Aaref Watad/AFP via Getty Images
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Aaref Watad/AFP via Getty Images
A Syrian child poses atop a stack of neutralized shells at a metal scrapyard on the outskirts of Maaret Misrin town in the northwestern Idlib province, Syria last week.
Aaref Watad/AFP via Getty Images
On March 15, 2011, protesters inspired by successful "Arab Spring" uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, rallied in Syria to call for an end to their own repressive regime.
But unlike the governments that had earlier more or less collapsed in the face of popular uprisings and armed insurrections, Syria's President Bashar Assad was not about to go quietly. Days after the initial protests, Syrian soldiers fired on demonstrators, killing dozens in what would become the opening shots in a seemingly endless civil war that has reverberated far beyond the Middle Eastern country's borders.