Middle East, Sept.8.─ The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) says 4475 people were killed in the nation's horrific civil war during July. Of these, 1289 were civilians, including 263 children.
Almost three quarters of these civilian casualties were killed in airstrikes by the government or its ally, Russia, and other attacks by the pro-government side, SOHR said.
Since the Syrian Civil War began in 2011, more than 400,000 people have been killed, between 4-to-5 million people have left Syria as refugees and about 8 million have been internally displaced.
The government is responsible for the highest civilian body count, but it does not have a monopoly on atrocities. Among their opponents is ISIS, whose sadism is well known.
But many of the other armed opposition groups, including those affiliated to the Western-backed Syrian National Coalition (SNC), share a similar Islamist ideology to ISIS. Even secular affiliates to the SNC have, like ISIS, made videos advertising their own cruelty. 
Rojava
Amid this carnage, there has emerged a region of hope: the self-administered areas of Rojava (Syrian Kurdistan) and Northern Syria.
This revolutionary experiment emerged in 2012 when most government forces withdrew from Rojava to defend the capital, Damascus, and the largest city, Aleppo, from falling to Islamist and Western-backed opposition forces.
After uprisings in the main cities and towns of Rojava, three geographically separated cantons were established. Under the political leadership of the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and the Democratic Society Movement (TEV-DEM), a system based on grassroots participatory democracy was established.
The commitment to democracy was notable. The Syrian Civil War emerged out of a democratic uprising against the Baathist dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad ...
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