The Houla Region or Houla Plain ( ''Al-Ḥūla'') is an area consisting of three villages in the

Homs Governorate Homs Governorate ( / ALA-LC: ''Muḥāfaẓat Ḥimṣ'') is one of the fourteen Governorates of Syria, governorates (provinces) of Syria. It is situated in central Syria. Its geography differs in various locations in the governorate, from to . ...

of central

Syria Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...

, northwest of the city of

Homs Homs ( ; ), known in pre-Islamic times as Emesa ( ; ), is a city in western Syria and the capital of the Homs Governorate. It is Metres above sea level, above sea level and is located north of Damascus. Located on the Orontes River, Homs is ...

. The biggest village in the Houla region had 20,041 inhabitants in 2004 and is called

Kafr Laha Kafr Laha () is a town in the Homs Governorate north of Homs in northern Syria. In 2004 it had a population of 20,041 according to the Central Bureau of Statistics of Syria. Its inhabitants are predominantly Sunni Muslim Sunni Islam is the l ...

. The second largest village,

Taldou Taldou (, also spelled Tall Daww, Taldo, Tall Dhu or Taldao) is a town in the Houla region of northern Syria, north of Homs in the Homs Governorate. Nearby towns include Burj al-Qa'i to the east, Tallaf to the northeast, Kafr Laha and Tell Dah ...

, had 15,727 inhabitants in 2004 and is located in the outskirts of Houla. The third village,

Tell Dahab Tell Dahab (, also spelled Tal Dhahab) is a village in central Syria, administratively part of the Homs Governorate, located northwest of Homs. Nearby localities include Taldou and Kafr Laha, Maryamin and al-Taybah al-Gharbiyah to the southwest, ...

had 12,055 inhabitants in 2004. The settlement is essentially a

Turkmen Turkmen, Türkmen, Turkoman, or Turkman may refer to: Peoples Historical ethnonym * Turkoman (ethnonym), ethnonym used for the Oghuz Turks during the Middle Ages Ethnic groups * Turkmen in Anatolia and the Levant (Seljuk and Ottoman-Turkish desc ...

Sunni Muslim Sunni Islam is the largest branch of Islam and the largest religious denomination in the world. It holds that Muhammad did not appoint any successor and that his closest companion Abu Bakr () rightfully succeeded him as the caliph of the Musli ...

town, where

Turkish language Turkish ( , , also known as 'Turkish of Turkey') is the most widely spoken of the Turkic languages, a member of Oghuz languages, Oghuz branch with around 90 million speakers. It is the national language of Turkey and one of two official languag ...

is widely spoken among its people. Houla is also surrounded by

Alawite Alawites () are an Arabs, Arab ethnoreligious group who live primarily in the Levant region in West Asia and follow Alawism, a sect of Islam that splintered from early Shia as a ''ghulat'' branch during the ninth century. Alawites venerate A ...

neighboring villages. Many of the inhabitants of the Houla village cluster are of

descent. Houla was described by 19th-century English scholar

Eli Smith Eli Smith (September 13, 1801 – January 11, 1857) was an American Protestant missionary and scholar. Biography Smith was born in Northford, Connecticut, to Eli and Polly (née Whitney) Smith. He graduated from Yale College in 1821 and from A ...

as a low-lying tract of land situated at the eastern slope of the

Syrian Coastal Mountain Range The Coastal Mountain Range (, ''Silsilat al-Jibāl as-Sāḥilīyah'') also called Jabal al-Ansariya, Jabal an-Nusayria or Jabal al-`Alawīyin (Ansari, Nusayri or Alawi Mountains) is a mountain range in northwestern Syria running north–south, ...

. The 13th-century Syrian geographer

Yaqut al-Hamawi Yāqūt Shihāb al-Dīn ibn-ʿAbdullāh al-Rūmī al-Ḥamawī (1179–1229) () was a Muslim scholar of Byzantine ancestry active during the late Abbasid period (12th–13th centuries). He is known for his , an influential work on geography con ...

visited al-Houla in 1226 during

Ayyubid The Ayyubid dynasty (), also known as the Ayyubid Sultanate, was the founding dynasty of the medieval Sultan of Egypt, Sultanate of Egypt established by Saladin in 1171, following his abolition of the Fatimid Caliphate, Fatimid Caliphate of Egyp ...

rule noting that the place belonged to

Jund Hims ''Jund Ḥimṣ'' (, " military district of Homs") was one of the military districts of the caliphal province of Syria. Geography The capital of Jund Hims was Homs, from which the district received its name. Its principal urban centres in the 1 ...

("military district of Homs").

The Houla massacre

The

Houla massacre The Houla massacre () was a mass murder of civilians by Ba'athist Syria, Ba’athist Syrian government forces that took place on May 25, 2012, in the midst of the Syrian Civil War, in the town of Taldou, in the Houla Region of Syria, a string o ...

() was a mass murder of civilians by Syrian government forces that took place on May 25, 2012, in the midst of the Syrian civil war, in the town of Taldou, in the Houla Region. According to the United Nations, 108 people were killed, including 34 women and 49 children. On 29 April 2022, a water canal built by

FAO The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations; . (FAO) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations that leads international efforts to defeat hunger and improve nutrition ...

was inaugurated in the region, which would bring water from Taldou dam to the agricultural lands there, after an 11-year hiatus due to the Syrian civil war.

References

Bibliography

* * {{coord, 34, 53, 7, N, 36, 30, 42, E, region:SY, display=title Homs Governorate Plains of Syria Turkmen communities in Syria zh:侯拉镇