Syrian Protests Are Said to Be Largest and Bloodiest to Date
Dozens of communities across Syria erupted in protest on Friday in what activists said were by far the largest and bloodiest demonstrations against the iron rule of President Bashar al-Assad.
While the number of protesters, said by some opposition activists to be in the hundreds of thousands, could not be independently confirmed, the size of the protests and their level of coordination suggest that Syria�s fragmented opposition movement is reaching new levels of coherence and organization.
The deadliest clashes were in the southern city of Dara�a, where security forces opened fire on demonstrators, witnesses said. A Syrian human rights activist said 21 deaths had been confirmed, but that figure was likely to rise.
The government, meanwhile, said its security forces had been fired on by armed groups in Dara�a. The Interior Ministry said 19 police officers and members of security forces were killed, in addition to several civilians, the government news agency, Sana, reported. It was the first time the government had made a substantial claim of deaths.
The numbers reported by either side were difficult to verify. Foreign news media have not been permitted to travel outside Damascus, the capital, and state security forces have cordoned off the towns and suburbs where the largest protests took place.
There were also protests on Friday in Damascus, in a suburb where at least 15 protesters were killed by security forces last Friday, and in Kurdish towns in the east.
In Washington, President Obama condemned what he called �the abhorrent violence committed against peaceful protesters by the Syrian government today and over the past few weeks.� He also condemned �any use of violence by protesters.�
Ausama Monajed, a London-based political activist who is in frequent touch with protesters in Dara�a and other cities, said that the protest movement had gained enormous momentum and confidence over the past week. Though Syria lacks a natural mass gathering point like Tahrir Square in Egypt, he said, he estimated that across Syria, total numbers of protesters might add up to hundreds of thousands.
He called the attack on protesters in Dara�a �a massacre.� He feared that the government might be trying to make an example of Dara�a, where the protests began three weeks ago after a group of teenagers was arrested for writing antigovernment graffiti, as it did with Hama in 1982.
�What happened is that after Friday Prayers, the marchers started to chant, �Freedom! Freedom!� and security forces opened fire,� Mr. Monajed said in a phone interview. �When the protesters tried to collect the dead and wounded, the security forces opened fire again.�
There were reports that security forces had closed the hospitals, possibly to forestall further protests at funerals on Saturday, Mr. Monajed said. According to Islamic custom, the dead are buried as soon as possible, and the funerals of protesters in recent weeks have turned into political demonstrations.
Ammar Abdulhamid, a Syrian dissident who lives in Maryland and has helped organize the protests, said that according to his contacts in Dara�a, 100 may have been killed there and as many as 500 wounded.
Though Syria�s protest movement is far more decentralized than it has been in Egypt and Bahrain, Mr. Abdulhamid said, its strength is growing.
�Each community has its own uprising,� he said. �Every week the regime is being forced closer to its endgame.�
The killings in Dara�a on Friday, he said, may have been an attempt by the government �to send a lesson to other cities,� the way Mr. Assad�s father, Hafez al-Assad, massacred at least 10,000 Muslim Brotherhood members in Hama in 1982 to strike fear in Islamists across the country.
Amr al-Azm, a Syrian historian, cautioned that it was not yet clear how broad support for the protest movement was. He said the greatest numbers of protesters were poor, semirural and young, and that the country�s powerful Sunni upper-middle class had not yet decided where it stood.
�The urban upper-middle classes feel uncomfortable with these people,� he said. �The thing about Syria is that in order for these protests to reach the critical mass you need to achieve real change, you have to tap into the merchant classes of Damascus and Aleppo.�
He said that group was unhappy with the government but also concerned about stability.
There were also protests on Friday in the eastern Kurdish areas, two days after Mr. Assad sought to quell unrest there by offering Syrian nationality to the estimated 200,000 Kurds, formerly classified by the government as stateless.
Kurdish leaders and human rights activists rejected the offer.
Hakeem Bashar, a Kurdish leader, said that thousands of people had demonstrated in Qamishli, one of the largest towns in the Kurdish northeast.
�We want all of the demands that other Syrians in other parts of the country are making,� Dr. Bashar said. �These are national demands, but we are demanding them too because this is our country. We are Kurds, but we are also Syrians.�
Security forces have maintained a heavy presence in Damascus. Six buses carrying uniformed and plainclothes officers arrived at the Al Rifai mosque, a center of protests last week, during Friday Prayer, said Wissam Tarif, a human rights activist, pulling open its doors and beating worshipers as they exited.
