Justice & Accountability

The deeper we dug with Tim into the stories of joy coupled with the losses, of hopes nipped in the bud yet re-emerging, the more we were convinced that this way, of not only sharing impressions but displaying the sweet and sour broader context of the reality behind these photos, really matters. For that, we paired Tim with Syrian writer and rapper Hani Al Sawah whose words helped create a personal narrative telling the story. The collaborative work speaks volumes about civilians doing what any civilian should be doing - living. Buying and selling. Diving into the unknown. Fishing. Barbecuing. Celebrating weddings and public holidays. Or for children: learning at school or simply spending time at a playground.

Kristina Lunz and Nina Bernarding, who are leading the Centre for Feminist Foreign Policy in Germany explain why a peaceful world will remain an utopia without a feminist foreign policy.

The anticipated military offensive in Idlib was averted by a Russian-Turkish agreement. But that does not mean the issue is solved. Even if Turkey managed to accomplish disarming extremist groups - what to do with them? And to what extent does the deal show the deal satisfy the different stakeholders' interests?

The Right to Belong to a Political Community: Syrian refugees in Lebanon face difficulties in their legal status and in the possibilities they have to claim rights. The reasons are complex and go far beyond the Lebanese context, however, that most of them are illegal is crucial since revealing themselves to the authority with any claim is a risk. Antonia Klein studied the impact of gaps in international law adapting to the world refugee situation and looks at patterns in Lebanon.

While Berlin is contemplating secure borders, the Syrian regime has embarked on its next campaign to exacerbate the suffering of refugees. Bashar al-Assad considers them little more than a weapon.

When the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London stated in 2013 that the Syrian army’s strength had been severely compromised and had fallen to about half its original size, the institute may have simply applied an incorrect scale. Perhaps the strength of the Syrian army is not measured in its numbers but rather in the amount of household appliances a soldier can carry.

On paper, the slaughtering in Syria has long drawn to a close. Yet neither the regime nor Russia is keen on setting an end to the incessant killing. And the world stands by idle. first published in German on 27/02/2018 by Zeit Online

Alex Rowell from Al-Jumhuriya speaks to Dr. Bente Scheller, director of the Heinrich Böll Foundation's Middle East office, on the recent German elections and their likely impact on European Syria policy, the ongoing debate over Western participation in the future reconstruction of Syria, threats faced by Syrian refugees both in Europe and here in the Middle East, recent military developments against ISIS and other actors in Syria’s east and north, and much more.

No matter how complex and religiously driven the conflict in Syria may seem, its basic constellation is this: A regime with powerful allies wages a war of annihilation against wide parts of its own population. How could it get to this point? And what is the very least we can do?

  Haid Haid on Transitional Justice in Syria - Heinrich Böll Foundation Beirut - Middle East Watch on YouTube This external content requires your consent. Please note our privacy policy.   Transitional justice is an essential element of sustainable peace. How successfully have Syrian NGOs been working on this matter? What can be done to support them? And where to go from here? We are delighted Haid N Haid will be discussing these matters in Beirut this Monday! Join us at Antwork at 7pm.

Over the past years, tens of thousands of men, women and children in Syria havee become subject to forced disappearances in Syria. All armed factions in Syria engage in arrests, abductions and human rights violations but none does so as systematcially as the Syrian regime. Despite its accession to the international convention against torture in 2004, conditions in regime prisons are excruciating. On July 12, the European Council for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR) and Heinrich Boell Stiftung Berlin screened the film "Syria's Disappeared" in which survivors of Syrian prisons and relatives of some tortured to death speak out.

A project-installation by Andrea Monras that revisits Beirut and Berlin today in relation to their similar tumultuous paths July 04, 2017 starting 7pm and running until July 10. Mansion- Zoukak el-Blatt Beirut, Lebanon

  Crime, Perpetrators and those implicated in the conflict in Syria (1/3) - Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Watch on YouTube This external content requires your consent. Please note our privacy policy. Where can we begin to seek for justice in a war that sees violations of basic human rights committed by almost all conflicting parties? In our conference “How to do Justice? Accountability for Mass Atrocities in Syria” we invited panelists from different fields of expertise to find answers to this very urgent question.

