Latest news with #DamascusUniversity
Los Angeles Times
3 days ago
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
A Syrian American returned to Syria to aid his ailing father. He was executed in sectarian violence
SWEIDA, Syria — The first video opens with Hosam Saraya, a 35-year-old Syrian American and seven other members of his family, walking in a procession down a street, their hands placed on the shoulders of the person in front of them, escorted by gunmen wearing fatigues and waving assault rifles. One of the gunmen says, 'We gave you safe passage,' while others shout religious slogans. Another video shot on July 16 cuts to Saraya and his relatives kneeling in the middle of a roundabout. One of the gunmen speaks to a family member, his voice becoming more menacing as his anger mounts. Then the shooting starts, and Saraya and the others collapse to the ground. Saraya, a member of the Druze religious minority, was living in Oklahoma but had returned to the family home in the Druze-majority city of Sweida to take care of his ill father, relatives said. 'His father improved, and Hosam was supposed to come back to Oklahoma in a month. We're in complete disbelief and shock,' said one U.S.-based relative who refused to be identified, fearing reprisals against her family in Syria. 'We just never thought something like this could happen to us.' Saraya studied finance and accounting at Damascus University before moving to the U.S. in 2014, where he earned an MBA at Oklahoma Christian University. Afterward, he worked as an operations manager at a senior home care company and became a U.S. citizen. He was unmarried. Saraya was among an estimated 1,380 people killed in a spasm of sectarian violence that swept through Sweida this month, when fighting between Bedouin clansmen and Druze militiamen escalated into armed clashes that drew in Syria's fledgling government and Israel, which said it intervened to protect the Druze community. Government forces were supposed to quash any fighting between Bedouins and Druze, residents and Saraya's neighbors say. Instead they left behind a trail of looting, burning homes and the execution of more than 230 civilians, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitor. This week, Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) said he was 'heartbroken' by the death of Saraya, who he said 'was an Oklahoman ... tragically executed alongside other members of his family in Syria.' Relatives in the U.S. said they had been interviewed by the FBI. The Syrian government has yet to reach out to the family here, but said it would hold all government forces accountable for violations. The violence, the third round of sectarian violence to hit Syria since the new Islamist government toppled longtime President Bashar Assad nine months ago, threatens to bring about the disintegration of a country struggling to move on from its 14-year civil war. At the Saraya home in Sweida, signs of the violence are everywhere — walls pockmarked by shrapnel from a hand grenade and family pictures and mirrors cracked by bullet holes. Sitting morosely in the midst of the destruction, one of his relatives, Dima Saraya, 41, recounted what she described as a living nightmare that left her a widow. Most of the family was sleeping when gunmen in fatigues surrounded the house around 6 a.m., shooting the lock off the gate before breaking into the house. Woken up by the commotion, the men told the women and children to stay inside while they went out to stop the gunmen. 'They didn't have any weapons. If they did, those people would have killed them on the spot,' Dima said, adding that one of the fighters, who identified himself as Abu Jaafar, said he was part of the government's General Security apparatus and that they should come with him. When the men refused to go, the fighters responded with a spray of bullets, a hand grenade, and two RPGs to the upper floor. They decided to surrender and as Saraya and the others filed out, Dima and the others ran outside, crying and pleading that the men stay. One of the fighters pointed his rifle at Dima's chest and told her to go inside before he shot her. Later, Dima said, after the gunmen finished searching the house, their leader reassured her, 'Don't worry. We won't hurt them. In two hours — or by morning — they'll be back. I promise they'll be safe.' 'By then he had already killed them,' Dima said. After the gunmen left, others soon followed. Each time a new group came, they accused the family of hiding weapons and searched the house. Each time they looted: One fighter demanded the gold necklace on Dima's neck and the jewelry from the other women. Another asked for the keys to one of the cars downstairs. Yet another, in a fit of rage, threatened to rape Dima. By the time the last band of fighters arrived, it was 2:30 in the afternoon. They said they would execute everyone in the house, Dima said, but then one of the fighters said, 'Leave them. There are pretty women among them.' They again demanded jewelry or car keys, but Dima replied that there was nothing left to take. When the fighters went outside to continue looting, Dima and 14 other family members ran to a neighbor's house and locked the door, staying silent and hoping they wouldn't be noticed. 