Commercial flights between Turkey and Syria resume after 13 years

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ISTANBUL (AP) — Commercial flights between Turkey and Syria resumed Thursday after 13 years with a Turkish Airlines flight from Istanbul to Damascus.

Turkish media showed Syrian families draped in their national flag singing pro-opposition songs and cheering as they prepared to board flight TK0846 to Damascus. Passengers continued their celebrations inside the plane, singing the uprising anthem “Hold your head up high, you are a free Syrian.” One man sobbed while waiting for takeoff.

“I missed Syria and am happy to fly back,” said Fuad Abdulhalid, who has lived in Turkey for 12 years.

Another passenger, Nail Beyazid, expressed hope as he prepared to visit his home for the first time since fleeing from Syria.

“We are very happy that (Syria) was liberated, and the situation is very good,” Beyazid said. “We had a house, a factory. We also had cars, which are gone now. We are going back to take a look.”

Since the lightning rebel offensive that ousted Syrian President Bashar Assad a month ago, Arab and Western countries that had cut off relations with the former government have been reopening diplomatic relations with Syria’s new de facto authorities, headed by the Islamist former insurgent group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS.

The first international commercial flight since Assad's fall, a Royal Jordanian Airlines plane, landed in Damascus earlier this month.

Turkey, a key ally of Syria's new authorities, has expressed its intention to invest in its economy and help its ailing electricity and energy sectors.

Turkish Airlines CEO Bilal Eksi announced earlier this month that the airline would fly three times a week between Istanbul and Damascus. The move followed a visit to Ankara by Syria’s foreign minister, Asaad al-Shibani, who met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and other officials.

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Associated Press journalists Kareem Chehayeb in Beirut, Lebanon, and Albert Aji in Damascus, Syria, contributed to this report.