When so-called ‘Islamic State’ (ISIS) fighters were reported to have blasted and bulldozed the ancient Assyrian site of Nimrud into the ground last year, the rest of the world lined up to condemn its actions. One ISIS militant, engaged in the destruction of Assyrian antiquities in the Mosul museum, told the camera ‘we were ordered by our prophet to take down idols and destroy them.’

These days, to ask what effect the Arab Spring had on women is to pose a question which seems ridiculous, irrelevant almost, given the bloody and brutal outcomes of revolutions in countries such as Syria, Libya and Yemen, and the ongoing repercussions of the uprising in Egypt, which leave no room for doubt that the dreams of the millions who demonstrated in Egypt's Tahrir Square in 2011 chanting ‘Bread, Liberty and Social Justice’ and calling for ‘Dignity and Freedom’ widespread in Syria, Libya and Yemen, have become terrifying nightmares which have touched on the lives of all members of society. But the progressive feminist movement across the Middle East is recovering from a particularly traumatic ride, and are finding they are being forced to fight again on issues which were on the table at the very birth of the movement and were felt by many to have been reconciled.

Heinrich Böll Stiftung Middle East cordially invites you to celebrate the launch of the 10th issue of our regional magazine Perspectives! Wednesday, November 2, 2016 at 19.00 Venue: The Crypt, Monot, Beirut

Although the concept of borders has a long history, a definition remains quite ambiguous. It relies on a multitude of complex socio-political and economic elements that are at times contradictory. This is primarily due to the difficulty in establishing the shape and function of borders, since they are constantly changing and evolving. Thus, the concept of borders changes as you move between academic disciplines. There are a number of diverse approaches to the concept and each field employs ideas and philosophies specific to it; whether that is historical, geographical, political, sociological, anthropological, psychological or other, it is evident that there is no single definition. Nevertheless, the notion of the border relies heavily on John Locke’s notion of natural law and the demarcation of private property rights. It is a concept at the heart of knowledge production in the social sciences and has currency in the field of international relations.

We see them daily in the news. Masses of black bodies, cramped together on unseaworthy boats, bodies in rags lying, helpless, exhausted, on the white sand. No face. No name. Such images reproduce, time and again, an imaginary of the invasion of Europe by its radical ‘Other’; an imaginary that, in turn, justifies exceptional measures – the militarized and arbitrary government of migration. Here too, images are, identical, interchangeable: military ships, circling radars, men in uniforms and gloves intercepting desperate bodies. We see these images so often. There is nothing left to see or think; or do: both this ‘flow’ of people and the violent reaction of the state to the crossing of its borders seem unstoppable. Flip the page, zap. And yet it is precisely this ‘flow’ of people that I have sought to present differently: I’ll try to show that far from being a uni-directional, violent, and massive ‘invasion,’ the transnational migration of Sub-Saharan Africans in the Maghreb has evolved according to complex patterns, often over several years, and is shaped by multiple forms of agency and collaboration enacted by migrants.

Many a time, they will reminisce about a pre-revolutionary Syria, albeit a romanticised version, from which they – due to a lack of knowledge, ignorance or quite consciously – omit that the country already was a rogue state at that time, characterised by arbitrary arrests, torture, oppression and discrimination.

One year ago, Heinrich Böll Stiftung’s Beirut office did a research on the European Neighbourhood Policy and its perception in Lebanon. Views from the region on the performance of the European Union are important and it is particularly beneficial to see how experts and activists on the ground perceive the impact of it and take their recommendations on what could be improved and how. Therefore this year, we conducted interviews with a number of researchers and practitioners in Lebanon on specific issues – discussing with them specific findings of the EU’s own progress report and the latest press release of December 2015.

Lebanon has accepted more people in need per capita than all other states neighbouring Syria but never having acceded to the UN convention does not recognise them as refugees.

Many internally displaced people within Syria are being prevented from fleeing conflict zones due to fears over sleeper cells

Syria's five year war has cost up to 470,000 lives. Many survivors are plagued with guilt that their revolution has led to so much pain, says Haid Haid.

"Shelter" is a Beirut-based project that integrates a documentary on Bomb Shelters with space (a former bomb shelter). An audience-powered performance in the two-room shelter blurs lines between memory and the present, between image and physical surroundings in order to unearth a people's history of Lebanon's wars.

