2014 in Syria

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See also:	Other events of 2014 List of years in Syria

The following lists events that happened in 2014 in Syria.

Events

January

• January 5 - A sniper kills a man and six people are wounded in clashes between districts in Tripoli, Lebanon, that support rival sides in neighboring Syria's civil war.^[1]
• January 7 - Both the Syrian opposition and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant mass execute dozens of their combatant prisoners.^[2]
• January 9 - Syrian Civil War
  • A car bomb kills 18 people, including women and children, in central Hama province, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights organization.^[3][4]
  • Islamic extremist groups in Syria with ties to al-Qaeda try to identify, recruit and train Americans and other Westerners who have traveled there to get them to carry out attacks when they return home.^[5]
• January 11 - 500 people are killed in inter-factional fighting between an alliance of secular rebels and moderate Islamists against radical Islamists.^[6]
• January 12 - Syrian State TV claims that a rebel mortar attack kills 19 people in the government-controlled Ghouta and Karm al shami areas of the city of Homs.^[7]
• January 14 - 46 Palestinians and Syrian residents in the Yarmouk Camp have died of starvation and lack of medical care, since October, from a Syrian army enforced blockade.^[8]
• January 16 - A suicide bomber kills 4 people and injures 26 in the Lebanese town of Hermel, a Hezbollah stronghold near the Syrian border.^[9]
• January 17 - A rocket fired from Syria into the Lebanese border town of Arsal kills seven people and wounds 15.^[10]
• January 20 - Two car bombs hit a rebel-held post on the Syrian border with Turkey, killing at least 16 people amidst continuing fighting between Turkey-supported rebels and Saudi-supported rebels.^[11]

February

• February 6 - Fighting between Syrian rebels and government forces rages around the Aleppo Central Prison in the war-torn city of Aleppo, but it is unclear whether rebels control all or part of the facility.
• February 7 - Civilians are evacuated from a rebel-held area of the Syrian city of Homs after more than 18 months under a government blockade.
• February 9 - Hundreds of civilians are evacuated from Homs, as a tense truce between rebel and government forces is maintained.
• February 12 - Syrian Civil War
  • The Syrian Army and their Lebanese ally Hezbollah begin an assault to retake the strategic border town Yabrud from the Syrian rebels.
  • Russia says it will veto a U.N. resolution on humanitarian aid access in Syria, claiming that the draft is an effort to prepare for military strikes against President Bashar al-Assad's government.
• February 14 - From 18 to 43 people including civilians are killed and dozens wounded by a car bomb outside a mosque in the southern Syrian village of al-Yadouda according to local reports.
• February 16 - Syrian Civil War
  • Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, calls on other sectarian forces in the Arab world to withdraw from Syria, saying that if they did so, Hezbollah would also "not remain in Syria either."
  • A Syrian child is transferred to an Israeli hospital near Tiberias for emergency treatment after being injured during clashes in Syria, near the Israeli border, between rebels and Syrian Army.
• February 23 - Seven people are killed and 50 wounded in a car bombing near a field hospital in northern Syria, close to the border with Turkey.
• February 24 - Israeli Air Force planes reportedly bomb a weapons shipment of SS-21 missiles destined for Hezbollah near a Hezbollah stronghold on the Lebanon-Syria border.
• February 26 - Syrian army and Hezbollah troops kill over 70 rebel fighters in an ambush in the outskirts of Damascus.
• February 28 - Syrian air strikes near the Lebanese border town of Arsal killed three people.

March

• March 18 - The United States expels all Syrian diplomats and closes the Syrian embassy in Washington D.C.
• March 19 - The Israeli Air Force launches several air strikes on Syrian military sites, killing 1 Syrian soldier and wounding 7 others, in retaliation for a bombing that wounded four of its troops in the Golan Heights.
• March 20 - Syrian troops capture the 1,000-year-old Krak des Chevaliers crusader castle from rebels after laying siege to the fortress since January.
• March 21 - Clashes erupt in Tripoli, Lebanon, between Syrian government supporters and detractors, leaving 3 dead.
• March 23 - Turkish F-16s shoot down a Syrian military aircraft for purportedly violating Turkish airspace. A Syrian Arab Republic spokesman denies this claim and says the aircraft was in Syrian airspace when it was shot down.
• March 29 - A suicide bomber kills three soldiers at a Lebanese army checkpoint in the border town of Arsal close to the Syrian border.

