Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas met Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus on Friday, on his first visit to Syria in 16 years.
According to a Syrian government source, the pair were expected to discuss reinforcing ties between Syria and the Palestinians, as well as the "threats" faced by both parties.
According to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), 560,000 Palestinians lived in Syria before the outbreak of civil war in 2011. Around 438,000 remain, 40 percent of whom were displaced during the war.
Abbas last visited in 2009, meeting with then-president Bashar al-Assad, who was toppled in December by an Islamist-led rebel alliance headed by Sharaa.
Abbas and Sharaa met for the first time on the sidelines of an Arab summit in March aimed at hammering out a plan for rebuilding the devastated Gaza Strip, where Palestinian militant group Hamas has been at war with Israel since October 2023.
AFP
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