It has been common to frequently come across assassination incidents in local Syrian news, which turned them into expected news. The daily killing and atrocities committed in Syria contributed to normalizing this phenomenon not only internationally but locally as well. However, the scale of these incidents and their significant impact on the local dynamics of the conflict make the assassination war in Syria stand out as an important issue that can’t be ignored.

Since February 26, a truce has largely prevailed in Syria. However, hardly any improvements to the humanitarian situation in the country can be observed to date. People continue to suffer starvation. That is part of the war strategy.

Lebanese bureaucracy, traumatized people, and little international support: There are numerous day-to-day problems in Syrian refugee camps in Lebanon. Majd Chourbaji helps to solve them.

Of the 52 besieged areas mostly in rural Damascus, 49 of them are encircled by the Syrian regime, two by rebel forces and one by ISIS. Under siege, conditions are very uncertain—since starvation is being used as a weapon of war–therefore the situation in some of these areas could quickly turn into a critical situation if aid is completely cut off for a short amount of time.

The killing of Zahran Aloush, leader of one of the strongest rebel group in Syria — Jaysh al-Islam — on 26 December, by a Russian airstrike shows again that Russia is willing to do whatever it takes to tip the balance of the conflict in favor of the Assad regime.

Moscow is now preoccupied with bringing the strategy initiated by Bashar al-Assad to perfection: After the attempt to convince western states that the only alternatives to Assad are chaos and the “Islamic State” fell through, the powers in the centre are to be weakened and to be virtually driven into the arms of the “IS”.

“It's clear that Ahrar al-Sham have recruited the PR agency we've dreamed of for so long, ever since the beginning of the uprising.” This is what a Syrian activist wrote on his Facebook page right after Labib al-Nahhas, foreign affairs director at Ahrar al-Sham, published an article in The Telegraph on 21 July. The article followed another by Nahhas in the Washington Post on 10 July.

In 2011, Syrian people demonstrated for dignity and freedom. Nowadays religious extremism spreads all over country. How do these opposites go together? A conference organized by Sharq and Zico house in Beirut tried to figure out how deeply rooted religious extremism is in the Syrian society. In what way was Syrian society susceptible to the religious extremism that it is facing today? Did people in Syria become more conservative over the years? Or do other priorities such as security distort the image on what actually might be the future of Syria? Fouad M. Fouad, Syrian poet, medical doctor and AUB professor, Dr. Bente Scheller, Director of Heinrich Böll Foundation (Middle East) and Christoph Reuter, journalist at Der Spiegel  and ISIS expert, discuss the issue with Reem Maghribi.

Though the anger towards the Southern Front is still not alarming yet- as people are criticizing their strategy not the SF itself- this could be the beginning of a significant shift in its community support, which could be used by its rivals.

Some of the most devastaing attacks of the airforce killed scores of civilians last week: incendiary weapons were used in Daraya, and bombing Douma's market place killed over 80 and inured more than 100 people. What about the "safe zone" Turkey and the US have been announcing?

Image credits   Objects are, depending on the situation you find yourself in, more than mere objects. For those who leave their home in a hast, who leave for good and to an uncertain future, something that they brought from home might be a line to connect them to their old life and habits, to their family and an environment that they are not part of any longer – or that ceased to exist. Photographer Marta Bogdanska met Syrian refugees and asked them to show her an object or a memory that still connects them to their former lives and share their stories around this object. Someone has a favourite sweater. Another one scars reminding him what he went through to reach where he is. Somebody else a trivial plastic lighter. The exhibition was first shown in Beirut in May 2015 and now is on display here.

The stronger the competing Islamist terrorist militias of IS and the Nusra Front become, and the more brutal Syria's civil war gets, the easier it is for the Syrian regime to portray itself as the sole force capable of protecting the country's civilians.

Though it might seem as if Druze are in a position in which they have no good options, some of their options could prove, in the long-term, to be better than others.

The conflict dynamics and development in Syria are strongly determined by the different groups' access to certain areas. Some have been able to turn problems into opportunities.

There are many obstacles on the way to peace in Syria. What about Jabhat al-Nusra, a pragmatic group with an extreme ideology?

A no-fly zone is no solution for the conflict in Syria, but it would help save the lives of hundreds of people every month - and less people would be forced to seek refuge somewhere else. Read here one of the contributions to re-open the debate.

