Afrin is a district in the north-western corner of Aleppo Governorate, taking its name from the Afrin river that runs through it. Its terrain of low hills and narrow plains has long made it an agricultural area rather than an industrial one, and its towns — among them Jindires, one of the district's main population centres — sit along the routes that link the north-western countryside to the city of Aleppo.

The district's economy rests principally on tree crops, above all olive cultivation and the pressing of olive oil, together with the seasonal trades that grow around a harvest: pressing, packing and haulage. Afrin also holds one of northern Syria's notable archaeological landscapes, including the Graeco-Roman city of Cyrrhus, known locally as Nabi Houri, which the United Nations Satellite Centre (UNOSAT) records as a cultural site within Afrin District (2023).

The earthquake of 6 February 2023 left documented damage across the district. Analysing a very high-resolution satellite image acquired on 10 February 2023, the United Nations Satellite Centre (UNOSAT) identified, across 17 locations in Afrin district including the town of Jindires, 310 damaged structures and 470 potentially damaged (UNOSAT, 2023). UNOSAT describes the analysis as preliminary and not yet validated in the field.

A closer reading of Jindires itself, from imagery acquired on 11 February 2023, identified 228 damaged structures and 318 potentially damaged within the town (UNOSAT, 2023) — indicating that a large share of the district's recorded damage was concentrated in that one built-up area. This assessment, too, is preliminary and awaiting ground verification.

Heritage was affected alongside housing. From a satellite image acquired on 11 February 2023, UNOSAT detected possible and moderate damage over several monuments at the archaeological site of Cyrrhus in Afrin District (UNOSAT, 2023), again as a preliminary analysis not yet validated on the ground.