Protests in Syria

[High_Gravity]

Syria Christians fear for religious freedom

BEIRUT: Syria’s minority Christians are watching the protests sweeping their country with trepidation, fearing their religious freedom could be threatened if President Bashar al Assad’s autocratic but secular rule is overthrown.

Sunni Muslims form a majority in Syria, but under four decades of rule by Assad’s minority Alawites the country’s varied religious groups have enjoyed the right to practice their faith.

Calls for Muslim prayers ring out alongside church bells in Damascus, where the apostle Paul started his ministry and Christians have worshipped for two millennia.

But for many Syrian Christians, the flight of their brethren from sectarian conflict in neighbouring Iraq and recent attacks on Christians in Egypt have highlighted the dangers they fear they will face if Assad succumbs to the wave of uprisings sweeping the Arab world.

“Definitely the Christians in Syria support Bashar al Assad. They hope that this storm will not spread,” Yohana Ibrahim, the Syriac Orthodox Archbishop of Aleppo, told Reuters.

Protests erupted in Syria two months ago, triggered by anger and frustration at widespread corruption and lack of freedom in the country ruled with an iron fist by the Assad family for nearly half a century.

Although some Christians may be participating in the protests, church institutions have not supported them.

Christians contacted by Reuters said they backed calls for reform but not the demands for “regime change”, which they said could fragment Syria and give the upper hand possibly to Islamist groups that would deny them religious freedom.

“The Christians in Syria — whether Orthodox, Armenians, Maronites, Anglicans, Assyrians or Catholics — consider themselves first (Syrian) citizens, the sons of the land,” said Habib Afram, president of the Syriac League.

“The general atmosphere from the churches’ positions and from Christian figures is fixed on stability and security because religious freedom is absolutely guaranteed in Syria,” he said.

Syria Christians fear for religious freedom | | DAWN.COM

 

[High_Gravity]

Bashar Assad Sanctions Announced By U.S.

WASHINGTON — The United States slapped sanctions on Syrian President Bashar Assad and six senior Syrian officials for human rights abuses over their brutal crackdown on anti-government protests, for the first time personally penalizing the Syrian leader for actions of his security forces.

The White House announced the sanctions Wednesday, a day before President Barack Obama delivers a major speech on the uprisings throughout the Arab world. The speech is expected to include prominent mentions of Syria.

The Obama administration had pinned hopes on Assad, seen until recent months as a pragmatist and potential reformer who could buck Iranian influence and help broker an eventual Arab peace deal with Israel.

But U.S. officials said Assad's increasingly brutal crackdown left them little choice but to abandon the effort to woo Assad, and to stop exempting him from the same sort of sanctions already applied to Libya's Moammar Gadhafi.

In a letter to congressional leaders, Obama said he issued the new sanctions order as a response to the Syrian government's "continuous escalation of violence against the people of Syria."

Obama cited "attacks on protesters, arrests and harassment of protesters and political activists, and repression of

democratic change, overseen and executed by numerous elements of the Syrian government."

The sanctions will freeze any assets Assad and the six Syrian government officials have in U.S. jurisdiction and make it illegal for Americans to do business with them. The U.S. had imposed similar sanctions on two of Assad's relatives and another top Syrian official last month but had thus far refrained from going after Assad himself.

"The actions the administration has taken today send an unequivocal message to President Assad, the Syrian leadership and regime insiders that they will be held accountable for the ongoing violence and repression in Syria," said David S. Cohen, Treasury's acting under secretary for terrorism, said in a statement.

Bashar Assad Sanctions Announced By U.S.

 

[Ropey]

Russian president says Syria must be allowed to settle its own affairs

Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev says that Moscow won't support any United Nations resolutions that would open the way for interference in Syria's internal affairs.

