The library of the Culture Palace in Douma reopens by the effort of its loyal sons

The shelves of the library of the Palace of Culture in the town of Douma, which contained tens of thousands of titles in various sciences, reopened with the zeal of its loyal children.

The director of the Library of the Culture Palace in Douma Zainab Haidar, said : “I have worked in this place since 1999, and the library contained 26,000 books by Syrian, Arab and foreign authors in scientific, literary, religious and artistic disciplines, in addition to 7,000 titles.”

She added: “ We returned after the liberation of the town in 2018, it was turned into ruins and rubble. The library’s condition was catastrophic by all standards, from chaos, destruction, theft and destruction of thousands of publications.”

She said : “ We found that it needed an emergency plan that should be implemented by a working team.”

At the request of the head of the center, a volunteer team was formed, bearing the name of the Duma Youth Cultural Team, which included 10 young men and women who worked with us and under our supervision on cleaning work.

According to Haidar, the work team worked to sort the remaining publications by topics and by general number, and to determine the estimated losses of about 30% of the library’s contents, especially religious books, which were looted as they were the original and references that are of great use to students of the faculties of religious sciences and Sharia.

Haidar expresses her hope that the library will return to what it was before the war, especially since it contained books that were not found in the largest Syrian public libraries.

She noted that the civil society in the city of Douma played a key role in rebuilding this cultural place to occupy its position in the process of reconstruction.

Rima Ataya, Head of the Palace of Culture in Douma, said: “When we entered the building, it was almost destroyed in all its sections, including the headquarters of the Directorate of Culture.”

Ataya reveals the intention to launch a special choir at the Palace of Culture that carries the message of the Syrian heritage, especially the Damascus countryside, due to its diversity and heritage.

On the role of local administration institutions in rehabilitating the Palace of Culture to take its active role, Ayman al-Sayed, a member of the Damascus Rural Governorate Council, stressed that culture is a basic need, not a luxury.

It is noteworthy that the cultural center in the town of Douma was established in 1967 and included a small theater hall, a library and a training center for popular culture.

It was expanded in 2000 to include a theater containing 700 fixed chairs, equipped with sound, lighting, heating and air-conditioning equipment, with rooms for the scenes, and training halls for the Institute of Folk Culture with headquarters Directorate of Culture.

Inas Abdulkareem