Syria News Wire

The First Islamic Sharia Judge of Damascus, Adel Bunduk has just announced that Ramadan will begin on Wednesday in Syria. That means Syria joins Egypt, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and most of the Gulf states in starting the holy month tomorrow. Oman starts on Thursday.

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This is me attempting to explain the niqab ban in a two-way on Ireland’s Newstalk radio yesterday.

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No Way Through is an award-winning short film on the Israeli Occupation. Set in London, it asks, what would happen if the British capital was filled with Israeli-style checkpoints. The results brought me to tears. Really. Thanks to Anas for spreading the word, and letting me find this amazing piece of work. No Way Through [...]

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An interesting article in Syria Today. It was published during the Gaza War, but I didn’t feel like it was appropriate to mention it back then. It features the thoughts of wonderful bloggers like Anas Takriti, Yazan Badran, and Razan Ghazzawi, plus some ramblings by me. John Dagge wrote the thoughtful piece. Here’s a snippet: It is [...]

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I haven’t seen the case against Israel’s “Jewish state” claim put so eloquently for a long time: “Netanyahu wants the Palestinians to acknowledge that Israel is a “Jewish state.” I don’t understand this demand. Israel is not a Jewish state, it is a multi-cultural state, with about half a million non-Jewish Russians and Ukrainians and [...]

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The Quartet’s demands on Hamas: -Hamas must recognise all previous agreements -Hamas must recognise Israel -Hamas must renounce violence Meanwhile on the other side: -Likud has torn up all previous agreements -Likud doesn’t recognise a Palestinian state – now or in the future -Likud will not renounce violence

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The big sell off continues. Rubbish collection is the latest state service to be privatised. In the Old City men in orange outfits now clean the streets. They work for a new company called Swan. Not only do they have new clothes, but there are more of them, and they use new smaller bins. It [...]

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Most of the cafes littering Jebl Qasioun, high above Damascus, opened 6 years ago.   During the spring of 2003, lots of florescent multi-coloured cafes and restaurants appeared. Through the spring of 2009, many of them have vanished.   If you look up at the mountain from the city below, the mountain road used to be [...]

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The David Greig play ‘Damascus’ continues its tour of the Arab World this week.   It is in Beirut, at the Masrah Al Medina on Tuesday and Wednesday. It will then visit Jordan, Palestine, Egypt and Tunisia.   It just finished a six week run in London.   The Dummar Cultural Centre in Damascus was [...]

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Barack Obama is giving just under one billion dollars in aid, to help Palestinians rebuild Gaza. Except that it is not being given to Gaza – and they are not allowed to use it for rebuilding. Two-thirds of the cash will be given to the West Bank-based Fateh Authority, because Gazans can’t be trusted. The [...]

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