Cease fires, in the current situation, can neither achieve their objectives nor lead to a political solution to the conflict in Syria.

Watch the video of the panel "Refugees and the responsibility of the West", featuring among others George Ghali from the Lebanese organization ALEF - act for human rights, journalist Gabriele del Grande, UNHCR's Hans ten Feld and German official Christian Klos, with German journalist Kristin Helberg as moderator.

In her first documentary, Tamara Qiblawi together with Knooz Room explores the sealed memories of a teacher, a literature professor and writer and a DJ. While she takes them down to revisit the shelters and re-live the atmosphere, the protagonists take the audience on a travel through history.

In an attempt to limit Syrian immigration to Lebanon, visa requirements have been introduced - an absurd and moreover dangerous measure. This is a first in the history of the two countries. Before this change in legislation, it was sufficient for Syrians to present their ID card when crossing the border.

The regime is well aware of the impact of fear, of death due to random bombardment, on the life style of Syrians in areas outside its control, where everyone is too preoccupied with minute-to-minute survival to think of the future.

Syrians and their supporters who continue to cling to hope and believe in the justice of this revolution—that they still insist on calling a revolution— have other narratives which tell us that behind the map of warring fascist ideologies lies the truth that our country has never in its history done anything better than entering into this revolution.

If you cannot overthrow the tyrant, co-operate with him – after four disastrous years in Syria this seems to be the conclusion the international community has arrived at. While back in 2011 Bashar al-Assad’s days appeared to be drawing to a close, a growing number of people are now suggesting to see him as part of the solution, as illustrated recently by UN Special Envoy Staffan de Mistura in Vienna.

“It must be now clear to western defence chiefs that there is only one credible fighting force on the ground capable of fighting ISIS and that is the Syrian military. The Syrians [i.e. the Syrian regime] have held all the aces up their sleeve…” Such proposals are commonplace in diplomatic circles, but what is new this time is that this view is no longer limited to Assad’s supporters and allies.

Less refugees are crossing Syria's borders. Not because the situation is improving - but because less people have the possibility to flee. And some are determined to stay, even if it means risking their life. On internally displaced persons in Syria.

Conmemoration of a terrible incident on the shore of the Queik river: Ahtletes in Aleppo remember the dead.

Amid the general helplessness in the West, voices to approve a cooperation with Bashar al-Assad are becoming stronger. Whatever aspirations one may have for a cooperation with the regime, neither an end to the war nor safety will be gained through it.

There's little hope for an improvement of the Syrian situation. Nonetheless, there are civil society activists who are still working on non-violent resistance and democratic change. Sarah Schwahn conducted interviews with many of them to see what motivates them to continue.

Generally speaking, Lebanon takes a relaxed approach to problems, either denying they exist or playing them down, only to draw up policies once reality hits home and the problem has reached crisis point.

Can the universal appeal of Ancient Greek drama render the current Syrian tragedy intelligible? Antigone of Syria – an eight-week theatrical workshop for Syrian refugee women from the Beirut camps of Sabra, Shatila and Bourj el-Barajneh – shows that it can. On December 10th, 11th and 12th, their interpretation of Sophocles’ tragedy was performed at the Al Madina Theatre in Beirut. It unfolded stories of loss and despair which go beyond what seems bearable for the human soul – but even more so, it was homage to the courage, non conformism and revolt of these women. It was homage to their unabated hope for a better future. Get an impression of these evenings’ atmosphere by reading our press review.

Antigone of Syria is the latest project of the internationally acclaimed Syrian playwright Mohammad Al Attar. Can the universal appeal of Ancient Greek drama render the current Syrian tragedy intelligible? The Aperta Productions-team – director Omar Abusaada, actors’ trainers Hala Omran and Dina Mousawi – took the challenge: by offering an eight-week theatrical workshop, he gives a voice to Syrian refugee women from the Beirut camps of Sabra, Shatila and Bourj el-Barajneh.

For IS murder is a political act. But is also a performance--a spectacle as a means to amplify its message. The ritual act of murder, especially of a westerner, is certain to receive media coverage. IS uses this to rudely force attention.

