For six years now, Syrians have endured the loss and hardship caused by a protracted civil war. An estimated 4.9 million Syrians have fled their homeland, filling refugee camps in neighboring countries, and another six million remain displaced inside Syria’s borders. While Syrian government forces—backed by Russian air support—appear to have gained the upper hand in many places, recapturing the city of Aleppo in December, street battles and airstrikes continue to take place nearly every day. A number of rebel groups, including ISIS, still control vast rural areas and smaller cities and villages to the east. The complex and dangerous situation remains nowhere near resolved, as foreign intervention increases—including a growing U.S. presence on the ground—and those caught in the crossfire continue to suffer the most. Gathered here are images of the ongoing Syrian conflict from recent months.
In Syria: Six Years of War
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Mohammed Mohiedin Anis, or Abu Omar, 70, smokes his pipe as he sits in his destroyed bedroom, listening to music on his hand-cranked gramophone in Aleppo's formerly rebel-held al-Shaar neighborhood in Syria. Anis had recently returned to Aleppo, with plans to rebuild not only his home, but his large collection of vintage American cars, despite everything being reduced to wreckage and rubble. When reporters asked him about the gramophone, he responded “I will play it for you, but first, I have to light my pipe. Because I never listen to music without it.” Read photographer Joseph Eid's full account of his time spent with Anis here. #
Joseph Eid / AFP / Getty -
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Fire and smoke billow following a reported car bomb explosion at a Syrian pro-government position during clashes between rebel fighters and regime forces to take control of an area in the southern city of Daraa on February 20, 2017. #
Mohamad Abazeed / AFP / Getty -
The body of a victim lies on the floor at a makeshift morgue following an airstrike in the rebel-held town of Douma, on the eastern outskirts of the capital Damascus, on November 10, 2016. At least 11 people including four children were killed on November 10 in air strikes on rebel-held areas near the Syrian capital, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. #
Abd Doumany / AFP / Getty -
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Syrian Mahmoud Al-Khatib, a fighter from the Jaish al-Islam (Islam Army), the foremost rebel group in Damascus province who fiercely oppose both the Syrian regime and ISIS, holds a position inside a building on the frontline in the town of Bilaliyah, east of the capital Damascus, on February 4, 2017. Fifty-year-old Al-Khatib says he's been fighting against the regime since the beginning of the conflict in Syria. He was wounded four times and spends his free time taking care of stray dogs. #
Amer Almohibany / AFP / Getty -
Rebel fighters from the Jaish al-Fatah (or Army of Conquest) brigades fire mortar shells towards western government-controlled districts on October 30, 2016 at an entrance to Aleppo, in the southwestern frontline neighborhood of Dahiyet al-Assad, on the third day of a rebel offensive to break a three-month siege of the opposition-held east of Syria's second city. #
Omar Haj Kadour / AFP / Getty -
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Residents of Bir Said village sit inside a home, after their return to the village when Syrian Democratic Forces took control of the area from ISIS militants in northern Raqqa province, Syria, on February 7, 2017. #
Rodi Said / Reuters -
Syrian musicians play at the site of the damaged Roman amphitheatre in the ancient city of Palmyra in central Syria, during a tour organized by the Syrian army for journalists, on March 4, 2017. Syrian troops backed by Russian jets completed the recapture of the historic city of Palmyra from ISIS fighters on March 2, 2017, the Kremlin and the army said. #
Louai Beshara / AFP / Getty -
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A displaced Syrian, fleeing from Deir Ezzor city besieged by ISIS, in a refugee camp in al-Hol, located some 14 kilometers from the Iraqi border in Syria's northeastern Hassakeh province, on February 1, 2017. #
Delil Souleiman / AFP / Getty -
A Harakat Nour al-Din al-Zenki fighter watches news about Donald Trump's election as president on his smart phone in the rebel-held beseiged area in Aleppo on November 9, 2016. #
Abdalrhman Ismail / Reuters -
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Men inspect damage in the water pumping station in the village of Ain al-Fija in the Wadi Barada valley near Damascus, Syria in this handout picture provided by SANA on January 29, 2016. #
Sana / Reuters -
A fighter from the Jaish al-Islam (Islam Army) runs to avoid sniper fire, in the village of Tal al-Siwan area of the rebel-held stronghold of Douma, on the outskirts of Damascus, on September 5, 2016. #
