A sense of ease in new Syria after iron-fisted Assad rule
Call to get rid of corruption, bribery
Now, Damascus streets are bedecked with the new three-starred flag, not long ago a symbol of Assad’s opponents
Updated 25 March 2025
AP
DAMASCUS: Sahar Diab had visited Damascus’s famed Umayyad Mosque previously. But as the Syrian lawyer went there to pray during her country’s first Ramadan after the end of the Assad family’s iron-fisted rule, she felt something new, something priceless: A sense of ease.
“The rituals have become much more beautiful,” she said. “Before, we were restricted in what we could say ... now, there’s freedom.”
This Ramadan, such are the realities of a Syria undergoing complex transition. Relief, hope and joy at new openings — after 53 years of the Assad dynasty’s reign, prolonged civil war and crushing economic woes — intermingle with uncertainty, fear by some, and a particularly bloody and worrisome wave of violence.
“We’re not afraid of anything,” Diab said. She wants her country to be rebuilt and to get rid of Assad-era “corruption and bribery.”
At the Umayyad Mosque, the rituals were age-old: A woman using a prayer bead and kissing a copy of the Qur’an; the faithful standing shoulder-to-shoulder and prostrating in prayer; the Umayyad’s iconic and unusual group call to prayer, recited by several people.
The sermon, by contrast, was fiery in delivery and new in message.
The speaker, often interrupted by loud chants of “God is great,” railed against Assad and hailed the uprising against him.
“Our revolution is not a sectarian revolution even though we’d been slaughtered by the sword of sectarianism,” he said.
This Ramadan, Syrians marked the 14th anniversary of the start of their country’s civil war. The conflict began as one of several popular uprisings against Arab dictators, before Assad crushed what started as largely peaceful protests and a civil war erupted.
Many Syrians speak of omnipresent fear under Assad, often citing the Arabic saying, “the walls have ears,” reflecting that speaking up even privately didn’t feel safe. They talk of hardships, injustices and brutality. Now, for example, many celebrate freedom from dreaded Assad-era checkpoints.
“They would harass us,” said Ahmed Saad Aldeen, who came to the Umayyad Mosque from the city of Homs. “You go out ... and you don’t know whether you’ll return home or not.”
He said more than a dozen cousins are missing; a search for them in prisons proved futile.
Mohammed Qudmani said even going to the mosque caused anxiety for some before, for fear of getting on security forces’ radar screen or being labeled a “terrorist.”
Now, Damascus streets are bedecked with the new three-starred flag, not long ago a symbol of Assad’s opponents. It flutters from poles and is plastered to walls, sometimes with the words “God is great” handwritten on it.
One billboard declares this the “Ramadan of victory.” On a government building, the faces of former Presidents Bashar and Hafez Assad are partly cut off from a painting; in their place, “The Freedom” is scribbled in Arabic.
Haidar Haidar, who owns a sweets shop, said he was touched that new security force members gave him water and dates while he was out when a call to prayer signaled that those fasting can eat and drink.
“We never saw such things here,” he said, adding that he used to recite Qur’anic verses for protection before passing through Assad’s checkpoints.
Many dream of a new Syria, but exactly how that would look remains uncertain.
Damascus resident Wassim Bassimah said Syrians must be mindful to protect their country from sliding back into civil war and should maintain a dialogue that is inclusive of all. “The external enemies are still there.”
Iran foreign minister says uranium enrichment ‘non-negotiable’
Remarks came after US envoy said Iran must stop its enrichment of uranium as part of any nuclear deal
Updated 34 min 7 sec ago
AFP
TEHRAN: Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Wednesday that Iran’s enrichment of uranium as part of its nuclear program was “non-negotiable” after US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff called for a halt.
“Iran’s enrichment is a real, accepted matter. We are ready to build confidence in response to possible concerns, but the issue of enrichment is non-negotiable,” Araghchi told reporters after a cabinet meeting.
