by Sameer al-Doumy with Layal Abou Rahal in Beirut AFP photographer Sameer al-Doumy never dreamed he would be able to return to the hometown in Syria that he escaped through a tunnel seven years ago after it was besieged by Bashar al-Assad’s forces. Douma, once a rebel stronghold near Damascus, suffered terribly for its defiance of the former regime, and was the victim of a particularly horrific chemical weapons attack in 2018. “It is like a dream for me today to find myself back here,” he said. “The revolution was a dream, getting out of a besieged town and of Syria was a dream, as it is now being able to go back. “We didn’t dare to imagine that Assad could fall because his presence was so anchored in us,”
