LONDON: Maher thought he would never set foot in his Damascus neighborhood again after he fled 13 years ago. But when a rebel offensive toppled the Bashar Assad regime a year ago, he seized the opportunity to return to his home in the Yarmouk camp.
Four months ago, the Syrian-Palestinian father of two returned to the capital to see whether he could move his family back to their former home. However, hopes of rebuilding his past life there were quickly dashed when he saw the extent of the damage.
“The neighborhood is now in ruins, and our home is nothing but a pile of gray rubble,” Maher told Arab News. “It was painful, sad, hard to see.”
Children look on from inside their tent in the village of Al-Hawash in Syria's west-central Hama province on May 22, 2025. (AFP)
Thirteen years earlier, Maher — whose name has been changed to protect his identity — was forced to flee when regime forces besieged Yarmouk to root out rebel fighters it claimed were hiding in the Palestinian camp.