Security forces scuffled with protesters and hauled others into the waiting buses as they chanted �Freedom! Freedom!�
Villagers outside of Damascus marched toward Douma, a village where security forces fired on demonstrators last week, killing at least 15 people.
Iran is secretly helping Syrian President Bashar al-Assad put down pro-democracy demonstrations, according to U.S. officials, who say Tehran is providing gear to suppress crowds and assistance blocking and monitoring protesters' use of the Internet, cellphones and text-messaging.
At the same time, communications intercepted by U.S. spy agencies show Tehran is actively exploring ways to aid some Shiite hardliners in Bahrain and Yemen and destabilize longstanding U.S. allies there, say U.S. officials familiar with the intelligence. Such moves could challenge interests of the U.S. and Saudi Arabia and inflame sectarian tensions across the Middle East, they say.
"We believe that Iran is materially assisting the Syrian government in its efforts to suppress their own people," said an Obama administration official.
U.S. officials say they don't see Iran as the driving force behind popular revolts against longtime U.S. allies in the Mideast, and caution they have no concrete evidence that Iran is providing or preparing large-scale financial or military support to opposition elements in Bahrain or Yemen.
Rather, the White House has worried that protracted political turmoil could provide an opening for additional influence by Tehran, whose nuclear ambitions are a concern to the U.S. and its allies in Europe and the Middle East.
So far, an administration official said, Iranian "aspirations far outpace their ability to project their influence into these places."
By disclosing intelligence about Iranian involvement, the U.S. appears to be trying to put Tehran on notice that it is under close surveillance in Washington. "We're keeping an eye on these activities," another Obama administration official said.
The U.S. disclosures also appear designed to help soothe anxious Arab and Israeli allies, who have privately complained that President Barack Obama, in his enthusiasm to embrace popular uprisings, is paying scant attention to how the revolts could play into the hands of their regional nemesis, Iran. By voicing concerns about Iran's activities, the U.S. appears to be trying to close ranks, at least in part, with Saudi and Bahraini leaders whose warnings about Tehran's influence in their internal affairs have long been played down in Washington.
Iranian diplomats didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.
Some U.S. officials have expressed surprise that Shiite-dominated Iran hasn't intervened more aggressively to support Mr. Assad and Shiites in Bahrain. Officials said they believed Iran has secretly promised more help to Mr. Assad if the protests intensify.
U.S. officials believe Iran's recent support for Mr. Assad reflects Tehran's concerns about losing a critical regional ally and military partner against Israel.
So far, officials said, Iran has begun transferring to Damascus equipment to help security forces put down protests. This includes providing Syrian authorities with equipment, advice and technical know-how to help curtail and monitor internal communications, including the email and online postings that opposition groups commonly use to organize their protests and report security excesses, officials said. Some deliveries have been made and others are believed to be in the works, they said.
Iran is also sharing "lessons learned" from its 2009 crackdown on protesters who demanded the removal of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the officials said. "These guys know the best practice in this kind of situation�they've had lots of experience in this sphere," a U.S. defense official said of the Iranians.
"The Syrians don't want to see a Green Revolution in their country," the defense official added, referring to the protest movement in Iran. "The Iranians are ready to help."
Any aid to Mr. Assad could signal an escalation of sectarian proxy battles in the region, one the U.S. has sought to avert.
The Obama administration repeatedly pressed Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia and Bahrain not to use force against largely Shiite protesters, according to U.S. officials, fearing that would provide Iran with an excuse to start meddling in Bahrain and elsewhere in the Middle East. Under Tehran's religious code, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has an obligation to protect the rights of Shiites world-wide. "We told them not to use force because it would provide Iran with an excuse," a senior U.S. official said. "They didn't listen."
Last month, Saudi Arabia sent troops into neighboring Bahrain to support the island kingdom's ruling al-Khalifa family against protesters.
The U.S. is concerned large-scale solidarity protests could break out in Iraq, whose Shiite majority has close religious ties to Bahrain's Shiites. That could complicate U.S. plans for withdrawing troops this year. The U.S. has long accused Iran of providing weapons, funding and training to anti-American militants in Iraq and to the Taliban in Afghanistan, as well as to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The latest U.S. assessment is based on intelligence that includes intercepted communications among Iranian officials as well as between Iranian officials and Bahraini and Yemeni opposition figures. Military officials describe intercepted "chatter" in which Iranian officials have talked of the possibility of shipping cash, weapons or both to opposition elements in both countries.