April

• April 3 - Mortar fire kills at least six people in a Damascus suburb.
• April 6 - Mortar fire kills two people near the Damascus Opera House.
• April 9 - 25 people are killed in car bombings in the central city of Homs.
• April 10 - 88 civilians are killed in Aleppo by barrel bombs dropped from Syrian government warplanes.
• April 12 - Chemical weapons are used again in Syria, this time on the town of Kafr Zita, Hama.
• April 14 - Syrian Civil War
  • Syria's political opposition urges US action in response to the Syrian government's barrel bombing campaign in the city of Aleppo.
  • Syrian government troops recapture the towns of Al-Sarkha and Ma'loula near the Syria-Lebanon border.
• April 16 - Syrian Civil War
  • More chemical attacks are reported, this time in the Damascus suburbs.
  • Jordanian warplanes strike a convoy of vehicles as they were trying to enter Jordan from Syria.
• April 18 - The death toll of children in the entire Syrian Civil War reaches nearly 15,000.
• April 21 - Syrian Air Force air strikes in Aleppo, killing dozens of people; 14 others are killed by barrel bombing in the neighborhood of Baeedeen.
• April 21 - The Syrian government sets the presidential election for June 3, with opposition groups calling it a "parody of democracy".
• April 27 - Iraqi helicopters destroy a convoy of ISIL fuel tankers inside Syrian territory.
• April 29 - At least 37 people are killed and 85 others are injured in multiple explosions in Homs.
• April 30 - The Local Coordination Committees of Syria announces that 25 children were killed on Wednesday when Syrian army forces dropped barrel bombs on an elementary school.

May

• May 2 - A 24-hour ceasefire deal is reached in Homs allowing rebels to withdraw from their last stronghold in the central city.
• May 7 - Rebels withdraw from the besieged city of Homs in accordance with the U.N.-brokered deal between them and the Syrian government.
• May 8 - A large explosion levels the Carlton Hotel in Aleppo which was used as a military base by the Army of Syria as well as several other buildings.
• May 23 - Syrian TV reports that 39 people have been killed and 205 injured as a result of a mortar attack on a pro-Assad rally.
• May 23 - Russia and China veto a U.N. Security Council resolution that would have asked the International Criminal Court to investigate war crimes in Syria.
• May 25 - 3 bombs detonate in Homs, killing 9 people and injuring another 20.
• May 27 - Eleven people, including six members of a United Nations Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons fact finding mission, are attacked near Hama.
• May 30 - United States State Department makes its first confirmation that a U.S. citizen has been "involved" in a suicide bombing as part of the Syrian Civil War.

June

• June 1 - A teenager is arrested at Heathrow Airport in England in relation to suspected involvement in Syrian-related terrorism.
• June 2 - Four people are arrested in Paris and southern France on suspicion of recruiting militants to fight in Syria.
• June 3 - Voters in Syria go to the polls for a presidential election with incumbent President Bashar al-Assad all but certain to win amidst an opposition boycott. On Wednesday, the Syrian government claimed that he had won with 88.7% of the vote.
• June 9 - The Syrian government declares a general amnesty for all citizens.
• June 14 - A bomb explodes in the town of al-Mayadin in Deir al-Zor province near the Iraqi border killing 8.
• June 15 - The Syrian Military retakes control of Kessab in north-western Syria.
• June 16 - A barrel bomb is dropped from a helicopter in Aleppo, killing at least 25 people.
• June 18 - Syrian Civil War
  • Opposition activists claim that Syrian Army helicopters have bombed a refugee camp near the border with Jordan, killing at least 20 people.
  • The OPCW releases a preliminary report indicating more chemical weapons have been used since the August 2013 attacks, confirming France's suspicions that the Syrian government has still been using chlorine gas attacks.
• June 20 - 12 people including 9 children are killed when a Syrian army helicopter strikes a refugees camp south of Damascus.
• June 22 - Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant capture the al-Walid (al-Tanf) border crossing with Syria and the Turaibil (Karameh) border crossing with Jordan.
• June 22 - A 15-year old Israeli boy is killed and three Israelis wounded when their truck is hit by an unknown weapon in the Golan Heights near the Quneitra border crossing; Israeli Defense Forces fire at Syrian government targets in response.
• June 23 - Israeli Air Force planes carry out a series of air strikes in Syria following an attack on Sunday that caused the death of an Israeli teenager.
• June 23 - Syria hands over its remaining 100 tonnes of its declared chemical weapons to the United Nations Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons but the organisation cannot declare that the country no longer has any such weapons.
• June 26 - The Prime Minister of Iraq Nouri al-Maliki confirms that the Syrian Air Force bombed Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant positions in Iraq earlier in the week.
• June 28 - Islamist rebels including members of the Al-Qaeda affiliated Nusra Front challenge Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant's control of the town of Albu Kamal on the Syrian border on Saturday.

