26 July 2019
A quick English summary of our Arabic news coverage this week.
Jordan
Just as Oedipus, an immigrant of Phoenician descent, had to solve the Sphinx's riddle to save his besieged people, so Syrians today—and, in fact, all of us—face a new set of perplexing, life-or-death questions.
Every major party to the Syrian conflict without exception shares in the blame for a needless humanitarian disaster that could be resolved in a day.
Despite the enormous professional and personal price she paid for it—including arrest by Assad’s infamous security agencies—the celebrated 49-year-old actress never wavered in her support for Syria’s revolutionaries.
Two days after rebels reached a deal with Russia to end fighting in southern Syria, Moscow and the Assad regime are already back on the offensive. Meanwhile, Daraa’s tens of thousands of displaced civilians scramble west toward Quneitra, where the bloodshed may soon follow them.
An Al-Jumhuriya colleague in south Syria currently fleeing Russian and Assad regime bombing tells of her ordeal over the past few days, and the bleak prospects for the coming ones.
Despite a US green light for Russia and the regime to bomb at will in Daraa Province, rebels have thus far refused to surrender after several bloody days of Russian air strikes, regime barrel bombs, and yet more waves of civilian displacement.
For Syrians, the past is long gone, while the future—a homeland free of Assad—is forbidden, writes Yassin al-Haj Saleh in this reflection on exile, time, and revolution.