A 13th century mosque is shuttered, its tottering minaret struck at the base by a shell. Snipers fire from nests atop the immense stone walls of the citadel, where ancient Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Arab and Turkish warriors once perched.
Until a few months ago, Old Aleppo was both a living museum and a breathing city, where souk shoppers haggled over spices, books and olive-oil soap beneath wrought-iron filigree balconies and wooden lattice screens.
Aleppo is Syria’s largest city and economic hub. Its old district, with towering fortifications built by the medieval dynasty of Saladin after his 12th century victory over the crusaders, is also a UNESCO heritage site, its architecture declared a marvel of human achievement by the UN cultural body.
Today it is a war zone and a ruin. Corrugated iron sheets pocked with bullet holes cover alleyways housing shuttered, burnt or demolished market stalls. Rebel fighters zigzag around in cars blasting revolutionary music.
“Old Aleppo was the foundation of this world,” said Haj Amer, who owns a printing press in the old bazaar. “What really upset us are the mosques that were destroyed.”
“This area is my roots, my life since 1975,” he added. “I’ll always stay.”
Syria’s civil war has killed an estimated 44,000 people and driven half a million from their homes. It reached Aleppo with full wrath six months ago, and though rebels now control much of the city, parts of it remain a battleground.
UN officials who declared Old Aleppo a heritage site have catalogued some of the wonders to be found here.
“The 13th century royal palace, with its fine stalactite and honeycomb entrance porch, is inlaid with white marble,” they wrote. “The throne room, dating from the Mameluke period (15th-16th centuries) has been tastefully restored: Syrian artists and craftsmen have recreated the luxurious setting of the court — the ceiling with its decorated beams and caissons, lighting, windows, polychrome columns — all are a tribute to their skill. There are around 200 minarets, some squat like defensive towers, others slender as needles.”
During a walk through the old town, residents show the damage and describe their own heartbreak.
At al-Uthmaniya mosque, a gaping hole has been blown through a dome dating to 1728. Concrete floors bear the marks of a shell, and the glass that decorated the tall arches at the entrance to the prayer hall has gone, shattered.
“There were no gunmen in this mosque,” said 70-year-old Abu Mohammed, a local man dressed in traditional robes, who often prays here.
“Two weeks ago, we were leaving afternoon prayers, and sitting in the shade when a shell blasted into the courtyard,” he said.
Further on, at an Ottoman-era bathhouse that bustled before the war, the dank stench of an abandoned swimming pool fills the domed stone underground rooms.
A shell has blasted through the atrium dome and bits of broken colored glass lie scattered around a fountain. Iron-lattice lanterns lie on the floor. An empty vending machine stands near white marble basins and colored ceramic mosaics.
People have slowly begun to return to the ruins of the old city.
“We came back because there was nowhere else for us to go,” said 12-year-old Riham, accompanying her grandmother down a cobbled alley to a clinic. “We don’t even recognize the alleyways any more.”
In the bazaar, a few surviving stalls are open selling sweets and sodas. Men drink tea outside workshops.
“Bashar al-Assad destroyed the mosques and old souks, one of the oldest souks in the world,” said Abu Othman, a fighter in the rebel Free Syria Army’s al-Tawheed Brigade, wearing the group’s green fatigues.
“We haven’t seen water and electricity in two months,” he said. “It’s as if this man has enmity between himself and the ruins: the souks and the mosques. And even with the sellers. Because they did not hail his oppressiveness, he got his revenge by burning all their property.”
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese