The destruction that greets a visitor to Kobane is so comprehensive that it takes a while for the mind to adjust.

Only after a moment of stunned disbelief, followed by the brief conviction that you have stumbled onto a film set, do you begin to acknowledge the reality of a country plagued by four years of civil war.

Entire rows of buildings have collapsed in uneven heaps by the roadside, creating a scraggy skyline of rubble. Deep bomb craters block streets, and the skeletal remains of apartment blocks alternate with the shot-up fronts of the few structures left standing.

The signs of intense street fighting are everywhere: machine guns have left their imprints on facades; rocket-propelled grenades have torn deep holes into walls; the mangled remains of vehicles still lie scattered about.

Jihadist mess

Kobane had it good for a while, avoiding the worst ravages of the war. While large tracts of Aleppo and Damascus were reduced to ruins, and Raqqa became the de-facto capital of the jihadist group Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (Isis), much of the Kurdish territory in Syria’s north was left untouched by the fighting.

Then, in the autumn of 2014, Isis launched a determined assault on the city, advancing swiftly through the surrounding countryside to lay a siege that was only lifted after four months of heavy fighting. Attacking with tanks in the wake of extensive mortar barrages, the jihadists advanced deep into the city, destroying much of it in the process.

The poorly armed Kurds defended tenaciously, but the battle only turned when the US intervened, and helped flush out the attackers with more than 600 air strikes.

Deep scars

The destruction is worst in those parts of the city that fell to Isis and had to be retaken with the help of US air power. From the roof of Kobane’s central administrative building, the view stretches over a district that even in the evening dusk cannot hide the deep scars of war.

“We are not getting any help. Our ability to rebuild the city is dependent on support from the outside”

Abdulrahmen Hamo, Kobane’s reconstruction board

Isis had pushed its way through the area before being stopped by the turning tide of battle. The central administrative building itself was hotly contested, and spent machine-gun rounds litter the rooftop, while bullet holes riddle the hallways and staircases.

In a nearby government building, next to a bakery that supplied Kobane with bread until it was captured by Isis, Abdulrahmen Hamo oversees the efforts to rebuild the city.

A total of 70 per cent of the city has been destroyed in the fighting, estimates the head of Kobane’s reconstruction board, and 1.2 million tonnes of rubble have been removed to make way for new housing.

Turkish hostility

Unfortunately, Turkish hostility towards Rojava, as the Kurdish-dominated autonomous region in northern Syria is known, is hampering reconstruction. As part of a comprehensive economic blockage, Ankara is not allowing building materials or any sort of international aid across the border into Rojava.

“We are not getting any help,” says Hamo. “Our ability to rebuild the city is dependent on support from the outside.”

Satellite imagery analysed by the UN shows 3,200 buildings have been either completely destroyed or severely damaged during the siege. Hamo says only 1,300 flats are under construction, which will be completed during 2016.

Materials come from within Rojava, where the left-wing administration is trying to resuscitate the ailing economy with communally-owned small-scale industry, such as cement factories.

So far, the most conspicuous new development is a large earthen berm piled up behind a trench several meters deep, which surrounds the city and restricts vehicle access to a few heavily fortified checkpoints.

Residents return

The sluggish pace of reconstruction cannot keep up with the influx of residents returning to the city. With Isis banished, Kobane’s inhabitants are streaming back in from across the border to Turkey, where they had fled to escape the fighting.

Hamo estimates that about 30,000-40,000 residents have already come back, out of a peacetime population of about 50,000. This is more than the battered city can absorb, and many people now live with relatives in the surrounding villages, most of which have been spared destruction.

Despite the harsh surroundings and the uphill struggle to return to normality, the people of Kobane are remarkably successful in breathing life back into their city.

While traffic remains light, the relatively undamaged centre of town is bustling with activity, during the day at least.

Behind scarred facades, shops are selling the few products that have found their way onto the shelves. Restaurants are serving tasty falafel sandwiches and lamacun, while butchers are carving up carcasses for those that can afford meat.

Transforming destruction

The detritus of war has been turned into decorative items: mortar rounds have been transformed into flower pots and ashtrays, and burned-out car wrecks have been arranged neatly on the top of buildings or piles of rubble.

A tank gun, taken from a turret that lies shattered next to the road, has been installed on a roundabout in a display of war installation art. Throughout the city, colourful posters of the ‘shehids’ or martyrs who died defending the city serve as grim reminders of the price paid to keep Kobane free.