"The translation of Omar Aziz's text The Formation of Local Councils appeared two years ago, in the winter 2016-7. Like most resources dealing with the Syrian revolution, it circulated a little among those already paying attention, but in our opinion it deserves a more lasting place in anarchist literature. Both the text and its author's life story are extremely illuminating one of the most massive and far-reaching revolutionary upheavals or our time. The text was written as an internal document synthesizing Omar and his comrades' experience with local, direct action organizing in areas struggling to liberate themselves from the regime. It was written simply and directly, largely as a series of bullet points, a very practical document that explored theory only in its introduction and in a few digressions throughout. Its simplicity and practicality though meant that it circulated from hand to hand among hundreds or thousands of revolutionaries in the struggles early years and the forms Omar describes in it became the backbone of the civil revolutionary movement, which struggled to hold its own against both the state and the reactionary militias that thrives as the conflict militarized." -Excerpt from Foreword