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syria

:ID: BE234E49-5E49-4054-8308-6EDDCA766FAB

Tags: middle east

  • Supreme Sharia Judge as of April 26, 2020 is Mahmoud al-Maarawi

  • “Rifaat argues to this day that he, not Bashar, should have succeeded to the presidency of Syria upon Hafez’s death in 2000, but he does his arguing from France, where it surprisingly doesn’t have much effect.” (Today in Middle Eastern History: The Hama Massacre Begins)

Lafarge

Travels (Jan 19th - Feb 2nd, 2025)

  • Sayyida Zaineb
    • Jan 21st
    • surburbs are destroyed, lots of bombed out buildings
    • Women and children primarily in the shrine, lots of children palying. Largely normal, but less amount of people
    • Quran class being held on some days
    • Funerals
    • Lack of smells, no incense or guards
    • Lots of security around the shrine
    • Not huge, actually around the same size as al-hur
    • Had a section for buying sweets but they closed it down
    • Two spires, not sure if there’s a library
    • Met an uigur
    • Hard to tell who was official shrine security or not
    • Dudes with guns, shops and other suburbs similar to Karbala
      • Lots of poor and disabled
    • Jan 23rd
      • Exchange shops, lots of lines around the exchange itself
      • Bread lines too, lots of people walking around and selling bread in damascus and the suburbs
        • Alaa said it was “conutry people”
    • Jan 24th
      • No majlis or anything at sayyida zaineb
      • Nothing planned, met Ahmed from Homs
      • Many people come for juma3
    • Jan 25th
      • Bread lines around zaineb
      • Quran class
      • generators not in the neighborhood, not many solar panels either
      • Two other shrines: mashad al-nuqta in Haleb and another one in Raqqa
      • Chinese resturant in Cham Hotel
  • Sayyida Ruqeyya
  • Mashad al Nuqta
  • SIM card stuff
    • #111* for buying baq
    • #110* for checking credit
    • MTN store in Jaramana has the shortest line
      • Need passport and entry card
  • Damascus
  • Haleb
    • Jan 30th
      • Graveyard sacked near masjid al-raees
      • Mashad al-Nuqta was closed
      • Visited the grave of Mohsin
  • Lattakia
    • Bridges have the la ila il allah sign
    • Fears about uncertain future, how much longer can you wait?
    • Withdrawal limitations forcing salaries to electronic payments
    • Lattakia is very green
    • People who built careers are questioning leaving?
    • Notable fears around the stability of the new government
    • No one is working!
    • Presidential speech good, but not convincing
    • Electricity is for two hours a day, everyone has a solar panel and battery, but issues otherwise
      • Iraq has more generator cause the cost of fuel is much cheaper
    • Soft digitization of money via capital controls
    • Sanctions -> what happens?
    • Bolman is the name of an old bus company
    • Influx of people from the country side
    • Lattakia weed good
    • people are clearly poor, haleb and damsacus have harder issues with electricity, but there’s some other stuff
    • former minister was waiting in the passport line to go to dubai, not everyone was purged, beyond the mukhabarat most people see ministers asnot an active participant in the system

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