Syrian protests seem to continue as information struggles to leave the area

Twitter is still ablaze concerning the details in Daraa while major US news outlets wait to confirm reports.


23 March 2011 - 1355 CDT: After almost a week of otherwise peaceful protests in Daraa, Syria, clashes between civilians and government forces are becoming more violent after an alleged attack on a mosque by the Syrian military. Protesters were using the Omari mosque as a makeshift hospital Tuesday night when gunfire sent the crowds running for shelter. Phone service in the area has remained down and Syrian officials have already reported to Al Arabiya their disconnection of electricity in and around Daraa just before the raid early Wednesday morning.


The protesters have been calling for president Bashar al-Assad to push for more meaningful political reform despite the Emergency Law that has been in effect since 1963. The almost 40 year old law makes participation in such protests a crime, and government officials are claiming the violence is in response to “the armed gangs that terrorize civilians.” Videos reportedly from the area showed a number of vans, trucks, and cars entering a neighborhood as they deployed dozens of armed men—mostly in black but some in plain clothes. These men then flooded into the streets to detain a number of unarmed protesters and quickly put them into vehicles.


Many larger news outlets are not giving the detailed reports from Daraa. Unlike the reports from other Middle Eastern protests, confirmation from Syria is severly limited. Most networks do have confirmed reports of at least 15 deaths since yesterday, but some accounts on social networking describe “hundreds of dead bodies” in and around the city. Allegations of Syrian forces targeting doctors, nurses, and ambulances have grown in numbers as night falls on the city, but none of which can be validated by pictures or first-hand accounts.


The crackdown on information out of the area is also becoming more apparent. Mohammad al-Abdullah, a former Syrian political prisoner in exile in the US, is urging citizen journalists and bloggers in Daraa to be careful as the number of their arrests grows. The Syrian Human Rights Committee has also condemned the execution of Khaled el-Masri, a soldier in the Syrian army sent to Daraa. After he refused to participate in the early morning raid of the Omari mosque, el-Masri was subsequently shot three times by Syrian authorities.


-MDS