ESP

DE
RT

FR

Applications R RSS

RUPTLY

QUESTION MORE

LIVE

21:56 GMT, Mar 15, 2016

Home / OpEdge /

Syria: The hidden massacre

Sharmine Narwani is a commentator and analyst of Middle East geopolitics. She is a former
senior associate at St. Antony's College, Oxford University and has a masters degree in
International Relations from Columbia University. Sharmine has written commentary for a wide
array of publications, including Al Akhbar English, the New York Times, the Guardian, Asia Times
Online, Salon.com, USA Today, the Huffington Post, Al Jazeera English, BRICS Post and others. You can
follow her on Twitter at @snarwani
Published time: 7 May, 2014 14:36
Edited time: 26 Sep, 2014 12:41

A picture shows courthouse that was torched a day earlier by angry protesters in
the southern town of Daraa, 100 kms 60 miles south of Damascus, on March 21,
2011 following a demonstration demanding "freedom" and an end to 48 years of
emergency laws in Syria under President Bashar alAssad and his father Hafez.
AFP Photo / Louai Beshara / AFP

152

The attack took place shortly after the first stirrings of trouble in the
southern Syrian city of Daraa in March 2011.
Several old Russianmade military trucks
packed with Syrian security forces rolled onto a
hard slope on a valley road between Daraa al
Mahata and Daraa alBalad. Unbeknown to the
passengers, the sloping road was slick with oil
poured by gunmen waiting to ambush the
troops.

Trends
Syria unrest

Tags
Politics, Human rights,
Opposition, Syria, Shooting

Brakes were pumped as the trucks slid into each other, but the shooting
started even before the vehicles managed to roll to a stop. According to
several different opposition sources, up to 60 Syrian security forces were
killed that day in a massacre that has been hidden by both the Syrian
government and residents of Daraa.
One Daraa native explains: At that time, the government did not want to
show they are weak and the opposition did not want to show they are
armed.
Beyond that, the details are sketchy. Nizar Nayouf, a longtime Syria
dissident and blogger who wrote about the killings, says the massacre took
place in the final week of March 2011.
A source who was in Daraa at the time, places the attack before the second
week of April.
Rami Abdul Rahman, an antigovernment activist who heads up the Syrian
Observatory for Human Rights SOHR, the most quoted Western media
source on Syrian casualties, tells me: It was on the first of April and about
18 or 19 security forces or mukhabarat were killed.
Syrias Deputy Foreign Minister Dr. Faisal Mekdad is a rare government
official familiar with the incident. Mekdad studied in Daraa, is from a town
35 kilometers to the east called Ghasson, and made several official visits to
Daraa during the early days of the crisis. The version he tells me is similar,
down to the details of where the ambush took place and how. Mekdad,
however, believes that around 24 Syrian army soldiers were shot that day.

Why would the Syrian government hide this information, when it would
bolster their narrative of events namely that armed groups were
targeting authorities from the start, and that the uprising was not all
peaceful?
In Mekdads view, this incident was hidden by the government and by the
security for reasons I can interpret as an attempt not to antagonize or not to
raise emotions and to calm things down not to encourage any attempt to
inflame emotions which may lead to escalation of the situation which at
that time was not the policy.

April 2011: The killing of soldiers

What we do know for certain is that on April 25, 2011, nineteen Syrian
soldiers were gunned down in Daraa by unknown assailants. The names,
ages, dates of birth and death, place of birth and death and
marital/parental status of these 19 soldiers are documented in a list of
military casualties obtained from Syrias Defense Ministry.
The list was corroborated by another document given to me by a non
government acquaintance involved in peace efforts that details 2011
security casualties. All 19 names were verified by this second list.

