Syrian Jewish Foundation Kickstarts Efforts to Reclaim Properties in Aleppo

A Syrian Jewish heritage organisation, licensed last month by the transitional government, has reopened the longstanding issue of vacant and seized properties belonging to Syrian Jews.

The migration of Jews from Syria did not take place during a single, clearly defined period, but rather unfolded in successive waves shaped by shifting political and security contexts. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Jewish population in Syria was estimated at around 100,000. The first major wave followed the events of December 1947, after the adoption of the UN Partition Plan for Palestine, when Jewish neighbourhoods and properties in the city of Aleppo were subjected to violence that included killings, arson, and widespread destruction of synagogues, homes, and shops. A second, more prolonged wave occurred between 1950 and 1967, under restrictive state policies that imposed severe limitations on travel and property rights, leading to continued emigration through illegal channels and external networks. The largest and final wave took place between 1992 and 1994, when the regime of Hafez al-Assad officially allowed Syrian Jews to leave the country following the Madrid Peace Conference, under US mediation and Syrian security supervision, resulting in the departure of nearly all remaining members of the Jewish community in Syria.

On December 10, 2025, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labour announced the licensing of the “ Jewish Heritage in Syria Foundation”, which is concerned with preserving Jewish heritage in Syria. The organisation was founded by members of the Syrian Jewish diaspora abroad and aims, according to Syrian-American rabbi Henry Hamra, who spoke to Agence France-Presse, to catalogue Jewish properties and pursue the restitution of those seized during the Assad regime. Its mandate also includes protecting Jewish shrines and synagogues, restoring them, and making them accessible to Jewish visitors from around the world.

Henry Hamra, 48, now heads the foundation. He is the son of Yosef Hamra, the Chief Rabbi of Syrian Jews in New York, who left Syria in 1992. Henry Hamra ran for a seat in the most recent People’s Assembly, whose members were announced in October 2025, but did not win.

Mr Hamra has visited Syria four times since the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024, as part of visits organised by the Syrian Emergency Task Force (SETF). The SETF describes itself on its website as a non-profit founded in 2011 and based in Washington, bringing together volunteer activists from around the world who work to amplify Syrian voices on international platforms, document realities on the ground, and advocate for a free, safe, and democratic future for Syria. The organisation’s executive director, Mouaz Moustafa, told AFP that his team has documented dozens of Jewish homes that were seized during the rule of deposed president Bashar Al-Assad, stressing that the documentation process is ongoing as part of a legal pathway aimed at returning them to their owners.

In the city of Aleppo in particular, where there are many Jewish-owned properties, attempts to reopen religious and heritage sites intersect with questions of whether these properties were lawfully appropriated or seized, as their original owners remain absent.

Jewish homes, schools and synagogues in Aleppo are distributed across the neighbourhoods of Al-Jamilieh, Al-Bandara, and the areas surrounding the Aleppo Citadel. Most of these properties require restoration due to their age. Others were demolished as part of urban development projects carried out in the old city, most notably the Bab Al-Faraj redevelopment project in the late 1970s, which sought to construct mixed-use commercial buildings under a plan to revitalise the area.

The Syria Report was unable to obtain an official figure for the number of Jewish properties in Aleppo. However, real estate agents in the old city estimated that there were about 250 Jewish-owned properties, ranging from shops and old houses to multi-storey residential buildings. They added that the owners were not present.

What stands out in Mr Hamra’s statements is his reference to the confiscation of Jewish properties during the Baathist era — a claim that The Syria Report has been unable to substantiate. No decree or official decision was issued during the Baath period for the expropriation of Jewish properties. Syrian Jews were subject to a travel ban following the Baath Party’s rise to power in the early 1970s, a ban that was not lifted until the launch of Arab-Israeli peace talks in 1991 after the Madrid Conference. The last remaining Jews left the country during that period, including Henry Hamra’s father, after the Jewish population in Syria had been estimated at around 100,000 at the beginning of the 20th century.

One day after the Syrian Jewish Heritage Organisation was licensed, the Syrian Emergency Task Force organised a cultural and religious event that included visits to two Jewish heritage sites in the city of Aleppo. The first was the Samuel School in the Al-Jamilieh neighbourhood in the city centre, and the second was a Jewish synagogue in the Bab Al-Nasr area to the east. Both sites date back to the Ottoman period. During the event, the two sites were reopened to visitors after having been closed since the early 1980s.

Despite similar activities having been recorded recently in the capital, Damascus, the reopening of the two sites in Aleppo is the first of its kind there in decades. A correspondent from The Syria Report attempted to attend the opening of the Samuel School in the Al-Jamilieh neighbourhood, but a security cordon imposed by General Security forces on the street where the school is located prevented access, noting that the opening took place away from the media.

A source in Aleppo Governorate, who preferred not to disclose his name or official position, told The Syria Report that the reopening of these sites would be followed by inspections of Syrian Jewish properties and attempts to recover them. He added that these steps come as part of what he described as the transitional administration authorities’ responsiveness to efforts to close what he termed a dark chapter in the country’s history under the Baathist regime.

Several long-standing Aleppo traders told The Syria Report that the core issue surrounding Jewish properties in the city does not relate to legal disputes arising from confiscation, as most of these properties remain registered in the names of their original owners. The problem, they said, lies in inheritance procedures, given that the majority of the original owners are deceased, as well as the possibility that restrictions on disposal were placed on the records of some properties after their owners emigrated. The Syria Report was unable to verify these claims, as it could not access any Land Registry records relating to these properties.

On the other hand, based on field reporting and interviews, The Syria Report  identified  several confirmed cases of the unlawful appropriation of Jewish-owned properties within the Jdeideh neighbourhood. Unlawful appropriation refers to taking possession of and using a property without legal entitlement. The Syria Report’s correspondent estimated the number of apartments and shops seized in the neighbourhood alone from the 1970s to the present day at more than 40, spread across multiple locations. These include the street opposite the main entrance of Al-Siddiq Mosque, between the Directorate of Health and the Iskenderun Street intersection, as well as the extension of the Finance Building Street northwards, passing along the street adjacent to the Directorate of Public Transport.

According to the correspondent, some of those who appropriated these properties are longtime neighbours, while others are linked to former powerbrokers under the Assad regime. These powerbrokers vacated the properties they controlled after the fall of the regime in December 2024, only to be replaced by new occupants, some of whom are affiliated with the current transitional administration. He also noted that some of these properties are no longer fit for habitation or commercial use due to decades of neglect, with others having been damaged during the years of war between 2012 and 2016, in addition to damage caused by the February 2023 earthquake.

Al-Jamilieh neighbourhood holds a special place among Aleppo’s districts close to the city centre. It is considered one of the first neighbourhoods established outside the old city’s markets in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The area was known for its palaces and modern, grand buildings, and it housed a large Jewish synagogue known as Slouira. Among Jdeideh’s earliest residents were several Jewish families, including Jaddaa, Shammaa, and Silveira, who left a clear architectural, economic, and social legacy in the fabric of the area.