The Outer Town area lying in Syria has been designated, already before the Syrian Civil War, an endangered cultural heritage site and labelled "at risk" by the Global Heritage Fund, due to the agricultural expansion and, especially, the urban encroachment. The field assessment of the Syrian part of the Outer Town documented that parts of the modern border town of Jerablus encroached upon the Outer Town. In July 2019, a scientific visit to the outer town in Syria by the Turco-Italian Archaeological Expedition at Karkemish, entailed the protection of the area from further encroachment by the sprawling town of Jerablus and by the facilities for trucks which were being built to the South of the border: the City Council of Jerablus declared all the area enclosed by the Iron Age city walls a "first degree protected site", meaning the complete ban of any activity on it.