WEEKLY UPDATE
May 21, 2016
Dear Readers,Welcome to the weekly Syria Deeply newsletter. We’ve rounded up the most important stories and developments about Syria and the Syrians in order to bring you valuable news and analysis. But first, here is a brief overview of what happened this week:In Syria this week, the government continued to pound rebel-held areas as world powers met in Vienna to discuss increasing aid deliveries to besieged areas in the hopes of reviving the now defunct cease-fire and eventually coaxing warring parties back to the negotiating table.In Homs on Wednesday, a barrage of airstrikes on the rebel-held town of Rastan killed an extended family of 12, including 10 children, who had been hiding in a shelter underground.Government forces, with the help of Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia, on Thursday successfully captured the strategic rebel stronghold of Deir al-Asafir in Eastern Ghouta. Government troops have made strategic advances in the area on the northeastern outskirts of the capital in recent weeks, exploiting weeks of infighting between the area’s two rival Islamist factions – Jaish al-Islam and Failaq al-Rahman – to make gains.Southwest of Damascus, the Syrian army and its allies pressed forward on an assault to shore up control of the main highway running from Damascus to southwestern Syria. Government warplanes carried out dozens of air raids on the town of Khan al-Shih, where rebel groups straddle the strategic highway.As fighting raged across much of the country and ISIS took part in a separate series of battles against Kurdish forces and the U.S.-led air campaign, world powers gathered in Vienna in efforts to salvage the now-collapsed truce and bring warring parties back to the negotiating table.Although Tuesday’s meeting in Vienna failed to secure its intended goal of setting a date for a new round of peace talks, it did produce a joint statement pushing the U.N. World Food Program to airdrop much-needed humanitarian aid in besieged areas across the country, starting June 1, if forces loyal to Bashar al-Assad continue to block efforts to reach these areas.Shortly after the ultimatum, a 29-truck convoy entered the besieged Damascus suburb of Harasta on Wednesday, bringing the first delivery of aid to the area since government forces closed it off from the rest of the capital nearly four years ago.

Weekly Highlights:

In War-Torn Syria, Women Emerge as Changemakers

More and more Syrian women are at the forefront of new efforts to solve local conflicts and counter the death and destruction that has engulfed the country.
Syrian refugees cross from Syria to Turkey by the Orontes River, near the village of Hacipasa, Turkey, on Dec. 8, 2012. AP/Manu Brabo

Amid War and Conscription – A City Without Men

As the war in Syria pushes into its sixth year, the streets of Damascus are eerily absent of young men in civilian clothes. While many are off fighting on the front lines, thousands have hidden themselves away at home out of fear of being conscripted.
Syrians in a Damascus coffee shop watch a televised broadcast of President Bashar al-Assad delivering a speech in January 2012. AP/Muzaffar Salman

Curriculum v. Ideology: the War in the Classroom

In a classrooms across the opposition-controlled province of Idlib, the schoolcurriculum has become the battlefield for various factions trying to win the hearts and minds of Syrian youth.
Ahmed al-Fikri helps his 12-year-old son Abdo al-Fikri with his homework after school at their family home in the village of Maday in the province of Idlib on Sept. 29, 2013. AP

More Recent Stories to Look Out for at Syria Deeply:

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Top image: Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, center left, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, center, and United Nations special envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura, center right, attend the ministerial meeting on Syria in Vienna on May 17, 2016. Leonhard Foeger/Pool Photo via AP

Author: Impunity Watch Archive