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February 12th, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda
Other formerly free areas such as Inshaíat were under regime control, another
Free Syrian Army soldier said.
In these places, there is no longer any visible life. People who were among
the last to leave the city as the army moved in to follow up on days of
artillery assault say that no-one can go out for fear of the shelling and
the snipers who take aim at men, women, and children in the street.
One hospital contacted by telephone in the city said it had only three
patients and five nurses. Most of the population is sheltering in the lower
floors and basements of houses, crammed 30 to a room.
But despite the obvious threat of retribution when the regime turns to face
him, Capt. Abu Mahmoud is now marshalling defences of the liberated area the
other side of the government line, between Homs and the Lebanese border, and
even driving the army back. His men have pushed government troops four miles
from positions they held recently, and now occupy a line roughly between the
old military airport and the military training school, he said.
“After Homs, 100 per cent sure they will turn against us,” he said. “They
have tanks but we have heavy arms. Praise be to Allah we will beat them.”
The ruthlessness of the army’s assault on Homs must cast that claim in doubt.
The clear intention of the Assad forces is to repeat the massacre of the
nearby city of Hama in 1982, when President Bashar al-Assad’s father, Hafez,
and uncle, Rifaat, ordered the deaths of tens of thousands following an
uprising by the Muslim Brotherhood.
Residents of that city at the time recall the results. One Christian woman
described to The Sunday Telegraph how, as a young girl, she saw her
next door neighbours executed in their back yard, including a nine-year-old
playmate.
It was brutal, and it succeeded: there was no concerted internal opposition to
Assad rule for three decades afterwards.
This time, though, the Assad modus operandi seems not to be working.
Rather than intimidating them, residents of the surrounding area say it has
made them more determined than before to hold out.
“I don’t know if the government knows what I am doing here, and I don’t
care,” said Dr Abbas, who has become the de facto civilian leader of
the free area defended by Capt. Abu Mahmoud and his men. “None of us
cares.”
This area did not throw off its shackles in one bound, as happened with the
free cities of the Libyan uprising. But after months of demonstrations,
arrests and shootings, gradually a group of respected citizens took the
shape of an informal civilian council led by Dr Abbas who is not in fact a
doctor but a dentist and an owner of several factories in Syria and abroad.
The Free Syrian Army managed to turn it into a regime-free area, last week
evicting regular forces from a pair of buildings occupied by the police and
military intelligence, or Mukhabarat. An outpost in what was once the
regional hospital is the only government hold-out within sniper range of
heavily built-up areas.
Dr Abbas – who like otehrs in this area were nervous about giving their whole
names – reckons that this pocket of land contains 110-120,000 people, and
stretches to the Lebanese border. It is mostly contiguous, though there is a
problem with pockets inhabited by Shia Muslims.
While he insists that the uprising is not sectarian – “We just want
democracy, we don’t care whether people are Sunni, or Alawite or Shia, or
Christian. Have I asked you what you are?” he says – he also adds that
the Shia villages are a problem because of their links with Hizbollah in
Lebanon, the Shia militant group backed by the Assads.
This has made parts of both sides of the border no-go areas.
But throughout this area he and other council members supervise the arrival of
supplies, including medicines, brought in from Lebanon, and relief efforts
for the families of those arrested by regime forces, or whose houses have
been shelled and destroyed.
They have also set up a field hospital in an abandoned house, which also
operates as a place for council members to meet daily and review their work.
Lunch-time discussion sessions are regularly punctuated by the arrival of
the injured, like a man yesterday with a bullet-hole through his knee.
Four months ago, Dr Kasem, its senior doctor, left his post at the government
hospital and joined the opposition. He had already begun operating secretly
on injured rebels, keeping them off the books.
He knows, he says with a nervous laugh, that he is “for it” if the
regime troops re-take this place. “The government has a blacklist, and
we are all on it,” he said.
But this is the difference from events of Hama 30 years ago. While that was an
organised uprising from a particular opposition faction, none of these men,
whether doctors and businessmen like Dr Abbas and Dr Kasem, or career
soldiers like Abu Mahmoud, had any inkling of what was going to happen, only
a longstanding grievance. When they saw an opportunity, they seized it, as
did similar figures across the country.
“We have had 40 years of it,” Dr Abbas said. “Forty years of
security running our lives.” He says that President Assad is a “liar”,
because of his early promises of reform when he came to power in 2000.
“He said the right things, about democracy and everything,” he said. “Things
I thought came out of his mouth. But I think he did not understand the
system himself.”
Now, he says, he has proved himself as “criminal”, like his father.
It is hard to disagree, when considering events down the road in Homs, or the
random sniper fire and shell-bursts that send people here scurrying for
cover and have turned those parts of town still in the line of fire into
wastelands.
It is also hard, though, to be confident about these men’s futures.
Abu Mahmoud admits that they are short of weapons – in reality, they have only
a few light arms and rocket-propelled grenade launchers.
Dr Abbas snorts imperiously when asked if he is afraid. “We are not doing
it for ourselves. We are doing it for our sons, so they can have a future,”
he said. “We will never let him rule us again like he did before.”
But the women are clearly nervous, sheltering inside as their menfolk go to
war. And when pushed, even Dr Kasem looks sheepish. “Of course we are
all afraid,” he said and, only half-jokingly, adds: “If they come,
I shall run for the border.”
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