The Canadian Press: Russian president says Syria must be allowed to settle its own affairs

Russia, Iran, Turkey, Syria are allied against the West. This is no surprise. Russia uses these strategic alliances in order to extract their own concessions from the West. Iran, Turkey, Syria are also part of one block attempting to destroy the American Middle Eastern Oil Hegemony. Then there is the Sunni Saudi block that is caught between the middle and their own desires to create a Wahhabi caliphate. Iran wants to create their own caliphate and Turkey envisions another Empire.

 

[High_Gravity]

SYRIA: Assad regime denounces sanctions, says they serve Israel

A day after the Obama administration tried to tighten the screws on Syria by announcing new sanctions directly targeting President Bashar Assad and his top aides amid a bloody crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators, regime mouthpieces came out swinging, insisting the penalties are part of some imperialist American plot to dominate the Middle East and serve Israel's interests.

"The U.S. measures are part of a series of sanctions imposed by successive U.S. administrations against the Syrian people as part of a regional scheme, aimed primarily at serving Israel's interests," the official Syrian Arab News Agency reported on Thursday (link in Arabic), quoting an unnamed official source.

"Any aggression against Syria is akin to US support for Israeli aggressions against Syria and the Arabs," added the report.

Syria's government-controlled Watan newspaper depicted the sanctions as part of a vast conspiracy targeting Syria for its relations with Iran and Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah,among other groups.

A piece published in the newspaper on Thursday said the sanctions were aimed at trying to pressure Syria into cutting ties with the Islamic Republic, Hezbollah, and Palestinian Hamas.

"The United States and its allies are wasting no time in putting pressure on Syria to force it to change its regional policies," it read, according to a report compiled by Now Lebanon. "What is happening in Syria is part of a U.S. plan aimed at weakening Syria and cutting off its alliance with the resistance," a reference to the bloc consisting of Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas.

Obama is scheduled to deliver a major speech Thursday addressing the political changes across the Arab world.

SYRIA: Assad regime denounces sanctions, says they serve Israel | Babylon & Beyond | Los Angeles Times

 

[High_Gravity]

Syria Troops Fire During Protests; 3 Killed

BEIRUT — Syrian security forces opened fire on protests around the country Friday in the latest sign the conflict could be moving toward a long and bloody stalemate as President Bashar Assad shrugs off tighter sanctions and U.S. calls to step aside. Activists said at least nine people were killed.

The clashes indicate neither side appears able to tip the scales in the two-month uprising. Assad's forces have waged a relentless crackdown on the opposition, but protesters continue to face down security forces with marches seeking to break the Syrian leader's authoritarian rule.

Human rights groups say more than 850 people have been killed in the clashes and clampdowns.

Witnesses reported protests Friday in the central cities of Homs and Hama, as wells the Mediterranean ports of Banias and Latakia.

In Banias, one witness said security forces dispersed protesters with gunfire and sticks. Several people were wounded from beatings, including a woman who was taking video of the march, he said.

Like most witnesses contacted by The Associated Press, he asked that his name not be used in fear of reprisals from the government.

Syria has banned foreign journalists and prevented local reporters from covering trouble spots, making it nearly impossible to independently verify witness accounts.

Last week, mass arrests and heavy security kept crowds below previous levels seen during the uprising, suggesting Assad's sweeping campaign of intimidation was working. But the marches Friday suggested that opposition forces could be trying to regroup.

Friday's death toll was reported Friday by one of the Local Coordination Committees in Syria, which help organize the protests. The groups said at least seven people were killed in Homs, one in the Damascus suburb of Daraya and one in the village of Sanamein in southern Syria.

Syria Troops Fire During Protests; 3 Killed

 

[High_Gravity]

Hezbollah Supports Syria Leader Bashar Assad

BEIRUT — The leader of Lebanon's Hezbollah militant group stood firmly behind his allies in Syria on Wednesday in his first comments on the country's uprising, saying that toppling the Damascus regime would serve only U.S. and Israeli interests.

