10 Images That Have Defined The Syrian Civil War
More than 250,000 Syrians have lost their lives in five bloody years of armed conflict. What started out as peaceful anti-government protests escalated into a full-blown civil war. More than 11 million others have been displaced by the conflict. The civil war has spawned an unprecedented refugee crisis and similar violent spillovers in neighboring countries.
- The Beginning
The seeds of revolution were first planted in Daraa, a small city south of the capital. When a group of teenagers were arrested and tortured for painting revolutionary slogans on a school wall, it sparked a wave of protests across the city. Demonstrators chanted for freedom and for the end of corruption. Syrian security forces responded with violent crackdowns, opening fire on peaceful protesters. The images coming out of Daraa shocked the nation and triggered large scale protests in cities across Syria. By July 2011, hundreds of thousands were taking to the streets demanding President Bashar Al Assad’s resignation.
2. Uprising
On 29 July 2011, 7 defecting Syrian Army officers formed the Free Syrian Army (FSA), composed of defected Syrian Armed Forces officers and soldiers, aiming “to bring the regime of Bashar Al Assad down” with united opposition forces.
3. Escalation
In early November 2011, clashes between the FSA and security forces in Homs escalated into a full blown siege. After 6 days of bombardment, the Syrian Army stormed the city on November 8, leading to heavy street fighting in several neighborhoods. However unlike Deraa and Hama, the Syrian Army failed to quell the unrest. Resistance in Homs was significantly greater than that seen in other towns and cities, and the city earned the title as the “Capital of the Revolution”.
4. Human Rights Abuses
As the war escalated, so did reports of human rights abuses. According to various human rights organizations and United Nations, human rights violations have been committed by both the government and the rebels. Since the civil war began, 7000 people have died in detention in Syria’s prisons.
5. Chemical Warfare
The Syrian Civil War stands out among other conflicts because of its indiscriminate barbarity and the willful violation of international law by all sides. The conflict saw some of the greatest use of chemical weapons since the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s. The Syrian regime, ISIS, Syrian Rebels — all have deployed chemical weapons at one point or another. Civilians caught in the crossfire and without proper protection have proven to be the biggest source of chemical casualties.
6. Civilian Casualties
According to estimates provided by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), approximately 90,000–100,000 civilians have died since the civil war began. The Assad regime has been blamed for using chemical weapons (chlorine gas) against civilians and conducted torture and extrajudicial killings. Assad has also been accused of “Indiscriminate and disproportionate aerial bombardment and shelling” which “led to mass civilian casualties and spread terror.” War crimes reported being committed by the Free Syrian Army and other rebel groups include recruiting child soldiers, shelling civilian-populated areas, taking hostages and murdering members of religious minorities, and use of poison gas.
7. The Rise of ISIS
The destabilization of Syria was the catalyst that sparked a frightening new trend: the rise of jihadi extremism. From the ashes of war, a new terrorist group, ISIS emerged. With the black banner of Islamic extremism, the group now controls between 30–40% of Syrian territory. The terrorist group is also responsible for sheer acts of brutality, the likes of which have never been witnessed since Medieval times. ISIS is disproportionately targeting non Sunni minorities; Kurds, Shiite Muslims, Christians and Alawites. When the advancing Syrian Army recaptured the ancient city of Palmyra from ISIS in March 2016, it discovered dozens of mass graves containing the bodies of victims tortured and executed by ISIS militants.
8. Innocence Lost
In September 2015, the image of a dead toddler washed up along the beaches of Turkey shocked the world and brought home the sobering reality of the ongoing Syrian refugee crisis. 3 year old Aylan Kurdi drowned when a boat carrying refugees to the Greek island of Kos capsized. The image has now come to symbolize the desperate and perilous struggle of millions of refugees to reach Europe.
9. Desperation and Heartbreak
In September 2015, the ‘Humans of New York’ Facebook page started a campaign to shine a light on the long-term suffering caused by the refugee crisis. The page, which normally focused on individuals on the streets of New York, branched out to discuss with refugees their experience escaping their countries. One image in particular describes the harrowing moment when an overcrowded refugee boat sank.
“My husband and I sold everything we had to afford the journey. We worked 15 hours a day in Turkey until we had enough money to leave. The smuggler put 152 of us on a boat. Once we saw the boat, many of us wanted to go back, but he told us that anyone who turned back would not get a refund. We had no choice. Both the lower compartment and the deck were filled with people. Waves began to come into the boat so the captain told everyone to throw their baggage into the sea. In the ocean we hit a rock, but the captain told us not to worry. Water began to come into the boat, but again he told us not to worry. We were in the lower compartment and it began to fill with water. It was too tight to move. Everyone began to scream. We were the last ones to get out alive. My husband pulled me out of the window. In the ocean, he took off his life jacket and gave it to a woman. We swam for as long as possible. After several hours he told me he that he was too tired to swim and that he was going to float on his back and rest. It was so dark we could not see. The waves were high. I could hear him calling me but he got further and further away. Eventually a boat found me. They never found my husband.” (Kos, Greece)
10. Aftermath
A Syrian Rebel watches over the bombed out ruins of a neighborhood in Aleppo. One of the most visible legacies of the Syrian Civil War is the sheer destruction of Syria’s infrastructure. 5 years of all-out civil war have reduced the great cities like Aleppo, Damascus, Homs and Idlib into sprawling heaps of rubble.
