The
Last Stand
JUST
AFTER DAWN on a cold morning in December 2024,
explosions tore across the volcanic hills near
the village of Sahwet Balata in southern Syria’s
Sweida governorate (an administrative unit
similar to a province). It was one of several
Israeli airstrikes that week, part of a broader
campaign targeting sites across the country.
Villagers awoke to the thunder of collapsing
concrete and the sight of smoke rolling through
an oak-covered ridgeline as Israeli missiles
flattened bunkers at a military base and peeled
open a munitions depot with surgical
precision.
For
years, the base, which includes an old oak
grove, had been guarded by Syrian troops and
therefore avoided by locals and loggers alike.
In a province where many forests were stripped
for fuel and profit over 13 years of protracted
civil war, the outpost had created an unlikely
sanctuary for one of the last intact oak stands
in the region.
When
the bombs landed, no civilians were hurt.
Against the odds, the trees survived as well,
their twisted trunks silhouetted against a dusty
sky. Beside them, a rusting tank lay tilted on
its tracks — abandoned when government forces
fled days earlier, following the overthrow of
Syria’s former dictator, Bashar al-Assad.
The
strikes marked a turning point for the region.
With Assad’s army withdrawn, a power vacuum
emerged — quickly filled by local militias,
spiritual leaders, and improvised civic groups.
Instability deepened, and so did uncertainty
about what would come next. Locals feared that
without some level of protection, the oak grove
at the abandoned base would fall to loggers. So
villagers organized armed patrols, setting up
watches to keep intruders out. One year on,
despite worsening economic and humanitarian
conditions, some locals are still taking shifts
to protect the grove, determined to defend
it.
“We
need firewood too,” said Youssef, a farmer in
his forties who volunteers there regularly and
asked to be identified only by his first name
due to safety concerns. “But if we cut these
trees, what’s left? We’ve already lost
enough.”
Reporter
Robert Bocciaga details the vast toll that years
of wartime and post-war logging have taken on
southern Syria’s forests, and profiles the
dedicated land defenders who have preserved one
of the region’s last remaining oak
groves.
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