Hezbollah has much to lose if Syrian President Bashar Assad is deposed. Besides receiving money from Syria, Hezbollah also is believed to receive Iranian weapons shipments through the country.

"Overthrowing the regime in Syria is in the American and Israeli interest," Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said in a speech marking "Liberation Day," which celebrates the withdrawal of the Israeli army from southern Lebanon in 2000 after 18 years of occupation. "They want to overthrow the regime and replace it with a moderate regime."

Nasrallah spoke during a time of great upheaval in the region, including the uprising in Syria and a May 15 march by Palestinian refugees on Israel's borders, as well as two highly contentious speeches by the Israeli prime minister and American president Barack Obama.

While praising uprisings that toppled longtime dictators in Egypt and Tunisia, Nasrallah urged the Syrian people to "protect their country" and give a chance for the Syrian leadership to implement reforms.

"We are worried about what is being plotted for the regime in Syria and the Syrian people," Nasrallah said, echoing Assad's claims that the events in Syria were a foreign conspiracy aimed at weakening the country's leadership.

Nasrallah rejected U.S. and Western sanctions on Syrian leaders.

"We should all cooperate so that Syria may emerge strong and immune," he said.

"President Bashar Assad believes in reform and is serious and ready to go a long way toward reforms, but in a calm and responsible manner," he said.

Hezbollah Supports Syria Leader Bashar Assad

 

[High_Gravity]

Syria Gunmen Used To Crush Protests

BEIRUT — The Syrian regime is unleashing shadowy, mafia-style gunmen to carry out some of the most brutal attacks on dissent as the country's 10-week uprising threatens President Bashar Assad's once-unshakable grip on power.

The gunmen belong to a pro-Assad militia called "shabiha," which runs protection rackets, smuggling rings and other criminal enterprises while providing muscle for the regime.

Recruited from the ranks of Assad's Alawite religious community, the militiamen enable the government to distance itself from direct responsibility for the drive-by shootings, bloody executions and waves of intimidation and robbery that have made Syria's revolt one of the deadliest of the Arab Spring.

More than 1,000 people have been killed in the crackdown in Syria, many of them at the hands of the shabiha, human rights activists say. As the uprising has gained momentum in recent weeks, the gunmen appear to have taken on a more central role.

Syrians who have encountered the shabiha say they flaunt weapons, clutch rolls of cash and whiz through checkpoints with guns sticking out of their car windows.

"They always, always get what they want," a 38-year-old Syrian man told The Associated Press in an interview after he fled the besieged town of Banias and crossed into Lebanon.

"If they like your car, it's theirs. If they want your apartment, it's theirs. It's shameful to say it, but if they like a girl, she is also theirs," he said.

He, like all witnesses, spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals against relatives still inside Syria.

In many ways, witnesses say, the shabiha are more terrifying than the army and security forces, whose tactics include shelling residential neighborhoods and firing on protesters. The swaggering gunmen, they say, are deployed specifically to brutalize and intimidate Assad's opponents.

Syria Gunmen Used To Crush Protests

 

[High_Gravity]

Fresh fatalities as Syrians brave crackdown

At least three people have been killed in Qatana, a suburb of the capital Damascus, after Syrian security forces used live fire to disperse hundreds of anti-government demonstrators, activists say.

According to Al Jazeera's Zeina Khodr reporting from neighbouring Lebanon, there were also reports of five protesters being shot dead in Dael, a southern town located 10km from Deraa, and one other in Zabadani, a town not far from the Lebanese border.

The killings came amid renewed demonstrations after midday prayers on Friday, dubbed "day for the Guardians of the Homeland" by pro-democracy advocates in an effort to reach out to the army to join their 10-week uprising.

As prayers ended, demonstrations were reported to be taking place in Idlib, in the country's north west, in Deir al-Zur in the north east, and in Qamishli, Amouda and Ras al Ain in the Kurdish areas in Syria's north.

