading for six years and a half in Syria. While one witnesses international outrage at the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and European countries (...)
A leading Syrian intellectual takes on the famous linguist, arguing that Americentrism blinds the latter from the reality of the revolution
Just three weeks following my release after 16 years in prison in Syria, I started translating a book into Arabic. The book was “Powers and Prospects: (...)
After the gradual lifting on subsidies for oil derivatives, in 2020 and particularly 2021, Damascus took a next important step, on 1 February 2022. It announced the exclusion of approximately 600,000 families from its subsidy programme; something like three million people in total (based on an (...)
For decades, the Assads have tried projecting an image of themselves as “secular” bulwarks against religious extremism. All the while, they’ve been shoring up the powers of loyalist religious institutions and stoking sectarian divisions as a tool for control, argues Joseph Daher.
“I also want to (...)
Yasser Munif on the lessons of the Syrian revolution and beyond
Harald Etzbach spoke with Yasser Munif about the theoretical and methodological approaches of his book The Syrian Revolution: Between the Politics of Life and the Geopolitics of Death, the limitations of geopolitical thinking, and (...)
The disappearance of Razan Zaitouneh and her colleagues has been one of the greatest mysteries of the Syrian war — until today. DW’s investigative unit hunted clues across six countries to track down the perpetrators.
By the summer of 2013, documenting human rights abuses had become taboo even (...)
It’s difficult to recollect the euphoria of the early days of the 2011 uprising in Syria against the regime of Bashar al-Assad. Reflecting on that time, Syrians speak of the breaking of the “fear barrier”—the suffocating authoritarianism and repression that had silenced them for decades. At the (...)
Staff at Aqeirbat hospital call on the UN Secretary General to visit Idlib and see the evidence of deliberate targeting of hospitals by Syrian government and Russian forces firsthand – picture: Al-Atareb news website via Facebook
Medical staff at Aqeirbat hospital in the countryside near Idlib (...)
The Caesar Bill has become the subject of debate among progressive and democratic Syrian actors. But what are the key arguments surrounding the bill?
On December 20, 2019, US President Donald Trump signed into law the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, so named after the Syrian military (...)
Syria After the Uprisings: The Political Economy of State Resilience By Joseph Daher Haymarket Books, 2019, 386 pages, $29 paperback.
PERHAPS MORE THAN any other recent question, the Syrian Revolution confused and divided the international left. Many dismissed the revolt as a “color revolution” (...)
Demonstration in Maarat Al Nu’man in solidarity with Kafar Takharim and against HTS, 7 November. Photo credit: MMC
Over the past few days a popular uprising has broken out across Idlib against the hardline Islamist group HTS (formerly Al-Qaeda linked Nusra) which is militarily dominant in much (...)
As current international pushes for Syrian refugee returns take hold, European solidarity efforts must understand that the danger of return is not simply war but corrupt and brutal state repression.
no one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark Warsan Shire ‘Home’
Crossing the (...)
In the aftermath of Syria’s civil war, Bashar al-Assad’s regime has deepened its neoliberal economic approach. This is heightening the inequality that led to war in the first place.
INTRODUCTION
As Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has regained power, thanks to Russian and Iranian (...)
Bashar al-Assad has started confiscating the homes of Syrians who fled during the Civil War. For decades, his clan has purged the state of all but the most fanatical loyalists: now, it’s doing the same to society itself.
In September 2011, Syrian leftist Yassin al-Haj Salah warned that the (...)
Government’s aid and reconstruction policies used to punish perceived opponents and reward supporters, HRW says.
The Syrian government is co-opting humanitarian aid and reconstruction assistance to entrench its repressive policies, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has said in a new report.
Now that (...)
As it draws closer to the eve of September 30—when three years earlier Russian military intervention in Syria first began—it is telling that Russia’s influence in Syria continues to grow on the ground and internationally, particularly through various de-escalation zones, the Astana peace process, (...)
The regime of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad is threatening to carry out a massive assault on the province of Idlib, including a potential chemical weapons attack, in a bid to crush one of the last strongholds of opposition. Such an assault would have a potentially devastating impact on (...)
MORE THAN SEVEN years after the beginning of the Syrian popular uprising, which was gradually transformed into a deadly war with an international character, the situation in the country is catastrophic at all levels. The popular classes are the most affected with continuous suffering.
At the (...)
As the forces of Bashar al-Assad, backed by the Russian air force, reconquered Daraa city, the birthplace of the Syrian revolution, an aid worker reported to Kareem Shaheen in The Guardian that “people have accepted the reality that the entire world is fighting against the revolution, and (...)
Syria’s civil war seems to be nearing end amid government advances - but at appalling cost
Crossing into Syria from neighbouring Lebanon, visitors are greeted by giant posters of the country’s president, Bashar al-Assad. The signs proclaim: “Welcome to victorious Syria.”
In the capital, Damascus, (...)
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