Were these the soldiers of the Daraa massacre? April 25 is later than the
dates suggested by multiple sources and these 19 deaths were not
exactly hidden.
But even more startling than actually finding the 19 Daraa soldiers on a list,
was the discovery that in April 2011, eightyeight soldiers were killed by
unknown shooters in different areas across Syria.
Keep in mind that the Syrian army was mostly not in the field that early on
in the conflict. Other security forces like police and intelligence groups
were on the front lines then and they are not included in this death toll.
The first Syrian soldiers to be killed in the conflict, Saer Yahya Merhej and
Habeel Anis Dayoub, were killed on March 23 in Daraa.
Two days after those first military casualties, Alaa Nafez Salman was
gunned down in Latakia.
On April 9, Ayham Mohammad Ghazali was shot dead in Douma, south of
Damascus. The first soldier killing in Homs Province in Teldo was on
April 10 when Eissa Shaaban Fayyad was shot.
April 10 was also the day when we learned of the first massacre of Syrian
soldiers in Banyas, Tartous when nine troops were ambushed and
gunned down on a passing bus. The BBC, Al Jazeera and the Guardian all
initially quoted witnesses claiming the dead soldiers were defectors shot
by the Syrian army for refusing to fire on civilians.

That narrative was debunked later, but the story that soldiers were being
killed by their own commanders stuck hard throughout 2011 and gave
the media an excuse to ignore stories that security forces were being
targeted by armed groups.
The SOHRs Rami Abdul Rahman says of the defector storyline: This game
of saying the army is killing defectors for leaving I never accepted this
because it is propaganda. It is likely that this narrative was used early on by
opposition activists to encourage divisions and defections among the
armed forces. If military commanders were shooting their own men, you
can be certain the Syrian army would not have remained intact and united
three years on.
After the Banyas slayings, soldier deaths in April continued to pop up in
different parts of the country Moadamiyah, Idlib, Harasta, alMasmiyah
near Suweida, Talkalakh and the suburbs of Damascus.
But on April 23, seven soldiers were slaughtered in Nawa, a town near
Daraa. Those killings did not make the headlines like the one in Banyas.
Notably, the incident took place right after the Syrian government tried to
defuse tensions by abolishing the state security courts, lifting the state of
emergency, granting general amnesties and recognizing the right to
peaceful protest.
Two days later, on April 25 Easter Monday Syrian troops finally moved
into Daraa. In what became the scene of the second mass slaying of
soldiers since the weekend, 19 soldiers were shot dead that day.
This information also never made it to the headlines.
Instead, all we ever heard was about the mass killing of civilians by security
forces: The dictator slaughtering his own people. But three years into the
Syrian crisis, can we say that things may have taken a different turn if we
had access to more information? Or if media had simply provided equal
airtime to the different, contesting testimonies that were available to us?

Facts versus fiction

A report by Human Rights Watch HRW relies entirely on 50 unnamed
activists, witnesses and defected soldiers to set the scene for what was
taking place in Daraa around that time.

taking place in Daraa around that time.

HRW witnesses provided accounts of security forces using lethal force
against protesters during demonstrations and funeral processions. In some
cases, says HRW, security forces first used teargas or fired in the air, but
when the protesters refused to disperse, they fired live ammunition from
automatic weapons into the crowdsFrom the end of March witnesses
consistently reported the presence of snipers on government buildings near
the protests who targeted and killed many of the protesters.
The HRW report also states: Syrian authorities repeatedly claimed that the
violence in Daraa was perpetrated by armed terrorist gangs, incited and
sponsored from abroad.
Today we know that this statement is fairly representative of a large
segment of Islamist militants inside Syria, but was it true in Daraa in early
2011 as well?
There are some things we know as fact. For instance, we have visual
evidence of armed men crossing the Lebanese border into Syria during
April and May 2011, according to video footage and testimony from former
Al Jazeera reporter Ali Hashem, whose video was censored by his network.

There are other things we are still only now discovering. For instance, the
HRW report also claims that Syrian security forces in Daraa desecrated

