I no longer need convincing this is a globalist driven crisis with western intelligence agencies using the Sunni Saudis to stir up trouble. The war-promoting propaganda playbook has all the hallmarks.
"Syria regime offers amnesty to activists; Opposition views it as bid for time" by Zeina Karam, Associated Press / June 1, 2011
BEIRUT — President Bashar Assad of Syria issued a general amnesty yesterday for prisoners that includes those deemed to have committed political crimes as pressure built from a 10-week-old uprising that his regime has been unable to quell with overwhelming military force.
The offer was swiftly rejected by the opposition as just another ploy by the regime to gain time....
The offer came as members of the Syrian opposition gathered in Turkey for a conference aimed at overcoming differences and bolstering the protesters who have endured a crackdown that has killed more than 1,000 civilians.
The opposition was quick to reject the amnesty offer. “This shows weakness on the part of the regime,’’ said Mohammad Abdullah, a Washington-based Syrian dissident who was attending the conference in Antalya, Turkey.
Abdullah, whose father, Ali Abdullah, is a well-known political prisoner, said the move would have been a good one had it come in the first week of the uprising, not after hundreds of protesters have been killed.
“The opposition now will accept nothing less than regime change,’’ he said.
In Washington, the Obama administration expressed doubts about the amnesty offer and demanded that Assad prove that he is serious about reform....
Yemen? Bahrain?
Syria’s Russian allies welcomed the move as a serious step toward reform. “Moscow pins high hopes on the opposition to take it as an invitation for talks,’’ Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was quoted as saying by the Itar-Tass news agency....
Russians trying to stop WWIII.
Who would have thunk that the big, bad Russians would emerge as the potential peacemaker in this world, huh?
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And what is the most tried and true way to turn people against someone you wish to designate as an enemy?
"Images of children killed in Syrian revolt inflame protesters; Government frees prisoners but continues violence" by Bassem Mroue, Associated Press / June 2, 2011
BEIRUT — The images grow no less shocking with time — a gaping wound on a tiny skull, the hair matted with blood; a gunshot that pierced a small torso; and finally, the broken neck and mangled body of a 13-year-old boy.
The images of children killed in a government crackdown on protests are circulating widely on YouTube, Al Jazeera, Facebook, and opposition websites. And they are stoking even more fury against a regime the opposition says has lost all legitimacy.
Syria’s government tried to blunt the anger with promises yesterday to investigate the killing of 13-year-old Hamza al-Khatib, whose tortured and mutilated body turned him into a symbol of the Syrian uprising.
The U.S. has tortured children to get their parents to confess, and murdered children with missile strikes. Israel has done the same to Palestinians.
Now, that is not to excuse the Syrian government if this is true; however, I have my doubts after all I've been told by my bulls*** press.
And even if true, I'm tired of the ax-grinding selectivity in service to Zionist Israel and the neo-con war plan.
But protesters deride that and other government concessions, including an amnesty that freed political prisoners yesterday and a committee to prepare for national dialogue, as nothing more than a ploy to buy time for President Bashar Assad. They say at least 25 children are among more than 1,000 dead, with government crackdowns that increase the toll almost daily.
The deaths of two girls — a 12-year-old killed Saturday when her school bus came under fire, and an 11-year-old shot to death Tuesday while her town was being shelled — appeared certain to inflame tensions. Already, a Syrian opposition page refers to the older girl, Hajar Tayseer al-Khatib, as “the flower of Syria’s martyrs.’’
Military operations in southern and central Syria killed at least 33 people Tuesday and yesterday, even as the government released hundreds of political prisoners. The government claims the revolt is the work of Islamic extremists and armed gangs....
No foreign conspiracies this time? Then their must be one.
Both the United States and France said the amnesty would not be enough.
“We need to see all political prisoners released, and we need to see an end to the violence that Syrian forces have been continually carrying out against civilian populations,’’ State Department spokesman Mark Toner said in Washington....
This from a nation that is indefinitely locking up innocent people?
The one dropping missiles on people from unmanned drones?
Many of the dead children were from the southern province of Daraa, where the uprising was touched off by the arrest of 15 teenagers who scrawled antiregime graffiti on the walls of the provincial capital. At the time, those teens became the symbol of the new revolt inspired by the toppling of regimes in Egypt and Tunisia.
Hamza, the 13-year-old boy, has become a new emblem of the uprising and thousands of people now carry his smiling photo during protests or post it on their Facebook profile. A Facebook page set in his memory has more than 66,000 fans.
State television aired an interview late Tuesday with Dr. Akram Shaar, who examined Hamza’s body. He said the cause of the death was shooting, and three bullets had hit the boy’s body. He added that what appeared to be bruises and signs of torture were the result of natural decomposition since the boy died on April 29. His body was handed over to his family on May 21, state TV said.
The station also aired a recorded interview with Hamza’s father who said he was received by Assad this week.
The father added that the president considers “Hamza as his son and was touched’’ by the death.
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Also see: Globe Editorial Time for UN to take action
That makes it official.
