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The Observatory, which monitors the conflict from the UK, also said jets from Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s air forcebombed the camp on Saturday

called the crisis in Yarmouk “an affront to the humanity of all of us, a source of universal shame”.

He said Palestinian and Syrian refugees in the camp, which had previously been besieged by Assad’s forces, were already suffering from starvation and disease

Their main target was Aknaf Beit al-Maqdis, an anti-Assad militia of Syrians and Palestinians from the camp.

Reuters that Isis fighters had killed 21 people including fighters and civilians since Friday

The evacuation of the camp had been made harder as Isis snipers were shooting refugees as they tried to leave the camp.

"Today, we have restored about 80 percent of services,"

gasoline prices have quadrupled

five kilometres from the city, the military airport

supplies of antibiotics, gauze and children's medicine have been depleted

only a doctor and three staff

"The Syrian National Council does not help us. They only make promises."

"All we want is for Bashar to go,"

ight in the crucial battle for Aleppo, leaving no one to protect the city of 70,000 inhabitants.

Almost all of the rebel fighters

not want to cross the border into Turkey and become a refugee like many other Syrians

In February, government forces stormed Aazaz but the rebel Free Syrian Army seized control of the city at the end of July

after five months of fierce fighting

helped make ISIS the world’s richest extremists.

Rebel groups targeted oil resources from the regime in battles often overshadowed by higher-profile fronts in the war — namely in the provinces of Raqqa and Deir Ezzor, where there were refineries and oil fields.

Strapped for cash, the rebels smuggled some of the oil to buyers in Turkey, whose government was one of the Syrian opposition’s main backers, having already opened its borders to activists, fighters, and refugees.

Omar would receive a call from a commander in the Free Syrian Army (FSA), the U.S.-backed rebel coalition, telling him to head to the Syrian side of the border.

If he took in $1,500 in a night, he would give $500 to the FSA commander and another $500 to the Turkish border guards. “You can’t really say that we are smuggling oil, because we take permission from the Turkish side and the Syrian side,” Omar said. “But since it’s under the table, we call it smuggling.”

it controlled Raqqa, and soon after it was battling for control of the rebel-held parts of Deir Ezzor.

It was the worst example of a wartime pillage that has stripped Syria of everything of value, from scrap metal to precious artifacts. “I just want to show the world what they are doing to my country,” he said.

He said Turkey notified the Syrian government, rebel leaders and the coalition forces fighting the Islamic State about the operation.

572 troops, 39 tanks, 57 armored vehicles and 100 other vehicles were involved

Turkish flag was lowered, and the tomb and security station were destroyed to prevent any possible use by extremists.

operation was prompted by the chaos and instability in Syria

clashes were likely to erupt nearby between forces of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, and Kurdish troops known as pesh merga, and that the tomb could become a target.

“The Suleyman Shah tomb has been a point of vulnerability for Turkey for a long time, and with this operation, such weakness has been eliminated

crisis discouraged Turkey from joining the United States-led military coalition conducting strikes against the Islamic State, though Turkey has cooperated with the United States in other ways,

in accordance with the 1921 treaty, a new tomb for Suleyman Shah was being established in a part of Syria that is under Kurdish control

when conditions in Syria permitted, the tomb would be moved back again to the site that was evacuated, near the village of Karakozak

Tensions have mounted around the tomb since March, when the Islamic State took control of the surrounding area and began threatening to destroy the tomb unless guards there lowered the Turkish flag.

The militant group raided Turkey’s consulate in Mosul, Iraq, last June and seized 46 Turks and 3 Iraqis as hostages; they were released three months later on terms that were not disclosed

“The Islamic State could have used the presence of the tomb as leverage in case of any confrontation with Turkey

Turkey has lobbied intensively for international military action in Syria, including no-fly zones and a presence on the ground to strengthen the more moderate Syrian rebel groups who are fighting both the extremists and the Syrian government.

Syrian government issued a statement on Sunday calling the military operation a “flagrant aggression” because Turkey did not wait for permission from Damascus to mount i

The Kurds were aided by airstrikes and other support from the American-led coalition

Mr. Ulgen, the analyst, said the choice of route was a sign of some improvement in relations between the Turkish government in Ankara and the Syrian Kurds, whom the Turks have regarded with deep suspicion.

In terms of sheer devastation, Syria today is worse off than Germany at the end of World War II

ven as the fighting continues, a movement is brewing among planners, activists and bureaucrats—some still in Aleppo, others in Damascus, Turkey, and Lebanon—to prepare, right now, for the reconstruction effort that will come whenever peace finally arrives.

