Al-Lataminah (, also spelled ''Latamneh'' or ''Latamnah'') is a town in northern

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 ...

, administratively part of the

Hama Governorate Hama Governorate ( / ALA-LC: ''Muḥāfaẓat Ḥamā'') is one of the 14 Governorates of Syria, governorates of Syria. It is situated in western-central Syria, bordering Idlib Governorate, Idlib and Aleppo Governorates to the north, Raqqa Gove ...

, located northwest of

Hama Hama ( ', ) is a city on the banks of the Orontes River in west-central Syria. It is located north of Damascus and north of Homs. It is the provincial capital of the Hama Governorate. With a population of 996,000 (2023 census), Hama is one o ...

. Nearby localities include Karnaz to the northwest,

Kafr Zita Kafr Zita (; also transliterated ''Kfar Zita'', ''Kafr Zayta'', ''Kfar Zeita'', ''Keferzita'' or ''Kafr Zeita'') is a town in central Syria, administratively part of the Hama Governorate, located } north of Hama. Nearby localities include Kafr Nab ...

to the north, Murik to the northeast,

Suran The Survivable Radio Network (SURAN) project was sponsored by DARPA in the 1980s to develop a set of mobile ad hoc network (MANET) radio-routers, then known as "packet radios". It was a follow-on to DARPA's earlier PRNET project. The program began ...

to the east,

Taybat al-Imam Taybat al-Imam (, also transliterated Tayyibat al-Imam or Taibet el-Imam), historically known as Tayyibat al-A'la, is a town in northern Syria, administratively part of the Hama Governorate, located northwest of Hama.Darke, 2010, p. 145. Nearby l ...

to the southeast,

Halfaya Halfaya (, also spelled Helfaya) is a town in northern Syria, administratively part of the Hama Governorate, located about 25 kilometers northwest of Hama. Nearby localities include Mahardah and Shaizar to the west, al-Lataminah and Kafr Zita to ...

and

Mahardah Maharda (, ; also transliterated ''Mhardeh'', ''Muhardah'', ''Mahardah'' or ''Mharda'') is a Christian city in western Syria, administratively part of the Hama Governorate, located about 23 kilometers northwest of Hama. It is situated along the O ...

to the south,

Shaizar Shaizar or Shayzar (; in modern Arabic Saijar; Hellenistic name: Larissa in Syria, Λάρισσα εν Συρία in Greek language, Greek) is a town in northern Syria, administratively part of the Hama Governorate, located northwest of Hama. Near ...

and

Kafr Hud Kafr Hud () is a Syrian town located in the Mahardah Subdistrict of the Mahardah District in Hama Governorate. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), Kafr Hud had a population of 2,736 in the 2004 census. Its inhabitants are pr ...

to the southwest and

Hayalin Hayalin (, also spelled Hayaleen or Hiyalin) is a village in northwestern Syria, administratively part of the Hama Governorate, located northwest of Hama. Nearby localities include al-Suqaylabiyah, the administrative center of the district, to the ...

and

al-Suqaylabiyah Al-Suqaylabiyah () is a city in western Syria, administratively part of the Hama Governorate. It is located about from Hama and overlooks the Ghab Valley. According to the 2004 official census, the town had a population of 13,920.Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), al-Lataminah had a population of 16,267 in the 2004 census, making it the second largest locality in the ''

nahiyah A nāḥiyah ( , plural ''nawāḥī'' ), also nahiyeh, nahiya or nahia, is a regional or local type of administrative division that usually consists of a number of villages or sometimes smaller towns. In Tajikistan, it is a second-level divisi ...

'' of Kafr Zita.General Census of Population and Housing 2004
Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). Hama Governorate. Its inhabitants are predominantly

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 ...

s. Al-Lataminah and its vicinity contain several caves, many of which had been used as homes for the village's residents. On the eve of the civil war, the use of modern housing had prevailed, but a few families continued to live in the caves. During the course of the war, most of residents were displaced.

History

Al-Lataminah was inhabited during the

Stone Age The Stone Age was a broad prehistory, prehistoric period during which Rock (geology), stone was widely used to make stone tools with an edge, a point, or a percussion surface. The period lasted for roughly 3.4 million years and ended b ...

and excavations by teams from the

Arab world The Arab world ( '), formally the Arab homeland ( '), also known as the Arab nation ( '), the Arabsphere, or the Arab states, comprises a large group of countries, mainly located in West Asia and North Africa. While the majority of people in ...

, the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

and the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

have been held at the site. One such excavation was held in 1965 and several artifacts were uncovered.

Ottoman era

When Swiss traveler

Johann Ludwig Burckhardt Johann Ludwig (also known as John Lewis, Jean Louis) Burckhardt (24 November 1784 – 15 October 1817) was a Swiss traveller, geographer and Orientalist. Burckhardt assumed the alias ''Sheikh Ibrahim Ibn Abdallah'' during his travels in Arabia ...

visited the region in the early 19th-century, during Ottoman rule, al-Lataminah was described as the "principal village" of Sanjak Hama. During this period the village was part of the Sanjak (District) of

and in late 1829, it consisted of 84 '' faddan'', larger than any other village in the district except for

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 ...

