Life under the rubble

A crossroad between Europe, Asia and Africa, millenarian and Mediterranean civilisations, Syria is back at the center of international debate because of a war that has gone on for more than five years. A crisis that started in the Spring of 2011, when the first peaceful demonstrations against the current president Bashar al Assad took place, and that, with the passage of time, have become a real armed rebellion that has de-stabilised an entire country because of an internal conflict which then extended to foreign countries and regional terrorist groups. In Syria, where once there was peace, war then prevailed, and only through war, unfortunately, an era of peace can begin once more. “Life under the rubble” is the photographic reportage by Luca Catalano Gonzaga who wants to describe, mercilessly, the wounds, the anguish, the hopes of a people battered by long, endless, fighting. There are those who pray, those who try to live in dignity, those who fight, those who suffer, those who came to a close brush with death, those who give themselves totally to serve others. War is brutal but also regenerative. No use crying over the corpses, what counts, looking into the face of the Syrians, is fighting for the future. (text by Sebatiano Caputo).

  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A Syrian soldier anaesthetised during surgery. He had been hit by the shrapnel of an explosion in the outskirts of the city.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. In the infirmary the wounds of the Syrian army soldiers are cleaned and stitched up.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A Syrian army soldier shot in the back by a bullet , is lying on a cot as he receives a radiological analysis.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A soldier on a hospital bed next to his “trench comrade”.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A girl in tears, over her husband, a Syrian soldier, injured on the front lines.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A young boy just out of surgery shows his desperation.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A few moments before surgery.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. Anesthesia before surgery.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. During a surgery on the leg, the Surgeon Fabio Abenavoli, President of Emergenza Sorrisi Onlus, and Professor Vincenzo Ferdinandi, a volunteer doctor, train a Syrian orthopedist at the hospital.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. Preparing for anesthesia.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. The Syrian doctor takes measurements of his patient’s surgery.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A few moments before anesthesia.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. Interior of one of thr operating rooms.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. Amir, 28 years old and Muahir, 26 years old, have been both hit in fire arm battles in the outskirts of the capital.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. Doctors and nurses working on patients’ medical records.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A war veteran while he has a blood test.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. Young wounded soldier, waiting to be transported to the operating room.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A mother consoles her son, now paralysed.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. The young volunteer Mohammed, paralyzed on the bed and wrapped in a wool blanket, “protected” by the gaze of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A boy injured by a sniper.
  • Youssef Al Asma Hospital, Damascus, Syria 2016. A Syrian nurse waiting to start her shift.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. Darayya, the destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. Darayya, the destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. Darayya, the destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. Darayya, the destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. Darayya, the destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. The destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus, famed throughout the country to be the birthplace of Gregory III Laham, patriarch of the current greek-Melkite Catholic Church. The entire area, released by the Syrian army in early November, has been torn to the ground because of the fighting. And the artillery shells have not spared churches either. So after Maaloula, Al Hamydyya in Homs, and Al Qaryatayn, another nucleus of Christianity in Syria is erased from the spiritual map of the country.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. The destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus, famed throughout the country to be the birthplace of Gregory III Laham, patriarch of the current greek-Melkite Catholic Church. The entire area, released by the Syrian army in early November, has been torn to the ground because of the fighting. And the artillery shells have not spared churches either. So after Maaloula, Al Hamydyya in Homs, and Al Qaryatayn, another nucleus of Christianity in Syria is erased from the spiritual map of the country.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. The destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus, famed throughout the country to be the birthplace of Gregory III Laham, patriarch of the current greek-Melkite Catholic Church. The entire area, released by the Syrian army in early November, has been torn to the ground because of the fighting. And the artillery shells have not spared churches either. So after Maaloula, Al Hamydyya in Homs, and Al Qaryatayn, another nucleus of Christianity in Syria is erased from the spiritual map of the country.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. The destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus, famed throughout the country to be the birthplace of Gregory III Laham, patriarch of the current greek-Melkite Catholic Church. The entire area, released by the Syrian army in early November, has been torn to the ground because of the fighting. And the artillery shells have not spared churches either. So after Maaloula, Al Hamydyya in Homs, and Al Qaryatayn, another nucleus of Christianity in Syria is erased from the spiritual map of the country.
  • Darayya, Syria 2016. The destruction of the historical district once inhabited by more than 75 thousand inhabitants, mostly Christians, just ten kilometers away from the heart of Damascus, famed throughout the country to be the birthplace of Gregory III Laham, patriarch of the current greek-Melkite Catholic Church. The entire area, released by the Syrian army in early November, has been torn to the ground because of the fighting. And the artillery shells have not spared churches either. So after Maaloula, Al Hamydyya in Homs, and Al Qaryatayn, another nucleus of Christianity in Syria is erased from the spiritual map of the country.
  • Damascus, Syria 2016. Two veiled women in a moment of prayer and meditation inside the Great Mosque of the Umayyads.
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