The remarks came as Araghchi and Witkoff are due to meet again in Oman on Saturday, a week after they held the highest-level talks between the longtime foes since US President Donald Trump abandoned a landmark nuclear deal in 2018.
Trump reimposed sweeping sanctions in a policy of “maximum pressure” against Tehran that he has reinstated since returning to office in January.
In March, he sent a letter to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urging talks but warning of possible military action if they fail to produce a deal.
Both sides described Saturday’s meeting as “constructive.”
But on Tuesday, Witkoff said Iran must “stop and eliminate” its enrichment of uranium as part of any nuclear deal.
He had previously demanded only that Iran return to the 3.67 percent enrichment ceiling set by the 2015 accord between Iran and major powers that Trump withdrew from.
Araghchi condemned what he called the “contradictory and conflicting positions” coming out of the Trump administration ahead of Saturday’s talks.
“We will find out the true opinions of the Americans during the negotiation session,” he said.
Iran’s top diplomat said he hoped to start negotiations on the framework of a possible agreement but said that required “constructive positions” from the US.
“If we continue to (hear) contradictory and conflicting positions, we are going to have problems,” he warned.
Araghchi is set to head to Iranian ally Russia on Thursday, Iran’s ambassador in Moscow Kazem Jalili said.
Iran has said the visit was “pre-planned” but will include discussions on the Iran-US talks.
“The objective of (my) trip to Russia is to convey a written message from the supreme leader” to Russian President Vladimir Putin, Araghchi said.
In readiness for the US talks, Iran has engaged with Russia and China, which were both parties to the 2015 deal.
Ahead of Saturday’s second round of talks in Muscat, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said he hoped a deal could be reached with the US, the official IRNA news agency reported.
On Tuesday, Khamenei cautioned that while the talks have proceeded well in their early stages, they could still prove fruitless.
“The negotiations may or may not yield results,” he said, noting that Iran had already outlined its “red lines.”
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have said the country’s military capabilities are off-limits in the talks.
Late on Sunday, IRNA said Iran’s regional influence and its missile capabilities — both sources of concern for Western governments — were also among its “red lines.”
The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi was due in Iran later Wednesday for talks with senior officials.
The UN watchdog was tasked with overseeing Iran’s compliance with the 2015 nulear deal.
In its latest report, the IAEA said Iran had an estimated 274.8 kilograms of uranium enriched to up to 60 percent.
That level far exceeds the the 3.67 percent ceiling set by the 2015 deal but still falls short of the 90 percent threshold required for a nuclear warhead.
Charity says 400,000 children in Syria risk ‘severe malnutrition’ after US cuts
More than 13 years of conflict in Syria ravaged the country, with the health system shattered and infrastructure hobbled
Updated 53 min 1 sec ago
AFP
DAMASCUS: Save the Children said on Wednesday that more than 400,000 children in the Syrian Arab Republic were at risk of “severe malnutrition” after the US suspended aid, forcing the charity to slash operations in the country.
Bujar Hoxha, Save the Children’s Syria director, in a statement called on the international community to urgently fill the funding gap, warning that needs were “higher than ever” after years of war and economic collapse.
“More than 416,000 children in Syria are now at significant risk of severe malnutrition following the sudden suspension of foreign aid,” Save the Children said in a statement, adding separately that the cuts were those of the US.
The global aid situation has grown dire since US President Donald Trump ordered the dismantling of the US Agency for International Development early this year.
His administration scrapped 83 percent of humanitarian programs funded by USAID.
The agency had an annual budget of $42.8 billion, representing 42 percent of total global humanitarian aid.
The suspension has “forced the closure of one third of Save the Children’s life-saving nutrition activities” across Syria, the charity said, halting “vital care for over 40,500 children” aged under five.
Hoxha said the closure of the charity’s nutrition centers “comes at the worst possible time” with “the needs in Syria are higher than ever.”
Its clinics that are still open are “reporting a surge in malnutrition cases while struggling to keep up with the growing demand for care,” the charity added.
More than 13 years of conflict in Syria ravaged the country, with the health system shattered and infrastructure hobbled.
