BEIRUT — Syrians who remained loyal to President Bashar al-Assad throughout the past eight years of war are increasingly expressing discontent with his government as living standards in the country continue to deteriorate even as the conflict winds down.
Conditions are dire for most of the 19 million Syrians living across the ravaged country, including in the roughly one-third that remains outside government control. Whole towns and villages have been depopulated and destroyed, and an estimated 89 percent of the population is living in poverty and dependent on international food handouts, according to the United Nations.
But for the first time, those living in the pro-government areas that were spared the worst of the violence are experiencing some of the harshest deprivations, including in the capital, Damascus.
Residents there say life has become more difficult in recent months than at any point in the past eight years, bringing a realization that there will be no swift recovery from the immense damage inflicted by the war on Syria’s economy, social fabric and standing in the international community.
Until the last of the rebellious Damascus suburbs were reconquered last year, shells fired from rebel-held territory regularly exploded in the streets of the capital, sustaining a mood of fear and uncertainty.
The conquest of the Eastern Ghouta suburb last year ended the rocket fire, but it has not brought the respite residents were hoping for, said a Damascus-based writer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he fears for his safety. “This is the worst we have ever known,” he said. “People can barely survive, and the percentage of poor is increasing all the time.”
Large parts of Damascus’s suburbs previously held by rebels have been destroyed in the war. The realization that reconstruction could take years fuels a sense of anxiety among residents. (Louai Beshara/AFP/Getty Images)
Acute shortages of fuel, cooking gas and electricity have left citizens shivering in darkness through an unusually cold winter. The Syrian currency, which had plunged and then stabilized after the war broke out, is sliding again, sending prices soaring.
Many thousands of men who fought on the front lines for years are returning home without hope of finding jobs. The wartime economy has fueled corruption on an unprecedented scale, compounding the daily challenge of lining up for long hours to secure basic necessities with the indignity of having to pay multiple bribes to layers of officialdom, according to Damascus residents.
Widespread expectations, encouraged by the government — that wealthy Arab investors would flock back to Damascus, Chinese funding for reconstruction projects would flow and U.S. sanctions would be relaxed — have been disappointed and don’t seem likely to be fulfilled anytime soon.
The cafes and bars of Damascus are packed at night, creating the impression of a city on the path to recovery. But the revelers represent a tiny elite that has profited from the war, and their conspicuous consumption only fuels the resentment of the vast majority of people for whom life is a daily struggle to survive, the residents say.
“What is being touted as a big military victory has not translated into the improvement of quality of life that was expected,” said Danny Makki, a British Syrian analyst and journalist living in Damascus. “You’ve got 3 to 4 percent of people with the vast majority of the wealth, and for the rest, life is just a struggle.”
“It’s such a depressing mood, and it’s been such a harsh winter,” he added. “Even when we had militant groups on the doorstep of Damascus, we never had such big issues from the quality-of-life perspective.”
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