The war is still ongoing in Syria, in some pockets of the country. It is therefore an enormous challenge to write about this complex conflict without the benefit of hindsight. However, I believe that Rania Abouzeid did an absolutely amazing job at providing some key reference points for the reader to navigate through this all consuming at times contradictory period. She does so by detailing the day to day experience of Syrian war through the eyes of selected individuals, some very young some mature and some old, whom she follows through a period of at least 5 years if not longer (2010 to 2016/7), weaving a web of continuous narratives of specific men and women that over the years become familiar to the reader, and a prism through which they can understand the various factions and events on the ground. Not an easy feat in an ever changing war landscape. Daughters, fighters, rebels, government army defectors, refugees, imprisoned civilians, etc. For the first time, I have a sense of what the various factions are or were in Syria, a first albeit I am sure incomplete unravelling of what happened just a few miles from our shores. The humanity and the total respect of the individuals she demonstrates are a testament to her attempt at giving the world a first-hand account of what happened for some people in Syria. Some people on here have criticised her for writing at length about fighters involved with IS. But she also interviewed pro Assad individuals, Free Syrian Army fighters, and many more from other fighting groups within the country. She does not hold back in the description of the gruesome violence of torture and sheer murder that the Syrian people were subjected to from all sides.
It is difficult at times to keep track of the many factions involved as there are so many of them, and I cannot even begin to understand how hard it must have been to sift through all the details and stories across 7 years. Scenes of complete humanity and total destruction juxtapose. And a wish for restoration and restitution. I think it is impossible to say that this work is the whole truth, but she proves to the reader that this is somebody's truth. The desire of freedom from dictatorship is how the conflict started off, a spring revolution quickly hijacked by other religious and non religious groups and political agendas. Watching scenes of conflict even this week on TV, there is no doubt that the initial impetus for change that came from the people was totally overridden by proxy wars - Turks against Kurds, Russian incursions, US bombing, religious fanaticism. In the end, there are absolutely no winners. But a message of hope prevails in the new lives of the many incarcerated who managed to rebuild and move on, whether in Syria or not. However, the death toll and the psychological burden will be with us for many decades to come. A great piece of writing. Perhaps an initial piece of the puzzle that in future might shed some light on a conflict that not many people have understood. 9780393356786 This is no easy read. Like most Americans, I have only a cursory familiarity with the history and culture of Syria, much less the place names and human names. Trying to keep track of each character and the events was daunting, until I realized that detail was not essential to understanding the story of the tragedy that is modern Syria. It is a book that should be read for that story alone. The suffering of Syrians will be a worldwide issue for years, if not generations, to come. This book puts human faces on that suffering. 9780393356786 A very brave Arabic-speaking journalist followed Syrians -- families, poets, activists, politicians, Islamists, soldiers -- for six years, as their country blew up. She gives plenty of context, takes no sides, and lets them speak. This is the book on Syria I'd recommend to anyone who wants to understand what's been happening there. 9780393356786 The Syrian civil war began in March of 2011 as an outgrowth of Arab Spring protests erupting throughout the Middle East. Freelance journalist Rania Abouzeid began clandestinely interviewing Syrians from various factions and documenting their stories. Her stated goal was “not to judge, and not to turn characters into caricatures, but to present information about an individual’s motivations, worldview, and actions to help readers understand him or her and arrive at their own conclusions.” She included two important references, first, a detailed map of Syria’s fourteen provinces and key cities, and second, a cast of characters grouped by both region and allegiance. The key to understanding the problem in Syria is to know the differences between the three main groups in the war. First, the Ba’athist regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is complicated by the fact that he is a member of the Alawite minority (10%) within Syria. The Alawites “follow a syncretic religion, a very distant offshoot of Shiite Islam,” one which both Sunni (more than 70% in Syria) and Shiite (Iran’s majority religion) consider to be heretical. However, al-Assad is more closely aligned to, and supported by, Iranian Shiites (Hizballah), and is known for brutally suppressing dissent within Syria. Second, resistance to al-Assad led to the formation of the Free Syrian Army, with the Farouq Battalions being the strongest units. Combatants included both disgruntled civilians and defectors from al-Assad’s army and air force, mostly Sunni. The third main faction in the conflict is ISIS (Nusra), a Sunni group who dreams of a borderless Levant (ad-Dawla, “The State”) and imposition of Sharia law. ISIS and Al-Qaeda share many of the same goals, though differing in tactics. Unlike Al-Qaeda, ISIS has no qualms about killing Muslims with whom they disagree, especially Alawites and Shiites. These three factions are the basis for both the conflict as well as the progression of personalized stories collected in this book. However Abouzeid’s work is not a dry history lesson. Rather, it is a compilation of heartbreaking, horrendous, and riveting personal accounts of individuals who have been caught up in the struggle. I highly recommend this amazing work for anyone who is perplexed by this complicated war, one that has been deemed the second deadliest conflict of the 21st century. 9780393356786 Let them be eaten alive.
