If anyone at Church of the Good Shepherd in Afrin celebrated President Donald Trump’s decision to pull troops from Syria, they weren’t Christians. The church was emptied of its regular worshippers when a militia backed by Turkey invaded a year ago, setting fire to the church in a once-multiethnic and peaceful city barely 70 miles from the U.S. base at Manbij. The church became a jihadist war room, as Sharia law and the Turkish language took over in Afrin.

WASHINGTON—Lawmakers from both parties criticized President Donald Trump’s decision Wednesday to withdraw troops from Syria, saying it may open the door for Islamic State (ISIS) to regain territory and power. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., typically a strong Trump ally, said he feared a repeat of what happened in 2011 when former President Barack Obama pulled troops from Iraq, eventually clearing the way for ISIS to grab territory. “If Obama had done this, we’d be going nuts right now,” Graham said.

The United States is planning to withdraw all its remaining troops from Syria, a U.S. official said Wednesday, as President Donald Trump declared victory against Islamic State (ISIS) there. The report came from a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity. On Wednesday, Vice President Mike Pence met with top military leaders at the Pentagon, and the president tweeted, “We have defeated ISIS in Syria, my only reason for being there during the Trump Presidency.”

A fourth U.S. soldier has died from wounds suffered last week in a roadside bomb attack in Afghanistan. Sgt. Jason Mitchell McClary, a 24-year-old Pennsylvania native, died at the U.S. military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. Three U.S. service members were killed in the explosion last Tuesday near Ghazni, and two others were wounded. It was the deadliest attack against U.S. forces in Afghanistan this year. The Taliban claimed responsibility and said it destroyed a U.S. tank.

Russian airstrikes on Sunday targeted Syrian rebels accused of launching a poison gas attack on the government-held city of Aleppo that affected about 100 people. Aleppo Police Chief Essam al-Shali told Syrian state TV that the suspected chemical attack hit the al-Khalidiya neighborhood and affected at least two other areas in the city. Rami Abdurrahman, who heads the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said the stench of gas filled the city. Doctors told state TV that the victims had breathing problems and blurred vision.

Perhaps one day we can read as history Rania Abouzeid’s No Turning Back: Life, Loss, and Hope in Wartime Syria (W.W. Norton) and be grateful for her meticulous attention to detail and to humanizing a brutal and misunderstood conflict. For now, as the Syrian war grinds on, Abouzeid brings us uncomfortably face to face with its ongoing horror. That hard encounter, plus the persistence of U.S. policymakers and others in doing the wrong thing, is why No Turning Back is our Book of the Year in Understanding the World.

In a small room in a nondescript building near Colombia’s mountainous border with Venezuela, Pastor Juan Martinez leans his slight frame over a bulky Bible and describes Christian ministry in his rural Colombian village: “I am currently under threat of death for preaching the gospel.”

Martinez isn’t alone.

In the same room, three other Colombian pastors tell similar stories about the dangers of leading evangelical churches in rural regions where armed militants still roam the hills and demand control.