In February, a United Nations Development Programme report estimated that nine out of 10 Syrians now live in poverty and face food insecurity with “malnutrition on the rise, particularly among children.”
Save the Children said more than 650,000 children under five in Syria were now “chronically malnourished,” while more than 7.5 million children nationwide needed humanitarian assistance, which it said was the highest number since the crisis began.
Hoxha urged the international community to “urgently step up” to fill the funding gap.
Syrian children “are paying the price for decisions made thousands of miles away,” Hoxha added in the statement.
How falling cases of tuberculosis in Iraq reflect a wider health system recovery
Iraq has halved its tuberculosis rate over the past decade through tech-driven diagnosis and expanded mobile health services
AI-supported X-rays and GeneXpert machines now detect TB faster, even in remote areas and among high-risk populations
Updated 16 April 2025
Sherouk Zakaria
DUBAI: Sameer Abbas Mohamed, a Syrian refugee from Qamishli who fled to Iraq in 2013, was terrified when his one-year-old son, Yusuf, was diagnosed with tuberculosis. He knew the disease was life-threatening — and highly contagious.
“I have two older boys, and I was scared they would catch the disease,” said Mohamed, who lives in Qushtapa refugee camp for Syrians in Irbil, home to most of the 300,000 Syrian refugees in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
“Yusuf was also very young and I worried about losing him.”
An IOM medic checks a little girl at the family's rented house in Kirkuk. (Photo: Anjam Rasool/IOM Iraq, 2019)
Mohamed consulted several doctors when Yusuf began coughing. Scans revealed a mass on the right anterior wall of his chest. A diagnosis was finally made when a general surgeon reported the case to Iraq’s National TB Program.
Following surgery to remove the mass, Yusuf returned home, where nurses delivered an all-oral regimen, monitored his treatment, tracked his progress, offered support, and educated the family on isolation measures to prevent the disease’s spread.
Within six months, Yusuf was cured.
His journey reflects the progress made in combating TB in Iraq, especially the drug-resistant variant that has emerged in the conflict-affected country — which until recently had the region’s highest prevalence of TB cases.
Iraq’s NTP, supported by the International Organization for Migration, the Global Fund, and the World Health Organization, is tracking TB among displaced communities using advanced diagnostic technologies and artificial intelligence.
Giorgi Gigauri, IOM Iraq’s chief of mission, told Arab News that TB detection and timely treatment have helped to drive a significant decline in cases in Iraq.
This was achieved, he said, through a tech-driven strategy, including the installation of the advanced 10-color GeneXpert detection machine across Baghdad, Basrah, Najaf and Nineveh, enabling faster diagnoses.
IOM’s mobile medical teams were also equipped with 10 AI-supported chest X-ray devices, known as CAD4-TB, which can detect the disease in seconds — even in high-burden areas such as refugee camps and prisons.
FAST FACTS
• TB is caused by the Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacterium that primarily affects the lungs.
• It spreads through airborne droplets when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
• Symptoms include a persistent cough, chest pain, fever, night sweats and weight loss.
• With proper treatment using antibiotics, TB is curable, though drug-resistant strains exist.
Routine screenings by these mobile units helped to increase the detection rate of drug-resistant TB from 2 percent to 19 percent, and drug-sensitive TB from 4 percent to 14 percent between 2019 and 2024, according to IOM data.
After screening, sputum samples are taken to central labs, making testing accessible for those unable to travel or living in areas with limited health care access.
Thanks to these efforts, TB cases in Iraq have fallen dramatically — from 45 to 23 cases per 100,000 people between 2013 and 2023. The current prevalence is 15 per 100,000, with an estimated mortality rate of three per 100,000.
In many ways, these numbers reflect Iraq’s wider public health recovery after decades of instability, including the crippling sanctions of the 1990s, the successive bouts of violence that followed the 2003 US-led invasion, and the 2014 rise of Daesh.
“Despite years of instability, progress made in the detection, treatment and prevention of the spread of TB restored trust in health care services by strengthening infrastructure and extending care to vulnerable groups like prisoners and displaced populations,” Gigauri told Arab News.