A U.S. defense official said Iranian policy makers are seriously debating how much aid, if any, to provide to Bahrain's opposition. Another U.S. official said some intelligence indicated that Iran has made small-scale transfers of money and light weapons�"a few dozen guns, maybe less, definitely not more"�into Bahrain. Much of the intelligence suggests Iran and Hezbollah were focused now on using propaganda to assert influence among restive Shiites.
Other Iranian officials appear content to let Bahrain's leaders become more repressive, which the defense official said is "probably more effective at getting people riled up against the king" than anything Tehran could do.
The Bahraini and Yemeni governments have long claimed Iran is meddling in their internal affairs, an issue they know could alarm their U.S. counterparts.
U.S. intelligence agencies have long been skeptical of such claims. But last week, after talks in Riyadh, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the U.S. has unspecified "evidence" of Iranian interference in Bahrain and elsewhere.
Shiite political leaders in Bahrain say that while they have cultural and religious connections to Iran, they aren't seeking help or guidance from abroad. They say accusations of Iranian involvement are designed to deflect their demands for democratic reforms and to justify Bahrain's widescale detention of suspected protest organizers, which the government has said it suspects of ties to Iran or its ally, Hezbollah.
"Bahraini Shia are very aware of how they're paying the price for Iran's growing power in the region," said Nabeel Rajab, president of the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights. "They know to keep their distance."
To keep a lid on tensions in Bahrain, which is home to the U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet, the White House has encouraged protesters to negotiate with the king, rather than seek his ouster.
In Yemen, the U.S. has shifted from supporting President Ali Abdullah Saleh to backing talks aimed at easing him from power.
Last year, the U.S. picked up intelligence showing Iran had provided a small amount of support to Yemen's Houthi rebels, which have fought against Saudi and Yemeni forces, although officials say their knowledge is limited because of a lack of U.S. intelligence sources in the area.
The Houthis, who aren't part of the political opposition demanding Mr. Saleh's removal, have stayed quiet in their home region during the past two months of upheaval. The Houthis follow a minor offshoot of Shiism that isn't the same as the version practiced in Iran.
�Jay Solomon, Nathan Hodge, Margaret Coker and Bill Spindle contributed to this article.
More than 40 dead in protests as violence erupts across Syria
quote:
Violence swept across Syria on Friday, with at least 43 people reported killed in another bloody day of confrontation between government forces and demonstrators calling for political change.
Reliable numbers were difficult to come by. Amnesty International, citing local human rights activists, reported that at least 75 people were killed in Friday's protests. The Syrian government does not permit CNN to report from inside the country.
The killings occurred in several flashpoint regions as thousands of Syrian protesters defiantly marched after Muslims' weekly prayers in a display of mass discontent toward the government.
Violence ripped through the Damascus suburbs of Douma, Moademy, and Zamalka, and other cities -- Homs, Harasta, and Izraa. The state-run news agency reported demonstrations and clashes, citing injuries but no deaths.
Human rights groups and witnesses told a different story. "Today, they have killed so many people. There are so many people injured and people have been kidnapped," Wissam Tarif, a human rights activist, told CNN. "They are acting as an armed gang, not as security forces."
The violence prompted international condemnation, with British Foreign Secretary William Hague calling the killings "unacceptable," and calling on Syrian security forces "to exercise restraint instead of repression, and on the Syrian authorities to respect the Syrian people's right to peaceful protest."
Before Friday's marches, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said the death toll had exceeded 200 since the demonstrations began in mid-March.
Human rights groups had been urging the government to refrain from cracking down on peaceful turnouts during the Facebook-inspired outpouring dubbed "Great Friday."
A witness in Douma said eight people died and approximately 25 were wounded when security forces fired on several thousand protesters. Riot police and secret police comprised the security forces and a sniper on a hospital roof was seen taking shots at people. Pellets and lethal rounds were used, the witness said, as people chanted for the downfall of the regime.
A doctor in the Damascus suburb of Moadamy said six people were killed and dozens wounded when security forces fired in an "indiscriminate and disproportionate manner" on thousands of demonstrators. The doctor, a pediatrician, said it was difficult taking the wounded to the hospital. Syrian security forces had set up checkpoints across the area and were preventing anyone from entering or leaving the suburb.
