Latest Articles

21/04/18

‘Syrians are not cockroaches to be exterminated’

Early on in the Syrian revolution activist Hammam Yousef met the German minister of foreign affairs in Berlin and told him it was his chance to change the course of history and start a new page of understanding between the West and the Arab world. There had been six months of peaceful protests and Yousef was not asking for military intervention, simply for UN observers to be embedded with the demonstrators to put pressure on the regime to stop shooting into the crowds. “Syria is a very important country in the Arab world, it can influence the rest of the region,” says Yousef. “But it didn’t happen. If it had, it would have cost a fraction of the hundreds of billions of dollars that need to be spent now.” [ read more ]

13/04/18

World leaders shed a tear for Syrian children, but for Gaza it's business as usual

In the aftermath of the chemical weapons assault that suffocated to death over 80 men, women and children in the town of Douma, eastern Ghouta, this weekend British Prime Minister Theresa May issued a stern warning to the highest levels of the Syrian government: “The regime and its backers, including Russia, must be held to account,” she said. This was an “utterly … barbaric attack”. Former foreign minister William Hague is recommending missile strikes against the Assad regime whilst Tony Blair has waded in on the debate to persuade May that she does not need Parliament’s approval for air strikes. US envoy to the UN, Nikki Haley, said that Russia has the “blood of Syrian children” on its hands whilst US President Donald Trump has promised that there will be a “big price to pay”. [ read more ]

23/03/18

As rights violations increase in Egypt, so does British investment

On Monday Egyptians will head to the polls to elect their president, though the result is a foregone conclusion. President Sisi's only competitor is a self-declared supporter of the strongman himself, and in the absence of real choice, many Egyptians have pledged to vote with their feet. As the elections near it's worth considering the UK's relationship with Egypt, particularly given that the British government's consistent failure to take a stand against Sisi has been interpreted by the president as a blank cheque not only to continue violations, but to worsen them. [ read more ]

23/02/18

‘The regime is killing people and the whole world is watching’

Mohamed Adel has been inside his office, a basement below a building in Douma in Eastern Ghouta, for four days now. Yesterday at midnight he decided to risk the seven-metre journey and ran to his house to check on his family. “It was terrifying,” he says, pausing as a missile hit the building opposite. Since the increased bombardment on Eastern Ghouta began almost a week ago, hundreds of families have sought shelter in basements, some without food and water, recounts Adel, a journalist covering the Syrian war. Yesterday a volunteer went out to get food for 200 families trapped underground and was killed. This morning this video was posted on Twitter which appears to be of a young girl in Eastern Ghouta explaining the desperate situation within one of these shelters: [ read more ]

06/02/18

‘As a Palestinian on the stage I feel I’m fighting, I’m resisting’

When Mo’min Swaitat was five-years-old he would build toy towns made of stones in the forest near his hometown Jenin in the north of Palestine. The next day he would return to his construction only to find that Israeli soldiers had trampled them into the ground. “This is the symbolism of what happened to Palestinian villages,” Swaitat tells me. “I grew up at the end of the First Intifada and at the beginning of the Second Intifada. I saw the army everywhere when I was five.” Seventeen years on and Swaitat is an actor and a director living in London having studied at the London International School of Performing Arts (LISPA). His latest work is a dark comedy, “Alien Land”, a solo show produced by the Sarha Collective and inspired by the Middle East’s first science fiction novel “The Secret Life of Saeed the Pessoptimist” authored by Emile Habibi. [ read more ]

04/12/17

‘The Syrian conflict is a very big money machine’

Manaf Halbouni tells me that the price of tomatoes in Syria has increased 80 fold since the start of the conflict: “When I left Syria you used to pay five Syrian pounds for one kilo of tomatoes and at the moment it’s around 400… if you want to buy eggs you pay around 500 Syrian pounds. The prices are insane. I really ask myself how they manage to live. The salaries didn’t get higher just the prices.” Inflation is just one of the tragedies to come out of the war on Syria, along with the constant air strikes, bombs and shootings that terrorise people on a daily basis. Over five million people have fled Syria since the war started in 2011. [ read more ]