Child is War
It is counterintuitive in working towards the goal of preserving a race,
to instruct children to hide when threatened,
because when they reemerge,
there will be a new oppression,
the orphans chant at the enemy, Let them be eaten alive.
Chris Roberts, God to the Mentally Unhinged (Shell Shocked)
9780393356786
“Rania Abouzeid has produced a work of stunning reportage from the very heart of the conflict, daring to go to the most dangerous places in order to get the story.” —Dexter Filkins, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Forever War
Award-winning journalist Rania Abouzeid dissects the tangle of ideologies and allegiances that make up the Syrian conflict through the dramatic stories of four young people seeking safety and freedom in a shattered country. Hailed by critics, No Turning Back masterfully “[weaves] together the lives of protestors, victims, and remorseless killers at the center of this century’s most appalling human tragedy” (Robert F. Worth). Based on more than five years of fearless, clandestine reporting, No Turning Back brings readers deep inside Bashar al-Assad’s prisons, to covert meetings where foreign states and organizations manipulated the rebels, and to the highest levels of Islamic militancy and the formation of the Islamic State. An utterly engrossing human drama full of vivid, indelible characters, No Turning Back shows how hope can flourish even amid one of the twenty-first century’s greatest humanitarian disasters.
Winner of the Overseas Press Club of America's Cornelius Ryan Award for the best non-fiction book on international affairs and a finalist for the Lionel Gelber Prize. No Turning Back: Life, Loss, and Hope in Wartime Syria
Page 219 (my book)
The family once again scurried to the basement accompanied by the hiss, whoosh, and boom of things exploding around them. “Why isn’t anyone helping us?” Noora screamed. “Why doesn’t anyone care?”
This book is first-rate journalism at a very human level. The stories of individual Syrian people coping with the disintegration of society gives us an emotional comprehension of the devastation in their country since 2011.
What started out as protests against the government stimulated by the “Arab Spring” became fragmented by the repressive Assad regime which wanted to maintain at any cost its grip on power. It let go from its prisons its’ Islamic fanatics so that they would go to Iraq to form an opposition that none in the exterior world community would support.
The democratic forces that initially opposed Assad disintegrated into ragtag militia forces and many succumbed to the Islamic fanatics that evolved into ISIS.
Page 214 Abu Azzam
“Our revolution was beautiful, but political money entered and dirtied it,” he said. “Now I must wear a fake smile, grit my teeth, and kiss the feet of donors and tell them they are the crowns on my head.”
The author gives us the story of Sulieman who was incarcerated and then tortured for taking part in protests. He goes through a horrible Orwellian prison system until he is final released with a pardon from Assad. He represents all in the Arab world who can be arbitrarily arrested for non-existent crimes. He ends up fleeing to Germany because he fears Assad’s security forces will use any excuse to round him up again. Sadly, given conditions in Syria, he will likely not be able to return to his homeland for years to come.
There are others who sadly yielded to the pull of Islamic fundamentalism and its code of Sharia. I felt the author risking her life when meeting with these people. Their world view is medieval, anti-liberal, and anti-woman.