. It paid 8,250 qirsh in taxes, the highest rate of the revenue-producing (''hasil'') villages in the district. In 1838, it had a predominantly

population. Towards the end of Egyptian Khedivate rule (1832–1841), in 1840, al-Lataminah was a large village that paid a moderate tax rate of 700 qirsh, as result of a tax decrease for rural villages at the expense of urban towns.

Ongoing Syrian civil war

The Syrian state media reported that on 9 March 2012, al-Lataminah's mayor was kidnapped from his home by anti-government fighters. His car had been stolen earlier on 30 September 2011. On 7 April 2012 secret

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...

monitors reported that dozens of residents were killed when the village was shelled by government forces, days before a truce was to be established. The fatality count ranged from 24 to 27 and activists reported that the shelling was part of an attempt by security forces to raid the town after two days of clashes with defectors from the

Syrian Army The Syrian Army is the land force branch of the Syrian Armed Forces. Up until the fall of the Assad regime, the Syrian Arab Army existed as a land force branch of the Syrian Arab Armed Forces, which dominanted the military service of the fo ...

. In September 2012 ''

Al Jazeera English Al Jazeera English (AJE; , ) is a 24-hour English-language News broadcasting, news channel operating under Al Jazeera Media Network, which is funded by the government of Qatar. Al Jazeera introduced an English-language division in 2006. It is ...

'' classified al-Lataminah as a "rebel village". A girl was reportedly killed and several more people were injured as a result of shelling by government forces on 12 September. In a mid-December 2012 rebel offensive against government-held positions in the Hama Governorate, al-Lataminah was captured by opposition forces along with a string of several other villages. Gas attacks were reported as occurring in Al-Lataminah in October 2016. Additional attacks occurred on 24 and 25 March in 2017. They were substantially confirmed a year later by the

Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW; French: ''Organisation pour l'interdiction des armes chimiques'', OIAC) is an intergovernmental organisation and the implementing body for the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), ...

(OPCW) as having been a

sarin Sarin (NATO designation GB nerve_agent#G-series.html" ;"title="hort for nerve agent#G-series">G-series, "B" is an extremely toxic organophosphorus compound.chlorine Chlorine is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Cl and atomic number 17. The second-lightest of the halogens, it appears between fluorine and bromine in the periodic table and its properties are mostly intermediate between ...

gas attack, respectively. Another sarin gas attack occurred on 30 March 2017. On April 8, 2020, the OPCW issued a report determining that the

Syrian Air Force The Syrian Air Force () is the air force branch of the Syrian Armed Forces. It was established in 1948, and first saw action in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. Under Ba'athist Syria until December 8, 2024, it was known as the Syrian Arab Air Forc ...

was the perpetrator of these chemical weapon attacks. From 2017, the city was situated in the southernmost sector of rebel-held territory (sometimes called the ''

Idlib Idlib (, ; also spelt Idleb or Edlib) is a city in northwestern Syria, and is the capital of the Idlib Governorate. It has an elevation of nearly above sea level, and is southwest of Aleppo. It is located near the border with Turkey. History ...

pocket'' although Al-Lataminah is part of Hama Governate). As a result, the city was exposed to attacks by the

Syrian Arab Armed Forces The Syrian Arab Armed Forces (SAAF; ) were the combined armed forces of Syria from 1963 to 2024. They served during the rule of the Ba'ath Party in Syria. The SAAF consisted of the Syrian Arab Army, Syrian Arab Air Force, Syrian Arab Air De ...

from three directions, and suffered repeated bombardments and

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

n airstrikes despite the cease-fire arrangements supposedly provided by the 2016 Astana accord. On 20 August 2019, the

Syrian Observatory for Human Rights The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (also known as SOHR; ), founded in May 2006, is a United Kingdom-based information office whose stated aim is to document human rights abuses in Syria; since 2011 it has focused on the Syrian Civil War. ...

reported that the rebel and Islamist factions including

jihadist Jihadism is a neologism for modern, armed militant Political aspects of Islam, Islamic movements that seek to Islamic state, establish states based on Islamic principles. In a narrower sense, it refers to the belief that armed confrontation ...

groups like

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) was a Sunni Islamist political organisation and paramilitary group involved in the Syrian civil war. It was formed on 28January 2017 as a merger between several armed groups: Jaysh al-Ahrar (an Ahrar al-Sham facti ...

(HTS) had withdrawn from Lataminah in north Hama province amid a military operation by Syrian government forces. On 30 November 2024, HTS rebels recaptured the city from the Syrian Army during the Hama offensive.

References

Bibliography

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lataminah Populated places in Mahardah District