Five people were killed in the Damascus suburb of Zamalka, a witness said.
An opposition leader in Homs said 12 people died and dozens were wounded when security forces fired on demonstrators. Protesters raced from the main streets for cover in smaller streets and alleys where they waited for the situation to calm. A witness said one of the dead was a 41-year-old demonstrator who was shot in the neck.
Tarif said security forces fired on demonstrators from the southern city of Izraa who were trying to join protesters in nearby Daraa, killing nine and wounding others. Two people in Izraa reported seeing an assault on demonstrators and many casualties.
An activist in Harasta in the south said 2,000 to 3,000 people met with a fierce crackdown by security forces, and heavy gunfire could be heard over the phone as the witness spoke. Three people have been killed and nine wounded, the source said. In protest, demonstrators burned down a police station.
In Daraa, where the protests got their start last month, people shouted "dignity and freedom!"
Activist Razan Zaitouneh in Damascus said security forces in the suburb of Sit Zainab fired on demonstrators who were tearing down a statue of Hafez al-Assad, the president's late father and the former ruler of Syria.
She said three people were wounded when security forces opened fire in Hasaka in the northeast.
Witnesses reported demonstrations in the capital, Damascus, where people chanted slogans and tear gas was fired amid a moderate security presence.
Amateur video obtained by CNN purportedly shows demonstrations in Homs, Damascus, Banias, Kiswah, and Qamlishi. CNN cannot independently confirm the authenticity of the material.
The Syrian Arab News Agency said a "limited number of demonstrators" came out on Friday in the Damascus area, Hama, Deir Ezzour, Hasaka, Daraa, and Banias. It said security forces settled "scuffles that erupted between demonstrators and citizens" in Hama, Harasta, al-Hajar al-Aswad, and Hasaka.
Demonstrations have been a daily occurrence across Syria for weeks and huge rallies have been common in the authoritarian state after Friday prayers across the predominantly Muslim nation. As people gathered to express their grievances toward the government, they've frequently been greeted with force from police.
Friday's turnouts came a day after President Bashar al-Assad lifted the country's 48-year-old state of emergency and abolished the state security court, both of which were key demands of the demonstrators.
The emergency law permitted the government to make preventive arrests and override constitutional and penal code statutes. The security court was a special body that prosecuted people regarded as challenging the government.
Al-Assad's decrees on Thursday included recognizing and regulating the right to peaceful protest. They also extended the period that security forces can hold suspects in certain crimes.
But Human Rights Watch says the decrees don't "address the extensive immunity that Syrian law provides to members of its security services."
It urged al-Assad to undertake more change, such as releasing political prisoners and those arrested for participating in peaceful protests, order probes in security force violations, ensure detainees gain "prompt access to a lawyer," and amend repressive provisions of the penal code.
It said the government, which is controlled by the Baath Party, should "enact a political parties' law in compliance with international human rights norms." Such a law would allow the establishment of independent political parties.
Hague urged the government to address the citizenry's "legitimate demands."
"Political reforms should be brought forward and implemented without delay," he said. "The Emergency Law should be lifted in practice, not just in word."
Tarif also said that "lifting the emergency law is a big joke while the security forces have impunity.
"This is going to become worse. Remember, tomorrow are the funerals," he said.
On a separate note, Assad's wife is fucking hot.
EDIT: Death count is up to 70 now.
Last edited by Zharen on Apr-23-2011 at 05:08
Apr-22-2011 21:56
Zharen
Put down the plate
Registered: Mar 2003
Location: On a spit of sand we call Earth
The Syrian government?s bloody crackdown on protesters in Dara?a and across the country seemed to signal a new, harrowing chapter in a widening conflict that has already killed nearly 400 people.
The Syrian Army stormed the restive city of Dara?a with tanks and soldiers and helped detain dozens in towns across the country Monday in an escalation of the crackdown on Syria?s five-week-old uprising, according to residents and human rights activists. They said at least 25 people had been killed in Dara?a, with reports of bodies strewn in the streets.
Such was the growing international alarm about developments in the country, a critical regional player adjacent to Israel and a close ally of Iran, that the United States State Department urged American citizens not to visit the country and said Americans already there should leave immediately.
An official travel advisory late Monday said the State Department had instructed the evacuation of diplomats? families and some personnel not essential to the functioning of the American embassy in Damascus ? measures similar to those taken in Egypt as the uprising there unfolded earlier this year.
