Shahba Mall ( ar, شهباء مول) is a defunct shopping mall in Aleppo, Syria, and was the largest shopping mall in Syria prior to its destruction during the Syrian civil war. Located in northern Aleppo, the mall consists of area of building that consists of fashion stores,

boutiques A boutique () is a small shop that deals in fashionable clothing or accessories. The word is French for "shop", which derives ultimately from the Ancient Greek ἀποθήκη (''apothēkē'') "storehouse". The term ''boutique'' and also ''de ...

, electronics stores,

supermarket A supermarket is a self-service shop offering a wide variety of food, beverages and household products, organized into sections. This kind of store is larger and has a wider selection than earlier grocery stores, but is smaller and more lim ...

restaurants A restaurant is a business that prepares and serves food and drinks to customers. Meals are generally served and eaten on the premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services. Restaurants vary greatly in appearance ...

cafes A coffeehouse, coffee shop, or café is an establishment that primarily serves coffee of various types, notably espresso, latte, and cappuccino. Some coffeehouses may serve cold drinks, such as iced coffee and iced tea, as well as other non-caf ...

, an indoor amusement park, a carting circuit, cinema and a four-star

hotel A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. Facilities provided inside a hotel room may range from a modest-quality mattress in a small room to large suites with bigger, higher-quality beds, a dresser, a ref ...

with 250 guestrooms. The main anchors inside this mall were

Carrefour Carrefour () is a French multinational retail and wholesaling corporation headquartered in Massy, France. The eighth-largest retailer in the world by revenue, it operates a chain of hypermarkets, groceries stores and convenience stores, wh ...

and

Virgin Megastores Virgin Megastores is an international entertainment retailing chain, founded in early 1976 by Richard Branson as a record shop on London's Oxford Street. In 1979 the company opened their first Megastore at the end of Oxford Street and Tottenha ...

. The mall was permanently closed when the mall was damaged during the Syrian civil war on October 16, 2014.

History

Pre-Syrian civil war era

Shahba Mall was one of the first project which was developed by Syrian Jordanian Company for Tourism and Real Estate Investment (SJC) and had opened in the final quarter of 2009. This project had included a 4-star

with 250 rooms, a seven-storey shopping mall, eight screen cinema, a business center, and 36

and

. The mall was located in northern Aleppo which is close to

motorway A controlled-access highway is a type of highway that has been designed for high-speed vehicular traffic, with all traffic flow—ingress and egress—regulated. Common English terms are freeway, motorway and expressway. Other similar terms ...

that links to

Gaziantep Gaziantep (), previously and still informally #Name, called Aintab or Antep (), is a major city and capital of the Gaziantep Province, in the westernmost part of Turkey's Southeastern Anatolia Region and partially in the Mediterranean Region, Turk ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

. The construction of this mall had cost around

US $ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

70 million and was the largest shopping mall in Syria. Both

and

were to be anchors inside the mall.

Destruction and aftermath

The mall was damaged during the Syrian civil war clashes which caused the mall to be permanently closed on October 16, 2014. Syrian activists believed that the bombing of the mall was done by pro-government airforces. According to a 2015 article in

the Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide ...

, the mall had served as a prison while it was under the control of the

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant An Islamic state is a state that has a form of government based on Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a translation of the Arabic term ...

References

External links

* Shopping malls in Syria Buildings and structures in Aleppo Buildings and structures completed in 2009 Shopping malls established in 2009 Shopping malls disestablished in 2014 Defunct shopping malls 2009 establishments in Syria 2014 disestablishments in Syria Attacks on shopping malls Ruins in Syria Demolished buildings and structures in Syria {{Syria-stub