In a glass tower belonging to the United Nations’ Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia, a project called the National Agenda for the Future of Syria has brought together teams of engineers, architects, water experts, conservationists, and development experts to grapple with seemingly impossible technical problems

It is good to do the planning now, because on day one we will be ready,”

The team planning the country’s future is a diverse one. Some are employed by the government of Syria, others by the rebels’ rival provisional government. Still others work for the UN, private construction companies, or nongovernmental organizations involved in conservation, like the World Monuments Fund

As the group’s members outline a path toward renewal, they’re considering everything from corruption and constitutional reform to power grids, antiquities, and health care systems.

Aleppo is split between a regime side with vestiges of basic services, and a mostly depopulated rebel-controlled zone, into which the Islamic State and the Al Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front have made inroads over the last year

The population exodus has claimed most of the city’s craftsmen, medical personnel, academics, and industrialists

It took decades to clear the moonscapes of rubble and to rebuild, in famous targets like Dresden and Hiroshima but in countless other places as well, from Coventry to Nanking. Some places never recovered their vitality.

Of course, Syrian planners cannot help but pay attention to the model closest to home: Beirut, a city almost synonymous with civil war and flawed reconstructio

We don’t want to end up like Beirut,” one of the Syrian planners says, referring to the physical problems but also to a postwar process in which militia leaders turned to corrupt reconstruction ventures as a new source of funds and power

Syria’s national recovery will depend in large part on whether its industrial powerhouse Aleppo can bounce back

The city’s workshops, famed above all for their fine textiles, export millions of dollars’ worth of goods every week even now, and the economy has expanded to include modern industry as well.

Today, however, the city’s water and power supply are under the control of the Islamic State

Across Syria, more than one-third of the population is displaced.

A river of rubble marks the no-man’s land separating the two sides. The only way to cross is to leave the city, follow a wide arc, and reenter from the far side.

Parts of the old city won’t be inhabitable for years, he told me by Skype, because the ground has literally shifted as a result of bombing and shelling

The first and more obvious is creating realistic options to fix the country after the war—in some cases literal plans for building infrastructure systems and positioning construction equipment, in other cases guidelines for shaping governanc

They’re familiar with global “best practices,” but also with how things work in Syria, so they’re not going to propose pie-in-the-sky idea

If some version of the current regime remains in charge, it will probably direct massive contracts toward patrons in Russia, China, or Iran. The opposition, by contrast, would lean toward firms from the West, Turkey, and the Gulf.

At the current level of destruction, the project planners estimate the reconstruction will cost at least $100 billion

Recently a panel of architects and heritage experts from Sweden, Bosnia, Syria, and Lebanon convened in Beirut to discuss lessons for Syria’s reconstruction—one of the many distinct initiatives parallel to the Future of Syria project.

“You should never rebuild the way it was,” said Arna Mackic, an architect from Mostar. That Bosnian city was divided during the 1990s civil war into Muslim and Catholic sides, destroying the city center and the famous Stari Most bridge over the Neretva River. “The war changes us. You should show that in rebuilding.”

Instead, Mackik says, the sectarian communities keep to their own enclaves. Bereft of any common symbols, the city took a poll to figure out what kind of statue to erect in the city center. All the local figures were too polarizing. In the end they settled on a gold-colored statue of the martial arts star Bruce Lee

“It belongs to no one,” Mackic says. “What does Bruce Lee mean to me?

is that it could offer the city’s people a form of participatory democracy that has so far eluded the Syrian regime and sadly, the opposition as well.

“You are being democratic without the consequences of all the hullabaloo of formal democratization

A great deal of money has been invested in Syria’s destruction— by the regime, the local parties to the conflict, and many foreign powers. A great deal of money will be made in the aftermath, in a reconstruction project that stands to dwarf anything seen since after World War II.

A soldier was killed in the operation, as far as the international coalition to combat ISIS knows, although it didn’t see clashes,

After the Turkish forces transported the remains, they destroyed all the buildings in the site to “prevent abuse of the site

he al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front also said it had captured the crossing but rival rebels denied this and accused them of looting after the crossing fell into rebel hands.

Jordan closed its side of the crossing on Wednesday. A Jordanian source said on Thursday the kingdom had stepped up security and redeployed some troops to the border

The Syrian army, which accuses the staunch U.S. ally of harboring rebels on its soil, said the kingdom had deployed its troops inside the crossing after the rebels took control. Amman denies providing training and arms for the insurgents

ordan has pressured rebels in the past not to overrun the Nasib crossing so the highway could stay open to trade and traffic with Damascus

Nasib, one of Syria's last official border crossings, is now crucial for importing goods into a country hit hard by Western sanctions

nside Syria, two million children and adolescents are currently out of school.

