There is always a rush of tension and excitement driving into Damascus, a city inhabited for thousands of years, where cultures and influences have mixed and accumulated like coral on a reef.

More than five years into Syria’s chaotic civil war, the capital is relatively undamaged and functioning, bustling with commuters, markets and restaurants — especially compared with Aleppo, where government airstrikes this week are pummeling rebel-held districts and rebels are shelling government-held ones. But my stay in Damascus early this month, even under the restrictions of government minders, revealed new ways that war has wounded and warped the city, which I have visited nine times since 2001.

When we drive from Beirut, Lebanon, into Damascus, we take the highway past President Bashar al-Assad’s hilltop palace. Rebel-held suburbs are visible, sometimes smoking from government airstrikes or shelling. Also nearby is an air base where detained opponents of the government sometimes disappear without a trace. Then we enter the capital on the Mezze Highway, a broad avenue of apartment buildings, government offices, cafes and cellphone shops.