July

• July 10 - A BBC investigation determines that photographs circulating on social media sites allegedly covering the airstrikes on Gaza include photographs taken from conflicts in Iraq and Syria and are up to five years old.
• July 13 - At least four people are killed as Hezbollah clashes with Syrian rebels on the border between Lebanon and Syria.
• July 15 - The IDF reports that a rocket which started a fire in the Golan Heights was launched from Syria.
• July 16 - Bashar Assad is sworn in to serve his third term as President of Syria.
• July 18 - About 100 soldiers, guards and employees are killed as insurgents belonging to the Islamic State (ISIS) seize control of the Shaer gas field in Palmyra. The United Kingdom-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 115 people were killed in total.
• July 25 - Syrian Civil War
  • The Jordanian Air Force shoots down a drone as it flew over the northeastern Mafraq Governorate near the border with Syria, a security official said. The official said the drone flew near the Zaatari refugee camp, which is home to around 100,000 Syrian refugees.
  • Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant forces claim to have killed at least fifty members of the Syrian Army, summarily killing many of them.

August

• August 3 - The Islamic State loses control of three towns in the area around Al-Asharah to local tribesmen.
• August 4 - The Lebanese Army states that 14 soldiers have been killed and 22 are missing after alleged clashes with Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant fighters on the Syrian border.
• August 6 - Saudi Arabia grants Lebanon US$1 billion to help the country in its conflict with self-declared jihadist fighters on the border with Syria.
• August 13 - The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights claims that 52 people have died as Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant Islamists gain control of eight villages between Aleppo and the Turkish border.
• August 19 - American journalist James Wright Foley, kidnapped in 2012, has reportedly been beheaded by Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
• August 21 - The Syrian opposition accuses the Syrian army of launching a chemical attack on the Jobar neighborhood of Damascus, killing at least six people.
• August 22 - The United Nations estimates that the death toll in Syria has doubled to at least 191,000 in the past year.
• August 24 - Syrian Civil War
  • After more than 18 months of requests, Turkey comes under heavy international pressure to secure its borders to the influx of foreign fighters, oil, and weapons crossing into Syria to fight for ISIS. ISIS fighters have been moving towards the Turkey-Syria border using armored cars looted from Iraqi military bases.
  • Fighters from the Islamic State seize Al-Thawrah airbase, the last remaining stronghold of Bashar al-Assad's government in Ar-Raqqah Governorate.
  • Peter Theo Curtis, an American citizen, is released by an al-Qaeda-linked group after two years in captivity.
• August 27 - Syrian Civil War
  • The UN Human Rights Council issues a report accusing both IS militants and Syrian government forces of committing war crimes in Syria.
  • The US government confirms that an American man believed to have been fighting alongside Islamist militants in Syria has been killed; the total number of Americans killed while taking part in the civil war rises to three.
  • Syrian rebels take over the border Quneitra crossing between Israel and Syria after heavy fighting. Mortar rounds and rockets were launched into Israel. One IDF soldier is wounded by a bullet just days after rocket attacks from Lebanon.
• August 28 - Syrian Civil War
  • A Syrian tribe in Deir Ezzor province faces genocide from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant and appeals for the world to help.
  • Syrian Air Force jets bomb rebel-held positions near the Israel-Syria border on the Golan Heights with heavy fighting on the ground and the IDF claims that members of a UNDOF peacekeeping force were abducted.
  • The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports that dozens of Syrian government forces, captured after the loss of the Tabqa air base, were executed by IS militants.
  • The United Nations says that 43 Fijiian peacekeepers have been captured on the Golan Heights with another 81 trapped.
• August 29 - Syrian Civil War
  • The United Nations estimates that three million Syrians live as refugees overseas while another 6.5 million are displaced within Syria.
  • Syrian rebels attack the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force in the Golan Heights and capture 42 Fijian peacekeepers while surrounding a base manned by 75 Filipino soldiers.
• August 29 - The United Kingdom raises its terror threat level from "substantial" to "severe" in response to conflicts in Iraq and Syria.
• August 31 - Thirty-two United Nations peacekeepers from the Philippines were evacuated under fire from the Golan Heights border checkpoint between Syria and Israel, while others remain under fire from groups including the Al-Nusra Front.

