Syrian government forces enter the Ashrafiya neighborhood of Aleppo after days of fighting with Kurdish forces – January 8, 2026. (Photo: Levant 24).
Beginning on January 4, heaving fighting erupted in Aleppo city between Syrian government forces and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces. The fighting has forced tens of thousands of Syrians to flee their homes.
The fighting centers on two districts of Aleppo where many Kurds and Christians live, and which are controlled by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces – who also control much of northeast Syria.
Since the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024, Syria’s “transitional government” and its security forces have been dominated by fighters from HTS, a jihadist group which attacked Christians and other religious minorities throughout Syria’s long civil war.
Syria’s new government, led by the founder of al Qaeda’s Syria branch, Ahmed al-Sharaa, demands centralized control over all of Syria. Two areas remain largely out of their control: the Druze-majority region of Suwayda in the South, and Kurdish-majority northeast Syria.
Druze and Kurdish leaders are asking for autonomy for their regions in a centralized system. These demands have become more urgent since forces under al-Sharaa’s command massacred thousands of Alawite Muslim and Druze civilians in March and July 2025.
On the morning of January 9, a ceasefire was announced in Aleppo, which will require the Kurdish forces to evacuate some areas of the city and hand them over to al-Sharaa’s government.
Last night, Father Georges Saba, a member of the Marist religious order and the founder of the “Blue Marists” NGO in Syria – one of CSI’s most trusted partners in Syria – sent us this message about the situation in his Syria:
A Special Letter from Aleppo
I write this letter from the hell of the war that has ravaged Aleppo for the past 4 days. In our city, there are two neighborhoods under Kurdish control: Ashrafiya and Shaykh Maqsoud. In these two neighborhoods live hundreds of thousands of people of all ethnicities and religions. The Christians of Aleppo call Shaykh Maqsoud “Jabal al Sayda” (the hill of Our Lady). In this neighborhood lives a very poor Christian community. And it is from this neighborhood that the Blue Marists were born.
These two neighborhoods have suffered enormously during the war. On Good Friday of 2013, the entire Christian community of Jabal al Sayda had to flee. On that occasion, we created a crisis cell and welcomed about thirty families into our Marist community, who spent 6 months in our facilities. Later, we helped all these families rent apartments far from their original living area. Gradually, with the establishment of a fragile peace, families returned to Jabal al Sayda, even though the neighborhood remained under Kurdish control. We knew very well that it was not the best solution.
Since December 2024, the situation has deteriorated between Kurdish forces and the government army. Periods of calm followed by tensions. On March 10, 2025, an agreement was signed in Damascus between the Syrian government and Kurdish authorities. Apart from the situation of the two Aleppo neighborhoods, this agreement established a process to normalize relations between the two parties in the northeastern region of Syria, also held by Kurdish forces. This agreement foresaw a plan to be implemented before December 31, 2025. Unfortunately, it was not carried out.
For weeks, fighting broke out in Aleppo but was halted by truces. However, since Monday, January 5th, 2026, and until the moment I write this letter, the fighting has intensified, causing above all a massive displacement of the population of the two neighborhoods. Horrible scenes of people wandering without knowing where to go: children, youth, women, and men continuously leaving the neighborhoods. Shelling does not stop, day or night. The districts bordering the combat zones are severely affected.
Schools and universities, in the middle of semester exams, are closed indefinitely. Life is paralyzed. A real curfew bathes the city in silence and fear… A dark night invades the hearts of the inhabitants.
It is horror, as if 14 years of war, sanctions, and earthquakes were not enough. As if this city were cursed. As if the streets of Aleppo were thirsty for blood… As if horror multiplied endlessly. Why must Aleppo and its inhabitants endure such a fate? Until when? When will the horizon of peace become a reality? We no longer have the strength for resistance or resilience. We are afraid and we ask ourselves: Until when?
I share with you these words from a young Marist doctor who, from the university hospital where he is an intern, shares his feelings: “In the heart of Aleppo’s university hospital… frightened faces… Worried staff wondering if the road is safe to return home… Exhausted patients, without medicine or money… An exodus and uprooting marking the path of arrival, an icy cold tightening what remains of the beats of a tired heart… And we continue to say: there is hope…”
I write these words to denounce wars, their perpetrators, their instigators. I need you to denounce: Basta, Enough, Kafa… Our nerves can no longer bear it. We are traumatized and anguished. Let us pray, let us invoke God, Allah… Give us YOUR PEACE.
17:26, Thursday, January 8, 2026
Father Georges SABE Marist