'We didn't dare go out to search for anyone. We were too terrified,' Dima said. That night, as videos of the killings — many of them gleefully taken by the gunmen themselves as they tortured and executed Druze — surfaced on social media, the Saraya family looked for signs of their loved ones. It wasn't till the next morning that someone came to the door and told them to come collect the bodies of their relatives. That task fell to another relative, Mutassem Jbaai. 'Each body had more than 50 bullet holes. There was blood everywhere. It was like they were mangled,' he said, wincing at the memory. The U.S. State Department said on Thursday it was having direct discussions with the Syrian government on Saraya's killing, and that it called for 'an immediate investigation,' according to department deputy spokesman Tommy Pigott. 'Hosam and his family deserve justice, and those responsible for this atrocity must be held accountable,' Pigott said. Yet among the Saraya family, few believe the Syrian government will do anything to bring justice. They point to earlier bouts of sectarian bloodshed that have gone unpunished. 'We can't live like this. When Assad fell, we had a bit of hope and gave them a chance,' said the U.S.-based relative. 'But as the saying goes, 'once a terrorist, always a terrorist.' '
Local Sweden
11-07-2025
- Business
- Local Sweden
Employer demanding Swedish dental degree ordered to pay damages
A man with a foreign dental degree was rejected for two jobs in Sweden, despite the fact that he had completed additional training in Sweden to qualify for a Swedish dental license. Now, both employers have been ordered to pay damages. Advertisement The man, who had a dental degree from Damascus University, was taken out of the running for two dentist jobs by a recruitment firm, which cited the fact that his foreign dental degree made him ineligible. After arriving in Sweden, the man had undertaken additional training at Gothenburg University and subsequently qualified for a Swedish dental license, allowing him to practice in Sweden. According to the Equality Ombudsman (DO), his rejections were discriminatory, and both employers have now been ordered to pay the man 40,000 kronor each. "Everyone who has a Swedish dental license should have equal opportunity to work as a dentist in Sweden," Karin Ahlstrand Oxhamre, the head of DO's legal unit, wrote in a statement. "Taking people out of the running because of the country they studied in stops people who came to Sweden with a foreign degree from joining the labour market on equal terms," she added. Advertisement According to DO, the requirement to hold a Swedish dental degree was discriminatory, as it specifically disadvantaged people who hold a Swedish dental license but who came to Sweden as adults from abroad who have foreign qualifications. "DO believes that the requirement does not have a legitimate purpose, nor is it appropriate or necessary," the statement reads. The ombudsman determined that the employers were responsible for discriminating the applicant, and they have until the middle of August to pay damages, else risk the case being escalated to the Labour Court.
Yahoo
09-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Syria's Druze divided as sectarian tensions linger after violence
Instability has plagued Syria in the past two weeks after fighting broke out in two of Damascus's suburbs and a southern governorate, drawing in government forces and non-state armed factions. Using the unrest as a pretext, Israel also launched attacks on several locations in Syria. The fighting and the Israeli attacks add to the difficulties faced by Syria's new government – which only came to power after the fall of longtime dictator Bashar al-Assad – as it attempts to rebuild Syria after nearly 14 years of war. The violence of that war has not fully subsided. Instead, the recent fighting has taken on a sectarian character, though locals also told Al Jazeera that some actors were motivated by power as they try to carve out spheres of influence in the new recent clashes began on April 28 in the town of Jaramana, on the outskirts of Damascus, before spreading to nearby Ashrafiyat Sahnaya and the southern governorate of Sweida, where many of the country's Druze population live. All of the areas have significant Druze populations, and the violence began after attackers were incensed by a blasphemous audio recording criticising the Prophet Muhammad, attributed to a religious leader from the minority group. The religious leader denied the recording was in his voice, and an investigation by Syria's Ministry of the Interior has concurred. But it mattered little, as fighting between local armed Druze groups and outsiders began. The violence was followed by several Israeli attacks, including one near Syria's presidential palace in Damascus. Syria's government called it a 'dangerous escalation'. Israel's military has struck Syria hundreds of times since the fall of al-Assad, while Syria has yet to retaliate and has indicated that it has been involved in non-direct talks with Israel to calm the situation. Israel has attempted to portray its latest attacks in Syria as evidence that it is a defender of the Druze, many of whom live in Israel. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a joint statement with Defense Minister Israel Katz, saying the attack was 'a clear message to the Syrian regime: We will not allow [Syrian] forces to deploy south of Damascus or any threat to the Druze community.' But many officials in Syria's Druze community have expressed an openness to working with the new authority in Damascus and denied Israel's overtures that claim to protect them. Sources told Al Jazeera that these recent clashes have not altered that view on Israel. 