Tag: Homs

Syrian village bombed: five children under 15 – three from same family – among 12 killed

September 11, 2018 Syria Al-Qaeda, Children, Civil War, Free Syrian Army, Greek Orthodox, Homs, Idlib, Syria

The children were still playing in the streets on Friday night. Then the rebels bombed the village. On Saturday, they should have celebrated a wedding in Mhardeh, a Christian village in northwest Syria. Instead they had to carry ten of their own to the grave; two more later died in . . . Read More

Syria: Report highlights ‘brutality against Christian clerics’, with five still missing

June 26, 2018 Syria Aleppo, Boulos Yazigi, Greek Orthodox, Homs, Kidnapping, Paolo Dall’Oglio, Qatana, Syria, Yohanna Ibrahim

Fr. Paolo Dall’Oglio, a Jesuit priest who was abducted in Syria in July 2013, is one of the clerics who disappeared and whose fate remains unknown. (Photo: veDro via Flickr / Creative Commons)

A report about violence against Syrian church leaders during the ongoing civil war shows that clerics have been beaten, abducted – five are still missing – and killed, and that 2013 was the worst year. In ‘The Good Shepherd: A Report on Brutality against Christian Clerics in Syria March 25, . . . Read More

Can the Scouts help safeguard the future of the Church in Syria?

May 17, 2018 Syria Children, Churches, Damascus, Greek Orthodox, Homs, IDPs, Refugees, Syria, Women, Youth

As the war in Syria enters its eighth year, clergy who have watched their congregations dwindle fear that those who have left the country may not return. One priest expressed his fear that “Christianity will be erased” from certain areas of the country “because the Christians who left these places . . . Read More

Syria: more families return to Homs

May 16, 2018 Syria Civil War, Homs, IDPs, Migrants, Refugees, Syria

Hundreds of people displaced from Syria’s third largest city of Homs because of years of violent conflict will soon be returning home, according to the Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN). Homs saw some of the first protests of the Syrian conflict back in 2011 and in the years that . . . Read More

Syria: Homs Christians return to rebuild homes and lives

December 5, 2017 Syria Homs, Iraq, Islamic extremism, Islamic State, Syria

Basima in her renovated kitchen. (Photo: World Watch Monitor)

Syrians who fled the city of Homs five years ago are slowly returning to rebuild their homes and lives. Much of Syria’s third largest city has been destroyed, but Maha says she is just “so happy” to be back. With her husband and her sister, she recently returned to live . . . Read More

Security not only concern for Syrians returning home

July 4, 2017 Syria Aleppo, Damascus, Homs, IDPs, Islamic State, Maaloula, Migrants, Refugees, Trauma, UN

As Islamic State forces are pushed back and more areas declared “safe”, Syrians are starting to return to their homes. According to the UN’s Refugee Agency (the UNHCR), nearly half a million have gone back since January. Around 440,000 internally displaced people, and more than 31,000 refugees who had fled . . . Read More

‘Coming back’ – a poem scribbled on a church wall in Homs

November 15, 2016 Syria Homs, Maaloula

Time has almost faded the message written on a church wall in Homs by someone who, like thousands of others, presumably had to flee the city quickly for safety or survival. The Syrian city, 166km north of Damascus, was soon taken over by Islamic fighters. Fierce fighting made living in . . . Read More

ISIS loses Syrian town with Christian legacy

April 5, 2016 Syria Homs, Islamic State, Jacques Mourad, Paolo Dall’Oglio, Qaryatain, Syria

The Syrian government has claimed victory over the Islamic State in Qaryatain, a Syrian town with a notable Christian presence. “Army units, backed by the Syrian and Russian Air Forces, restored security to Qaryatain and the farms surrounding it in south-eastern Homs,” . Islamic State’s apparent loss of Qaryatain comes . . . Read More

10 Assyrians released after ‘negotiations’

November 25, 2015 Syria Assyrians, Hasakah, Homs, Islamic State, Khabur, Qaryatain, Syria

The Islamic State has released 10 more Assyrians, from over 200 indigenous Christians it had snatched from their communities in north eastern Syria in February. The civilians, five men and five women, were released Tuesday evening, the Assyrian Human Rights Network (AHRN) reported. The released hostages, from Tel Shamiram, Tel Jazeera, . . . Read More

Forces rally to defend Christian Syrian town from IS

November 16, 2015 Syria Assyrians, Homs, Islamic State, Qaryatain, Sadad, Syria

Efforts are being rallied to save one of the last remaining centres of indigenous Christian presence in the Levant against a renewed jihadi attack. Militants of the theologically-based “Islamic State” have come within 3 kilometres of the Syriac Orthodox town of Sadad in western Syria, the Assyrian International News Agency . . . Read More

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