Having fled bombing, Syrian children learn to read in borderland tent schools

A student holds a notebook as she sits at a makeshift school in a tent in Azaz, Syria January 12, 2020. REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi

AZAZ, Syria (Reuters) - Syrian teacher Ahmad al Hilal listens to his young pupils sitting on a mat reciting the Arabic alphabet in a makeshift school in a tent on the outskirts of a sprawling refugee camp city along the Turkish border.

Many ran for their lives with their mothers under heavy aerial bombing by Syrian and Russian jets that paralysed day-to-day life and damaged dozens of schools and hospitals.