Syrian Revolution News Round-up
Day 156: Wednesday, 17 Aug 2011

Assad Puts Milosevic to Shame The genocide continues in Latakia, with additional reports confirming the deliberate and direct targeting of all Palestinians and Sunni Syrians over the past two days. According to activists on the ground, Assad’s troops besieged only the residential areas in the Raml Palestinian refugee camp, while the troops responsible for the incursions are Iranian militiamen, bearded and clothed in black. Murders, rapes, and tortures have been attributed to the latter troops in the past couple of days. Many Sunni Syrian and Palestinian families are still arbitrarily detained at the sports complex stadium in the city. Despite all the aforementioned, demonstrators still managed to take to the streets of Latakia, starting from the Maghrabi mosque, chanting for national unity and refusing to fall in the regime’s sectarian trap.
The house-to-house arrest and search campaign is still underway in Rukn al-Din and Hajar al-Aswad in Damascus, and in Artouz and Kesweh in its suburbs. Some reports suggest that this campaign has also reached several areas in Salehiya, and other reports indicate that the Palestinian camp of Yarmouk will be invaded soon. Indan in Aleppo has also been the target of such operations.
Other areas subjected to the house-to-house searches and arrests are Hoola in the suburb of Homs, and the neighborhoods of Khaldiya, Nazheen and Asheera in the city of Homs. Meanwhile, in Deir Azzour, checkpoints and house-to-house searches and arrests started again after the Syrian and Aldounya TV stations’ news crews left the city. In Daraa suburbs, security forces invaded Masaifra and Busra, arresting many residents and damaging and robbing many private establishments. Heavy gunfire has been reported in Jableh and in the village of Ahsam in Idlib. As for Hama, demonstrators took to the streets despite the crackdown and were faced with heavy gunfire.
As usual, demonstrations have been breaking out all across Syria,, including in the besieged cities of Boukamal and Deir Azzour. Furthermore, protests broke the silence in over seven areas in Aleppo, including the Baath HQ avenue in the city.
At the international level, Tunisia withdrew its ambassador, as an increasing number of countries are realizing the futility of reasoning with Assad. The latest evidence of Assad’s disconnect surfaced after a Spanish envoy discreetly flew to Syria to offer Assad an exit strategy that would provide him with asylum in Spain and end his security crackdown without fear of prosecution. Assad confidently shunned the plan, in another senseless exhibition of dementia. Nonetheless, Syrians are thankful that Assad did not choose to respond rationally to the offer, which would have allowed him to escape justice.

Prepared by
Ausama Monajed and others