Lebanon has opened its doors to more than 20 times as many refugees as the whole European Union. How do refugees take decisions to move to an uncertain future? What difficulties do they face?

The world, it seems, looks paralyzed at the Syrian conflict. On the humanitarian side every cent is critically looked at because it could fall into the 'wrong hands'. The political and military complexities are enhanced by external parties of which each seeks to work on a single issue in the conflict. On November 5, 2014 hbs Berlin held a conference on Syria. Read here the keynote of Dr. Bente Scheller.

ISIS has plenty of funding, but it does not live on material sources only: one of their most powerful weapons is to commit the most monstrous atrocities - and make sure everybody sees them. Unable so far to stop them, Arab activists at least try and mock them, and the French foreign minister tries to ban them rhetorically where they want to be least: in the letter soup. Instead of their self-chosen name "Islamic State" he from now on want to refer to them only by the acronym Daesh which they hate and try to ban by all means.

Is Germany willing and capable to contribute to the crisis management in Iraq? Judging by the initial reactions of Germany’s political frontrunners, the answer not only depends on whom you ask but also on which day of the week it is. That said, the public debate currently unfolding in Germany marks a tentative but significant paradigm shift.

I still remember—way back in the mists of the distant past—that warm feeling when I first picked up a camera. As though I was experiencing a prophecy that one day I would use this instrument until I wore it away to nothing. Back then I carried it like a sceptre; today I bear the camera like a shield. Today, I remember the first time I literally did this—bore it like a shield. I’ve forgotten many dates and events, but that day—June 26, 2012—stays engraved in my memory.

With ISIS’ capture of Mosul, a nightmare seems to be becoming a reality: the development of a caliphate state in the heart of the Middle East, which is obliterating the established borders and could engage the whole region in a protracted war between various militias. So why does Assad not seem to be worried?

*Large-scale religious-historical references are readily used to explain recent events in the Middle East. In reality, however, protagonists pursue mundane interests: money and power.*

Mohammad Ali Atassi and Ziad Homsi’s impressive documentation “Our Terrible Country” is nominated for the International Competition“ at the International Film Festival Marseille (1-7 July 2014), where it will have its international premiere

Syrian Director Liwaa Yazji’s work “Haunted” is nominated for the “First Film Competition” at the International Film Festival Marseille, which will be held from July 1 to 7 2014, where it will also have its international premiere. This documentary is produced with the cooperation of Heinrich Böll Stiftung-Middle East

The revolution is a woman. Free, she has no need for fathers, guides or leaders. She needs children, working with love and faith for change and to champion women (in particular) and mankind.

This article looks at the filmed confessions aired on pro-regime stations which many believe to have been extracted by threats or torture, in an attempt to shed light on their most important features and to provide a rough categorization of their different “types”.

Razan Zaitouneh, prominent human rights solicitor and leading figure in the Syrian revolution, was abducted from her office in an armed raid in the Syrian city of Douma last Tuesday, together with her fellow male and female combatants of the Violence Documentation Center. Pelican Mourad worked for the Goethe Institute in Damascus and in that capacity witnessed Razan Zaitouneh’s peaceful mission for human rights in Syria. The interview with her was conducted by Bente Scheller, head of our Middle East Office in Beirut.  

Not many pictures and videos from Syria lend themselves to public distribution. Much of what I view I do not even wish to describe. However, the most bloodlusted images are in fact not always the most ghastly ones.  

For two-and-a-half years the international community has eloquently spoken out against the unrestrained killing, while at the same time standing passively by and watching. Today it is mending fences with Assad. How sustainable is this?

One is left, at the end of the film, with a sense of loss, of embarrassment, of failure and anger. One feels obliged to do something, if only to change one’s attitude, to remember always to take these people and their circumstances into consideration in every discussion on the subject.

They had removed a totalitarian and tyrannical regime from their city. Today, they see this achievement as just one step along the long and hard road to their goal: a free, just and proud nation"  

Whilst, initially, the Syrian regime acted as if nothing unusual had happened in Ghouta, Russia spoke of the use of chemical weapons from the very beginning, however, accusing the rebels of being responsible. Such little coordination between the politics of the Russian and the Syrian government suggests there might be ruptures in their alliance.  

The West has its own conception of what is going on in Syria and a short memory. This allows Assad to define the facts.  

