The Syrian Civil War began in 2011 as part of the wider Arab Spring movement.

It started with peaceful pro-democracy protests against the authoritarian rule of President Bashar al-Assad.

The Assad regime responded to the protests with a brutal military crackdown, which caused the conflict to escalate into a full-scale civil war.

The opposition to Assad fragmented into numerous rebel groups, with varying ideologies, from moderate to extremist.

The conflict became a complex proxy war, drawing in numerous international powers.

The Assad government received crucial military support from Russia and Iran.

Various rebel groups received support from the United States, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar.

The chaos of the war allowed the extremist group ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) to seize large territories in eastern Syria.

The war has caused a massive humanitarian crisis, resulting in hundreds of thousands of deaths and displacing more than half of Syria's population.

It is one of the most destructive and complex conflicts of the 21st century.