Born at the Gates of Hell: A Doctor's Frontline Story of Delivering Babies in al-Hol Camp in Syria

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Maria Milland

Born at the Gates of Hell

A Doctor's Frontline Story of Delivering Babies in al-Hol Camp in Syria

Maria Milland

$46.95

Paperback

Forthcoming
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English

Steerforth Press
07 April 2026

Biography: general

Imagine what it's like to be pregnant and give birth-or to try to care for and protect a family in the middle of hopelessness? This book is not about politics. It is about individual human beings in a dry, barren landscape. Up to 75,000 people at a time-mostly women, babies, and children-live for years in tents and have no prospect of leaving because no country will have them. Maria Milland takes readers on a powerful, documentary journey to meet the pregnant and labouring women facing the difficult, harsh, and violent living conditions of al-Hol camp in northeast Syria. Her first-hand account provides vivid, unique, and honest insight into life inside the camp, which has never before been described to the outside world. Amidst the brutal everyday realities of the camp, the maternity ward is a safe space, where health problems, as well as existential challenges, are displayed and embraced-and children are born. Behind towering fences, sprawling in the desert's nothingness, they spend their childhood deprived of fundamental human rights, and with the looming risk of growing into a new generation of Islamic fundamentalists. Beautifully written and carefully observed, this is not only a story of resilience and hope in the face of hopelessness, but also serves as a powerful reminder of our shared humanity.

By: Maria Milland
Imprint: Steerforth Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 215mm, Width: 139mm,
Weight: 369g
ISBN: 9781586424268
ISBN 10: 1586424262
Pages: 192
Publication Date: 07 April 2026
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming

1.PROLOGUE 2.DEPARTURE TIME 3.ARRIVAL AT THE END OF THE WORLD 4.AL-HOL HOSPITAL 5.BEGINNING LIFE IN AL-HOL 6.CESAREAN SECTION 7.YOUNG MOM 8.SANDSTORMS AND SICKNESS 9.CONSUMPTION 10.AT THE GATES OF HELL 11.PHASE 2 OF THE HUMANITY AND SECURITY OPERATION 12.HEADLESS 13.SHIPS OF THE DESERT 14.MISSION COMPLETED 15.AFTERWORD 16.WORDS OF GRATITUDE 17.BIBLIOGRAPHY

Maria Milland is a Danish obstetrician and gynecologist who has been deployed 11 times for international organizations to various countries throughout Africa, the Middle- and Far-East, and teh Caribbean. In 2022, she was dispatched to Syria where she worked at one of the al-Hol-camp's hospitals for 9 months. Born at the Gates of Hell is her first book.