"By the time the red sun slipped beyond the horizon, the playground was empty except for one little girl, nine-year-old Fouziah Alalawi, who stood staring at the bend where her father always appeared to pick her up from school. It was February 20, 2013, and war had become the background of her childhood: the distant thunder of shelling, the sharp percussion of gunfire, and the sudden quiet that made the adults tense."
"He never spoke politics at the ministry; he had seen what happened to those who did. The father of four Fouziah, nine; Omar, six, Ahmed, two; and Asenat, just 11 months old had wanted to name his youngest daughter Hurriyya, meaning freedom, but Somayah begged him not to. Even a name could make a man disappear. That evening, Somayah called her husband's number, but it rang once and went dead."
On February 20, 2013, Mohammed Alalawi disappeared after leaving his daughter at school in Damascus amid escalating conflict. He worked at the Ministry of Agriculture, held a PhD in rural development, and commuted through multiplying checkpoints while avoiding political discussion. The family had already been displaced from al-Maliha and lived in Qaboun with four young children. His wife Somayah and children Fouziah, Omar, Ahmed, and infant Asenat were left uncertain and fearful after a phone call that rang once and cut off. The disappearance reflects wider patterns of abduction, the danger of perceived political association, and the enduring search by families for missing relatives.
Read at www.aljazeera.com
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