“It also supports upskilling of health professions and creates sustainable systems that can support responses to other communicable diseases.
“Efforts made by all partners under NTP have contributed to national recovery by addressing urgent health needs and laying a foundation for timely detection of preventable and treatable diseases.”
Despite a period of relative stability, Iraq still faces considerable humanitarian pressures amid a fragile economy and an unpredictable security landscape. According to UNHCR, more than 1 million Iraqis remain internally displaced, with 115,000 living in 21 camps across the Kurdistan Region.
Roughly five million displaced people have returned to their towns and villages since Daesh’s territorial defeat in 2017. But these areas often lack basic infrastructure, increasing the risk of TB outbreaks.
In Mosul — Iraq’s second-largest city, which endured three years under Daesh — those unable to afford housing live in overcrowded settlements, where malnutrition and exposure to the elements weaken immunity.
The mobile medical teams have been a game-changer for these vulnerable communities.
Digital X-rays equipped with CAD4-TB, powered by AI, now enable quick and accurate TB detection — a stark improvement from the three-month wait many patients once faced for CT scans.
This technology also reduces radiation exposure. A single CT scan can expose patients to the equivalent of 300 X-rays, according to Dr. Bashar Hashim Abbas, manager of the Chest and Respiratory Diseases clinic in Mosul.
Abbas said that mobile medical teams and digital X-ray devices have been vital for reaching remote communities and detainees who lack clinic access.
“The mobility of these machines helped us examine prisoners who were difficult to bring into the clinic due to complex security protocols. We discovered many cases, especially multidrug-resistant TB patients, in this way,” Abbas told Arab News.
“We conduct X-rays and take sputum samples for further lab investigations. Therefore, we take the diagnostic tools to them as much as we can, scaling up TB prevention and providing treatment.”
A centralized disease surveillance system, District Health Information Software 2, allows lab results to be registered and coordinated across labs, facilities, and the Iraqi Ministry of Health, improving routine TB reporting.
IOM’s TB services reached 6,398 people in 2024, with 120 drug-resistant TB cases treated. These efforts have been bolstered by $11 million in Global Fund support since 2022.
A key breakthrough has been shifting the treatment of multidrug-resistant TB from a burdensome series of injections to a simpler, all-oral regimen, which shortened recovery time from two years to six months and significantly improved outcomes.
“Previously, treatments involved daily injections for at least six to eight months, which were difficult to sustain for patients and treatment outcomes were relatively poor at 50 percent,” Grania Brigden, senior TB adviser at the Global Fund, told Arab News.
“However, the innovation in treatment through the all-oral regimen has reduced treatment to six months with a 75 percent to 80 percent success rate.”
Although no new TB vaccines are currently available, researchers are optimistic about developing more effective ones in the next five years. The existing BCG vaccine offers only partial protection and is less effective for adults and adolescents, who are more prone to transmission.
New vaccines are vital for achieving the WHO’s End TB Strategy goals — reducing TB mortality by 95 percent and incidence by 90 percent by 2035. Brigden said ongoing investment is key to meeting these targets.
Meanwhile, the Global Fund is focused on halting TB’s spread in Iraq. “We have invested significantly in commodity security to ensure that everyone who tests positive or is notified of TB is put on treatment,” said Brigden.
Thanks to these steps, many — like young Yusuf — are alive today who might otherwise have succumbed without proper care.
“The discussions of tuberculosis we had with the nurse who gave the medication had a positive impact on us,” said Yusuf’s father, Mohamed.
“The nurse gave us information on how to isolate him after the first two to three weeks. He reassured us that if we gave him the medication regularly and made sure there were no gaps, everything would be getting well.
‘There is a constant fear, you go to bed with it, you wake up with it’
Updated 16 April 2025
AFP
ZABABDEH: In the mainly Christian Palestinian town of Zababdeh, the runup to Easter has been overshadowed by nearby Israeli military operations, which have proliferated in the occupied West Bank alongside the Gaza war.