Until Monday, the Syrian government had been hewing to a mix of concessions and brute force, but its latest actions indicate that it has chosen the latter, seeking to crush a wave of dissent in virtually every province that has shaken the once uncontested rule of President Bashar al-Assad, 45.
?The government has decided to choose the path of violence and repression,? said a Syrian analyst in Beirut, who asked to remain anonymous for his safety. ?How far can they go in this repression? That is the question.?
As in 1982, when it crushed an Islamist revolt and killed at least 10,000 people in Hama, the military again showed its willingness to use force to repress its own people. Though there were rumors of discord among soldiers, the leadership is still dominated by Mr. Assad?s minority sect, and its deployment to Dara?a illustrated that a crucial bastion of government support remained loyal ? in stark contrast with Egypt, where the military?s refusal to fire on protesters proved decisive in President Hosni Mubarak?s fall.
The official Syrian news agency said Monday night that the military had entered the town at the request of citizens to hunt what it called ?extremist terrorist groups.?
Dara?a, a town of low-slung buildings with 75,000 inhabitants, has become almost synonymous with the popular revolt that has posed the greatest challenge to four decades of rule by the Assad family. Protests erupted there in March after security forces arrested high school students accused of scrawling anti-government graffiti on a wall, galvanizing demonstrations that have spread from the Mediterranean coast and eastern regions dominated by Kurds to the steppe of southern Syria, where Dara?a is located.
Residents said at least eight tanks drove into the town before dawn, with 4,000 to 6,000 troops, though some estimates put the numbers far lower, in the hundreds. Water, electricity and phone lines were cut, making firsthand accounts difficult and the numbers impossible to verify, and nearby border crossings with Jordan were reported sealed. Snipers took positions on the roofs of mosques, residents said, and a mix of soldiers and armed irregular forces went house to house to search for protesters.
?There are bodies in the streets we can?t reach; anyone who walks outside is getting shot at,? said a resident of Dara?a who gave his name as Abdullah, reached by satellite phone. ?They want to teach Syria a lesson by teaching Dara?a a lesson.?
A handful of videos posted on the Internet, along with residents? accounts, gave a picture of a city under broad military assault, in what appeared to mark a new phase in the government crackdown. Tanks had not previously been used against protesters, and the force of the assault suggested that the military planned some sort of occupation of the town.
?It?s an attempt to occupy Dara?a,? Abdullah said.
He said soldiers had taken three mosques, but had yet to capture the Omari Mosque, where he said thousands had sought refuge. Since the beginning of the uprising last month, it has served as a headquarters of sorts for demonstrators. He quoted people there as shouting, ?We swear you will not enter but over our dead bodies.?
He said residents had also tried to block roads with cement blocks and cars. ?We didn?t pay such a high price to quit now,? he said.
For weeks, organizers have managed to circumvent the government?s attempt to black out news from Dara?a and cities like Homs. But it appeared to have more success Monday.
Organizers themselves had trouble reaching contacts, and only occasional videos emerged from the tumult. One showed heavily armed soldiers taking up positions behind walls, a few feet from a tank parked on a leafy avenue. In another, a young boy threw a chunk of concrete at a passing tank. Other videos showed a cloud of black smoke rising and volleys of heavy gunfire echoing in the distance.
?These are the reforms of Bashar al-Assad,? one resident said, as he filmed tanks entering the city. ?He is reforming Dara?a with the tanks of Bashar al-Assad.?
Wissam Tarif, executive director of Insan, a human rights group, said his organization had a list of 25 people killed Monday in Dara?a.
The United States called the violence ?completely deplorable.? Tommy Vietor, a National Security Council spokesman, said the Obama administration was considering sanctions against Syrian officials to ?make clear that this behavior is unacceptable.?
At the United Nations, European and American officials circulated a draft Security Council statement condemning the crackdown and calling on the government to respect human rights and freedom of expression. The draft endorses a call by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, released last Friday, urging an independent investigation into the mounting death toll.
Across the country of more than 22 million, the government continued a campaign of mass arrests, protesters said. Security forces searched house to house in Azra, another restive town near Dara?a. Activists said security forces had also entered two towns on the capital?s outskirts ? Douma and Maadamiah ? detaining dozens of people.
Clashes have been especially pronounced in the poor towns that encircle the capital, Damascus, and activists said there were reports of shooting during the raids.
