本周封面故事 | 阿萨德倒台后的叙利亚：自由的曙光还是新的噩梦？

财富 2024-12-16 11:52 美国

写在前面

1.重点单词

Downfall - 垮台

Tyranny - 暴政

Jihadists - 圣战者

Instability - 不稳定性

Momentous - 重大的

Watershed - 分水岭

Decapitated - 被斩首的

Brandishing - 挥舞

Grievance - 不满

Tasteful - 有品味的

Impoverished - 贫困的

Gawped - 目瞪口呆地看

Sectarian - 宗派的

Vengeance - 报复

Jubilation - 欢欣

Menace - 威胁

Benighted - 愚昧的

Autocratic - 独裁的

Purging - 清洗

Feuding - 争斗的

Traumatised - 受创伤的

2.词组

Religious tyranny - 宗教暴政

Civil war - 内战

Export refugees - 输出难民

Victorious rebels - 胜利的叛军

Ripped poster - 撕裂的海报

Human tragedy - 人类悲剧

Abandoned palaces - 被遗弃的宫殿

Powerful factions - 强大的派系

Nom de guerre - 战时假名

Political settlement - 政治解决

Religious pluralism - 宗教多元主义

3.固定搭配

Descend into - 陷入

Look back at - 回顾

End up using - 最终使用

Take place - 发生

Emerge blinking - 眨着眼睛出现

Seek vengeance - 寻求报复

Advance their own interests - 推进自身利益

Struggle to unite - 努力统一

Put back together - 重建

Live side by side - 和睦相处

Fall to someone - 落到某人身上

Distance oneself from - 与...保持距离

Court the West - 讨好西方

Bring down a tyrant - 推翻暴君

4.文章概述：

阿萨德政权在叙利亚的突然倒台震惊全球。尽管人们担心国家可能陷入宗教极端主义或内战，但也存在希望。反叛军领袖沙拉阿在伊德利卜省的统治展现了一些积极迹象，但他日益独裁的倾向令人忧虑。叙利亚正面临艰巨的重建任务和复杂的政治重组。虽然未来充满不确定性，但叙利亚人民终于推翻了长期统治的暴君，这份喜悦值得我们共同庆祝。叙利亚的命运走向，世界正拭目以待。

5.问题（如何读完文章能很快回答这几个问题，证明我们真正读懂了这篇文章）：

Q1: What are the main concerns about Syria's future after Assad's regime fell?

A: There are concerns that Syria might descend into religious tyranny or civil war.

Q2: What were the characteristics of Sharaa's rule in Idlib province?

A: He ran a competent government that respected religious pluralism and oversaw a successful economy.

Q3: What worries have arisen about Sharaa's style of governance?

A: He has become increasingly autocratic, purging rivals and imprisoning opponents.

Q4: What positive note does the article end on?

A: Despite the challenges ahead, it's worth pausing to share Syrians' joy at bringing down a tyrant.

精读|翻译|词组

Cover Story

How we chose this week’s image

Our worldwide cover this week was devoted to the downfall of Bashar al-Assad.

A lot of commentary has warned that post-Assad Syria is doomed to descend into religious tyranny or civil war. Many fear that the country will once again export refugees, jihadists and instability.

That is indeed a danger. However, we wanted a cover which, without seeming naive, argued that the fall of the Assads is neither so bleak nor so hopeless.

We thought that such a momentous event would probably demand a news photograph. One choice was whether to feature Bashar al-Assad, the Moscow-based ex-tyrant, or the victorious rebels who deposed him. One looked back at a watershed, the other forward at what it might bring.

Here are some shots that focus on Mr Assad. The ripped poster is powerful, but it has been widely published. The decapitated statue is much fresher—and indeed we ended up using it in our briefing section. However, it features Bashar’s father, Hafez, and it is wrong for the cover. It looks as if the rebellion was taking place in Tallinn or Riga in 1989, rather than in Damascus today.

We also looked for pictures of the rebels. This lot are brandishing their own version of the Syrian flag—with green instead of red at the top and three red stars instead of two green ones. The trouble is that this could have been almost any group with a grievance.

The other picture is too tasteful for a story packed with danger and human tragedy. As the regime collapsed Syrians impoverished under Mr Assad’s rule gawped at his abandoned palaces. Broken people emerged blinking from his prisons; some could no longer remember their own names.

And Syria’s future could very well descend into sectarian strife. In a country crammed with weapons, people have many reasons to seek vengeance. Syria’s new most powerful factions are hardly men of peace—their origins lie in al-Qaeda and Islamic state. Within a day of the regime’s collapse foreign powers were escalating their fighting in Syria so as to advance their own interests.

We were leaning towards focusing on Mr Assad, but we wanted to assess more news pictures to be sure.

This jihadist captures the mix of jubilation and menace that Mr Assad’s ousting inspires. Jubilation, because his benighted regime left behind nothing except ruin, corruption and misery. Menace, because the leading rebel group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, will struggle to unite Syria. Even if it does, HTS’s leader, Ahmad al-Sharaa, who went by the nom de guerre Abu Muhammad al-Jolani, may end up resembling the dictator he has just toppled.

We also looked at another disturbing photograph. At first you register a celebration, as Syrians cheer their liberation after 53 years under the Assads’ yoke. But then you look at the young boy sitting astride the barrel of a tank and you realise that in his short life he has known nothing but war. That is not the only reason the country will be hard to put back together: Syria is a mosaic of peoples and faiths carved out of the Ottoman empire. They have never lived side by side in a stable democracy.

The daunting task of attempting to forge a new political settlement out of a fractured country could well fall to Mr Sharaa. This picture speaks to his violent inheritance.

As ruler of Idlib, a rebel province in the north, Mr Sharaa ran a competent government that nodded at religious pluralism and oversaw a successful economy. However, although he has distanced himself from more radical groups and courted the West, Mr Sharaa has become increasingly autocratic, and had taken to purging rivals and imprisoning opponents.

If he tries to run Syria permanently as a giant Idlib—a Sunni fief dominated by HTS—he will fail. Syria will remain divided between feuding warlords, many of them mini-dictators in their own right.

The shot-up face of Mr Assad was hard to recognise. This picture of contempt was much stronger. A boot is less extreme than a bullet, but seeing it is what counts.

We debated whether to use the photograph in colour or black and white. Some argued that colour was more newsy; others thought the fall of the house of Assad was a piece of history and that black and white would have more weight.

We went with weight. Much will go wrong in a traumatised place like Syria. The effort to rebuild the country is bound to entail a struggle for influence. But it was time to pause for a moment and share Syrians’ joy at bringing down a tyrant.

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