The Syrian city of Aleppo wakes up these days between stunned and happy, like a patient after a period in a coma. Many residents are still processing what happened after the fall of dictator Bashar al-Assad, in a scenario in which life, which has regained its usual hustle and bustle, and the horrible scars of war intermingle. Unlike Damascus, the capital, the province of Aleppo is one of the parts of the country that has suffered the most from the ravages of almost 14 years of war, as its neighborhoods and cities have constantly changed hands between the regime, the rebels supported by Türkiye, Islamist factions and Kurdish militias.
Dozens of people cross the Bab al Salameh border crossing between Türkiye and Syria every hour. If in the first days the refugees who returned to their country did so with practically nothing—just a backpack or a suitcase—; Now, many carry everything they can: furniture, mattresses, large bags loaded with what their lives were like in Türkiye. They return home.
The other side of the border is a jumble of trucks of all kinds: they load cement, feed, gasoline. Syria still depends on the outside world for almost everything and, in this area, interconnected with its large neighbor to the north for years because it is under the control of pro-Turkish rebel militias, there is great construction activity. New blocks are raised and work is prepared for more.
However, when taking the new detour towards Aleppo, along a road that until two weeks ago crossed the front lines, the panorama changes completely. The driver steps on the accelerator as if something sinister was still floating in the air. The appearance is ghostly on both sides of the road: empty towns, entire towns razed, mosques bombed. Haritan, for example, was a town of more than 10,000 inhabitants, and its blocks of houses – many of them destroyed by shells, mortars and aerial bombardments – are leaky and lifeless buildings, whose only color are the flags of the regime that they painted Assad’s soldiers, after taking it in 2019.
Beyond, another town appears, where some children kick a ball through the streets and life timidly makes its way. This town was somewhat more protected from the front line. But it has changed hands. Now the new revolutionary flag of Syria (green, white and black) flies at its entrance; Until two weeks ago it was the yellow of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Kurdish militias. Approaching Aleppo, some concrete blocks where the rebels have painted – in Arabic and Turkish – the word “Welcome”, the road makes a wide detour, to avoid the northern neighborhoods, still in possession of the Kurdish militias, which They have stationed snipers to prevent this area, with a Kurdish majority, from falling into the hands of rival factions. This is an example, on a small scale, of the conflict that continues to develop in the north and east of the country: there, rebels supported by Turkey fight with Kurdish militias.
Burned Assad posters
Inside Aleppo things change: the streets are full again and the traffic is intense. The billboards mix burned posters with the effigy of Assad, advertising for brands that no one knows if they will continue to exist much longer, and messages from the new authorities. “Children of Aleppo: your liberation from the clutches of the criminal regime opens a new era of pride and dignity. With you, and for you, we begin a long path to build the Syria of the future,” reads one signed by the new prime minister, the Salafi Muhamad al Bashir.
“We have mobilized our patrols to protect your safety,” says another, from the Minister of the Interior. “Your lives, your money, your honor and your dignity are protected by the teachings of true religion and sharia”says a third, from the Minister of Justice.
Under the imposing citadel of Aleppo, the atmosphere is festive. People from all over the world wave flags of the revolution and become selfies with the medieval monument in the background, among sellers of balloons, candy and nuts, thunderous music and a man who has brought a camel so that children and adults can ride on it and immortalize the occasion. Sabah is one of them: “It is the first time I have visited the citadel in almost 14 years.” And not only that: she had also not been able to reunite until now with her father, who stayed behind the front lines because she fled to territory under the control of those who had taken up arms against the regime.
When asked how he feels, like other people from Aleppo returning to their city, his face lights up and a smile crosses his face: “It’s as if our soul has returned to our body. As if we were dead before and had revived.”
There is also a group of young militiamen, practically teenagers, who have come as “tourists,” they say. One of them, Khalid Ibrahim, participated in the conquest of Aleppo, Hama and, later, in the triumphal march towards Damascus. He himself is surprised at how quickly the regular army fell apart: “At first it was hard, but after Hama it surprised even us. With the help of God we defeated them.” Now he dreams of becoming a soldier in the new army established by the new authorities.
But Aleppo is also the sadness of its ruined neighborhoods. Much of the city – which before the war was the most populous in the country and its economic capital – was devastated by fighting between 2012 and 2016, when rebels were besieged in the southeastern neighborhoods, including its medieval old town. It was one of the toughest battles of the civil war and it is estimated that more than 30,000 people died in it; two thirds, civilians.
The Kallaseh neighborhood was the front line for many of these years. Aerial bombardments, artillery fire and the infamous “barrel bombings” – barrels loaded with dynamite and shrapnel that the regime dropped from helicopters – reduced numerous residential buildings to rubble. Asef and Maher fled there in 2013 to take refuge in Latakia—a province under regime control throughout the war—and returned in 2016, when government forces, with the help of pro-Iranian militias and Russia, retook control of Aleppo. There are still some graffiti in the neighborhood in Russian that indicate on the walls of the buildings: “Mine”, “No mine”, to indicate to their forces which buildings were safe or which could contain explosives. “When we returned, nothing was the same, many of our neighbors and relatives had gone to Türkiye or Europe, and did not return. In the houses that were standing, the soldiers had stolen everything,” says Asef.
In the eight years since it regained control over these neighborhoods, the Assad government has not even deigned to rebuild the damaged houses or infrastructure, which remain a sign of the destruction of the war and the cruelty of the regime. Little by little, however, the old neighbors are returning, says Maher, who is optimistic: “My nieces, who are in Ireland, have asked me how the situation is for returning. I tell them to wait a little, there is still no water, the electricity and internet fail….”
In the same neighborhood, Ahmet, who forcibly returned from Turkey seven months ago, is more pessimistic, fearing that the quarrels will revive after the euphoria of the revolutionary victory: “Here there were neighbors divided between those who supported the regime and the rebels, even within the same family.” Safi, an old man who accompanies him, narrows his eyes and whispers: “All hope is in the hands of God. Let’s hope it gets better.”