HRW report also claims that Syrian security forces in Daraa desecrated
(mosques) by scrawling graffiti on the walls such as Your god is Bashar,
there is no god but Bashar in reference to Syrian President Bashar al
Assad.
Just recently a Tunisian jihadist who goes by the name Abu Qusay, told
Tunisian television that his task in Syria was to destroy and desecrate
mosques with Sunni names Abu Bakr mosque, Othman mosque, etc in
falseflag sectarian attacks to encourage defection by Syrian soldiers, the
majority of whom are Sunni. One of the things he did was scrawling pro
government and blasphemous slogans on mosque walls like Only God,
Syria and Bashar. It was a tactic he says, to get the soldiers to come on
our side so that the army can become weak.
Had the Syrian government been overthrown quickly as in Tunisia and
Egypt perhaps we would not have learned about these acts of duplicity.
But three years into this conflict, it is time to establish facts versus fiction.
A member of the large Hariri family in Daraa, who was there in March and
April 2011, says people are confused and that many loyalties have changed
two or three times from March 2011 till now. They were originally all with
the government. Then suddenly changed against the government but now I
think maybe 50% or more came back to the Syrian regime.
The province was largely progovernment before things kicked off.
According to the UAE paper The National, Daraa had long had a
reputation as being solidly proAssad, with many regime figures recruited
from the area.
But as Hariri explains it, there were two opinions in Daraa. One was that
the regime is shooting more people to stop them and warn them to finish
their protests and stop gathering. The other opinion was that hidden militias
want this to continue, because if there are no funerals, there is no reason for
people to gather.
At the beginning 99.9 percent of them were saying all shooting is by the
government. But slowly, slowly this idea began to change in their mind
there are some hidden parties, but they dont know what, says Hariri, whose
parents remain in Daraa.
HRW admits that protestors had killed members of security forces but
caveats it by saying they only used violence against the security forces and
destroyed government property in response to killings by the security forces

destroyed government property in response to killings by the security forces

orto secure the release of wounded demonstrators captured by the security
forces and believed to be at risk of further harm.
We know that this is not true the April 10 shootings of the nine soldiers
on a bus in Banyas was an unprovoked ambush. So, for instance, was the
killing of General Abdo Khodr alTallawi, killed alongside his two sons and a
nephew in Homs on April 17. That same day in the progovernment al
Zahra neighborhood in Homs, offduty Syrian army commander Iyad Kamel
Harfoush was gunned down when he went outside his home to investigate
gunshots. Two days later, Hamaborn offduty Colonel Mohammad Abdo
Khadour was killed in his car. And all of this only in the first month of
unrest.
In 2012, HRWs Syria researcher Ole Solvag told me that he had
documented violence against captured soldiers and civilians and that
there were sometimes weapons in the crowds and some demonstrators
opened fire against government forces.
But was it because the protestors were genuinely aggrieved with violence
directed at them by security forces? Or were they armed gangs as the
Syrian government claims? Or were there provocateurs shooting at one
or both sides?

Provocateurs in Revolutions
Syrianbased Father Frans van der Lugt was the Dutch priest murdered by a
gunman in Homs just a few weeks ago. His involvement in reconciliation
and peace activities never stopped him from lobbing criticisms at both
sides in this conflict. But in the first year of the crisis, he penned some
remarkable observations about the violence this one in January 2012:
From the start the protest movements were not purely peaceful. From the
start I saw armed demonstrators marching along in the protests, who began
to shoot at the police first. Very often the violence of the security forces has
been a reaction to the brutal violence of the armed rebels.
In September 2011 he wrote: From the start there has been the problem of
the armed groups, which are also part of the oppositionThe opposition of
the street is much stronger than any other opposition. And this opposition is
armed and frequently employs brutality and violence, only in order then to
blame the government.

blame the government.

Certainly, by June 5, there was no longer any ability for opposition groups
to pretend otherwise. In a coordinated attack in Jisr Shughur in Idlib, armed
groups killed 149 members of the security forces, according to the SOHR.
But in March and April, when violence and casualties were still new to the
country, the question remains: Why would the Syrian government against
all logic kill vulnerable civilian populations in hot areas, while
simultaneously taking reform steps to quell tensions?
Who would gain from killing women and children in those circumstances?
Not the government, surely?

Discussion about the role of provocateurs in stirring up conflict has made

some headlines since Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paetsleaked phone
conversation with the EUs Catherine Ashton disclosed suspicions that pro
west snipers had killed both Ukranian security forces and civilians during
the Euromaidan protests.
Says Paet: All the evidence shows that people who were killed by snipers
from both sides, among policemen and people from the streets, that they
were the same snipers killing people from both sidesand its really
disturbing that now the new (prowestern) coalition, they dont want to
investigate what exactly happened.

investigate what exactly happened.

