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violations in Syria.

Policy Briefs

Major Real Estate Development Projects in Syria: Towards a Framework Linking Investment to the Protection of Property Rights and Occupants and Guaranteeing Objection and Compensation
22-09-2026
This paper approaches major real estate development projects as a test of how reconstruction is managed in Syria, rather than merely as investment or urban development projects. When land and property become a means of attracting finance and reactivating assets, protecting housing, land, and property rights becomes a necessary condition for preventing investment from turning into a tool for redistributing space and value outside a clear rights-based process.

Green Tabu

Marota and Basilia: Reparation and the Limits of Fairness
22-09-2026
Legislative Decree No. 66 of 2012 was issued as a tool for rezoning large areas of unlicensed and informal housing in Damascus. Over more than a decade, however, it has become one of Syria’s most sensitive property and housing issues. The problem is no longer confined to an urban plan or an administrative delay, but lies in a lengthy process that changed the very form of the right itself: from direct ownership of a property to zoning shares, from an existing home to a promise of alternative housing, and from property available for everyday use to a right requiring proof, valuation, allocation, financing and years of waiting. Decree No. 66 has thus become a test of how rights are produced within a reconstruction project before it is a test of the ability to construct buildings, roads and infrastructure. 

Green Tabu

Updates

Suspended Ownership in Suweida: From Obstructed Estate Inheritance Inventories to Frozen Property Transactions
22-09-2026
The property rights crisis in Suweida now unfolds through several channels, beginning with death registration and extending to Estate Inheritance Inventory Documents (EIIDs), powers of attorney, sales and ownership transfers. Since the July 2025 massacre, victims’ families have faced obstacles in registering deaths and amending family civil registration records, preventing heirs from obtaining the documents needed to deal with inherited property. Then, on 20 May 2026, the Ministry of Justice issued Decision No. 1475, freezing most judicial, property and notarisation transactions in the governorate. The ministry presented the decision as a measure to protect property rights, but its broad application closed the legal channels residents, expatriates and heirs need to manage their property. With no clear time limit for the freeze and no exceptions for urgent cases, ownership remains recorded in the Land Registry while the ability to sell property, transfer ownership or derive income from it is effectively suspended.

Analysis

Marota and Basilia: Reparation and the Limits of Fairness
22-09-2026
Legislative Decree No. 66 of 2012 was issued as a tool for rezoning large areas of unlicensed and informal housing in Damascus. Over more than a decade, however, it has become one of Syria’s most sensitive property and housing issues. The problem is no longer confined to an urban plan or an administrative delay, but lies in a lengthy process that changed the very form of the right itself: from direct ownership of a property to zoning shares, from an existing home to a promise of alternative housing, and from property available for everyday use to a right requiring proof, valuation, allocation, financing and years of waiting. Decree No. 66 has thus become a test of how rights are produced within a reconstruction project before it is a test of the ability to construct buildings, roads and infrastructure. 

Policy Briefs

Major Real Estate Development Projects in Syria: Towards a Framework Linking Investment to the Protection of Property Rights and Occupants and Guaranteeing Objection and Compensation
22-09-2026
This paper approaches major real estate development projects as a test of how reconstruction is managed in Syria, rather than merely as investment or urban development projects. When land and property become a means of attracting finance and reactivating assets, protecting housing, land, and property rights becomes a necessary condition for preventing investment from turning into a tool for redistributing space and value outside a clear rights-based process.

Directory

Ministry of Emergency and Disaster Management
28-10-2025
The Ministry of Emergency and Disaster Management is a newly established Syrian government body responsible for coordinating national responses to emergencies, natural disasters, and humanitarian crises.

News

Backlash Over Reconstruction Plan for Jobar and Qaboun
31-03-2026
On March 13, the Damascus Governorate held a meeting to present a reconstruction project for “the revival” of the areas east of the capital, including Jobar, Qaboun, and Bab Sharqi. Around 30 people attended the meeting, including members of neighbourhood committees, dignitaries from Qaboun and Jobar (but not from Bab Sharqi), as well as lawyers and engineers.

Analysis & Features

Explained: Procedures for Auctioning Real Estate Within Compulsory Enforcement
27-01-2026
This article offers a detailed examination of the subsequent stage of compulsory enforcement, namely the procedures for selling the property at public auction, including the mechanisms of announcement, participation requirements, the conduct of bidding sessions, assignment decisions, and the resulting legal effects on ownership and the rights of creditors and debtors.

Interviews

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More articles

Introducing Green Tabu
03-09-2026
Some stories don’t fit into a news cycle. Housing, land and property rights in Syria are exactly that kind of tale, sprawling across legal texts, official sources, field reporting and institutional publications, and rarely brought together in one place, with the depth they deserve. That’s why we’re launching Green Tabu, Syria’s first HLP journal. Read its first issue here.
From Urbicide to Ecocide: Spatial Justice and Environmental Violence in Sweida, Syria
13-04-2026
What does it mean to destroy not just a city, but the very conditions that make return possible? Spatial planner Marh Echtai examines the July 2025 assault on Suweida through the interlocking frameworks of urbicide, domicide, and ecocide, arguing that the violence visited upon the Druze community was not a security operation gone wrong, but a deliberate, layered strategy of spatial erasure.
Ayn Tarma Master Plan Undergoes Expansion
31-03-2026
The local council in the city of Ayn Tarma in Rural Damascus has proposed a new revision to the master plan based on expanding the city’s boundaries and increasing urban density. This will be done by incorporating unzoned areas and allowing the construction of residential towers, with an increase in the number of permitted storeys, and permitting the construction of residential towers throughout the entire city and not only in the damaged areas.
National Committee Formed to Prepare Infrastructure for Returnees
24-03-2026
Syria’s Transitional President, Ahmad Al-Sharaa, issued Decree No. 57 on March 8, forming a national committee to rehabilitate infrastructure in heavily damaged areas. The aim is to allow displaced people to return, as well as to close various displacement camps, amid growing criticism directed at the  government due to the deteriorating conditions in the camps and the decline in support from international organisations.
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