Bid to win over army

An eyewitness to the early morning attacks in Dael told Al Jazeera that the secret police opened fire on a crowd of around 3,000 locals who were returning to town from a peaceful march to the army barracks on the outskirts.

He said the crowd was chanting, "The people and army are one hand".

The march had passed off peacefully, until the secret police opened fire on the crowd as tanks entered the town, he said.

Khodr, our correspondent, said the number of casualties had been low in comparison to previous Friday protests, "a sign that the Syrian government is realising that it cannot stop these protests by relying [only] on a security option" without dialogue.

She has been reporting from Beirut as Al Jazeera is banned from entering Syria.

She said pro-democracy activists viewed the latest protests as a success since people took to the streets in cities like Homs and Baniyas despite a military siege.

But the demonstrators did not achieve any of their goal, which was to "get the army to switch sides" and stop shooting at protesters, she said.

The fresh violence came amid a brutal military crackdown on protests, that have swept the country for weeks and shaken the one-party rule of president Bashar al-Assad.

More than a 1,000 people are believed to have been killed in the crackdown to date.

The harsh crackdown has triggered international outrage and US and European sanctions, including an EU assets freeze and a visa ban on Assad and nine members of his regime.

Amnesty International, the human rights group, has accused Syrian security forces of deliberately killing hundreds of demonstrators in the city of Deraa.

Fresh fatalities as Syrians brave crackdown - Middle East - Al Jazeera English

 

[Trajan]

this, vs. Yemen the unease in Bahrain? I just don't see wasting time on Libya. If Syria is destabilized, this drops Irans influence in the Levant a far worthier venture than Libya.....

 

[georgephillip]

Robert Fisk is writing that the Turks are rapidly losing patience with Assad "because he twice promised to speak of reform and democratic elections - then failed to honor his word."

Assad's lies are hardly shocking but Turkey's response may well be:

"Watching the hundreds of refugees pouring from Syria across the northern border of Lebanon, the Turkish government is now so fearful of a repeat of the great mass Iraqi Kurdish refugee tide that overwhelmed their border in the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf war that it has drawn up its own secret plans to prevent the Kurds of Syria moving in their thousands into the Kurdish areas of south-eastern Turkey.

"Turkish generals have thus prepared an operation that would send several battalions of Turkish troops into Syria itself to carve out a 'safe area' for Syrian refugees inside Assad's caliphate.

"The Turks are prepared to advance well beyond the Syrian border town of Al Qamishli – perhaps half way to Deir el-Zour (the old desert killing fields of the 1915 Armenian Holocaust, though speak it not) – to provide a 'safe haven' for those fleeing the slaughter in Syria's cities."

Is the Arab Spring heading into a long, hot summer?

Who Cares in the Middle East What Obama Says? | Common Dreams

 

[High_Gravity]

this, vs. Yemen the unease in Bahrain? I just don't see wasting time on Libya. If Syria is destabilized, this drops Irans influence in the Levant a far worthier venture than Libya.....

Theres no oil in Syria though.

 

[High_Gravity]

Syria Military Renews Attacks In Heartland

BEIRUT — The Syrian military used heavy machine guns and artillery in renewed attacks on a town in the country's turbulent heartland Tuesday. At least one person was killed and many others wounded, activists said.

The Local Coordination Committees in Syria, which helps organize and document the country's protests, said heavy gunfire was heard in Rastan, a few miles (kilometers) north of the central city of Homs and under attack since Sunday.

The committee said Ibrahim Salmoun perished in the Tuesday attacks. His death raises to 16 the number of people killed in the three-day crackdown in Homs province, scene of some of the largest anti-government demonstrations in recent weeks, activists said.

The Syrian regime of President Bashar Assad is determined to crush the ten-week old revolt against his rule. The government claims the uprising is the work of Islamic extremists and armed gangs.