"Utilities to rebellious area in Syria cut off" by Associated Press, June 3, 2011
BEIRUT — Electricity, phone lines, and then the water supply were cut off in a restive area of Syria that is a new center for protests against President Bashar Assad, and activists said 15 people died in the sixth day of sustained government attacks yesterday.
So now they know what life is like for a Palestinian.
What started as street demonstrations calling for reforms has evolved into demands for Assad’s ouster in the face of a violent crackdown....
Syria’s opposition, fragmented by years of sectarian and ideological tensions, made tentative steps to organize and show an international face at the end of a two-day conference in Turkey....
Murhaf Jouejati, a political science professor at George Washington University who specializes in Syria, said the conference was an attempt to “put together a vision of what a post-Assad Syria will look like.’’
Do YOU need anymore convincing?
They are PLANNING ON REGIME CHANGE just as they did in Iraq!!
But the call issued by participants consisting mostly of Syrian exiles is unlikely to resonate soon beyond the conference. It also highlighted internal divisions that have long been exploited by the government.
I'm wondering who is their Chalabi.
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"Syria protest intensifies; Internet access is cut off; Rage continues over torture, death of teen" by Liam Stack and Katherine Zoepf, New York Times / June 4, 2011
CAIRO — Syrians poured into the streets yesterday in some of the largest antigovernment protests yet despite the shutdown of much of Syria’s Internet network, which has been crucial to the protesters’ ability to mobilize and a major source of information for those outside the country.
Related: Syria's See-Saw Protests
Up, down, up, down goes the propaganda paper!
The crowds protesting the authoritarian rule of President Bashar Assad appeared fueled in part by escalating anger about the torture and killing of a 13-year-old boy. Witnesses said protesters in dozens of communities yesterday dedicated their marches to him and other children killed during the uprising.
They defied the continuing crackdown that has killed more than 1,000 people, with hundreds more rounded up in mass arrests. Yesterday, more than 30 protesters were killed in the city of Hamah, according to Rami Abdelrahman, a human rights monitor. That report could not be immediately confirmed.
The boy who was killed, Hamza Ali al-Khateeb, has become a symbol of government oppression after a video of his mutilated body was circulated on YouTube....
Earlier this week, UNICEF issued an unusual statement describing “extreme violence against children in Syria.
“We are particularly disturbed by the recent video images of children who were arbitrarily detained and suffered torture or ill-treatment during their detention, leading in some cases to their death,’’ the statement said.
Although UNICEF has issued more general warnings about the effects of recent unrest in the Middle East on the lives of children there, the statement is the first time since the Arab Spring began that the organization has called on a specific government to investigate what it called “horrific acts’’ against children.
And where are they in regard to Israel's use of WMD against kids in Gaza?
Hello?
The Internet shutdown severely disrupted the flow of the YouTube videos and Facebook and Twitter posts that have allowed protesters and others to keep track of demonstrations, since foreign media are banned and state media are heavily controlled.
Here they censor and control themselves.
Both land lines and cellphones are so frequently monitored by Syria’s feared secret police that Skype had become a major means of communication among activists, and its loss as a tool may be a blow to the protest movement. Government websites, including those for the Ministry of Oil and the state news agency, SANA, remained online....
But when your government does that to you, Amerikan, it's all for the good.
Egypt and Libya had earlier shut off access to the Internet in an attempt to crush popular uprisings led by young people and aided by social media networks.
“When a government shuts down the Internet, it shows the disconnection between the governing and the governed,’’ Alec Ross, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s senior adviser for innovation, wrote on Twitter yesterday.
Then I trust that will NEVER HAPPEN HERE!
Oula Abdulhamid, a Syrian activist who helped organize a conference for members of the Syrian opposition in Turkey this week, said the protest videos posted yesterday were mainly the work of activists who had crossed Syria’s borders.
“In some of the areas on the borders, they’re using Jordanian lines and Lebanese lines,’’ Abdulhamid said. “They’re crossing the borders and going to Internet cafes. They’re doing such hard work just to get a few videos out. They’re risking their lives.’’
In recent weeks, SANA, the state news agency, has described the protest movement as an insurgency.
That's the way AmeriKan newspapers describe politics!
See: Insurgents vs. Incumbents
Of course, both are killing U.S. troops and a whole lot of other people by keeping the wars going.
Globe Joke of the Day
Do you see me laughing?
Syrian television has offered limited coverage of the demonstrations, describing them as peaceful protests calling for the government to speed the reform process.
Not like AmeriKan media has ever misrepresented American protests.
But Abdelrahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, described concerns that worsening attacks on the protesters by the security forces might cause the protesters to respond with violence of their own.
They ALREADY HAVE, and the MINIMIZATION by the AGENDA-PUSHING MEDIA screams volumes!
“I have fears that things will go out of control in the street,’’ he said. “Not all the people participating in the rallies are intellectuals, so it’s hard to control things, especially families who lost their sons.’’
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Update:
"The government lifted its stranglehold on the Internet, which has been key to motivating people to join the 11-week uprising, but the crackdown that has left more than 1,200 dead since March did not relent....
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