Where art the key discipline in the conflict between Syrian revolutionaries and the regime, the outcome would be a clear case.  

How has the Syrian conflict enhanced the 8-year old political deadlock between the March 14 coalition led by the Future Movement and the March 8 coalition led by Hezbollah?

In this interview carried out by the Syrian journalist and activist Ahmad Silal, Dr. Ziad Majed lays out the challenges that face the Syrian revolution and delay its ultimate victory.The interview was published in Arabic in The Republic on April 23, 2013 under the title: Interview with Ziad Majed on the Syrian Revolution - Two years on: International and Arab positions on the revolution, and the challenges that face it.  

“Cast your vote for the leaders, artists, innovators, icons and heroes that you think are the most influential people in the world”, TIME Magazine urges readers of its online edition. Amongst the 153 nominees: Bashar al-Assad.

March 14, 2013 Language is a living being that is born and dies, that grows, evolves, spreads out, reshapes the mind, is rational, thinks, feels, guesses, deduces, takes risks, revolts, conquers, is defeated and loses, and one that endlessly destroys itself. How is this language struggle being translated in Syria today?

"I had an agreement with Khidr that he write me a daily report and as a consequence his letters are a journal of life that we on the outside never lived, a life lived at a temperature warm enough to revive what is human in us. That is the definition of the revolution that we set up as our figurehead, the meaning for whose sake we once gave so much."

When the graffitied slogan Ben Ali Degage (“Ben Ali, get out!”) made its first appearance in Tunisia, Ben Ali himself failed to take it seriously. How could he have known that the Arab Spring had begun and that the people of the Arab world had decided to bring down their regimes? The people rose up, and graffiti came to the public squares to help them as they tried to break apart the foundations of the regimes that ruled them.  

The arts that emerged during the Syrian revolution are unrelated to the “politically committed art” that so dominates our impressions of the 1970s and 1980s in the Arab world. What has emerged, down alleyways and cramped public squares, is a creativity unburdened by ideology, which treats national issues as a tool to obtain freedom and not self-contained and self-sufficient issues of identity.

The global race to develop and acquire the latest war technologies has become central to nations’ goals since the end of the nineteenth century. Concurrent to this competition for the most modern implements of violence, parties in conflicts show no hesitance in resorting to one of the oldest – and most primitive – war weapons: rape. In wars, rape has been used as a tool to go beyond the physical and military defeat of the enemy, to subdue a society politically and morally. Perpetrators of such sexual and gender based atrocities on women, and increasingly on men and young male children, continue to be undeterred in spite of the development and states’ ratification of international instruments and conventions aimed at the protection of civilians during armed conflict. Such violations are now being reported from Syria, a country whose people stood up to a dictatorship that has reigned for over four decades. The present article, written by psycho-therapist Dr. Jamal Khalil Sobh, sheds light on the repeated war crime of rapes of women, including the recent tragic incidents in Syria.

Since March 15, Syrian culture has been steadily revealing itself to the Syrian people, and with it, its torch bearers: the intellectuals themselves. The moment in Old Damascus, which saw a number of young cultural types gather together to protest, marked the moment that we realized that the Syrian intellectual—whether theorist or observer, politician or writer—must assume his rightful place in the street or at least, keep step with it. Did Syrian Intellects succeeded in fulfilling this task?

Padre Paolo D’Oglio wrote that, “Rulers only resort to media misinformation when the people begin to emerge—if only superficially—as a social will within the historical process." How is this reflected in Syria today?

Tradition and Emancipation are two important poles influencing the societal acceptance of women's soccer in Lebanon. in this article, the author examines this influence through a number of interviews, observations and narratives.

Is it correct to describe the Syrian revolution as “armed” and nothing more? Has the revolution been militarized? What has happened to the revolution’s non-violence? all these questions and more are tackled in this critical analysis.

There has been a lot written on the ‘endgame’ in Syria. In some regards, the situation resembles more “Groundhog Day” than an “Hour Zero”. For 18 months, there has not been a single day during which the Syrian regime has not faced countrywide protests to overthrow it. And there has not been any indication that the President Bashar al-Asad is searching for a solution. Even though President Assad grimly holds on to power, he allows his troops and militias to rampage as if he has already acknowledged that he does not have a chance of staying in power.