Zahra Ziad met her in-laws for the first time when she moved in with them. Ten days after the former president of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, was ousted in December last year, she crossed from Turkey into Syria and travelled with her three small children to join her husband’s family. Her husband, Mahmoud al-Khader, saw them off at the border. He promised to join them in a year.
Ziad, 24, and al-Khader, 29, had spent the last nine years living in exile in Turkey. They had long hoped to return to northwest Syria. “Once the regime fell, we knew we had to start planning for the future,” al-Khader said.
But there are few work opportunities in Syria, where the economy and infrastructure have been devastated by 14 years of civil war. Safety is also a concern. Israel has conducted airstrikes across the country in the past months, militias killed hundreds in coastal areas in March, and the new regime is still in the process of consolidating its control.