This year unusually Easter falls on the same weekend for all of the town’s main Christian communities — Catholic, Orthodox and Anglican — and residents have attempted to busy themselves with holiday traditions like making date cakes or getting ready for the scout parade.
But their minds have been elsewhere.
Dozens of families from nearby Jenin have found refuge in Zababdeh from the continual Israeli military operations that have devastated the city and its adjacent refugee camp this year.
“The other day, the (Israeli) army entered Jenin, people were panicking, families were running to pick up their children,” said Zababdeh resident Janet Ghanam.
“There is a constant fear, you go to bed with it, you wake up with it,” the 57-year-old Anglican added, before rushing off to one of the last Lenten prayers before Easter.
Ghanam said her son had told her he would not be able to visit her for Easter this year, for fear of being stuck at the Israeli military roadblocks that have mushroomed across the territory.
Zababdeh looks idyllic, nestled in the hills of the northern West Bank, but the roar of Israeli air force jets sometimes drowns out the sound of its church bells.
“It led to a lot of people to think: ‘Okay, am I going to stay in my home for the next five years?’” said Saleem Kasabreh, an Anglican deacon in the town.
“Would my home be taken away? Would they bomb my home?“
Kasabreh said this “existential threat” was compounded by constant “depression” at the news from Gaza, where the death toll from the Israel’s response to Hamas’s October 2023 attack now tops 51,000, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
Zababdeh has been spared the devastation wreaked on Gaza, but the mayor’s office says nearly 450 townspeople lost their jobs in Israel when Palestinian work permits were rescinded after the Hamas attack.
“Israel had never completely closed us in the West Bank before this war,” said 73-year-old farmer Ibrahim Daoud. “Nobody knows what will happen.”
Many say they are stalked by the spectre of exile, with departures abroad fueling fears that Christians may disappear from the Holy Land.
“People can’t stay without work and life isn’t easy,” said 60-year-old math teacher Tareq Ibrahim.
Mayor Ghassan Daibes echoed his point.
“For a Christian community to survive, there must be stability, security and decent living conditions. It’s a reality, not a call for emigration,” he said.
“But I’m speaking from lived experience: Christians used to make up 30 percent of the population in Palestine; today, they are less than one percent.
“And this number keeps decreasing. In my own family, I have three brothers abroad — one in Germany, the other two in the United States.”
Catholic priest Elias Tabban adopted a more stoical attitude, insisting his congregation’s spirituality had never been so vibrant.
“Whenever the Church is in hard times... (that’s when) you see the faith is growing,” Tabban said.
Houthi-held areas of Yemen have endured near-daily strikes, blamed on the United States, since Washington launched an air campaign against the militia on March 15
Updated 16 April 2025
AFP
SANAA: Houthi media said more than a dozen air strikes hit the militia-held capital Sanaa on Wednesday, blaming them on the United States.
Houthi-held areas of Yemen have endured near-daily strikes, blamed on the United States, since Washington launched an air campaign against the militia on March 15 in an attempt to end their threats to shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.
“Fourteen air strikes carried out by American aggression hit the Al-Hafa area in the Al-Sabeen district in the capital,” the Houthis’ Al-Masirah TV reported.
It also reported strikes blamed on the United States in the Hazm area of Jawf province.
The US campaign followed Houthi threats to resume their attacks on international shipping over Israel’s aid blockade on the Gaza Strip.
Since March 15, the Houthis have also resumed attacks targeting US military ships and Israel, saying they are acting in solidarity with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
The Houthis began targeting ships transiting the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, as well as Israeli territory, after the Gaza war began in October 2023, later pausing their attacks during a recent two-month ceasefire.
Israel cut off all supplies to Gaza at the beginning of March and resumed its offensive in the Palestinian territory on March 18, ending the truce.
The vital Red Sea route, connecting to the Suez Canal, normally carries about 12 percent of world shipping traffic, but the Houthi attacks forced many companies to make a long detour around the tip of southern Africa.
