The Politics of Aid in a War Zone

Aleppo, Asharq Al-Awsat—Every day at 2 p.m., Raja joins the queue that snakes around the half-finished apartment blocks. Like all the others, she is clutching a small metal bowl that she will fill with food to take home to her family. On leaner days, this will be their only meal. “We left our homes in what we were wearing,” says Raja, a mother of five who fled from her home in the Palestinian district of Aleppo two months ago. Yesterday, she received news that her house has been destroy...

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My Friend, the Aspiring Suicide Bomber

Turkish–Syrian border, Asharq Al-Awsat—We were friends from the moment we met. It was February and I had arrived in Aleppo that day, a newcomer to the Syrian war struck dumb by the depth of the chaos and the sense of heavy danger that hung over the city like smog. Of all the wars in all the world, I thought, why had I chosen to walk into this one? I had made a mistake in coming, one of monumental proportions, and I wondered whether I could turn around and leave again immediately without offe...

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