The Battle for Syria & the Truth!

While Assad and his ilk are busy carving up Syria, even as the world watches on in horror and disbelief, both fake and sincere, the challenge ahead for Syria’s opposition groups is to conjure a plan for keeping the rest of the country together. Perhaps a plan can hasten the decision for intervention, without which the future looks bleak.

Saturday June 09, 2012

Today’s death toll: 96. The Breakdown: 26 in Daraa City including many women and children, killed by pro-Assad militias after they stormed the city. 26 in Homs, including 10 in Khaldieyh neighborhood in Homs City killed under the continued shelling of old neighborhoods with anti-aircraft missile and heavy artillery, the rest died in the towns of Talbisseh and Qusayr due to continued shelling. 26 in Idlib, half of whom fell in the city of Maaraat Al-Nouman. 12 including children in Lattakia who fell in the continued pounding of Hiffeh town and nearby villages. Deaths were also reported in Daraya suburb in Damascus, as well as in the provinces of Aleppo and Hassakeh.

News

'Battle is in Damascus' as Syrian tanks fire in 12-hour exchange

Lebanese abductees in Syria appear in new video

Op-Eds & Special Reports

Assad Response to Syria Unrest Divides His Own Sect

Shoddy unprofessional dimwitted journalism

Report: Rebels Responsible for Houla Massacre

“But according to a new report in Germany’s leading daily, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ), the Houla massacre was in fact committed by anti-Assad Sunni militants, and the bulk of the victims were member of the Alawi and Shia minorities, which have been largely supportive of Assad.”

Assad and his supporters have been working since the beginning of the revolution to provoke exactly this kind of response from Sunni rebels in order to use it to bolster their claims of terrorist infiltrators, armed gangs and external conspiracies, and so they can justify even more violent crackdown, wider-scale ethnic cleansing and larger massacres. Had this been an anti-Alawite massacre as FAZ report claims, had there, in fact, been a single Alawite victim among the dead in Houla, Assad and his media would have jumped on it like the ravenous wolves they are. They wouldn’t have waited for a German journalist quoting unnamed sources to tell them what happened.

We have lists of names of victims, we have eyewitnesses, we have videos and we have satellite photography showing pro-Assad checkpoints all over the place. But more importantly, had these claims been true wouldn’t Syrian media have pointed this out from day one? Wouldn’t Assad have bothered say so during his speech in which he described the people who perpetrated this as monsters? Would local Alawites have allowed Sunni rebels to bury their dead for them? Wouldn’t Assad have declared national mourning for the dead?

Assad and his supporters have been working since the beginning of the revolution to provoke exactly this kind of response from Sunni rebels in order to use it to bolster their claims of terrorist infiltrators, armed gangs and external conspiracies, and so they can justify even more violent crackdown, wider-scale ethnic cleansing and larger massacres. Had there been a single Alawite victim among the dead in Houla, they would have jumped on it like the ravenous wolves they are. They wouldn’t have waited for an overambitious German journalist, a novice trying to make a name or a has-been trying to revive it, quoting unnamed sources to tell them what happened.

Video Highlights

Homs

The neighborhoods of Old Homs at point housed over 800,000 people, most of whom Sunnis, now the inhabitants have been forced out and their dwellings are being raised to the ground. Meanwhile, majority Alawite and Christian neighborhoods are quite safe and life goes on as normal. The city is all too simply, and as the world watches on hopelessly, is being readied for incorporation in a future Alawite state.

In Homs City, the entire crew documenting the current bombing campaign was hit but they miraculously survived, and here they can be seeing tending to their own wounds http://youtu.be/L3H2hKPHaQo And the pounding of the old neighborhoods continued: Qarabees http://youtu.be/ZGY0GZXVe2k , http://youtu.be/04LKIgJTN3g Qoussour http://youtu.be/wHV5QqVjnco , http://youtu.be/bTXPRkGeArs , http://youtu.be/64HOIOOnGro , http://youtu.be/aWWKkjUcn9U , http://youtu.be/Wu_sranKqMA , http://youtu.be/NiHDalHs0FE , http://youtu.be/EFhQA-h4jKE , http://youtu.be/mknWT0xf8n4 Ghoutah http://youtu.be/-SihN7Q0aiA Jouret Al-Shayah: houses catch fire http://youtu.be/mKgfuMQ9NOc Hamidiyeh http://youtu.be/IQUlo4zTAzM Khaldiyeh http://youtu.be/3UpwzEAKBhk , http://youtu.be/sy7EqvhAnY4 , http://youtu.be/sKDZx0GUB8o Bomb goes off near the media team recording the events  http://youtu.be/8i5hIkc-6H4 Wounded http://youtu.be/XIo9EXK3JsA , http://youtu.be/nnpdtBk-z34