Sameer Al-Doumy / AFP / Getty -
A damaged orrery, a working model of the solar system, inside a damaged school in the rebel-held city of Douma, in the eastern Damascus suburb of Ghouta, Syria, on March 2, 2017. #
Bassam Khabieh / Reuters -
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Souad Hamidi removes her Niqab after Syria Democratic Forces took control of her village, on the outskirts of Manbij city, Aleppo province, Syria, on June 9, 2016. Photographer Rodi Said: 'When U.S.-backed forces seized Hamidi's village in northern Syria from ISIS, the 19-year-old swiftly tore off the niqab she had been forced to wear since 2014 and smiled. "I felt liberated," Hamidi said after swapping her black face-covering veil for a red headscarf. "They made us wear it against our will so I removed it that way to spite them." I was heading to villages that had been retaken by SDF, and my arrival coincided with the arrival of Hamidi back to her home. Am Adasa had been under the militants' control since 2014, when ISIS proclaimed its caliphate straddling Syria and Iraq. Under ISIS, life was strictly regulated, Hamidi said, including dress codes. "They would punish people who did not follow their rules, sometimes forcing them to stay in dug-out graves for days," she said. "Since they (SDF) took control, we are living a new life." #
Rodi Said / Reuters -
Rebel fighters inspect a tunnel they said belonged to ISIS fighters which connects the city to Aqeel mountain, in the northern Syrian city of al-Bab on March 13, 2017. #
Khalil Ashawi / Reuters -
A picture taken on March 9, 2017 in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, which was recaptured by government forces in December 2016, shows people walking in the formerly rebel-held al-Shaar neighborhood. #
Joseph Eid / AFP / Getty -
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Fighters from the Free Syrian Army take part in a battle against ISIS jihadists in the northern Syrian village of Yahmoul in the Marj Dabiq area north of the embattled city of Aleppo on October 10, 2016. #
Nazeer Al-Khatib / AFP / Getty -
A Free Syrian Army fighter reacts as he mourns near the body of his brother, who was an FSA fighter and died during an offensive against ISIS fighters to take control of Qabasin town, on the outskirts of the northern Syrian town of al-Bab, Syria, on January 10, 2017. #
Khalil Ashawi / Reuters -
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Fighters from the Kurdish-Arab alliance, known as the Syrian Democratic Forces, sit in a tractor near the village of Khirbet al-Jahshe, some 35 kilometers from al-Tabaqah on the western outskirts of Raqa as they advance towards an ISIS bastion on December 13, 2016. #
Delil Souleiman / AFP / Getty -
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A young Syrian man carries a wounded child following reported government airstrike on the rebel-held town of Douma, on the eastern outskirts of the capital Damascus, on February 25, 2017. Syrian regime forces carried out raids on several areas in the country, targeting mainly the besieged town of Douma, causing the deaths of at least 13 civilians, according to Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. #
Sameer Al-Doumy / AFP / Getty -
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A Syrian refugee from the informal Rukban camp, which lies in no-man's-land off the border between Syria and Jordan in the remote northeast, walks in the rain, as she shelters a young child outside a UN-operated medical clinic immediately on the Jordanian-side on March 1, 2017. #
Khalil Mazraawi / AFP / Getty -
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Syrian security forces inspect the scene of a reported suicide bombing at the old palace of justice building in Damascus on March 15, 2017. Two suicide bombings hit Damascus including the attack at the central courthouse that left at least 32 dead, as Syria's war entered its seventh year with the regime now claiming the upper hand. #
Louai Beshara / AFP / Getty -
Mohamed Ataya, a 31-year-old Syrian man known as "Abu Maher", tends to his plants on the rooftop of his damaged building in the Syrian rebel-held town of Arbin, in the eastern Ghouta region on the outskirts of the capital Damascus on March 3, 2017. Ataya, who used to be a professional football player before the war, cultivates seeds for sale. #
Amer Almohibany / AFP / Getty -
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Amineh Hamad, 58, a Syrian refugee from Eastern Ghouta near Damascus, shows a photograph of herself and her husband Ali Abdulqader, 58, at her shelter in the Ritsona refugee camp, Greece. "It was the last time we visited the Roman site of Busra al-Sham, a sunny Friday during the summer of 2010, we had a barbecue, walked and laughed a lot, a day from life, we miss these days, we hope one day it will come back." Amineh said. Photographed on January 7, 2017. #
Muhammed Muheisen / AP
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