HIS real home is the bomb-blasted city of Homs.
For some time now though, it has been a place to which Wassim Sabbagh has found it impossible to return.
Syrians call Homs the "mother of the poor", he says. "If you have no other place to go or are short of money, the people there will always give you a welcome," Wassim tells me as we sit drinking tea in a Turkish town a short drive from the border with his Syrian homeland.
Homs' reputation as a city of hospitality and good-humoured people has been transformed these last weeks as it endured a nightmare siege and slaughter under relentless bombardment by the Syrian army.
For Wassim, watching daily from so near yet so far, it has been a form of mental torture as he has followed closely the fate of its citizens, among them his parents, brothers and sisters who live only a few miles from the devastated Baba Amro district that has borne the brunt of the onslaught.
Only on Thursday, as news broke that the security forces of President Bashar al-Assad had moved into Baba Amro as Syrian rebel fighters withdrew, Wassim told me how if the city fell under the regime's control he would "feel like committing suicide".
Yesterday however, the desperate news from Homs had done little to dent Wassim's firm belief that Syria's revolutionaries and those fighters of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), of which he is now a part, would ultimately prevail.
He said: "The regime want to kill the resistance in Homs, but it can only do this if it kills all the people of the city, because more than 80% of them support the revolution."
Wassim has always had something of a rebellious streak. At 15, he refused to join Syria's Ba'ath Party. After years of exile because of a political activism that forced him to spent time in Dubai and New York, Wassim now lives in a makeshift refugee camp near the Turkish city of Antakya, having tried but failed to re-enter Syria.
Describing himself as a communications co-ordinator with the FSA, his job is to monitor daily events inside the country through a network of undercover activists. Lately, he has also been directly involved with the perilous task of helping evacuate the wounded from behind the Syrian lines into neighbouring Turkey.
"We have five urgently needing evacuation right now, but the weather has been so bad and the border is swarming with Syrian soldiers which has made it very difficult," he explains while sitting with the smartphone on which he receives endless updates on the worsening situation inside Syria.
Most of the messages are from what he says are tried and tested sources, sometimes relayed by one activist to another to try and create a picture of the atrocities Wassim says are widespread.
"Listen to this," he says, scrolling down his inbox before reading out one message from a woman.
"Today Assad's soldiers killed my husband and my two boys in front of me then raped me."
Time and again the messages give accounts that, while independently difficult to verify, are, Wassim insists, from some of his most reliable contacts.
Undaunted and living under difficult circumstances in a refugee camp blighted by the bitter Turkish winter and filling up with displaced people every day, he says he will continue his work in the hope a future generation might live with "dignity and freedom".
He continues to watch with special interest what will become of those who opposed the Assad regime in Homs.
"It is not he first time Homs has faced such a fate and survived," he says. "The people there have always been winners and I know in my heart that one day soon they will be again."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article