Syria will “respond immediately” to any new Israeli attack against its territory, its deputy foreign minister told AFP on Thursday, after two reported Israeli strikes on military targets last week.

“The instruction has been made to respond immediately to any new Israeli attack without [additional] instruction from any higher leadership, and our retaliation will be strong and will be painful against Israel,” Faisal Muqdad said.

He spoke in an interview with AFP in the Syrian capital.

Senior Israeli sources said the strikes targeted weapons bound for the powerful Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah, a close ally of Damascus.

Muqdad denied that.

“They absolutely did not achieve their objective and they lied when they said they are targeting Hezbollah,” he said.

There is “no way Syria will allow this to happen again,” he added.

Israel reportedly targeted military sites near the capital Damascus early on Friday morning and again early on Sunday morning, with at least 42 soldiers reported dead in the second strike.

The Jewish state has repeatedly warned it will intervene to prevent the transfer of advanced weaponry to Hezbollah, with which it fought the devastating 2006 Summer War.

The strikes last week were the third time Israel is thought to have hit sites inside Syria since the beginning of an uprising against the regime of President Bashar al-Assad in March 2011. That first was in January of this year.

The uprising, which began with peaceful protests, has devolved into a bloody conflict that has killed more than 70,000 people, according to the UN, and displaced millions of Syrians.

AFP - 05/09/2013

An Israeli air raid in Syria this week struck surface-to-air missiles and a nearby military complex on the outskirts of Damascus, as Israel feared the weapons would be transferred to Hezbollah, a US official said Friday.

With English Subtitiles 

“So, freedom without a price is not real”… this is the heartbreak

h/t to @Syrian_Scenes

#Syria - 12/29/2012 - Idlib - Ma’arat Al-Numan - Rebels firing a mortar

07/02/12 #Syria General strike in Qaboun, Damascus

Syria’s main opposition group on Thursday called for a nationwide student strike after pro-government forces killed four students in Aleppo and arrested some 200 following anti-regime protests.

In a statement, the Syrian National Council (SNC), an exile umbrella opposition organization, urged the strike “in solidarity with students at Aleppo University.”

The university in Syria’s second city and commercial hub was shut down Thursday until final exams after a night-time raid by regime forces that monitors say left four students dead and 28 wounded, three of them critically.

About 200 students were also detained in the assault that took place following an anti-regime protest on campus, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Activists and students said security forces raided the dormitories, threw out students and their belongings and torched some of the rooms.

Witnesses said some of the students jumped out of windows to avoid arrest.

Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Britain-based Observatory, said the events in Aleppo could mark a turning point for the northern city which has largely been spared the unrest shaking the country for nearly 14 months.

“The city of Aleppo hasn’t joined the anti-regime revolt thus far but the seriousness of these events will push residents to mobilise in solidarity with the students,” he told AFP.

“Security forces stormed the university in response to increased student protests lately inside and outside the campus,” he added.

“The university suspended classes because neither the management nor the security forces seem able to control the situation.”

In a video posted by activists on YouTube, heavy gunfire and screams are heard while dozens of men, identified as members of the security and intelligence services, are seen entering the campus.

The video could not be authenticated as Syrian authorities have restricted access to foreign media.

Several protests in solidarity with the Aleppo students broke out Thursday in various universities across the country, activists said.

The SNC called on authorities to reopen the university, the second largest in the country, and for students detained to be released.

It also urged student unions across the Arab world to show solidarity with their Syrian counterparts and for UN observers monitoring a tenuous ceasefire in the country to investigate the unrest in Aleppo.

The UN-backed truce went into effect April 12 but has failed to take hold with both sides to the conflict in Syria accused of violations.

Overall, more than 11,000 people have died in Syria since the revolt against the regime of Bashar al-Assad broke out in March last year, according to the Observatory.

-AFP/NOW Lebanon

Hasaka, Amouda, #Syria: General Strike on Nuwroz (Kurdish Freedom) Day

Douma, Damascus Suburbs, #Syria: General Strike

Daraa, #Syria: A General Strike in Busr Alharir 26/2/2012

24/02/12 #Syria Declaration of civil disobedience and a strike at a mass protest in Izaz.

General Strike in Salhiyeh in Deir Ezzor in solidarity with Homs #Syria

Hama, Karnaz, #Syria: General strike 4-2-2012

Residents in the central Syrian city of Hama have defiantly painted roads red and staged a general strike in memory of a massacre carried out by the regime there 30 years ago.

The Syrian opposition had called for demonstrations throughout the country to remember up to 40,000 people who were killed in Hama in 1982.

