Al-Thawrah in the context of "Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria"

The Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (DAANES), also known as Rojava, is a de facto autonomous region in northeastern Syria. It consists of self-governing sub-regions in the areas of Jazira, Euphrates, Raqqa, Tabqa, and Deir ez-Zor. The region gained its de facto autonomy in 2012 in the context of the ongoing Rojava conflict and the wider Syrian civil war, in which its official military force, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), has taken part.

While entertaining some foreign relations, the region is neither officially recognized as autonomous by the government of Syria, state, or other governments institutions except for the Catalan Parliament. Northeastern Syria is polyethnic and home to sizeable ethnic Arab, Kurdish, and Assyrian populations, with smaller communities of ethnic Turkmen, Armenians, Circassians, and Yazidis.

The Tabqa Dam (Arabic: سَدُّ الطَّبْقَةِ, romanized: Sadd aṭ-Ṭabqah, Kurdish: Bendava Tebqa; Classical Syriac: ܣܟܪܐ ܕܛܒܩܗ, romanized: Sekro d'Tabqa), or al-Thawra Dam as it is also named (Arabic: سَدُّ الثَّوْرَةِ, romanized: Sadd aṯ-Ṯawrah, Kurdish: Bendava Tewra; Classical Syriac: ܣܟܪܐ ܕܬܘܪܗ, romanized: Sekro d'Ṯawra, literally "Revolution Dam"), most commonly known as Euphrates Dam (Arabic: سَدُّ الْفُرَاتِ, romanized: Sadd al-Furāt; Kurdish: Bendava Firatê; Classical Syriac: ܣܟܪܐ ܕܦܪܬ, romanized: Sekro d'Frot), is an earthen dam on the Euphrates, located 40 kilometres (25 mi) upstream from the city of Raqqa in Raqqa Governorate, Syria. The city of Al-Thawrah is located immediately south of the dam. The dam is 60 metres (200 ft) high and 4.5 kilometres (2.8 mi) long and is the largest dam in Syria. Its construction led to the creation of Lake Assad, Syria's largest water reservoir. The dam was constructed between 1968 and 1973 with help from the Soviet Union. At the same time, an international effort was made to excavate and document as many archaeological remains as possible in the area of the future lake before they would be flooded by the rising water. When the flow of the Euphrates was reduced in 1974 to fill the lake behind the dam, a dispute broke out between Syria and Iraq (which is downstream) that was settled by intervention from Saudi Arabia and the Soviet Union. The dam was originally built to generate hydroelectric power, as well as irrigate lands on both sides of the Euphrates. The dam has not reached its full potential in either of these objectives.

Maskanah (Arabic: مَسْكَنَة), also spelled Meskene, is a town in northern Syria, administratively part of the Manbij District of the Aleppo Governorate. The town is located 100 kilometres (62 mi) southeast of Aleppo on the Lake Assad part of the Euphrates. Nearby localities include Dayr Hafir, Humaymah Kabirah and Tell Ayoub to the northwest and al-Thawrah to the southeast. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), Maskanah had a population of 15,477 in the 2004 census. The Syrian government took control of Maskanah on 3 June 2017 from the Islamic State. The SDF took control of the town on 1 December 2024.