A recent German TV investigation the sniper shootings confirms much
about these allegations, and has opened the door to contesting versions of
events in Ukraine that did not exist for most of the Syrian conflict at least
not in the media or in international forums.
Instead of writing these things off as conspiracy theories, the role of
provocateurs against targeted governments suddenly appears to have
emerged in the mainstream discourse. Whether it is the USs leaked plan to
create a Cuban twitter to stir unrest in the island nation or the
emergence of instructionalleaflets in protests from Egypt to Syria to Libya
to Ukraine, the convergence of just onetoomany lookalike mass protest
movements that turn violent has people asking questions and digging
deeper today.
Since early 2011 alone, we have heard allegations of unknown snipers
targeting crowds and security forces in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Syria and
Ukraine. What could be more effective at turning populations against
authority than the unprovoked killing of unarmed innocents? By the same
token, what could better ensure a reaction from the security forces of any
nation than the gunning down of one or more of their own?
By early 2012, the UN claimed there were over 5,000 casualties in Syria
without specifying whether these were civilians, rebel fighters or
government security forces. According to government lists presented to
and published by the UNs Independent International Commission of
Inquiry on Syria, in the first year of conflict, the death toll for Syrian police
forces was 478, and 2,091 for military and security force casualties.
Those numbers suggest a remarkable parity in deaths between both sides
in the conflict, right from the start. It also suggests that at least part of the
Syrian opposition was from the earliest days, armed, organized, and
targeting security forces as a matter of strategy in all likelihood, to elicit a
response that would ensure continued escalation.
Today, although Syrian military sources strongly refute these numbers, the
SOHR claims there are more than 60,000 casualties from the countrys
security forces and progovernment militias. These are men who come
from all parts of the nation, from all religions and denominations and from
all communities. Their deaths have left no family untouched and explain a
great deal about the Syrian governments actions and responses

great deal about the Syrian governments actions and responses

throughout this crisis.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely
those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.

SeeAlso

PromotedLinks byTaboola

FromArabSpringto2016truce:RTstimelineof5yearSyrianwar

TOWmissilevT90:Syrianrebelvideoshowsdramatichit

'Noneedtoshoot':IsraelrevealsRussianwarplanecrossedintoitscontrolzonefromSyria

HowtoEnjoy5StarLuxuryforUnder99
VeryChic.com

Aged35hespeaks11languageshis11trickstolearnanylanguage
Babbel

TheUltimateWaytoGetCheapHotelRooms
HotelBargains

Posting rules

Comments 2
Tree view
New
Popular
Context

Enter text...

FAQ

Add comment

muhammad razayesterday at 18:59

This article is worth reading..I salute the reporter
Reply
+2
+2
0

igor bundy2015.12.24 07:00

Of course the US armed terrorists in Syria and Iraq for a decade before any uprising. And the uprising was not for freedom but for relief from
economic hardship due to drowt.. US turned that into an uprising to get rid of a government that would not allow their pipeline.. There is
evidence since 2006 that the US was undermining the Syrian government and training terrorists.
Reply
+2
+2
0
Enter email

SeeAlso
SyrianarmyadvancesintoRaqqainmajorantiISISassault

ChinasmilitaryadvisersheadingtoSyriatohelpfightISISreport

SyrianoppositionnotagainstdirecttalkswithAssadgovernment

NamesofParissuicidebombersareinleakedISISdocsreport

RTgoesintoAleppoairbaseretakenfromISIS(EXCLUSIVE)

FirstfootagefromrecapturedSyrianairbasenearDamascus(VIDEO)

byTaboola

News

In vision

Live

RT NEWS APP

Espaol

USA

In motion

Where to watch

Android

UK

Shows

Schedule

iOS

Russian politics
More

Legal disclaimer

Windows phone Deutsch

Business

Privacy policy

Windows 8

Sport

Feedback

OpEdge

About us

RT

Contact info

RUPTLY

s
Applications

R RSS

Franais

Autonomous Nonprofit Organization TVNovosti, 20052016. All rights reserved.