Syrian Filmmaker Waad Al-Kateab Returns Home After Assad Regime's Fall

A Historic Return to Syria

• 🗓️ On December 8th, 2024, a historic moment unfolded as Bashar al-Assad fled Syria for Russia, ending his family's oppressive 50-year rule.
• 🎉 For millions of Syrians who opposed the regime, this marked a moment of joy and reckoning after more than 12 years of conflict and loss.
• 🎬 Syrian filmmaker Waad Al-Kateab, an Oscar-nominated documentarian, shares a deeply personal account of returning to her homeland.

Journey Back to Aleppo

• ✈️ Waad, her husband Hamza, and their family, all displaced by the regime, embarked on a journey back to Syria, carrying mixed emotions of shock, grief, fear, and hope.
• 🚩 Crossing the border, Waad saw the flag of the revolution again, a symbol of hope that the regime had tried to erase.
• 💔 The journey revealed villages destroyed and land littered with unexploded weapons and mines, a stark depiction of the Syria left behind by the regime.

Reclaiming Home and Voice

• 🏥 Waad revisits the last hospital in Aleppo where her husband, Hamza, worked during the war and siege, a building that stands as a witness to the crimes committed.
• 🏡 Returning to her childhood neighborhood, Waad finds redemption in seeing the garden where she last said goodbye in 2016, a space where flowers are now growing back.
• 🗣️ After 12 years of hiding her identity and origin to protect her family, Waad can now publicly claim her family's name and return to her hometown.

A Glimmer of Hope

• 🇸🇾 Despite the exhaustion and wounds of war, Syria is described as still breathing and dreaming, with Waad seeing a future in her country for the first time in years.
• 🤝 Her husband, Hamza, can finally meet her entire family, their happiness intertwined with grief for those lost during the conflict.