Crisis in Syrië #17 In de schaduw van Gaza

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Op vrijdag 30 november 2012 12:10 schreef Nibb-it het volgende:

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Heb 'm na een paar minuten afgezet.

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Syria’s Internet shutdown leaves information void, may signal escalating war

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The rising popularity of smartphones and the Syrian government’s sharp limits on the movements of independent journalists have made social media an especially vital source of information about the conflict. The abrupt loss of the technology has caused widespread fear, said Ammar Abdulhamid, a fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

“Not everyone will have access” to news about the conflict, said Abdulhamid, who has close ties to Syria’s opposition. “There will be panic. There will be fear.”

Syrian rebel forces have many satellite phones. But the devices expose users to risk of detection by government forces, and there are not enough of the phones to keep millions of Syrians informed.

“Most of the activists, especially in Damascus, are relying totally on the local Internet services, which are delivered by the Syrian communication companies,” said Ahmed Radoun, an activist in Hama who works for an opposition news service. “They want to pressure the activists who rely on the Internet services from the local companies and to limit the news delivery to the TV channels and the news agencies we deal with.”

The government has shut down Internet services previously, as well, often in specific regions right before launching attacks. On at least two other occasions, the outages were national in scope.

Omar Abu Laila, a spokesman for the rebel fighters in the eastern city of Deir al-Zour, said communications have been down for so long there that the new disruptions will have no impact. “The communication outage did not affect us,” he said. “You should report that we’re happy the rest of Syria joined us.”

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Syrian rebel films himself shooting 10 prisoners

New footage posted on the Internet appears to have been filmed by a Syrian rebel who points the camera along the barrel of his gun as he shoots 10 unarmed prisoners.

The video, posted on YouTube on Thursday, shows 10 men wearing t-shirts and camouflage trousers lying face down next to a building and a lookout tower. Even before the shooting, two of the men are not moving and one has blood coming from his torso.

"I swear to God that we are peaceful," begs one of the men to the camera, which is being held by the gunman. Cowering, the man gets up to plead with rebels. As he approaches a rebel off-screen, a shot is heard and he returns holding his bloodied arm.

The cameraman then points the camera along the barrel of his Kalashnikov assault rifle as he shoots the men.

"God is great. Jabhat al-Nusra," he says, referring to the secretive al-Nusra Front, an Islamist rebel unit linked to al Qaeda that has claimed responsibility for several suicide bomb attacks around the country.

The gunman gets on the back of a pickup truck and the camera pans to show the man who had been shot in the arm still moving. More shots are fired and his body spasms.

Reuters could not immediately verify the authenticity of the footage. Comments accompanying the video said it was filmed in Ras al-Ain, a town on the border with Turkey where pitched battles have raged in recent weeks.

Syria's uprising started with peaceful protests which were harshly suppressed by troops and has evolved into a civil war in which foreign jihadi fighters have joined ranks with defecting soldiers and armed civilians.

The 20-month-old revolt against President Bashar al-Assad has left 40,000 people dead. World powers who support the uprising say they are wary of providing arms to rebel groups due to the increasing role of Islamist radicals.

Rights groups accuse both rebel groups and government forces of war crimes including summary executions and torture.

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Op donderdag 29 november 2012 23:12 schreef zuiderbuur het volgende:
In ieder geval vind ik dat de internationale verontwaardiging maar matig is bij wat toch gewoon op een aanslag lijkt? Wie moet hiertegen optreden? Assad of de vertegenwoordigers van de Syrische Nationale Coalitie?
Ik ben verrevan pro-Assad, maar je kan het niet allemaal hebben: zowel erkenning als het afschuiven van verantwoordelijkheid over allerlei tuig dat daar nu actief is.

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Op zaterdag 1 december 2012 14:57 schreef BlaZ het volgende:
Is het eigenlijk nog mogelijk Syrië binnen te komen?

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Op zaterdag 1 december 2012 15:37 schreef rakotto het volgende:

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Ja. Via verschillende kanalen. Tot kort kon je nog naar Damascus vliegen, maar dat zit er nu niet meer in omdat het grotendeels in de handen is van de rebellen. Turkije is nog altijd de beste optie om naar Syrie te gaan.

Waarom vraag je dat?

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Op zaterdag 1 december 2012 15:37 schreef rakotto het volgende:

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Ja. Via verschillende kanalen. Tot kort kon je nog naar Damascus vliegen, maar dat zit er nu niet meer in omdat het grotendeels in de handen is van de rebellen. Turkije is nog altijd de beste optie om naar Syrie te gaan.

Waarom vraag je dat?

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Op zaterdag 1 december 2012 15:53 schreef BlaZ het volgende:

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Oh wilde het oude centrum van Aleppo graag bezoeken voordat het dadelijk vernietigd is.

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Benghazi explained: Interview with an “Intelligence Insider”

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II: As I said, the place where the attack happened is one of the largest, one of the most active CIA operation centers in North Africa, if not in the entire Middle East. It was not a diplomatic station. It was a planning and operations center, a logistics hub for weapons and arms being funneled out of Libya. Unlike the embassy in Tripoli, there was limited security in Benghazi. Why? So the operation did not draw attention to what was going on there.