“We simply cannot allow an entire generation of children and adolescents to be lost to ignorance, exploitation, despair and radicalisation.”

International humanitarian law, which declares that schools be respected as zones of peace and safe havens for children, has counted for little. The long-term consequences for children – and their place in the Syria of the future – can only be guessed at.

utside Syria, more than 50 per cent (600,000) of Syrian refugee children and adolescents are out of school, and this number continues to grow.

The campaigns include distribution of teaching and learning materials as well as school bags with stationary. Similar campaigns have been rolled out in countries hosting refugees.

When I go to the refugee camps and see the smiling faces of children, then I think we should not give up in the face of difficulties,

ublic schools receiving Syrian children are overstretched. Non-formal education spaces cannot absorb large numbers of students.

achers are not well equipped to work with stress, overcrowding and difference. Syrian children and adolescents are receiving multiple and dispersed forms of curricula and content that are not adapted to their capacity and needs and that come with enormous challenges in certification and accreditation.

More than 500 people, including dozens of civilians, have been killed since the assault began 10 days ago

urkey has already taken in more than 2.5 million Syrian refugees over the past five years and says it will continue to do so in a "controlled fashion".

rkey would be indirectly contributing to "ethnic cleansing" in northern Syria by the government.

urkey's president asked in a speech: "Are you on our side or the side of the terrorist PYD and PKK organisation?"

While Turkey sees the PYD and YPG as offshoots of the banned PKK, the US does not and believes they are the only effective force against IS on the ground in Syria, reports the BBC's Mark Lowen in Istanbul.

France's outgoing Foreign Minister, Laurent Fabius, also questioned the commitment of the US to resolve the crisis in Syria on Wednesday, saying its "ambiguous" policy was contributing to the problem.

But he warned: "We feel that we were sold to the Russians, and that the West has abandoned us."

Egypt’s leadership has grown frustrated with US admonitions and criticisms of its governance record, and from Cairo’s perspective, bewildering discussions of conditions on US military aid

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is hardly ready to ditch his country’s long-standing ties to the United States, the prospect of Russian arms and assistance could prove a useful complement to what some in Cairo consider more uncertain US support, especially as Egypt faces an ongoing terrorist insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula.

Naumkin adds th

Russia also considers Egypt an ally in its efforts to broker a political settlement in Syria

as a result of the Russian president’s visit to Cairo, the parties might agree to pool their forces in the context of a Syrian settlement.

It might be understandable for some analysts to dismiss the Moscow conference, given the diplomatic false starts over four years in a conflict that has left more than 150,000 dead, 7.6 million displaced, 3.2 million refugees, 12.2 million in need of humanitarian assistance and at least 680,000 injured, according to the United Nations.

Syrian opposition figures were not allowed to participate in the Jan. 26-29 Moscow conference as representatives of opposition parties, such as the National Coalition of Syrian Revolution and Opposition Forces (SOC), the leading umbrella group based in Turkey

The absence of the SOC and other representatives of the external opposition no doubt limited the potential impact of the conference,

Participants agreed to an 11-point list of “Moscow Principles” and a four-point “Appeal to the International Community” affirming the need to fight terrorist organizations such as the Islamic State (IS), rejecting outside interference and calling for increased humanitarian aid, while agreeing to meet again in a month’s time.

acknowledged the possibility for other organizations to play a role in future talks

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has vigorously supported the law, claiming its passage is essential in defending democracy

 “Success tempted the AKP, prompting it to revert back to its Islamism and initiate a much more ambitious narrative of building a new regional order, and even a new global order. Meanwhile, Erdogan turned into an unquestionable leader who is not limited by facts and creates his own facts, as envisioned by his Islamist ideology and extraordinary intuition. In the eyes of his hard-core supporters, he is not a mere political leader who formulates pragmatic policies. He is a total leader who redefines everything.”

He gave no dates

The minister said a consular presence in Syria would help Tunisia glean information on Tunisians fighting alongside Islamist militants in Iraq and Syria and who officials fear will return to carry out attacks at home.

Tunisia would also reestablish diplomatic relations with neighboring Libya

Tunisia completed a mostly peaceful transition to democracy but has struggled to clamp down on Islamist militants who have been carrying out regular attacks.

After withdrawing their envoys after the start of the uprising against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in 2011, some European Union countries have started to privately support more communication with Damascus.

Several countries including China, Indonesia and top allies Russia and Iran have envoys or charge d'affaires in Damascus