While world leaders keep foraging for a policy, Syria’s increasing
refugees are foraging for the basics of life: food, shelter and security. Where
does the buck stop in our contemporary world? Where do we go to plead our case
with a reasonable expectation of a just hearing?
Wednesday
December 19, 2012
Today’s
Death Toll: 161, including 7
children and 3 women: 67 in Damascus and suburbs including 6 field executed in
Kafar Sousseh, 50 in Aleppo including 40 in a car explosion in Marjeh
neighborhood, 19 in Daraa, 8 in Hama, 8 in Deir Ezzor, 5 in Homs, 3 in Idlib
and 1 in Suweida. Points
of Random Shelling: 246. Clashes:
104. Rebels downed a plane in Albal'as mountains in Hama, launched
an assault against the Koris Military Airport in Aleppo, took control of the checkpoint
at Alsoyouf Square in Deir Ezzor City, and liberated the checkpoint at Mjaimar
in Suweida City (LCC).
News
Syria
Interior Minister Wounded by Bomb Last Week Syria's interior minister
suffered a serious back injury in the bombing of his ministry last week and was
brought to Beirut on Wednesday for treatment, Lebanese security officials said.
Jordanians saw the first signs two
months ago when their intelligence service caught a cell of 11 Jordanian
Salafists who had assembled in Syria and were planning, under the aegis of
Al-Qaida, to attack shopping centers and Western embassies in Jordan.
Special
Reports
The country tears itself further apart
with each passing day. This is the moment to do something about it… In these
circumstances, time is the enemy of humanity. The longer the regime has to
break the Syrian people into combustible categories of sect and ethnicity, the
greater the chance that Syria will become a stateless, chaotic and expanding
black hole in a region where stability is a challenge in the best of
circumstances. Lebanese, Turks and Jordanians already feel Syria's agony -- and
share in it. Time, in this case, is not the great healer. Time is the deadliest
of enemies… Time is the enemy. Time is of the essence. Time, for Syria and its
neighbors, is running out.
Aleppo has been designated a World
Heritage site since 1986, recognized for its ancient market, citadel and
mosques, and the United Nations in recent months has called several times for
its protection while emphasizing the tremendous toll the war has taken on
civilians.
Cold and afraid, many here say they
want desperately to leave Syria’s nearly two-year conflict behind and cross
into Turkey. But for the moment, their northern neighbour has refused to accept
them, citing overcrowding. Fourteen Turkish camps, hosting 141,000 people, are
already well over capacity, with thousands of people sleeping in communal tents
or in neighbouring villages for lack of space.
Lack of cooperation on all sides has
left the doors open to the most extremist financiers from the Arab Gulf
countries to force their own agendas on the brigades they are financing,
agendas that have nothing to do with Syria’s cause of freedom and dignity.
Syria
Deeply
The last thought that doesn’t let me
sleep at night is the decision by the government to move the vital enterprises,
facilities and factories to the “safe” provinces. What do they mean by safe
provinces, are they the coastal area? And what a coincidence, because after
Damascus airport wasn’t available for several days last week, the governor of
Tartous announced that the agricultural airport in Tartous will start operating
as a commercial airport. Are we moving towards separation? This is my worst
nightmare…no Syrian can afford this.
My contribution to a just released briefing by Woodrow Wilson
Center.
For those who expected a fast and smooth transition to liberal
democratic norms, the Arab Spring has certainly failed to deliver. But for
those who simply wanted to push their countries into taking one important and
necessary step in the right direction by breaking the prevailing political
stalemate in their societies, then, the Arab Spring has definitely lived up to
expectations.
The fear barrier is now broken; the anciens régimes are gone;
and pent-up political forces, with their good, their bad, and their downright
ugly, have been released. The Islamists might have the upper hand at this stage
on account of their stronger organizational capabilities, but the more secular
elements are not giving up and have, in fact, made it clear that they, too,
have strong grassroots connections and support—and not only among minority
communities but within the larger Arab Sunni community as well.
No longer can any of the sides dismiss the other as irrelevant. The
choices confronting all are now stark and clear: accommodation, civil war, or
civil war eventually ending in accommodation. A return to the autocratic past
with one side dominating the other and imposing its ways is not feasible. Each
side of the divide has enough regional and international backers to ensure the
near impossibility of such an outcome. The sooner the representatives of the
different political forces realize this, the better for all. For only when
accommodation is reached can democracy finally begin to take root in our
region.
Video Highlights
Leaked video from the Damascene suburb of Daraya shows wounded loyalist
militias receiving treatment in the field, before being forced to withdraw with
their tanks when MiGs showed up to bomb rebel positions http://youtu.be/uuIWEk6UT_4
Another leaked video documents the use of missile launchers by pro-Assad
militias http://youtu.be/4xsjog7ZZP8
Rebels take a stand in Yarmouk Camp in Damascus City http://youtu.be/8Ly_9baT4u4 In Ain
Terma, pro-Assad militias pound the community with tanks http://youtu.be/EgR2CePNc1g Residents of
nearby Mleihah evacuate their town http://youtu.be/rMtNuJvJOfc
As MiGs continue their raids on the region of Eastern Ghoutah: Hamouriyeh
http://youtu.be/8lhjVXWhiNw Kafar Batna
http://youtu.be/VyTitCfcSAY
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