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Benghazi: Behind the scenes (Part II)

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Now there are questions that are not being asked. The two well-armed ‘hit teams’ had the capability to reduce the compound and annex to rubble quickly. Why a protracted firefight? There are a couple of reasons.

First, what was the makeup of the ‘hit teams,’ or who were the attackers? We have verified that the attackers were a combination of members of Ansar al Sharia and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), but they were operating under the flag of Ansar al Sharia. Who is Ansar al Sharia? Iranian terrorists. They are a terrorist group that receives their training by and funding from Iran. Now think about this. Carefully consider the implications here. IRAN. It’s the elephant in the room no one wants to mention or talk about.

The attack on our ambassador and our people - Americans - was an attack by Iran. It was an attack at a nation-state level.

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petegee1 twitterde op zaterdag 01-12-2012 om 16:38:11 After blocking it, Assad regime restores internet and phones. New surveillance hardware/software fitted ? #Syria #Anonymous reageer retweet

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OpLeakSpinFr twitterde op zaterdag 01-12-2012 om 16:58:15 Internet returns across much of #Syria http://t.co/VdKVMYh4 reageer retweet

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(Reuters) - The Syrian opposition made progress on Thursday toward forming a transitional government at the first meeting of their new coalition in Cairo and the Muslim Brotherhood emerged as an overwhelmingly powerful kingmaker, delegates said.

In a sign of its strength within the leadership of the opposition, the Brotherhood and its allies pushed for the adoption of an internal constitution that allows choosing the prime minister and the cabinet with a simple majority, rather than a two-thirds majority.

Since the coalition was set up in Qatar earlier this month with Gulf and Western support, the Brotherhood has swiftly assembled a de facto majority bloc, according to insiders keeping tabs of changes in the membership of the coalition.

The meeting in a luxury Cairo hotel, now in its second day, was held behind closed doors.

"It looks like the internal constitution will be pushed through without any real discussion. The Brotherhood has Qatar behind it and they are getting what they want," one delegate said on condition of anonymity.

The formation of a transitional government could encourage greater Western backing for the 20-month revolt against four decades of autocratic rule by Assad and his later father, President Hafez al-Assad.

The bloody repression of an armed Islamist uprising against the elder Assad's rule in the 1980s killed many thousands of Brotherhood followers, as well as leftists, and forced many Syrians to leave the country.

Membership of the Brotherhood became punishable by death and the movement was decimated, to the point that the Brotherhood announced in 2009 that it was 'suspending' opposition to Assad.

The revolt in March last year revived the Brotherhood's fortunes and opened more sources of financing for the organisation from exiled conservative Syrians.

But independent delegates at the Cairo meeting said the process by which a transitional government is being pushed through does not bode well for a democratic future for Syria.

"The West is sending a signal that it is ready to accept the Brotherhood as the only guarantee of stability other than Assad. It has not learnt from what happened in Egypt. I am afraid Syria will become like Iran, rather than a democracy," said one of them, speaking on condition of anonymity.

INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT

France, Britain, Turkey and Gulf Arab states have already recognised the coalition as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people. The United States has been more cautious.

U.S. ambassador to Syria Robert Ford said on Thursday Washington "strongly, strongly, strongly" supports efforts to develop the coalition. "We would like to see them continue to develop as an organisation, as a coalition. They are making real progress and I expect that our position with them will evolve as they themselves develop," he said in Washington.

Conspicuously absent from the Cairo discussions was Sheikh Moaz al-Khatib, the coalition's president, a popular Damascene preacher who is increasingly seen as a religious figurehead who is respected inside Syria and an interlocutor with outside powers, rather than a hands-on leader.

Aware they could quickly lose credibility with rebels and opposition activists inside Syria, the 60 delegates postponed possibly divisive discussions on the final membership of the coalition and began talks on an internal constitution as a first step toward forming a transitional government.

Liaison between the coalition and rebels has been assigned to former Prime Minister Riad Hijab, the highest ranking official to defect since the revolt, coalition sources said.

Hijab, a lifelong apparatchik in Assad's Baath Party before his defection, is also being touted as a possible prime minister but his history in Assad's Baath Party could exclude him.

Rima Fleihan, one of a handful of minorities in the coalition, said the government will be small at first, perhaps with four to five members.

Fleihan said the coalition will make it clear that any government it appoints will reject any deal to negotiate a transitional period in Syria unless Assad steps down, a condition not included in international proposals to solve the crisis that has cost tens of thousands of lives.

"The coalition will have nothing to do with any political process that includes talks with the regime, keeps Assad and his security apparatus and does not hold him and his cohorts accountable for 50,000 Syrians dead," she said.

Fleihan, from Syria's Druze community, had previously resigned from the Syrian National Council (SNC), the first major opposition grouping formed in Istanbul last year that became dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood.

The SNC won scant international support. A Western and Gulf backed effort produced the new coalition earlier this month.

