DAMASCUS: “I’m married to a man I never met. He’s almost twice my age, has two teenage daughters and lives in Romania,” Zainab, 28, told Arab News.
“I’ve been waiting for my visa for more than seven months so I can be united with my husband,” she said.
“There are no young men left in Syria, so this is my only chance at starting a family and leaving to become a citizen of a European country. I see no future for me here — at least this marriage gives me hope.”
Zainab and her husband Imran, 54, were introduced on Facebook. They spoke via WhatsApp and Skype for a month before they decided to elope and complete all the paperwork for her immigration to Romania.
Marriage by proxy or via Skype has become very popular in Syria since the war erupted in 2011.
Many men have joined the conflict while others have fled to Europe, the Americas or neighboring countries. This has forced young people to resort to marriage by proxy.
Such marriages account for an estimated 54 percent of daily marriages in Syria, said Judge Mahmoud Al-Maarawi, who heads the religious court that oversees personal status issues for Syrian Muslims.
Some youth prefer to carry out marriage ceremonies through Skype, where a licensed notary, the bride, the groom, their parents and witnesses are present.
After the ceremony, the wife or an attorney takes the contract and gets it registered in court for the marriage to be legal and to start working on immigration documents.
The law of personal status has authorized sending an official power of attorney in a proxy marriage, Al-Maarawi said.
Anyone inside or outside Syria may either send a power of attorney to a trusted acquaintance, or appoint an attorney to conclude a marriage contract with the wife or her guardian.
Earlier this year, Al-Maarawi said 70 percent of women in Syria were unmarried — or “spinsters,” as he put it.
To solve what he believed was a problem, he released a statement encouraging polygamy, which angered many Syrians on social media.
“It would be better of the judge to worry about providing people with food, warmth and shelter before making these suggestions,” said a Facebook user.
Ghalia, an executive manager at a major insurance company in Damascus, said: “Instead of encouraging a solution that is far worse than the problem itself, I suggest Judge Al-Maarawi seek ways to empower women in Syria and prepare them to be more independent instead.”
Syrian attorney and writer Faten Derkiy said women are agreeing to marry men they have never met “because of the pressure that faces them in a society that deems every unmarried woman a spinster.”
She added: “Those women may also be seeking ways to leave Syria in dreams of becoming citizens of more stable and prosperous countries.”
Derkiy said: “Young men are very reluctant to consider marriage under the current economic circumstances. High inflation rates, lack of good employment opportunities, and high accommodation rents are all reasons that put young men off marriage.”
She added: “Deeming a woman a spinster and shaming her for it can result in psychological trauma. Reaching a serious state of despair can make a woman accept unfitting marriage proposals or even seek a marriage of inferior rights. In some cases, social pressure may lead an unmarried woman to commit suicide.”
To solve these problems, Derkiy suggested establishing associations that facilitate marriage and provide a fund for young people who wish to marry, similar to what other Arab countries have done.
“Women must be encouraged to volunteer, get busy doing something useful and improve themselves instead of waiting for marriage,” she said.
“All wars take a toll on society, but usually women and children endure the greatest share of pain.”
Syrian women seek virtual marriages amid uncertain futures
Syrian women seek virtual marriages amid uncertain futures
Lebanese PM to visit Syria, discuss disappearance of prisoners
- Nawaf Salam lays wreath at Martyrs’ Monument in Beirut to commemorate 50th anniversary of Lebanese Civil War
LONDON: Lebanon’s Prime Minister Nawaf Salam is scheduled to visit the Syrian Arab Republic on Monday to discuss common interests with the new leadership in Damascus.
It will be Salam’s first visit to Syria since he formed a government in February, and he is scheduled to discuss the issue of Lebanese citizens who disappeared in Syrian prisons during the Bashar Assad regime that collapsed in December. It has been reported that 622 Lebanese nationals remain forcibly disappeared in Syrian prisons.
“I hope to return with good news about those missing in Syria, and I will update the Lebanese people on this issue tomorrow,” Salam said, according to the National News Agency.
Salam laid a wreath at the Martyrs’ Monument in Beirut on Sunday to commemorate the anniversary of April 13, the date when Lebanon’s Civil War began in 1975.
Salam wrote on X: “We pause not to reopen wounds, but to recall lessons that must never be forgotten. All victories were false, and all parties (from the war) emerged as losers.”
He added: “There can be no true state unless legitimate armed forces have the exclusive right to bear arms.”
Aid worker missing after deadly attack on colleagues is held by Israel, ICRC says
- PRCS demanded the immediate release of Nsasrah, who it said was “forcibly abducted” while carrying out humanitarian duties
CAIRO: A Palestinian Red Crescent staff member who went missing in late March when 15 humanitarian workers were killed by Israeli fire is being detained by Israeli authorities, the rescue service and the Red Cross said on Sunday.
Hisham Mhana, the spokesperson for the ICRC in Gaza, confirmed to Reuters that it had received information that the Palestine Red Crescent Society paramedic Assad Al-Nsasrah was being held in an Israeli place of detention.
“As per standard practice, we informed the families immediately. In this case, we also informed the Palestine Red Crescent Society as they have special standing as a partner of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement,” he said.
