But this elation, for Ahmad and Areej, does not — cannot — translate into an intention to return to Deir al-Zour, at least in the foreseeable future. ISIS has remained active in eastern Syria, and U.S.-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, who control large parts of the region, are currently clashing with the Syrian National Army, a Turkey-backed proxy. Ahmad and Areej see ethnic conflict ahead. And they aren’t considering returning to other parts of Syria.
“The problem is not in geography,” says Ahmad, who wants to live in a secular state and does not want to live under a government led by the rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham. “Can these people who are now in charge take the right steps to build a civil state — one that respects human rights — secure lasting peace and deliver full services?” He notes that Israeli forces are only kilometers outside Damascus, that U.S. planes still fly over Syrian skies and that many countries are calling the shots in Syria. It’s not the Syria he dreamed of when he joined the early demonstrations or that he has been striving for in his near decade in Turkey, where he has worked with civil-society organizations focusing on initiatives that include peace building, human rights advocacy, youth and female empowerment and planning for a political and democratic transition of power in Syria. And of course, there is the trauma of having lived under ISIS, which Ahmed al-Shara, the leader of H.T.S., once had ties to. “Our experience, personally and as a family, are among the main reasons we are not going back,” Ahmad says. “We are seeing signs that look a lot like ISIS. In how they are running the country and treating the people. Maybe not as intense or as obvious, or the same high level of severity, but the thoughts are one and similar.” The family still hopes to be resettled outside Turkey, where their attempts to build their lives have not been easy for any one of them. Since 2021, their application for asylum has been pending at the United Nations’ refugee agency.
For his part, Rami quit waiting for permission from the Turkish government to cross legally into Syria via the countries’ shared border. He flew from Gaziantep to Istanbul to Beirut and drove to the Syrian border, arriving at midnight on Dec. 27. The checkpoint — once a place of corrupt border guards and officials who regularly expected bribes at best, or at worst abducted and disappeared Syrians entirely — was unmanned. The road to Damascus was now open.
Rami reached the capital at 1:30 a.m., nearly 30 hours after leaving Hiba and Pamela. His plan was to stay a few nights before heading north to Aleppo. On his first afternoon, he attended a somber gathering, a vigil of sorts, for the disappeared Syrians, who still number in the thousands. In silence, relatives stood holding their loved ones’ photos, demanding to know their fates. When Rami saw a young woman with her father’s picture, he thought of Pamela, imagined her in such a situation and realized he didn’t have it in him to delay.
It would take him another 10 hours to make the 220-mile trip to his city, just on the other side of the border from Gaziantep. He was in an old car, and the road had no lights, no signs. “It was like a horror film,” he says. When he arrived at the entrance of Aleppo, again at midnight, there was no electricity, so the city was completely dark. It didn’t matter. “The beauty was, I didn’t need GPS,” he says. “I know all the roads.” He memorialized the moment, filming it on his phone. In the footage, he can be heard laughing hysterically, interrupted by gasps that could be sobs.