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Syria: Secret Journey Around a Nation in Revolt Finds Protesters Are Not Flagging
(Sunday Telegraph-UK) The Sunday Telegraph secretly visited Hama, Syria, during a week-long undercover journey around a nation in revolt - a journey which showed how tenuous government control has become, despite a crackdown that has claimed more than 1,400 lives since March. I witnessed a Syria of "freed" towns, vast anti-regime demonstrations, violent melees and angry gunfights. Within minutes of noticing a foreigner, Hama residents began to boast of the impending fall of the regime. A butcher, Omar was brimming with pride as he explained why. "Look around, the government is finished in Hama," he said. "The army came here and they killed many and they stole. But we kept coming out. No matter how many times the army comes, we'll never give in now." "This Assad family are murderers and criminals," said one resident. "Tell everyone: the people of Hama say that this regime is finished." It was a message that I heard repeatedly as I traveled across Syria, sometimes to places where it seemed the regime had completely abandoned any effort to keep control. In the northeastern city of Deir Resor, where six died in recent clashes, pictures of President Assad and his father, Hafez, had been destroyed and their statues removed. One man described how the government had lost control of the city. "The army tried to come into Deir Resor a few weeks ago, but they soon had to retreat," he said. "The government knows the northern clans are armed, they have support from Iraq, and if they are attacked they will fight. But this is the biggest town in the area and if it is anti-government it means the entire east of Syria is too." In the industrial port of Latakia, resident Abu Hamza described the violence: "For 10 days the army killed everyone walking the streets. I used to think that Israel was our enemy. But even the Israelis use rubber bullets, shoot at people's legs, allow ambulances to come and take people to hospital. Now I know the Syrian regime is our real enemy."