'Israel is protecting its own interests,' Ali Jarbou, a professor at Damascus University and a member of a prominent Druze family, told Al Jazeera. 'They are not protecting anyone. Not the Druze or anyone else.' Experts have said Israel prefers to have weak states on its borders, and is therefore attacking Syria to weaken the new government and prevent it from exercising its power over the whole country. Allying with regional minority groups may also appear attractive to some in Israel, although a similar strategy in the past, most notably in Lebanon during the 1975-1990 civil war, failed. But the Israeli government is also facing internal pressure to act from its own Druze community, the vast majority of whom are supportive of the Israeli state and serve in the Israeli army, despite being Druze community in the Middle East is split between Lebanon, Syria, Israel, and a small community in Jordan. They have played an influential role across these countries – in Syria, one of the leaders of the country's independence was a famous Druze named Sultan al-Atrash. Syria's Druze are mostly split between the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights and Mount Hermon, Sweida (in an area called Jabal al-Druze, or Mountain of the Druze), and a couple of Damascus's suburbs, while there is also a small community near Idlib. Syrians in the occupied Golan Heights live under Israeli authority but most have rejected offers of Israeli citizenship. They've also historically been able to keep ties to Syria, sometimes studying in Damascus or marrying across the border, according to Tobias Lang, director of the Austrian Centre for Peace, who has extensively studied the Druze community in the Levant. The Druze in Syria are, however, 'very fragmented politically', Lang said, due to years of life under the al-Assad dictatorship. 'No distinct Druze leadership was allowed to emerge, and the traditional leadership lost much of its power to the Baathist regime,' he said, referring to the Baath party, which ruled Syria from 1963 to 2024. During the war in Syria, competing voices emerged within the Druze community. Some, like Hikmat al-Hijri, the top Druze religious figure in Syria, initially supported the al-Assad regime. Others, like Wahid al-Balous, founder of the Men of Dignity Movement, split off from the regime much earlier and refused to send local men to die in support of the government. Al-Balous was later assassinated in 2015. Opposition figures blamed the regime. In 2023, when antigovernment protests erupted in Sweida, al-Hijri finally turned against al-Assad and supported the local opposition. Al-Hijri has also been sharply critical of the new Syrian authorities since the outbreak of violence last month, calling the attacks against the Druze a 'genocidal campaign'. 'We no longer trust a group that calls itself a government, because the government doesn't kill its own people through extremist gangs that are loyal to it, and after the massacre claims they are loose forces,' al-Hijri said. The Syrian government has denied any involvement in the attacks on the Druze, and has instead emphasised that its forces have sought to provide security and prevent any further sectarian struck between local actors and the new government at the start of this month have ended the fighting for now. But dozens of people had been killed, many civilians among them. In Jaramana, locals are still on high alert. 'We're scared of our neighbours,' a resident told Al Jazeera, requesting anonymity for fear of retaliation against them or their family. In the early days after the fall of al-Assad, places like Jaramana and Sweida were hesitant to work with the new Syrian government. Local leaders, some of whom are Druze notables, demanded a say in local governance and security matters. But members of the Druze community have now been working with the central authority in Damascus to calm tensions, resolve disputes, and negotiate security arrangements. Some of those agreements will see locals join the new government's internal security force and police their own areas under the central government's authority. Still, locals are on edge after the clashes and fear they could restart. Locals told Al Jazeera that some Syrians, particularly from minority sects like the Druze, have had their faith in the new central authority shaken. 'Trust [in the new government] began to decrease after the events on the coast,' Jarbou said, referring to attacks in early March on Alawite – another minority community – in the coastal region after government forces were attacked. Hundreds were killed, many of them civilians, and while the government quickly announced an investigation into the attacks, the violence provided evidence for those fearful of the new order in Syria. That is perhaps understandable after 14 years of war and more than five decades of brutal dictatorship. 'In other words, we can say that the war hasn't stopped,' Jarbou said, adding that a serious, participatory political solution is needed for the country. Should that not come to pass, the current pattern of clashes and increased communal tensions will only worsen. 'Sedition is raging,' he said. 'It's not that we're afraid of sedition. We're in sedition now.'