Page 270 by 2015
Rebel held Syria had become like the Afghanistan of the 1980s: failed state territory, lawless, a magnet for foreign and local jihadists, for Al Qaeda, ISIS.
This book is about the personal struggles of individuals and their families – some trying to rebuild Syria from the ruins of a long war, others fleeing to Turkey or Europe to find safety. The author describes how various Middle Eastern countries have entered the fray – like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, Lebanon pushing their own agenda and just adding complexities to the quagmire. Naturally Iran supports Assad, Russia supplies him with weapons and pilots. They all tried to eliminate ISIS, but none did much to stop Assad.
Page 312
What upset him [Abu Azzam] most was seeing the regime’s narrative playing out – that its opponents were all extremists, terrorists, and Assad the bulwark against them…Our regime [Assad] is focused on eliminating us, the moderate opposition, and it is the regime’s interest to surrender areas like Raqqa and Tabqa to tell the world, “Look at who is ruling it.”
By the author giving us individual narratives, we experience the Syrian war and all its horrid affects. There does not appear to be an end in sight. 9780393356786 When the revolution that tore Syria apart began in 2011 Abouzeid went in to cover it. Abouzeid is a freelance journalist living in Beirut who had been reporting on Syria before the revolution broke out. Already blacklisted by the Assad regime, she spent most of her time in rebel held areas entering from Turkey. An Arabic speaker she fit in culturally enabling her to form relationships and get open firsthand accounts. Hers is a bottom up rather than top down view of the conflict. She focuses on several individuals who come from different towns, have different backgrounds and beliefs and join different opposition groups in the war. We follow what happens to them during the conflict up to 2016 when the book ends. Abouzeid puts them in context reporting on their families, friends and communities. We witness how everyone copes the best they can as they struggle just to survive. These are very personal accounts of people facing constant danger, the destruction of their homes and towns, and the deaths of their relatives and friends. This book is not about battles. It is about personal experience.
We watch the emotions rise and fall of young Syrians fighting to cast off the brutal Assad regime. They begin with hope and then succumb to the violence and infighting and disappointment that follow. What begins with the oppressed rising up ends being co-opted by extremist groups and manipulated by outside states with vested interests. Abouzeid helps us understand the genesis and evolution of the Syrian war in a way that the headline news doesn’t. We look at it from the inside out rather than the outside in. Abouzeid was present at some of the events she describes and relied on the notes and memories of those she interviewed for the rest. She does not fictionalize to fill in the blanks. The presentation can seem fragmented, particularly as she presents her material chronologically showing how the war evolves. Thus we jump back and forth between individual stories making it a chore to keep track of the details especially each person’s friends, family and enemies. But the big picture of life in Syria is clear.
Why the war begins is easy to understand. Syria in 2011 was a police state and kleptocracy run by a small privileged minority. Those who objected soon found themselves in jail where they were tortured and frequently died. Pushed to the limit, the oppressed organized, but they all had different visions of the future. Some wanted a secular democratic government. Some wanted an Islamic state with varying interpretations of what that meant. The uprising which grew organically and spread rapidly devolved into numerous disparate groups without central leadership or political organization. The Free Syrian Army was a loosely organized group wanting democracy, but when it actually took over an area, it wasn’t prepared to control it. The area would become a lawless no-man’s land. This opened the door for al-Qaida linked groups and ultimately ISIS. They brought in foreign fighters with no connection to Syria. ISIS went in behind the Free Syrian Army and took over. The original Syrian dissidents ended up overwhelmed caught between Assad’s army and ISIS.
The brutality of the war stands out. Assad was merciless. His army blew up homes, essential businesses and whole towns to deprive people of a place to live. Who and how many died didn’t matter. He filled his prisons with people who were routinely tortured with no way out. One only had to be a suspect. Due process didn’t exist, although connections and bribe money could help. Abouzeid gives us detailed and extremely disturbing accounts of Assad’s prisons from people she knows and interviews who were fortunate enough to get out. Of course these practices brought revenge particularly from the family members of those lost in the prisons or to Assad’s widespread carnage. Abouzeid’s narrative depicts the very strong family ties in Syrian society. Syrians feel very close not only to their nuclear families but to aunts, uncles, cousins and their families as well. When any are harmed it is taken personally by all members of the extended family. Besides the Assad regime there was ISIS which was as brutal as Assad but perhaps more merciful in that they often shortened the torture by slicing off one’s head which they might send to one’s mother.