Details coming out of Syria are sketchy because the government has placed severe restrictions on the media and expelled foreign reporters, making it nearly impossible to independently verify accounts coming out of the country.

The committees said the army was shelling Rastan from four directions using Russian-made T-72 tanks. Activists said the military also shelled a field hospital, destroyed the entrance to the city and its industrial zone.

State-controlled media quoted a Syrian military official as saying army units and security forces in Rastan arrested members of "armed terrorist groups who terrorized citizens and destroyed public and private property." The official said the military also confiscated a large number of arms and weapons.

Two soldiers, including an officer, were killed and four others wounded Tuesday, it said.

Mohammad Said Bkheitan, assistant secretary general of the ruling Baath party, said the protest movement nationwide amounted to no more than 100,000 people.

Syria Military Renews Attacks In Heartland

 

[Trajan]

this, vs. Yemen the unease in Bahrain? I just don't see wasting time on Libya. If Syria is destabilized, this drops Irans influence in the Levant a far worthier venture than Libya.....

Theres no oil in Syria though.

there aint much in Yemen either bro....

 

[Trajan]

Robert Fisk is writing that the Turks are rapidly losing patience with Assad "because he twice promised to speak of reform and democratic elections - then failed to honor his word."

Assad's lies are hardly shocking but Turkey's response may well be:

"Watching the hundreds of refugees pouring from Syria across the northern border of Lebanon, the Turkish government is now so fearful of a repeat of the great mass Iraqi Kurdish refugee tide that overwhelmed their border in the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf war that it has drawn up its own secret plans to prevent the Kurds of Syria moving in their thousands into the Kurdish areas of south-eastern Turkey.

"Turkish generals have thus prepared an operation that would send several battalions of Turkish troops into Syria itself to carve out a 'safe area' for Syrian refugees inside Assad's caliphate.

"The Turks are prepared to advance well beyond the Syrian border town of Al Qamishli – perhaps half way to Deir el-Zour (the old desert killing fields of the 1915 Armenian Holocaust, though speak it not) – to provide a 'safe haven' for those fleeing the slaughter in Syria's cities."

Is the Arab Spring heading into a long, hot summer?

Who Cares in the Middle East What Obama Says? | Common Dreams

interesting.....

from the article; why do you suppose, the media difference exists?

But the Qataris are also attracting Assad's venom. Al Jazeera's concentration on the Syrian uprising – its graphic images of the dead and wounded far more devastating than anything our soft western television news shows would dare broadcast – has Syrian state television nightly spitting at the Emir and at the state of Qatar. The Syrian government has now suspended up to £4 billion of Qatari investment projects, including one belonging to the Qatar Electricity and Water Company.

 

[georgephillip]

The differences between western media and Al Jazeera?

I'm not sure where Assad gets most of his weapons.
If a substantial percentage come from western corporations...?

What did you make of Fisk's speculation on a "Third Intifada"?

"If there's an 'intifada' in Syria, why not a Third Intifada in 'Palestine'?

"Not a struggle of suicide bombers but of mass, million-strong protests.

"If the Israelis have to shoot down a mere few hundred demonstrators who tried – and in some cases succeeded – in crossing the Israeli border almost two weeks ago, what will they do if confronted by thousands or a million.

"Obama says no Palestinian state must be declared at the UN. But why not?
Who cares in the Middle East what Obama says?

"Not even, it seems, the Israelis.

"The Arab spring will soon become a hot summer and there will be an Arab autumn, too. By then, the Middle East may have changed forever. What America says will matter nothing."

Who Cares in the Middle East What Obama Says? | Common Dreams

 

[Trajan]

The differences between western media and Al Jazeera?

I'm not sure where Assad gets most of his weapons.
If a substantial percentage come from western corporations...?

What did you make of Fisk's speculation on a "Third Intifada"?

"If there's an 'intifada' in Syria, why not a Third Intifada in 'Palestine'?

"Not a struggle of suicide bombers but of mass, million-strong protests.