Al Bawaba
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Al Bawaba
Syrian series leads to dismissal and investigation of three officials
Published April 25th, 2025 - 12:04 GMT ALBAWABA - Three Damascus University officials were removed after unauthorized filming of the series "Under the Seventh Earth" sparked major controversy. "Under the Seventh Earth" is a television series that ultimately results in the removal of three Syrian government officials. At Damascus University, three officials have been removed from their positions by an investigating commission of the Syrian government. They were found guilty of assisting the shooting of sequences from the series "Under the Seventh Earth" at its offices without authorization, which is a case that has created enormous controversy during the course of its investigation and prosecution. When the director of the Damascus University Classification Office, Marwan Al-Rai, filed his resignation last month, he did so in protest at the breaching of his office lock and the shooting of scenes from the series there without his approval. This brought the problem to light on the previous month. "Under the Seventh Earth" Al-Rai said that the inquiry committee that was looking into the storming of the classification office in order to shoot the television series during the month of Ramadan carried out the conclusions of the investigation yesterday, Thursday, by removing three directors from their posts at Damascus University. The director of security at the university is one of the directors that was fired, according to Al-Rai, who shared this information on his Facebook account. مدير التصنيف في جامعة دمشق، مروان الراعي، كشف عن أمر غير مستحب، بسبب مسلسل 'تحت سابع أرض' للفنان السوري تيم حسن ومواطنته الممثلة كاريس بشار، والذي تم تصوير أحد مشاهده في داخل مكتبه، مما أدى لضياع أوراق مهمة لها علاقة بملف التقديم إلى اعتمادية الاتحاد الأوروبي. — Souria Post - سوريا بوست (@souriapost) April 6, 2025 He stated that the inquiry demonstrated that the three directors were involved in aiding the admission of the staff of the series and left them alone to break and remove the lock, which led to the loss of university accreditation files in addition to other data. According to him, the investigation established that the three directors were involved. A month ago, Al-Ra'i said that the classification office, whose door was smashed down and the cast entered, had "more than 157,550 pieces of university data and information, in addition to exam papers whose results are awaited by university students." This information was disclosed when Al-Ra'i submitted his resignation. In his letter of resignation, he also gave further information regarding the event, including the fact that the office was emptied of its belongings while the series was being filmed inside. This past Ramadan, the television series "Under the Seventh Earth" was shown. Among the actors who appear in it are Tim Hassan, Karis Bashar, Mona Wassef, Anas Tayara, Joan Khader, Sarah Baraka, Majd Fadda, and Tayseer Idris. The script was written by Omar Abu Saada, and Samer Al-Barqawi was the director of the film. The events that take place in "Under the Seventh Earth" take place in the present day in Syria. They focus on themes of social strife and corruption in a neighborhood in Damascus that is inhabited by people of working-class backgrounds, as well as the suffering of Syrians who are forced to live in very terrible circumstances. © 2000 - 2025 Al Bawaba (
Rudaw Net
05-04-2025
- Politics
- Rudaw Net
Syria's first Kurdish education minister works to bridge gaps with Rojava
Also in Syria Kurdish forces launch anti-ISIS operation in Syria detention camp Syria says Amnesty ignored context in Alawite killings Rojava doctors meet UK health secretary 'We do not exist without the olive tree': Afrin groves still under the axe A+ A- ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Syria's new education minister, the only Kurd in the cabinet, wants to bridge gaps between the federal education system and the one in northeast Syria (Rojava) that operated independently for 13 years during the civil war. 'The certificates of those who obtained their credentials between 2011 and 2024 should be accepted,' Mohammad Turko told Rudaw's Dilbixwin Dara on Tuesday. Kurdish authorities in Rojava developed their own curriculum in areas they controlled, rejecting the national one in place at the time that they said promoted Baathist ideology. They also promoted Kurdish as a language of instruction for the first time. While acknowledging the technical difficulties of aligning the Rojava curriculum with national standards, Turko vowed to develop a plan for certificate equivalency. The issue has become increasingly urgent for thousands of students in Rojava. Turko explained that recognizing these certificates would allow students from Rojava to enroll in Damascus University and other Syrian institutions. He also pointed to logistical obstacles faced by students in Rojava, who are often forced to travel to distant governorates to sit for baccalaureate exams for grades nine and 12. 'All of them cannot be expected to travel to other governorates to take their exams,' he said. Among his stated priorities are improving teaching quality, rebuilding schools, and integrating more than 2.5 million displaced children back into the education system. On the issue of mother-tongue education, Turko expressed support for cultural and linguistic rights. 'Language is the identity of a nation,' he said, noting that many Kurds would have expectations of him. 'I am the minister for all Syrian children,' he added. 'Every child has the right to learn.' He said that Syria's constitution guarantees language freedoms and framed Kurdish-language education as a cultural right. However, he tempered expectations by noting that practical implementation would require 'work and agreements.' Born in the Kurdish city of Afrin in northwest Syria in 1979, Turko holds a law degree from Damascus University and a doctorate from Leipzig University. He has published extensively on child rights, citizenship, and education, and has taught at several Syrian universities. Turko was appointed Minister of Education and Learning in late March by interim Syrian President Ahmad Sharaa as part of a new 23-member cabinet. The appointments have raised eyebrows, with ethnic and religious communities voicing concern over the lack of consultation. The cabinet includes several controversial figures, including individuals blacklisted by the United Nations and the United States for ties to extremist armed groups. Among them are Anas Khattab, a former intelligence chief named interior minister, and Mazhar al-Wais, a senior Sharia judge from Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), appointed justice minister. 'I am a Kurdish technocrat minister in this government,' Turko said. 'I am not a representative of a political party or political force.'