Rallies were also held elsewhere in Syria, including in the capital Damascus and in the central province of Homs.

In Hama itself footage posted on the internet showed the city’s Orontes River tinged red after paint was spilled into it.

“Our memory was awakened by the crimes that are happening now. It is the same oppression, same torture, same style of killing,” said activist Yasser al-Hamawi, who is from the city but now lives elsewhere.

“It is being repeated now even if on a smaller measure, people will not forget or forgive.”

Hama has become a symbol of defiance during the 11-month uprising against president Bashar al-Assad’s rule.

Residents, fearing reprisals, had until now not been able to mark the massacre.

By they reported that the city was paralysed on Thursday.

Schools and shops were closed and employees stayed at home.

Activists says a heavy government security presence, including snipers deployed throughout the city, prevented them from holding demonstrations to recall the day when forces loyal to then-president Hafez al-Assad attacked Hama.

“We did not mark it the way we wanted. The heavy security prevented us from protesting but at least now we can talk about it and it is acknowledged,” activist Mohamed abu al-Kheir said from the city.

The internet footage also showed graffiti which residents said dotted walls in the city, reading: “Hafez died and Hama did not, Bashar will die and Hama will never die.”

1982 massacre
The elder Assad was fighting an Islamist uprising in which the banned Muslim Brotherhood and its armed wing, the Fighting Vanguard, made a last stand in Hama.

For Sunni Islamist Syrians, Hama is synonymous with an assault on their religion by Mr Assad, a member of the minority Alawite sect which they deem heretical.

Thirty years later, his son is struggling to crush a revolt that began with mass demonstrations and now features an armed insurgency, which Bashar al-Assad calls an Islamist fifth column funded and directed from abroad.

The Brotherhood is playing a prominent role in the drive to topple Mr Assad in the present uprising - in which the United Nations says more than 5,000 people have been killed.

In a separate development, diplomats say a new draft of a UN Security Council resolution aimed at stopping the violence in Syria contains concessions to Russia.

Russia has consistently opposed any foreign intervention in Syria.

Posted February 03, 2012 08:15:25

Residents in the central Syrian city of Hama have defiantly painted roads red and staged a general strike in memory of a massacre carried out by the regime there 30 years ago.

The Syrian opposition had called for demonstrations throughout the country on Thursday to remember up to 40,000 people who were killed in Hama in 1982.

Rallies were also held elsewhere in Syria, including in the capital Damascus and in the central province of Homs.

In Hama itself footage posted on the internet showed the city’s Orontes River tinged red after paint was spilled into it.

“Our memory was awakened by the crimes that are happening now. It is the same oppression, same torture, same style of killing,” said activist Yasser al-Hamawi, who is from the city but now lives elsewhere.

“It is being repeated now even if on a smaller measure, people will not forget or forgive.”

Hama has become a symbol of defiance during the 11-month uprising against president Bashar al-Assad’s rule.

Residents, fearing reprisals, had until now not been able to mark the massacre.

By they reported that the city was paralysed on Thursday.

Schools and shops were closed and employees stayed at home.

Activists says a heavy government security presence, including snipers deployed throughout the city, prevented them from holding demonstrations to recall the day when forces loyal to then-president Hafez al-Assad attacked Hama.

“We did not mark it the way we wanted. The heavy security prevented us from protesting but at least now we can talk about it and it is acknowledged,” activist Mohamed abu al-Kheir said from the city.

The internet footage also showed graffiti which residents said dotted walls in the city, reading: “Hafez died and Hama did not, Bashar will die and Hama will never die.”

1982 massacre

The elder Assad was fighting an Islamist uprising in which the banned Muslim Brotherhood and its armed wing, the Fighting Vanguard, made a last stand in Hama.

For Sunni Islamist Syrians, Hama is synonymous with an assault on their religion by Mr Assad, a member of the minority Alawite sect which they deem heretical.

Thirty years later, his son is struggling to crush a revolt that began with mass demonstrations and now features an armed insurgency, which Bashar al-Assad calls an Islamist fifth column funded and directed from abroad.

The Brotherhood is playing a prominent role in the drive to topple Mr Assad in the present uprising - in which the United Nations says more than 5,000 people have been killed.

In a separate development, diplomats say a new draft of a UN Security Council resolution aimed at stopping the violence in Syria contains concessions to Russia.

Russia has consistently opposed any foreign intervention in Syria.

Flash || Dignity strike in AlBab, Aleppo, #Syria 1/25/2012