The Israeli army did not immediately comment.
Mhana said the ICRC has not been granted access to Nsasrah, who until Sunday had been declared missing, and also has not been able to visit any of the Palestinian detainees and prisoners in Israeli jails since October 7, 2023.
In a post on X, The PRCS demanded the immediate release of Nsasrah, who it said was “forcibly abducted” while carrying out humanitarian duties.
It added that Nsasrah and his colleagues came under heavy gunfire, which led to the killing of eight of them in a “grave violation” of international humanitarian law.
The bodies of 15 emergency and aid workers from the Red Crescent, the Civil Emergency Service and the UN were found buried in a mass grave in southern Gaza in March.
The UN and the Red Crescent accused Israeli forces of killing them after they were dispatched to respond to reports of injuries from Israeli airstrikes.
The Israeli military referred Reuters to its statement from Monday, in which it said that a thorough inquiry into the incident was still underway and that it would provide further details only once the investigation is complete.
It said that a preliminary inquiry indicated that “the troops opened fire due to a perceived threat following a previous encounter in the area, and that six of the individuals killed in the incident were identified as Hamas terrorists.”
The Israeli military has provided no evidence of how it determined that the six were Hamas militants, and the Islamist faction has rejected the accusation.
The only known survivor of the incident, PRCS paramedic Munther Abed, said soldiers had opened fire on clearly marked emergency response vehicles.
Moroccans demonstrate in support of Palestinians
- Demonstrators marched through the streets of Rabat under pouring rain in response to a call from the National Action Group for Palestine
RABAT: Several thousand people demonstrated in Morocco’s capital on Sunday to show support for Palestinians in war-torn Gaza.
Under pouring rain, demonstrators marched through the streets of Rabat in response to a call from the National Action Group for Palestine, a coalition of several political organizations, including the Islamist Justice and Development Party (PJD).
“The Moroccans are with Gaza,” said the principal of a private school in Rabat who spoke to AFP.
The North African kingdom has officially called for “the immediate, complete and permanent halt to the Israeli war on Gaza,” but has not publicly discussed reversing the official establishment of ties with Israel in 2020 as part of the US-led Abraham Accords.
The latest protest followed another large rally held a week earlier, part of a spate of demonstrations across the country since the Israeli army resumed its offensive on March 18 against the Islamist group Hamas after a two-month truce in Gaza.
Israel denies entry to Jerusalem for Palestinian Christians marking Palm Sunday
- Israeli restrictions at checkpoints around Jerusalem require Palestinians to obtain security permits to access religious sites
- Only 6,000 permits were issued this year to the West Bank’s 50,000 Christians
LONDON: Israeli authorities prevented Palestinian Christian worshippers from entering Jerusalem from the occupied West Bank to participate in Palm Sunday.
Israeli authorities imposed strict restrictions on Jerusalem over the weekend, limiting the access of Palestinian Christians to the city, the Wafa news agency reported.
Only a limited number of worshippers, primarily residents of Jerusalem and Palestinian citizens of Israel, were able to attend religious services at Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Wafa added.
Palm Sunday marks the beginning of Holy Week leading up to Easter. It commemorates the entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem and is observed by Eastern and Western Christian churches.
On Sunday, Patriarch Theophilos III of the Greek Orthodox Church and Latin Patriarch Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa led liturgies attended by the clergy and a small group of worshipers.
Israeli restrictions at checkpoints around Jerusalem require Palestinians — Muslim and Christian — to obtain permits to access religious sites, including the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
Father Ibrahim Faltas, Vicar of the Custody of the Holy Land, noted that only 6,000 permits were issued this year to the West Bank’s 50,000 Christians. Permit issuance requires a security clearance and often asks that applicants download a mobile application managed by Israeli authorities.
“This is the second consecutive year that only a small number of pilgrims are able to participate in Holy Week and Easter celebrations in Jerusalem due to the ongoing conflict (in Gaza),” Faltas told Wafa.
“Churches would continue to pray for peace, justice, and freedom for all people in the Holy Land,” he added.
The Catholic Palm Sunday procession took place on Sunday afternoon, starting from Jerusalem's Church of Bethphage and ending at the Church of Saint Anne.
Christians gathered for services at the Holy Family Catholic Church and Saint Porphyrius Greek Orthodox Church in the Gaza Strip amid the ongoing Israeli attacks since late 2023. In the West Bank, Palm Sunday services were held in churches throughout Bethlehem, Jericho, Ramallah, Nablus, and Jenin.
Syrian President Sharaa heads to UAE on official visit - SANA
CAIRO: Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa will travel to the United Arab Emirates for his second visit to a Gulf state as president on Sunday, Syria's official news agency reported.
He will be accompanied by foreign minister Assad al-Shibani, who visited the UAE earlier this year.
They are expected to discuss issues of mutual interest, the SANA state news agency reported.
Sharaa visited Saudi Arabia in February on his first foreign trip since assuming the presidency in January.
His visit to the UAE comes as the new Syrian leadership attempts to strengthen ties with Arab and Western leaders following the fall of Bashar al-Assad in December at the hands of Sharaa's Sunni Islamist group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.
(With Reuters)