September

• September 2 - ISIL releases an Internet video showing the beheading of American journalist Steven Sotloff.
• September 3 - Syrian Civil War
  • A spokesman for the White House confirms that a video showing American journalist Steven Sotloff being beheaded is authentic.
  • A spokesman for Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirms that Sotloff was a dual citizen of Israel and the U.S., a fact that had been concealed during his captivity, including by Sotloff himself.
• September 6 - The Syrian Air Force targets a bakery and a training camp controlled by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria in Ar-Raqqah, killing 25 people.
• September 10 - The President of the United States Barack Obama authorises $25 million for "immediate military assistance" to the Iraqi government and Kurdistan Regional Government. He also outlines plans to expand US operations against Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant to Syria in a televised address to the nation.
• September 11 - The al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front releases dozens of Fijian United Nations peacekeepers captured near the Golan Heights.
• September 16 - Islamic State fighters shoot down a Syrian Air Force warplane conducting an airstrike on Raqqa.
• September 17 - Nearly 50 people have been killed in two days of Syrian government airstrikes on the town of Talbiseh in Homs Governorate.
• September 18 - The United States Senate passes a budget measure authorising President Barack Obama to equip and train moderate rebels to fight ISIL in Syria.
• September 20 - The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights claims that ISIL militants have captured 60 villages near the Kurdish town of Kobani on the border with Turkey.
• September 23 - The United States and its allies commence air strikes against Islamic State in Syria with reports of at least 120 deaths.
• September 23 - Georgia denies media reports alleging that the country has offered hosting of a training center for anti-Islamic State Syrian rebel fighters and states that its involvement in the crisis will be limited to "humanitarian missions".
• September 23 - The al-Nusra Front claims that its leader Abu Yousef al-Turki was killed in the air strikes.
• September 23 - Israel shoots down a Syrian Air Force Sukhoi Su-24 that had infiltrated its air space.
• September 25 - Several Syrian rebel groups sign an agreement to unite in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and President Bashar al-Assad's forces.
• September 28 - The al-Nusra Front threatens retaliation against nations participating in air strikes against Islamic State.

October

• October 1 - At least 45 people (including 41 children) are killed and 56 injured following a suicide bomber attack on the Akrameh al-Makhzumi school in Homs.
• October 4 - The Kurdish city of Kobane in the Raqqa governate is on the brink of catastrophe as ISIS fighters besiege the city.
• October 5 - 18,000 Palestinians are facing life-threatening shortages of water in the Yarmouk Camp neighborhood of Damascus.
• October 7 - Kurds clash violently with Turkish police over failure to help Kurds under siege in the Syrian border city of Kobani under siege by ISIL forces. At least fourteen people have died in the clashes.
• October 8 - At least 19 Kurdish civilians were killed while protesting against the government's inaction in defending Kobani from ISIS advances.
• October 10 - Islamic State forces capture the headquarters of Kurdish forces defending the Syrian border town of Kobane with the United Nations warning of massacre.
• October 11 - Turkey agrees to allow the training of 2,000 Syrian opposition forces on its soil as Islamic State militants approach to within 1 mile of the centre of the border city of Kobani.
• October 22 - The Syrian Air Force claims to have shot down two of the three fighter jets operated by ISIL in northern Syria.

November

• November 1 - Turkey breaks from its policy of preventing Kurdish fighters from entering Syria and allows 150 Iraqi Peshmerga to cross into Kobanê.^[12]
• November 3 - Islamic State militants claim to have captured the Jahar gas fields in Homs, the second gas field they have captured in a week.^[13]
• November 5 - 11 children are killed by mortar fire at a school in Damascus.^[14]
• November 16 - ISIL claims to have executed American hostage Abdul-Rahman Kassig.^[15]
• November 25 - Syrian Air Force raids on the city of Raqqa kill at least 36 people.
• November 29 - Heavy fighting in Kobani kills at least 40 fighters from both ISIL and Kurdish forces.
• November 30 - Coalition forces launch over 30 airstrikes on Raqqa, the de facto capital of ISIL.

December

• December 1 - The United Nations World Food Program suspends a food program for 1.7 million Syrian refugees after donor countries fail to meet their commitments.^[16]
• December 6 - The Syrian Army repels an ISIL offensive on the Deir ez-Zor air base, resulting in at least 119 casualties total.^[17]
• December 7 - The Israeli Air Force bombs two Syrian Armed Forces bases near Damascus and the town of Dimas, according to Russian and Syrian sources.^[18]
• December 8 - The United Nations seeks $16.4 billion to fund humanitarian assistance programs in 2015 with Syria, Iraq, Sudan and South Sudan the areas of greatest need.^[19]
• December 9 - Three Turkish Army soldiers die by gunfire in the town of Ceylanpinar. The local Turkish governor begins an investigation of whether the gunfire came from the Syrian side of the border.^[20]
• December 14 - A battle between Bashar al-Assad loyalist forces and Islamist rebels in Aleppo Governorate leave 34 rebels dead and 3 loyalist fighters captured.^[21]
• December 16 - Around one hundred Syrian soldiers and eighty Islamist fighters die in a two-day battle for Wadi Deif, with the Islamic Front capturing over 120 government soldiers.^[22]
• December 24 - A Royal Jordanian Air Force warplane crashes, and its pilot is captured by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant militants near Ar-Raqqah.^[23]
• December 31 - The Italian coast guard boards and regains control of a cargo ship that had been sabotaged and abandoned by human traffickers carrying nearly 1,000 passengers, mostly Syrian refugees, that was in imminent jeopardy of crashing into land.^[24][25]

References