Straddling crossroads of trade for 4,500 years, the ancient city of Aleppo, with its hilltop Citadel, avoided demolition plans and was named a World Heritage spot by UNESCO in 1986. The refurbished Citadel is one of Aleppo's main attractions for both foreign and local tourists. Syria, 2008.
Residents in the village of Ein Altineh share their April 17 Syrian Independence Day celebrations with the village of Majdal Shams, 2008. Although living across the demilitarized valley in Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, the residents of Majdal Shams remain Syrians citizens.
Military police patrol downtown Damascus, Syria on May 1, 1995.
Portrait of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad in his office high above Damascus, 2008.
Saud Al Hamad, a member of Parliament and head of The Peasants Union, meets some of his angry constituents in front of the Syrian Parliament in Damascus, 2008.
At the gravesite of Wissam al-Yahya, who died last year at the age of 31 from a suicide bombing in Iraq, his family gathers on Eid Al Fitr to mourn their loss at the Sayyida Zeineb cemetery in Damascus, Syria 2008. Originally from Babylon, the family fled the violence of Iraq less than a year ago.
Scenes from Palm Sunday during Orthodox Easter at the monastery of Saidnaya, a 6th century holy place to both Christians and Muslims. Syria, 2008.
Street life in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Damascus, 2008.
As Ramadan nears its end, verses of the Koran are read at the Omayyad Mosque in Damascus, Syria, 2008. This mosque, which sits at the heart of the Old City, is one of the most important places for Islam in the world.
In celebration of the first day of Eid Al Fitr and the end of Ramadan, young Damascenes gather to socialize, smoke hookahs, and enjoy the view of Damascus from a cafe atop Mount Qassion, 2008.
The famous Nofara Cafe in the Old City of Damascus with the Omayyad Mosque in the background. Syria, 2008.
Night scenes in Yarmouk camp, a Palestinian neighborhood of Damascus, 2008.
A night scene in the dark alleyways of the Old City of Damascus reveals the portrait of President Bashar al Assad of Syria on the front door of a gold shop juxtaposed with a poster of Britney Spears on the entrance of a tailor shop next door. Syria, 2008.
A very conservative section of Aleppo’s Old City, the Qalat Sharif neighborhood is where the Agha Khan Trust For Culture has developed an outreach program to bring dropout kids back to school. Syria, 2008.
Syria’s first and largest private university built to compete with public schools, the University of Kalamoon, has almost 5,000 students including these pupils focused on drilling pain-free plastic dental patients. Training is reserved for champion test-takers & the politically connected. Syria, 2008.
At the all girls Assat Al Thania public primary school in Sayyida Zeineb district, Syrian and Iraqi children learn together. At this school a third of the students are Iraqi, demonstrating Syria's dedication to making sure Iraqi refugees get educated and feel integrated into society. Syria, 2008.
At the modern Mahrouk Textile Factory, workers reload spindles and keep a watchful eye on the spinning yarn, which is made of Syrian cotton and sold worldwide. Syria, 2008.
An Orthodox Christian family in the Jaramana district of southern Damascus enjoys an abundance of food for their Easter lunch in 2008.
At the center of the largest Iraqi area in Damascus is the Sayyida Zeineb Mosque. Considered one of the holiest sites for Shiites, more than half a million Iranian tourists, worshippers, and religious pilgrims come to Syria every year to worship here. Syria, 2008.
Shiite worshippers visit the Mosque of Sayyida Zeineb, a holy Shia shrine and the center of the largest Iraqi area in Damascus. This is the mausoleum where the Prophet Mohammed's daughter in law is said to be buried. Syria, 2008.
Established in 1169 AD, the Nour Al-Din Al-Shaheed hammam, one of Damascus' oldest public bathhouses, provides a place for fathers and sons to enjoy the ancient ritual of baths. Syria, 2008.
Street scene in the Christian Quarter of the old city of Damascus, 2008.
The Greco-Roman ruins of the ancient city of Palmyra still stand majestically in the desert in central Syria, 2008. These ruins date back more than two thousand years and are one of Syria's main tourist attractions.
This television production is financed by an Abu Dhabi company but staffed and directed by Syrians. With the Kalamoon mountains as a backdrop, the show about the lives of bedouin women is filmed using real bedouins and Syrian actors. Syria, 2008.
Scenes along the public beach of Cote D'Azur in Latakkia, Syria, 2008.
Overview of daily life in Syria, 1995. A young man dives into a river near Aleppo while others swim or wash their vehicles.
A Muslim family spends their summer tending to their flock of goats and sheep near Serjilla, Syria on April 22, 2008. Serjilla is considered one of the 700 "dead cities" scattered across northern Syria. These cities were once Christian during the Byzantine period, but now lay abandoned and in ruins among rural life.
The family of Jaitham Yousseif makes olive oil on the side of the road, 2008. This is a typical scene in the Alawite Mountains, where most families grow olives and make olive oil for their own consumption and sell locally.
Cotton, one of Syria's largest cash crops, is picked by local villagers working as day laborers in the village of Erry Shamaly near Idlib, 2008.
In the farming village of Kitian, brothers working together load 400 lb bags of freshly picked cotton onto a truck for delivery to a state run cotton gin mill. Syria, 2008.
Children playing among the domed-roofs of Am Al Aboud, an ancient village in the Halab region of Syria that has conserved this traditional architecture, 1995.