GLOBAL PERSPECTIVES

The Unseen Casualty of the Syrian Civil War

Feb 14, 2018 | 08:00 GMT

Nearly seven years of war have transformed Homs in body and soul.

A mosque is pictured through shattered glass in the old city of Homs during May 2014. Most rebel fighters withdrew from the battleground city.

(YOUSSEF KARWASHAN/AFP/Getty Images)

To see the consequences of war, come to Homs. Known to the Romans as Emesa, Syria's third-largest city is only a 100-mile drive north of Damascus on the highway to Aleppo. A multitude of sects once shared the city, which spreads outward from its stone-built historic center into modern, high-rise suburbs. If you threw a shoe out the window, Homs' inhabitants used to say, it was bound to hit a doctor or an engineer. Now most of the doctors and engineers, like the buildings in which they dwelled, have vanished....

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