The coalition is holding its first full meeting in Cairo ahead of a conference of the Friends of Syria, a grouping of dozens of nations that had pledged mostly non-military backing for the revolt but who are worried by the influence of Islamists in the opposition.

Assad, who belongs to the minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam that has dominated power in Syria since the 1960s, has painted the opposition as Sunni extremists and al Qaeda followers and presented himself as the last guarantor for an undivided Syria.

Sources at the meeting said the coalition could eventually raise its membership from around 60 to 80 to include more minorities and Sunni figures who were overlooked.

But Michel Kilo, a veteran Christian opposition campaigner and a member of the coalition has not attended the Cairo meeting. The main Kurdish political bloc, the Kurdish National Council, has also refused to join.

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Syrian opposition leaders report an alarming growth within their ranks of fighters from Jabhat al-Nusra, an extremist group linked to al-Qaeda.

The Jabhat group now has somewhere between 6,000 and 10,000 fighters, according to officials of an non-governmental organization that represents the more moderate wing of the Free Syrian Army (FSA). They say that the al-Qaeda affiliate now accounts for 7.5 percent to 9 percent of the Free Syrian Army's total fighters, up sharply from an estimated 3 percent three months ago and 1 percent at the beginning of the year.

The extremist group is growing in part because it has been the most aggressive and successful arm of the rebel force. "From the reports we get from the doctors, most of the injured and dead FSA are Jabhat al-Nusra, due to their courage and [the fact they are] always at the front line," said a message sent today to the State Department by the moderate Free Syrian Army representatives, warning of the extremists' rise.

These estimates are very rough, given the scattered and disorganized nature of the opposition. But they are based on detailed reporting from the field by the members' military councils, which are the closest thing to an organized command structure among the rebels. In reports sent this week to the State Department, the NGO representing the Syrian moderates offered a detailed breakdown of the extremists' growth:

* In Aleppo, the Jabhat force is reckoned at around 2,000, mostly in the Al-Bab area northeast of the city. This estimate is based partly on reports from a doctor in the area who has treated injured fighters. The total FSA presence in the Aleppo area is about 15,000.

* In Idlib province, west of Aleppo, Jabhat's ranks number 2,500 to 3,000, or about 10 percent of the total number of FSA fighters there.

* In Deir al-Zor, to the northeast, the extremist group has about 2,000 of the FSA's total force of 17,000, according to the reports. Among Jabhat al-Nusra's most spectacular operations were recent seizures of the Al-Ward oil field and a Conoco gas field, the reports said.

* In Damascus, the Jabhat al-Nusra force is somewhere between 750 and 1,000. Another 1,000 fighters are spread around the country in Latakia, in northwest Syria, Homs in the center and Daraa in the south.

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Op zaterdag 1 december 2012 15:53 schreef BlaZ het volgende:

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Oh wilde het oude centrum van Aleppo graag bezoeken voordat het dadelijk vernietigd is.

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Op vrijdag 30 november 2012 23:04 schreef rakotto het volgende:
Misschien niet zo interessant, maar toch.

Assad's Forces Desecrating Christian Sanctities while the Revolutionists Honor it. SYRIA

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Lijkt me niet, het centrum ligt al maanden in de frontlinie.

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Op zondag 2 december 2012 13:10 schreef Frikandelbroodje het volgende:
Geen goede ontwikkeling dit:

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Bron

Artikel gaat verder.

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Lijkt me niet, het centrum ligt al maanden in de frontlinie.

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Goed om te zien, maar hoe betrouwbaar is dit nou? Wat het regime zegt over christenen vertrouw ik bij voorbaat al niet maar beide partijen maken graag gebruik van christenen in hun propaganda.

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Hala Gorani ‏@HalaGorani
!! MT @jenanmoussa My passport stamped by #FSA at Bab El Salemeh crossing. Brand new stamp that reads 'New #Syria'. pic.twitter.com/jfgxO9Iu

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Op vrijdag 30 november 2012 12:10 schreef Nibb-it het volgende:

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Heb 'm na een paar minuten afgezet.

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Op maandag 3 december 2012 08:07 schreef Senor__Chang het volgende:
Hoe groot is de kans dat hij zich terugtrekt naar de kust en daar blijft regeren?

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NaziqAlAbed twitterde op maandag 03-12-2012 om 19:30:27 Not a rumor MT @farGar: I once heard from very reliable activist that @IkhwansyriaEn denied aid to #Syrian women unless they'd wear hijab reageer retweet

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Op maandag 3 december 2012 19:17 schreef rakotto het volgende:
Minister van Buitenlandse zaken is vandaag overgelopen naar de FSA

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Op maandag 3 december 2012 08:07 schreef Senor__Chang het volgende:
Hoe groot is de kans dat hij zich terugtrekt naar de kust en daar blijft regeren?

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Op maandag 3 december 2012 19:47 schreef rakotto het volgende:

twitter:

NaziqAlAbed twitterde op maandag 03-12-2012 om 19:30:27 Not a rumor MT @farGar: I once heard from very reliable activist that @IkhwansyriaEn denied aid to #Syrian women unless they'd wear hijab reageer retweet