Kristyan Benedict

A Survivor of Assad's Dungeons Reflects on the Fall of the Regime By Mansour Omari The monumental, exhilarating, dream-like events in Syria surprised many foreign officials and journalists. Their instant reactions focused on how this...

Life in War - The Silent Genocide By Areej Alghazzawi What can I say about my exceptional friend Kawthar Afana? I met her at the central UN warehouses seven months ago in Rafah - Tal Al-Sultan. She's so kind and beautiful, with hazel...

By Areej AlGhazzawi Where are we going? Our future is unknown. We struggle from day to day under Israel's vicious assault on our ability to live. Before October 7, I could smile despite the endless obstacles imposed on our blockaded...

By Aya Al-Ghazzawi I believe that notorious colonialist Winston Churchill said that British people are the only people who like to be told how bad things are. Well, to put it mildly, things are bad in Gaza—how does that make you feel...

Trigger warning: this blog contains distressing content In every one of Israel's wars of aggression, I've felt terrorised, increasingly anxious and extremely uncertain about anything. I've lived through too many wars but somehow...

By Mansour Omari* This March marks the 12th anniversary of the Syrian revolution. It is, as ever, an occasion for remembrance, sadness, and defiance, but also urgent action. These anniversaries are an occasion to mourn the loss of our...

This November will see the fifth Israeli elections in less than four years, with now ex-prime minister Naftali Bennett having handed over the reins to Yair Lapid, who will remain interim premier until a new government is sworn in after...

By Mansour Omari I'm recovering from a stroke. My doctors said they didn't know the cause, but undoubtedly the stresses of surviving Assad's torture machine and continuing to campaign for justice are contributing factors. The doctors...

By Aya Al-Ghazzawi Growing up in Gaza My realisation of my suffocating surroundings in Gaza began when I was maybe four years old. I used to hear my dad discussing politics with our relatives. I didn't understand everything they were...

By Mansour Omari "Whoever has succumbed to torture can no longer feel at home in the world." German prosecutors quoted these words from Holocaust survivor Jean Améry to introduce their closing argument in Koblenz, at the trial of Anwar...

By Mansour Omari In July this year, the UN Development Program in Syria (UNDP) posted on its social media platforms that it is cooperating with the National Union of Syrian Students (NUSS) in organising the Hult students Prize. The...

By Nigina Istanakzai-Zarifi - Afghanistan Country Coordinator for Amnesty International UK Kabul's sudden fall to the Taliban opened the gates of hell to the Afghan people. The promises of a new and better era, especially for women and...

By Mansour Omari The UN Development Program in Syria is working directly with a group many Syrians believe to be complicit in crimes against humanity. This is the same UN office that thanked Russian authorities for supporting Syrians...

By Ahmed Masoud - @masoud_ahmed 20 May 2021 Rolling news humming in the background, constant work messages, endless Whatsapp notifications, phone calls to family in Gaza, a blizzard of Twitter, Facebook and Instagram posts. Is there a...

The tenth anniversary of the Syrian uprising has now passed. Harrowing testimony of victims and stories of resistance from survivors saturated this brief moment in our collective conscience. Hundreds of articles, podcasts, interviews...

Syria’s human rights community is not just petitioning and protesting against atrocities; they’re also hunting down torturers and war criminals.

Kristyan Benedict - @KreaseChan In the autumn of 2019, Syrian survivors of torture and familes of those still missing , gathered in rural Holland to work on what would become, nearly 18 months later, the Truth and Justice Charter . I...

Syrian human rights activists want states to hold Austria to account for violating the Torture Convention

By Mansour Omari Earlier this year, on April 23, a monumental event happened. The first ever trial about Syrian state torture started in Koblenz, Germany. The German prosecution charged two Syrians, Anwar Raslan and Iyad Al-Gharib...