An Intimate, Exclusive Interview With MOUNEB TAIM

After a bloody day, the man walks sadly on a street where more than 80 men have been killed following an airstrike by warplanes.

Muneb Taim, born in 2001, is an Award-winning international photojournalist, covering news stories with a focus on social issues and war zones, currently based in the Syrian-Turkey border as a freelance photographer who mostly works for Anadolu Ajansı and Zuma Press.

At the beginning of his career, in 2014, he worked as an independent reporter. He covered the life under the Siege in Douma, Eastern Ghouta, Idlib, and the countryside of Aleppo until early 2020. Taim Documented massacres, destruction, and people's hard life caused by airstrikes and bombing almost daily. During the past ten years, he lived under the Siege in his city. In the middle of 2012, the Syrian regime forces besieged Douma from all sides and began attacking it. The shelling and bombing prevented him from getting to school on his final exams and caused him to fail that year. Security circumstances prevented him from attending school for a whole year, but he eventually managed to continue high school. For three years, he put his life in danger by documenting what was happening for a local publication. He gained a lot of experience, though, and journalism became his passion and interest.

Lens Magazine: Thank you, Mouneb Taim, for taking the time to do this interview. As I understand, you are located now at the Syrian Turkish border, covering the refugee's stories. You started your photojournalism career at a very young age; When most children usually focus on education and go to high school, your everyday life was interrupted by the bombing in 2012 on Duma. Can you tell us about those years and how you started with photography?