Followers await news after Syrian girl's Twitter account deleted
UPDATE (Monday, Dec. 5, 2016, 1:40 p.m. ET): As of Monday afternoon, Bana's Twitter account was once again active.
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Twitter followers are concerned following the disappearance of the account of Bana al-Abed, a seven-year-old who has shared her experiences of living in the war zone of Aleppo, Syria on the social media platform. No explanation was given to her followers prior to the Twitter account deletion.
It's been a little less than a week since Bana tweeted what was described as her "last message," though the girl had sent out tweets since then, including one on Sunday, just before her Twitter account unexpectedly disappeared.
According to CNN, her final tweet was, "We are sure the army is capturing us now. We will see each other another day dear world. Bye.- Fatemah #Aleppo."
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Bana has captured the hearts of thousands of followers by sharing her tragic story, one of tens of thousands of stories of children in Aleppo, a region utterly decimated by bombings and ongoing violence.
The young girl made headlines when she reached out to Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, who responded by sending Bana a set of the series' books.
Days after her "last message," the young girl told Mashable that she and her mother had been displaced from their home. Talking to Mashable via direct message on Twitter, Bana Alabed said they were still trapped in the rebel-held areas in the eastern part of the city.
"Still inside, we can't escape. If we go to regime side, they will kill us. We received many death threats," she said. "We're just waiting. We're together."
Marcus Gilmer is Mashable's Assistant Real-Times News Editor on the West Coast, reporting on breaking news from his location in San Francisco. An Alabama native, Marcus earned his BA from Birmingham-Southern College and his MFA in Communications from the University of New Orleans. Marcus has previously worked for Chicagoist, The A.V. Club, the Chicago Sun-Times and the San Francisco Chronicle.