America’s ‘Caesar’ Bill

After many years and several failed attempts, the United States Senate has passed legislation containing tougher sanctions on the regime of Bashar al-Assad, its foreign backers and corporations that profit from Syria’s war.

Syria’s War on Doctors

One of the most brutal and most shocking features of Syria’s civil war is the way doctors and health centres have been targeted.

Throughout the war, the regime of Bashar al-Assad and its allies have attacked hospitals in rebel areas as part of a strategy to destroy popular resistance by rendering civilian life impossible.

Vlogging around Syria’s War

Syria’s war, perhaps unlike any other civil conflict this century, has been uniquely influenced by propaganda. That propaganda has exerted a crucial influence over the course of the war.

Assad’s People, Accused of Torture, Begin Trial in Germany

This week, Germany began attempts to prosecute two Syrians who, prosecutors allege, committed crimes against humanity on behalf of the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

The Toll of American Indifference in Syria

Last month, while he was preparing to attend the United Nations general assembly, the American secretary of state Mike Pompeo, made a statement of seriousness but not of significance.

Syria’s Propaganda Tours

Countries in war can make surprising tourist destinations. This is one objective of the Syrian government. It wants to forge an incongruous association with the leisure of travel. Its borders admit carefully chosen foreigners in the pursuit of that aim.

Syrians Face Deportation to a Homeland Still Very Much at War

Syria’s war has not concluded but for many it is convenient to pretend that it has. To those in the regime of Bashar al-Assad, it is necessary to present the government’s campaign of pacification as having produced peace. For foreign countries that wish to cease their programmes assisting the Syrian people, any opportunity to have their wish fulfilled is seized.

A Note on ‘Syria’s Nuremberg’

The war crimes of Syria’s conflict have been obfuscated and lied about on a vast scale and with great success, but they have never been effectively hidden.

Not hidden from those whose spells in regime prisons included torture and the possibility of execution, not hidden from those whose experience of regime bombardment was a little more than theoretical.

Idlib’s Position on the Periphery of Conflict and Ceasefire

The northern Syria governate of Idlib exists on many peripheries. It – along with parts of Aleppo and Hama – is dominated by rebel and Islamist groups. It borders territory held by the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad but does not fall under the government’s sway.

Germany’s Attempted Extradition Sends Strong Message to Syria

When Germany announced last April that it was seeking the arrest of Jamil Hassan, head of Syria’s feared Air Force Intelligence Directorate, many dismissed it as a well-meaning piece of theatre.