Aziz’s abduction in Aleppo made the couple more guarded and suspicious about working with the foreign press. The international community’s response was a harsh reminder of their marginal status in journalism. Foreign reporters who reached out to Leyla while Aziz sat in a Jabhat al-Nusra prison cell probed whether Aziz had conspired in his clients’ kidnapping. Those clients’ governments did nothing, as far as the couple could tell, to secure Aziz’s release when they negotiated ransoms for their own citizens.