Abouzeid helped me get a better understanding of the conflict. Talking in terms of individuals rather than solely of organizations, armies, states, factions, religions or groups gives a different perspective. While the Assad regime, ISIS and other factions may have had grand goals, the Syrian people were just trying to extricate themselves from a situation that went from bad to hellish. It’s easy to understand why people would risk everything to migrate to Europe. They were risking their lives to stay. Some of the individuals Abouzeid covers do migrate. This can be a difficult book to read. The cruelty can be overwhelming, still I recommend it for those interested in what the Syrian war means in personal terms.
9780393356786 Probably the best narrative nonfiction book written on the Syrian uprising to date, and the best about any war since Anand Gopal’s “No Good Men Among the Living”. The book interweaves the lives of a number of Syrians from different backgrounds, whose lived experiences make up a microcosm of the civil war as a whole. The author has language skills and intimate access to Syrians that puts her reporting above the vast majority of what has been written by others. I was also amazed by the incredible elegance of the writing, which was literature quality at times. Through the lives she follows the entire arc of the revolution is documented: civil uprising, war, prison, exile, radicalization and survival.
A must-read about Syria and the human condition during war generally. Even those who think that they are fatigued of hearing about this conflict owe it to themselves to give this book a look. 9780393356786 This book tells the story of the Syrian Civil War through portraits of Syrians. Author is an Arabic speaking journalist who was able to win the confidence her subjects. The interviews show the life before the war, the person’s role in the war and their reflections on it 6-7 years into it.
It starts and ends with a businessman whose family benefited from the rule of Bashar al-Assad. Through Suleiman you learn the horrors of Assad’s prisons and how their conditions conflict with the regime’s descriptions. Through others you see how the people’s protest for more rights was co-opted by the Islamists, the role of the Free Syrian Army and the divisions of the Al Qaeda and ISIS fighters. The book does not cover the supporters of Assad or how the regime internationalized its side of the war.
The most interesting portraits, to me, were those of Ruha, a 9 year old who becomes a teenager in this period, Talal, an Alowite depressed over the loss of his family and his hostage-held daughter, and the update of Saleh living underground in Germany and is relieved to bus tables while reflecting on the horrors he saw and abetted.
There are the sad stories of people returning to their uninhabitable homes, attending mass funerals and burials, escaping to Turkey, and describing how the war affected families and individuals.
The economy is baffling. With nothing being produced and so much destroyed, where are the resources coming from? How does Talah have a perfume business in the midst of war? Ruha’s family has a farm, but there is little mention of the work or the crops. Although they lost a home and travel back and forth to Turkey they seem unconcerned about money. Her father somehow acquires the resources to build a factory. How does Suleiman keep his money throughout his prison stay (with all the thievery and graft, did the guards really keep it for him?) His family continues to have the money to support him. It seems that along the border there are whole communities of Syrians springing up. They are not living in camps.
This may be as close as lay people can get to understanding the conflict from the perspective of the everyday Syrian. The conflict started with peaceful protests in hopes of more democracy only to have local battles became the stage for others fighting larger conflicts.
The table of names at the beginning is helpful; an index would have been even better so that it would be easy to trace the minor profiles. There are no photos. 9780393356786 Gritty, honest, personal, intimate, clear-eyed look at events leading up to and involving the Syrian civil war, told by a journalist with access to a number of activists and their families. The story moves back and forth between the activists as they negotiate the increasingly dire and deadly turn of events. More than simply a history, this is a look at what the civil war felt like on the ground, by people often too caught up in the swell of events to make sense of where it all would lead. I learned a lot by way of this book, and I found it chilling too--because in this tale I could see what the seeds of civil discord in my own country might well sprout into. 9780393356786
