Syrian Freedom

For #Syrians, Frustration Over Outrage About Film, Not Assad’s Horrors

16/09/12

by Ahed Al Hendi

As the media turn their attention to senseless violence elsewhere, the struggling, besieged people of Syria wonder: Where’s the demonstrators’ anger about what’s happening to us?

Syrian rebels take position during clashes with regime forces in the northern city of Aleppo, Sept. 14, 2012. Syrian regime forces used fighter jets and helicopter gunships to pound the city and province of Aleppo, where fierce clashes raged around a military airport, monitors said. (MARCO LONGARI Marco Longari, AFP / Getty Images )

So read a banner in Syria satirizing the absurd and exaggerated outrage against the Web trailer for Innocence of Muslims. Another read: “We have an Assad-esque movie that offends the messenger [Muhammad] and the god of the messenger. It’s been playing for 18 months.”

Many Syrians on Twitter, Facebook, and other social-media sites have expressed outrage about the production of this Web film. But their anger is largely directed at the Arab world’s reaction. Bashar al-Assad’s forces are slaughtering people on a daily basis not in a movie, but in real life, while the media and protesters elsewhere have shifted attention to what many Syrians call “a silly movie.”

“What happened affected us Syrians negatively,” Yassin Al Haj Saleh, a prominent Syrian writer and dissident based in Damascus, tells me over Google Chat. “First, media attention was focused on this story. Second, the movie and the violent reaction served the regime and its supporters by giving them an excuse—that a regime that looks modernist from the outside and depends on a criminal intelligence apparatus would be the best for the Middle East.”

Al Haj Saleh, who was one of 11 people recently awarded the Prince Claus Award for his work, did not rule out the possibility that the acts of violence were backed by remnants of ousted regimes or opportunistic populist movements.

Many Syrian activists share Saleh’s view of the movie. They fear that Western governments will use the turmoil as a pretext not to support Syrian opponents of the Assad regime.

It’s understandable that many in the West would think twice after seeing an ambassador killed in Libya. Christopher Stevens, after all, supported the Libyan rebels. But we don’t want to be like those who wanted to collectively punish Americans because of the acts of a few criminals. Many in the Arab world have condemned this senseless violence.

In Syria, for example, out of hundreds of demonstrations only a few have expressed anger against America. Sadly, it has always been safer and easier to burn a U.S. flag than a picture of Assad.

“The majority of Syrians have condemned the reactions to the movie,” Razan Zaioutneh, one of the few prominent female opposition leaders and a cofounder of the local coordination committees, who is based in Damascus, told me. “We did not even get 25 percent of these demonstrations to stand against the killing of thousands of Syrians during the last 18 months.”

She added: “I am not surprised about this savage reaction, but those who committed this violence are not the entire people of these countries, but a tiny portion that want to use this incident to gain more media attention and popularity.”

Syrians in general—and especially on Facebook—have had many debates about the Web movie. Some considered it part of freedom of expression by producers who shouldn’t be punished. As Lama Hamoudi, a Syrian dissident who is based in Arkansas, recently posted “I’m looking forward to watch more films—silly or otherwise—and read more articles/books that attack RELIGION (especially monotheistic religions) and ridicule religious figures. My favorite genre ever!”

“We did not even get 25 percent of these demonstrations to stand against the killing of thousands of Syrians during the last 18 months.”

Others have condemned the movie, but at the same time were outraged about the reaction in the Arab world.

“The movie is low quality, and the reactions were very exaggerated by people,” said Hanadi Zahlout, a former political prisoner who recently fled to Paris. “We don’t need these kinds of unconscious reactions. What we need is real actions that support the whole Syrian people, Muslim and Christians. The Syrians are facing one of the most criminal regimes in the world for more than a year, and yet no one supported or showed any kind of action to support them.”

Very few Syrians have praised the violence throughout the Arab world, even its Islamists. And despite some disagreements, most Syrians agree the movie and the reaction to it have served Bashar al-Assad more than anyone else in Syria.

#Syria, Blast at Damascus mosque kills 5 security personnel -TV

07/09/12

BEIRUT (Reuters) - An explosion outside a mosque in Syria’s capital killed five security personnel on Friday and wounded several others, state television said.

Syria TV said the “terrorist” blast had been caused by explosives attached to a motorcycle in the Damascus neighbourhood of Rukn al-Din.

The 17-month-old revolt against President Bashar al-Assad’s rule has grown increasingly bloody in recent months, as rebels try to bring the fight to his seat of power in Damascus and to the economic hub, Aleppo.

Assad’s forces have cracked down with troops, tanks and helicopter gunships on the unrest, which began as a series of peaceful protests but has now descended into civil war.

An opposition group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said Friday’s blast had been aimed at a security patrol in the area.

The British-based group, which has a network of activists across Syria, said that, in addition to the five dead, the explosion had wounded six members of the security forces, leaving several in critical condition.

(Reporting by Erika Solomon; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

(06/07/2012) Al-Latamna, Hama, #Syria | UN observers were present to view the destruction by helicopter gunships

Syrian gunships continue to pound rebels in Latakia #Syria

Syrian army helicopters and tanks pounded rebel positions in the
Mediterranean province of Latakia for a second day on Wednesday,
activists said, in the heaviest clashes there since the revolt against
President Bashar al-Assad erupted last year.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based group which monitors violence in the country, said army reinforcements arrived at dawn, killing a rebel captain in the town of Selma and six civilians in Haffeh, a mostly Sunni Muslim area where clashes have been most intense.

More than 35 people were reported killed on Tuesday and Assad’s forces also suffered heavy casualties with at least 26 soldiers killed, many in ambushes by insurgents.

Rebels said on Monday they were no long bound by a ceasefire brokered by international envoy Kofi Annan in April. They said the Assad government had failed to honour it.

Latakia province is home to several towns inhabited by members of Assad’s minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi’ite Islam, which has been wary of the mostly Sunni-led uprising.

This week’s clashes there are a rare surge of violence in a coastal province outside Syria’s usual trail of bloodshed.

Local activists provided shaky footage of a Syrian helicopter firing rockets. A member of the rebel Free Syrian Army in Latakia said its lightly-armed fighters faced shellfire.

“There was heavy fighting all night. In the morning, Syrian forces started shelling Selma and Haffeh,” the FSA’s Ali al-Raidi told Reuters by telephone.

Syrian rebels have killed more than 100 soldiers and other security personnel in the last few days, the Observatory says.

Syria heavily restricts access to international media organisations, which Damascus says have contributed to inciting violence, making it hard to verify reports from either side.

Reuters