Syria Direct

Outside the plan: Urban growth outpaces roads and services in Daraa

Driven by high property prices, Daraa residents are building homes beyond the planned boundaries of cities and towns, ...
Syria Direct

The living and the dead return home to Afrin

The living and the dead are coming home to Afrin as displaced families return with the remains of their loved ones, ...
Syria Direct

‘A repellent environment’: How Israel is reshaping life in southern Syria

PARIS — From the rooftop of a friend’s house in the Quneitra village of Jubata al-Khashab, Abu Saddam watches his land from afar. For two years, he has not been able to approach the 10 dunums he ...
Syria Direct

Child recruitment persists despite SDF-Damascus integration agreement

The Revolutionary Youth Movement and Syrian Democratic Forces continue to recruit minors in northeastern Syria, despite past ...
Syria Direct

Nationality law reform: Who has the ‘right to have rights’ in the new Syria?

DAMASCUS — Dana Hamila, 38, spends her days at home in Germany making soap and selling it online. Born and raised in Syria, she left in 2017 with her then-husband, who was wanted by the former regime ...
Syria Direct

White earth: Soil salinization threatens farming in Raqqa’s Euphrates river basin

PARIS — Year by year, the soil of Muhammad Abu Jumaa’s land on the outskirts of Raqqa’s al-Mansoura village grows more saline. At one of his farms, five of 20 dunams are now unusable land, locally ...
Syria Direct

Syria bids farewell to its ‘Kingdom of Silence’—but warnings remain over a ‘trap’ in comparing press freedom with the Assad era

PARIS — Syria marked World Press Freedom Day on May 3 with what many describe as a historic leap, rising 36 places to rank 141 out of 180 in the global press freedom index published by Reporters ...
Syria Direct

Suwayda’s students caught up in the struggle with Damascus

PARIS/DAMASCUS — For months, a standoff between the Syrian government and de facto authorities in Suwayda province over the recognition of national exams has left thousands of high school students in ...
Syria Direct

Syrian Jews and allies seek a place in the country’s future, divided over Israel

NEW YORK — As the sun sets on a Friday evening, preparations for Shabbat are in full swing in South Brooklyn. Local businesses—a modest kosher restaurant, a Levantine pastry shop, a Judaica ...
Syria Direct

Reconstruction plan for eastern Damascus neighborhoods alarms residents

PARIS — Day by day, Abu Bilal is losing hope that he will ever have the chance to rebuild his home in the Jobar neighborhood of Damascus, amid a “lack of transparency” from the Syrian government over ...
Syria Direct

Denied for decades, Syria’s stateless Kurds edge towards recognition

QAMISHLI — Standing outside the municipal stadium in Qamishli, Assem Abdullah Hamou, 51, and his brother joined dozens of other stateless Syrian Kurds holding sheaves of documents on Monday. In their ...
Syria Direct

Red lines and death threats: Freedom of expression wanes in Suwayda

PARIS — Barely recovered from five gunshot wounds and a broken leg suffered during an abduction and attempted assassination by Suwayda’s National Guard, Morhaf al-Shaer fled the southern Syrian ...