Pro-Assad militias stormed the neighborhood of Ghoutah and carried out hundreds of arrest amidst heavy firing http://youtu.be/M6YT2KNHVas , http://youtu.be/PY4dZ9tj1tE

The pounding of the town of Rastan continues http://youtu.be/s4E9dC5vUkw , http://youtu.be/8OWhVKR6hEc , http://youtu.be/ywqSGWtkHo8 , http://youtu.be/nVn6eaGHfbA , http://youtu.be/VTT98yZjMxU Homes catch fire http://youtu.be/pRBbDqo34DY , http://youtu.be/jvJ15KFXBkc a martyr http://youtu.be/IRW-WW1JKI0

The nearby town of Talbisseh is also pounded during the day http://youtu.be/cfz33qZhhLw , http://youtu.be/GNNoBq6IbKQ And at night http://youtu.be/ihanyayFAsg , http://youtu.be/fNeoERxnqPU , http://youtu.be/5lJSuLwob6s Martyrs http://youtu.be/A6eCLkHOa-U , http://youtu.be/iL14z1Ousxs , http://youtu.be/A1jKON8Qjz4 , http://youtu.be/hIZuxpitcnk , http://youtu.be/K0o_b64R7jc , http://youtu.be/8nQCCZecgvE  , http://youtu.be/avJVRYpEGoA

Qusayr: the pounding continues http://youtu.be/khp01Gi5M7E Martyrs http://youtu.be/CsvutxLb5yQ Rescuing the wounded http://youtu.be/9U7KUZKof5Y

Houla comes under heavy gunfire at night http://youtu.be/ZV2OTICTqJw

Idlib

The pounding of Maa’rrat Al-Nouman http://youtu.be/UxGciB7tnrM left many dead http://youtu.be/dC25vryp4WQ , http://youtu.be/8cx4OFBuePI , http://youtu.be/TA0k-pPdxLo , http://youtu.be/Mp1pfi5sCWk , http://youtu.be/0Xqg--Ydab8 , http://youtu.be/tEr0M180QnU Treating the wounded http://youtu.be/bku3pMKAj-Y

Hama

The town of Taybat Al-Imam comes under heavy pounding at night http://youtu.be/-RyIsE1VeME

In the town of Kafar Zeiteh, a local martyr is so disfigured he was only identified by the tattoo on his arm http://youtu.be/YhuqSEb93tI UN monitors meet the locals http://youtu.be/hhHSyVNNGmQ

Daraa

Nighttime clashes in the town of Sanamein http://youtu.be/JW7VCXlWYyc

Pro-Assad militias set a few houses I the town of Abtaa on fire http://youtu.be/8AsiAv_CjOE

In Daraa Al-Balad, locals take advantage of a lull in the pounding to see off the martyrs to their final resting place http://youtu.be/hm_TG8q7dxs , http://youtu.be/UD78Shu4HwU , http://youtu.be/H2u5fCkOyp0 , http://youtu.be/3MSsSsdYQ-8 Praying for the dead http://youtu.be/-kDwoCvgBXM the pounding earlier in the day http://youtu.be/9wUxOo6JXzs , http://youtu.be/XfdxltK5K5w , http://youtu.be/YXbGnFP2uRs

Damascus

The town of Zabadani comes under heavy pounding at night http://youtu.be/SsGmMJNboyA , http://youtu.be/OlJK5bwRCWE , http://youtu.be/wUa40sV7MIc , http://youtu.be/meYamXbHn9Q

Locals in Qaboun suburb hold a funeral for yesterday’s dead http://youtu.be/fD6AMxWMTEI , http://youtu.be/KYAt0-mcStw , http://youtu.be/J5EFftlJixM

Harasta: martyr http://youtu.be/3Xzq0Er0ESU

In Babbila, pro-Assad militias force local merchants to end their strike http://youtu.be/1GUBLYVULog

Aleppo

Protesters in Salaheddine neighborhood, Aleppo City, come under fire http://youtu.be/FJ9yZaVsjEY

The town of Tal Rif’aat is pounded by choppers http://youtu.be/cddR0SatVds