Tartus

The coast here was Phoenician long before the town existed: Arwad, the island offshore, was the city-state of Aradus, a sea power that ruled the facing mainland, and Amrit just to the south was its sanctuary and necropolis, with a temple set in a rock-cut pool. The mainland settlement that became Tartus was Antaradus, "opposite Arwad", rebuilt in the fourth century under Roman rule. Christian tradition holds that a chapel to the Virgin was built here very early, and the town grew around that cult.

The Crusaders took the coast at the beginning of the 12th century and called the place Tortosa. The Knights Templar were given the town in 1152, and the 12th-century cathedral of Our Lady of Tortosa, designed to be defensible, stood inside a walled compound with a keep and towers. The town fell to the Mamluks in 1291, and the Templars withdrew to Arwad, holding the island until 1302 — the last Crusader position in the Levant. Afterwards the fortifications were left to the local population, who built houses inside the compound walls, which is why the old town's lanes still run between medieval arches and vaults.

Under the Ottomans Tartus was a modest port in the shadow of Tripoli and Latakia. French rule after the First World War attached the district to the Alawite State that existed from 1920 to 1936, and after independence the town grew quickly: the port was developed into the country's second, an oil pipeline terminal and refinery were built along the coast, and Syrian families made the beaches their summer destination. The coast stayed under government control throughout the war after 2011 and received very large numbers of displaced people from inland. The Assad government fell in December 2024, and a transitional government followed in March 2025.

Tartus faces the sea, and that has shaped it. Boat-building on Arwad is a craft passed down in families, with wooden hulls still made by hand on the island's slipways and sold along the coast; fishing supplies the restaurants of the harbour; and the corniche in the evening, full of families, tea sellers and football on the sand, is the centre of social life in a way that has no real equivalent in the inland cities.

The province is mixed. The city has Sunni, Alawite and Christian residents, Christian villages lie in the hills behind it, and the coastal mountains are the Alawite heartland. That mixture, combined with a holiday economy, made the coast the most socially relaxed part of Syria, with mixed beaches, bars and a lighter dress code, and the city's identity has long been tied to being a place other Syrians came to enjoy themselves.

Weddings in the villages bring out the dabke line dance and drumming, and food is the main vehicle of hospitality. Arak is drunk with mezze where alcohol is served. Public space is used late: the promenade fills after sunset in summer, cafés serve coffee and water pipes until late, and the sea is swum in from spring to autumn. Football is followed closely, with local clubs a source of civic pride.

Tartus is a city of some 450,000 people, at the centre of a densely populated coastal province, and its population rose sharply during the war as families displaced from Homs, Aleppo and elsewhere settled here. Housing pressure, rents and crowded schools followed, and many of those families have not returned home.

The port is the city's spine: Syria's second harbour handles containers, bulk cargo and passenger traffic to Arwad, and related trade, customs work and haulage employ a large share of the city. The coastal plain around it grows citrus, olives, tomatoes under plastic and tobacco; the Baniyas refinery lies up the coast; Tartus University draws students from across the province; and fishing and boat-building continue on Arwad. Tourism from within Syria, once a major summer earner, has not recovered.

Days start early with the market and the fishing boats, quieten in the afternoon, and come alive again on the seafront in the evening. Power cuts, fuel prices and the cost of living dominate household planning here as everywhere in the country, and generators and solar panels are common. The economy of the coast, the return of displaced families and relations between communities under the new authorities are the questions people discuss.

Tartus eats from the sea. Fish is grilled or fried whole and served with tahini sauce sharpened with lemon and garlic; sayadieh is fish laid over rice cooked with caramelised onions and spices; and small fish, squid and prawns are floured and fried and eaten with bread and salad in the harbour restaurants and on Arwad. Fish is expensive by local standards, so it is a dish for an occasion as much as an everyday meal.

The coastal plain and the mountains behind supply the rest. Olives and olive oil are pressed locally, citrus groves run along the shore, and figs, pomegranates and honey come down from the hills. Mountain families make shanklish, balls of dried, spiced cheese rolled in thyme and eaten crumbled with tomato and onion, and kishk, yoghurt fermented with bulgur and dried to a powder for winter soups. Mezze is built on hummus, moutabal, muhammara — a paste of red pepper, walnuts and pomegranate molasses — and pickles.

Sweets come from the Orontes tradition shared with Homs and Hama, above all halawet el-jibn, warm sweet cheese dough rolled around clotted cream with syrup and pistachio, alongside baklava and semolina cakes. Coffee is bitter and scented with cardamom, tea is drunk very sweet, and arak, the aniseed spirit distilled from grapes, is the drink served with a table of mezze in a coast where alcohol is openly sold.