In Jabla, a coastal city inhabited by Syria?s Sunni Muslim majority and members of the minority Alawite sect, from which the government draws much of its support, security forces killed at least 12 people in a crackdown that began Sunday and persisted into the night. One resident said protesters had burned an army car and taken a soldier hostage.
?The army is deployed all over the area,? said another resident, who gave his name as Abu Ahmed. ?I can?t describe how bad the situation was all night. It?s a street war.?
He said the shootings had exacerbated tension between Sunnis and Alawites, a potentially dangerous manifestation in a country with a mosaic of religious and ethnic minorities, many of whom fear the government?s collapse may endanger them.
?The plate has shattered,? he said, using an Arabic expression. ?There?s strife between us now, it?s been planted, and the problem is going to exist forever in Jabla.?
Man, this is horrible. It looks like civil war is about to erupt in Syria.
Apr-26-2011 07:20
Comrade Stalin
Uncle Joe
Registered: Sep 2009
Location: Purging Traitors
quote:
Originally posted by Zharen
Tanks roll into Syrian towns
Man, this is horrible. It looks like civil war is about to erupt in Syria.
Civil war? Ha! What do the protesters have to fight the military with? The military and security apparatus is firmly integrated into the Assad dynasty. Filled to the top with loyal subordinates who will not question an order from the top. There will be no Libya or Egypt there.
Apr-26-2011 17:52
Zharen
Put down the plate
Registered: Mar 2003
Location: On a spit of sand we call Earth
quote:
Originally posted by Comrade Stalin
Civil war? Ha! What do the protesters have to fight the military with? The military and security apparatus is firmly integrated into the Assad dynasty. Filled to the top with loyal subordinates who will not question an order from the top. There will be no Libya or Egypt there.
Syrian soldiers rolled into flash point cities in tanks and set up sand barriers topped with machine guns Thursday, as President Bashar Assad's deadly crackdown on dissent pulled the country deeper into international isolation.
On the eve of another round of large protests, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton slammed the government's assault on demonstrators and said the violence showed Assad is weak, though she stopped short of saying he must quit.
"Treating one's own people in this way is in fact a sign of remarkable weakness," Clinton said during a trip to Greenland.
Assad, 45, is determined to crush the two-month-old uprising despite international pressure and sanctions from Europe and the United States. His government has led one of the most brutal crackdowns in the wave of popular revolts sweeping the Arab world.
Protests organizers were calling for more demonstrations Friday despite military operations and arrest raids meant to pre-empt the rallies.
"Authorities are detaining any person who might demonstrate," Rami Abdul-Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told The Associated Press.
In the northern city of Deir el-Zor, authorities placed cameras inside and outside the Osman bin Afan mosque, where many worshippers have been demonstrating after Friday's Muslim prayer services, he said.
Abdul-Rahman added that many former detainees were forced to sign documents saying that they were not subjected to torture and that they will not take part in future "riots."
A Western diplomat said 2,000 people have been detailed over the past two weeks, with a total of around 8,000 since the Syrian government launched its crackdown. The official, who demanded anonymity to share assessments of the situation in Syria, said Western nations believed that between 600 and 800 people have been killed so far.
A video dated April 27 in the southern city of Daraa emerged Thursday showing a sniper shooting two people on a motorbike, then preventing residents from rescuing them or getting close.
People in the street could be heard screaming "Traitors!" at the security forces.
Also Thursday, Syrian soldiers and tanks surrounded the city of Hama, which President Assad's father laid waste to in 1982 to stamp out an earlier uprising, an activist said. Forces also used clubs to disperse 2,000 demonstrators on a northern university campus on Wednesday night.
In the central city of Homs, a resident said soldiers set up sand barriers with machine guns perched on top. He added that three tanks were still in the area, despite a report by the private daily Al-Watan that said the army has pulled out of the city after completing its mission.
"It seems they are getting ready for tomorrow," the resident said.
Most witnesses contacted by The Associated Press spoke on condition that their names not be published out of fear for their personal safety. The government has imposed a media blackout, refusing to let most journalists in and restricting access to trouble spots.
The revolt was touched off in mid-March by the arrest of teenagers who scrawled anti-regime graffiti on a wall. Since then, the protests have spread nationwide and the death toll already has exceeded those seen during the uprisings in Yemen and Tunisia.
The government's bloody crackdown has increased in intensity in recent days. The army shelled residential areas in central and southern Syria on Wednesday, killing 19 people, a human rights group said.