"If the Israelis have to shoot down a mere few hundred demonstrators who tried – and in some cases succeeded – in crossing the Israeli border almost two weeks ago, what will they do if confronted by thousands or a million.

"Obama says no Palestinian state must be declared at the UN. But why not?
Who cares in the Middle East what Obama says?

"Not even, it seems, the Israelis.

"The Arab spring will soon become a hot summer and there will be an Arab autumn, too. By then, the Middle East may have changed forever. What America says will matter nothing."

Who Cares in the Middle East What Obama Says? | Common Dreams

I was asking a mainly rhetoric question George but in any event the media here is in the tank, thats the answer.

frankly as far as the US being a broker etc and having any power to affect anyone's thinking that was exploded after oslo, or that is thats what it meant to me.

obama stuck himself in a bind and has totally lost abbas's confidence, not that abbas was the answer either imho, but he was better than th alternatives. obama told Rice to vote no on the last UN res. and that was tha, abbas describes obama as having left him up a tree and taken the ladder.

Obama should never ever ever have made settlement freezes as part of a condition for negotiations, when he did that he told abbas hey I am on your side, he then saw that fall apart and now hes scrambling and no one believes him, he has as fisk said ( and so has sympathetic dems) screwed it up, we are done there.

Even the gaza pullout was made out as a sop. It just took from Oslo to now to see it all for what it is.

With the changes taking place now, fisk, and I never thought I'd say this, is spot on, our influence is over and done, now and forever, unless, we make the only play left; which is to take sides straight out in what will come to pass - the greater sunni shiite struggle which is to come.

We align with the sunnis and come what may.

you didn't need to add snips from the article george, I read it.....

 

[georgephillip]

More divide and conquer?

It has worked well for all Western empires since the Ulster Plantation early in the 17th Century.

It's chances for long term success are about as likely as a "good" emperor, imho.

 

[High_Gravity]

Syria Troops Pound Town WIth Artillery; At Least 43 Dead

BEIRUT — Syrian government troops pounded a central town with artillery and gunfire Thursday, renewing attacks in a restive area that has been largely cut off from outside contact for six days. At least 15 people died, bringing the total killed there to 72 since the onslaught began, activists said.

What started as street demonstrations calling for reforms evolved into demands for President Bashar Assad's ouster in the face of the violent crackdown, especially in Syria's south and center, where the challenge to his family's 40-year-rule is seen as strongest.

Activists say more than 1,100 people have died in the crackdown and 10,000 have been detained. But it hasn't slowed the protests, which take place nearly daily and swell into the thousands each Friday.

A resident of Rastan, a protest stronghold in central Syria, said the town's electricity was cut and it was by tanks. He said troops bombed the water supply as well as a mosque and the sports complex.

"We have become refugees in our own country," said the man reached by telephone, who said he fled his home in the town center to escape arrest and was sleeping in the woods.

"My family and sisters are still there, and I don't know how they are doing," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

He said army units entered some neighborhoods Wednesday evening and were making arrests.

The Syrian government on Wednesday freed hundreds of political prisoners in an amnesty and the president set up a committee for national dialogue in an effort to end the 10-week uprising, but concessions have been coupled with deadly attacks on the towns seen as the greatest threat to his power. Electricity and telephone lines were cut Saturday in Rastan and some nearby towns, and the government attacks have been unrelenting ever since, activists say.

A movement consisting mostly of Syrian exiles met in Turkey on Thursday, trying to find a unified voice and coherent response to the violence.

Syria Troops Pound Town WIth Artillery; At Least 43 Dead

 

[georgephillip]

Any reports of Syria's Kurds entering Turkey in large numbers?

 

[High_Gravity]

Any reports of Syria's Kurds entering Turkey in large numbers?

Thats a good question, I have not heard anything about the Kurds in Syria and where they stand in this conflict, I am assuming they want Assad gone but who knows?