'In Syria, we knew the incessant feeling of something stifling our mouths, hindering us from breathing, speaking clearly and being heard. We were used to social distancing – a fear of others, even family members, was planted in us from childhood. Anyone might be an informant – such as the son who reported his mother after she voiced her frustration about the government’s constant electrical outages.
Independent ideas, values, freedom of expression – these were a virus for Bashar al-Assad’s government. This is not just a metaphor. In one of the president’s speeches after the revolution – which began 10 years ago this month – he described us, the protestors, as “germs” from which Syria needed to be disinfected.
I was 20 years old and a student at the University of Aleppo when everything changed for my country. For months, we had watched anti-government protests unfold in Tunisia and Egypt (the Arab Spring, as it would later be termed). We never thought the same would happen in Syria. But on 6 March 2011, 15 children were arrested in Daraa for writing slogans against Assad’s government. We couldn’t believe it, but the violent reaction from the regime made it all too real.
After that, things escalated quickly across the nation, as more and more people emerged on to the streets chanting for freedom. In Daraa, a camera captured a father being beaten by the army. In Al-Bayda village in Baniyas, boys and men were pictured lying under the feet of soldiers. In Raqqa, a throng of people formed around a statue of Assad’s father, trying to pull it down. Enormous crowds gathered in Assi Square in Hama; hundreds around the giant clock in Homs; thousands of students – myself among them – at Aleppo university. The revolution was under way.
We were ecstatic at what we had created, but shocked at the aggressive response from the government. A friend was arrested by the regime and imprisoned. We never saw him again. A colleague was killed at a security forces checkpoint. Whole cities were invaded by tanks. We were attacked by mortars, scud missiles, phosphorus, cluster and barrel bombs. This became our everyday life – and still is for many Syrians today.
Growing up, I heard stories about the corruption of the military state, the injustice and violence, but I only saw it clearly when I reached secondary school. During Ba’ath Party meetings, I refused to affiliate with Syria’s sole political party and instead spent time alone in the schoolyard. My principal saw me as a sheep who had strayed from the flock. Though I wasn’t always comfortable being different, it taught me how to say no – and that no sometimes has a price, which is not always an easy one to pay.
After that, things escalated quickly across the nation, as more and more people emerged on to the streets chanting for freedom. In Daraa, a camera captured a father being beaten by the army. In Al-Bayda village in Baniyas, boys and men were pictured lying under the feet of soldiers. In Raqqa, a throng of people formed around a statue of Assad’s father, trying to pull it down. Enormous crowds gathered in Assi Square in Hama; hundreds around the giant clock in Homs; thousands of students – myself among them – at Aleppo university. The revolution was under way.
We were ecstatic at what we had created, but shocked at the aggressive response from the government. A friend was arrested by the regime and imprisoned. We never saw him again. A colleague was killed at a security forces checkpoint. Whole cities were invaded by tanks. We were attacked by mortars, scud missiles, phosphorus, cluster and barrel bombs. This became our everyday life – and still is for many Syrians today.
Growing up, I heard stories about the corruption of the military state, the injustice and violence, but I only saw it clearly when I reached secondary school. During Ba’ath Party meetings, I refused to affiliate with Syria’s sole political party and instead spent time alone in the schoolyard. My principal saw me as a sheep who had strayed from the flock. Though I wasn’t always comfortable being different, it taught me how to say no – and that no sometimes has a price, which is not always an easy one to pay.
When the revolution happened, I understood what it meant to belong to a place. Before then, Syria didn’t mean anything to me. My greatest dream was to finish university and to work in the Gulf or do a master’s degree or a PhD in Germany.
Suddenly, millions of us were fighting together for a new way of life, protecting each other, beating with one heart. I saw it in the shared smile of a stranger who I recognised from a protest. I felt it when I tried to rescue an unknown girl from the security forces. It’s why I smuggled a revolutionary flag to safety under my clothes during the chaos of a strike. I knew it when I drank water from a bottle that was being passed from one protester to another on a very hot day. It wasn’t cold, or clean, but it was the best water I have tasted in my life.
As the weeks and months wore on, the violence used by Assad’s regime descended the country into a full-blown war. Shock gave way to relief when we heard explosions because it meant we had survived. I picked up my camera and started filming. I needed to capture what was happening. I would not be able to explain it – I had to show it.
Somehow, among the falling bombs, I fell in love with Hamza, a doctor. We were married in the half-destroyed hospital where we lived and where he tried to save injured civilians, the young and old, friends and strangers. Soon, I was pregnant with our daughter, Sama. I was terrified, but I kept filming for her, so that one day she would understand. I didn’t put my camera down, not even during the hardest moments imaginable – not even when a mother found out her small child had been killed while playing with his brother. She wanted me to keep filming her indescribable pain, to show the truth to the world.
It’s thought that more than half a million people have been killed in the Syrian conflict; over 90,000 are believed to have been detained; and an estimated 13 million, more than half of Syria’s pre-war population, have been forcibly displaced either internally or internationally. I have submitted my footage as evidence of war crimes and we are building a case against the Assad regime and its ally Russia.
After 10 years, some people might think that we have been defeated, that we have made great sacrifices for a life that is worse than the one we lived before. But a revolution is a path of no return. I still believe in every word we chanted. Though I’m 30 now, and far wearier than that 20-year-old student in Aleppo, I still have her passion and willpower.'
Suddenly, millions of us were fighting together for a new way of life, protecting each other, beating with one heart. I saw it in the shared smile of a stranger who I recognised from a protest. I felt it when I tried to rescue an unknown girl from the security forces. It’s why I smuggled a revolutionary flag to safety under my clothes during the chaos of a strike. I knew it when I drank water from a bottle that was being passed from one protester to another on a very hot day. It wasn’t cold, or clean, but it was the best water I have tasted in my life.
As the weeks and months wore on, the violence used by Assad’s regime descended the country into a full-blown war. Shock gave way to relief when we heard explosions because it meant we had survived. I picked up my camera and started filming. I needed to capture what was happening. I would not be able to explain it – I had to show it.
Somehow, among the falling bombs, I fell in love with Hamza, a doctor. We were married in the half-destroyed hospital where we lived and where he tried to save injured civilians, the young and old, friends and strangers. Soon, I was pregnant with our daughter, Sama. I was terrified, but I kept filming for her, so that one day she would understand. I didn’t put my camera down, not even during the hardest moments imaginable – not even when a mother found out her small child had been killed while playing with his brother. She wanted me to keep filming her indescribable pain, to show the truth to the world.
It’s thought that more than half a million people have been killed in the Syrian conflict; over 90,000 are believed to have been detained; and an estimated 13 million, more than half of Syria’s pre-war population, have been forcibly displaced either internally or internationally. I have submitted my footage as evidence of war crimes and we are building a case against the Assad regime and its ally Russia.
After 10 years, some people might think that we have been defeated, that we have made great sacrifices for a life that is worse than the one we lived before. But a revolution is a path of no return. I still believe in every word we chanted. Though I’m 30 now, and far wearier than that 20-year-old student in Aleppo, I still have her passion and willpower.'
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