The shelling of neighborhoods evoked memories of Assad's father and predecessor, Hafez, whose most notorious act was the shelling of Hama in 1982.
He leveled the city to crush a Sunni uprising there, killing 10,000 to 25,000 people, according to Amnesty International estimates. Conflicting figures exist and Syria has made no official estimate.
Al-Watan newspaper reported Thursday that Assad met for four hours with a delegation of Sunni clerics from Hama. It said the clerics asked the president to solve some problems pending since 1982, such as people who have been living in exile since then.
"President Assad accepted to study the case as long as it includes people who are known to be loyal to the nation," the paper said.
Since the uprising began, authorities have been making announcements about reforms on Thursdays in an attempt to head off protests on Friday.
This week was no different: The state-run news agency, SANA, said Prime Minister Adel Safar introduced a new program to employ 10,000 university graduates annually at government institutions.
Unemployment in Syria stands at about 20 percent.
In Washington, State Department spokesman Mark Toner called the Syrian attacks "barbaric," adding, "We don't throw the word 'barbaric' around here very often."
Officials in the Obama administration, which had sought to engage Syria after it was shunned under former President George W. Bush, said Tuesday the U.S. is edging closer to calling for an end to the long rule of the Assad family.
The officials said the first step would be to say for the first time that Assad has forfeited his legitimacy to rule, a major policy shift.
Clinton repeated U.S. denunciations of the crackdown on Thursday and said Syrian authorities "engage in unlawful detention, torture, and the denial of medical care to wounded persons."
On Friday, Australian Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd said his government is ramping up targeted financial sanctions against key regime figures responsible for human rights abuses and is also imposing an embargo on arms and other equipment used for internal repression.
As long as the people are still out protesting, there is a chance of a civil war happening.
Last edited by Zharen on May-13-2011 at 04:16
May-13-2011 04:08
Lews
Platipus And Prog Addict
Registered: Feb 2007
Location: Hugging Whales And Saving Trees
quote:
One of the few Western journalists who has been able to get in to Syria to see the protests there and the crackdown by the regime of President Bashar Assad says he was "surprised at how much support President Assad himself still has."
Registered: Mar 2003
Location: On a spit of sand we call Earth
quote:
How's this for simplistic: If you have to sneak into a country to report on its government, if it's secret police are going door-to-door and arresting people for arbitrary reasons without due process, you'll find a lot of people that will tell you how much they love the president.
Nail on head.
May-14-2011 08:12
Zharen
Put down the plate
Registered: Mar 2003
Location: On a spit of sand we call Earth
Not exactly protest related, but still relevant to Egypt and Tunisia.
President Barack Obama will announce plans Thursday to funnel billions of dollars in economic aid to Egypt and Tunisia as part of a broader effort to inject democracy into the Middle East and North Africa.
Obama will unveil a massive package of economic measures, including up to $1 billion in debt relief and another $1 billion in loan guarantees, during a speech on U.S.-Middle East policy set for Thursday morning at the State Department. Other pieces of the package include a new trade partnership with the region and a fund for stimulating regional private sector investments.
In a Wednesday preview of the speech, senior administration officials said the U.S. singled out Tunisia and Egypt for economic help because they are the best positioned countries to serve as role models for democratic reform in the area, which has been gripped by anti-government protests in recent months.
Since December, there have been revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, a civil war in Libya and civil uprisings in Bahrain, Syria and Yemen. Major protests have also broken out in Algeria, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco and Oman.
"We do see [Tunisia�s and Egypt�s] success as a positive incentive for others in the region who are also working on a reform agenda," said one administration official.
The president�s speech will focus largely on the need to tie economic modernization to democratic change. He will note that the nonviolent protests in the region have stemmed largely from large populations of frustrated young people who can�t find work. Obama will also emphasize that the aid package will include strong safeguards to ensure that no money is siphoned off by corrupt officials and that "new governments there are taking this seriously," said the official.
None of the money requires new spending from Congress; the White House has been working behind the scenes with key appropriators to re-program existing funds for Egypt and other programs to fund the new initiatives. Lawmakers �have given their thoughts as well in helping to design some of these initiatives," said another senior administration official.
But that doesn't mean the president's plan won't meet resistance on Capitol Hill. House Foreign Affairs Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) "does not believe that the U.S. should forgive Egypt�s debt," her spokesman told The Huffington Post on Wednesday. And given the near-obsessive focus in Congress on lowering the federal deficit, expect other lawmakers to surface with similar objections to erasing Egypt's debt.
