The Syrian town of Darayya, destroyed by years of siege and bombardment, on Dec. 17, 2024. (Credit: Emmanuel Haddad/L'Orient-Le Jour)
They’re imposing, how they stand in front of the Daraya police station, Kalashnikovs in hand, some hooded, waiting for one of their leaders to arrive. Eight years ago, these Free Syrian Army fighters left for Idlib in buses chartered by Bashar al-Assad's now-ousted regime. They had endured three years of incessant bombardment and a total siege by loyalist forces, which ended with an agreement negotiated through Russia. They sat on those buses, their stomachs hollow, their faces defeated, fearing it was a final goodbye to the city for which they'd sacrificed everything. And today, all around them, rubble everywhere. The place they liberated on Dec. 8 was a ghost town, a corpse of a town, nothing left but the bones. But it's their home and they had to get back.‘A fairer Syria’The leader arrives, jeans and shirt under the down jacket,...
They’re imposing, how they stand in front of the Daraya police station, Kalashnikovs in hand, some hooded, waiting for one of their leaders to arrive. Eight years ago, these Free Syrian Army fighters left for Idlib in buses chartered by Bashar al-Assad's now-ousted regime. They had endured three years of incessant bombardment and a total siege by loyalist forces, which ended with an agreement negotiated through Russia. They sat on those buses, their stomachs hollow, their faces defeated, fearing it was a final goodbye to the city for which they'd sacrificed everything. And today, all around them, rubble everywhere. The place they liberated on Dec. 8 was a ghost town, a corpse of a town, nothing left but the bones. But it's their home and they had to get back.‘A fairer Syria’The leader arrives, jeans and shirt under the down...