Nonetheless, officials on the conference call framed Obama's plan as a major milestone in U.S. foreign policy. They compared it to components of the successful post-World War II economic recovery program, the Marshall Plan, as well as to the U.S. aid lent to former Soviet states after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Former National Security Advisor James Jones earlier this week called for a Marshall Plan for Egypt to help it transition to a free and vibrant economy after years of corruption and state control under former President Hosni Mubarak, who stepped down in February. The Marshall plan, named for then-Secretary of State George C. Marshall, had a two-fold purpose: to help rebuild a Europe devastated by war and to stave off the spread of communism.
While Obama's proposed economic package is far more modest in size and scope, it too is designed to give Egyptians reeling from high unemployment and economic stagnation a market alternative to Islamist extremism.
"It�s the beginning of a long-term effort because obviously these transitions will play out over a number of years," said one official. "Of course, it�s our hope there are additional transitions to democracy that follow in the years to come."
Obama's speech comes at a time when he gets low marks from both Muslims in the region and Jewish leaders who have criticized him for not being sufficiently sympathetic to Israel's point of view. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee warned its members Wednesday not to boo certain politicians attending its annual conclave in Washington on Sunday. The president is scheduled to speak at the group's opening session that morning.
Wendy Chamberlin, president of the Middle East Institute and the U.S. ambassador to Pakistan when the 9/11 attacks took place, said Wednesday that she worries Obama's speech "will not be greeted as good news throughout the Middle East" if it doesn't include a proposal to bring Israeli and Palestinian leaders back to the table for negotiations. The United States may also find that Israel "and maybe Samoa" will be its only allies to vote against unilateral recognition of a Palestinian State when the United Nations General Assembly is expected to take up the issue in September.
"We will be isolated," she said.
Brian Katilus, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, concurred that Obama needs to give another push for Middle East peace talks. �Inaction or just treading water on the Arab-Israeli conflict simply won�t do," he said during a Wednesday conference call. "They need to multitask here and move forward on trying to deal with the complicated questions of restarting direct talks between Israelis and Palestinians."
Katilus also said Obama needs to clearly explain why the U.S. has responded differently to each of the uprisings in the Middle East. Specifically, he said, the president must outline why the U.S. slapped sanctions on Syria on Wednesday while letting the United Nations take the lead in the Libya conflict. Obama announced sanctions on Syrian President Bashar Assad and six senior Syrian officials for human rights abuses over their brutal crackdown on anti-government protests.
And even as the U.S tightened financial sanctions on Syria, it maintained only a rhetorical campaign in Yemen as White House counterterrorism advisor John Brennan put in a call to Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh urging him to abide by a Gulf Cooperation Council-brokered deal that called for him to step down.
"People want more answers," Katulis said.
I can't believe this. They talk about the need to make spending cuts, to stop borrowing our way out of debt, to make shared sacrifices, and they go and do this? Is he President of the World now? Send everyone else billions of dollars while the average American continues to get fleeced? I never seen such a President, such an administration. Such a fucked up body of government. I can't be the only one who sees the irony in buying your way into a democracy.
Last edited by Zharen on May-19-2011 at 07:28
May-19-2011 07:18
Lews
Platipus And Prog Addict
Registered: Feb 2007
Location: Hugging Whales And Saving Trees
quote:
Originally posted by Zharen
Not exactly protest related, but still relevant to Egypt and Tunisia.
I can't believe this. They talk about the need to make spending cuts, to stop borrowing our way out of debt, to make shared sacrifices, and they go and do this? Is he President of the World now? Send everyone else billions of dollars while the average American continues to get fleeced? I never seen such a President, such an administration. Such a fucked up body of government. I can't be the only one who sees the irony in buying your way into a democracy.
Have you never heard of the Marshall plan?
I'm definitely in favor of forgiving their debt. I don't know about giving them more money. It does sound bad, considering we're in so much debt ourselves, but what is $1 billion now if it saves hundreds of billions in the future?
It obviously advances American foreign policy interests so I wouldn't consider it a hand-out just yet. If Egypt and Tunisia do what Pakistan has done, take what we've given them, and used it for purposes other than what it was meant for, then I would be totally against it. So the important thing here is that the money is well spent. Also, a huge portion is loan guarantees so a lot of the money would be paid back.
