29 February 2012
By Rula Asad, Syrian activist and journalist
"Violence" by Mohan Dehne
Homs is the trauma of Syria. In other words addressed to the international community: What is happening right now is Ruanda in Homs. We repeat and repeat again that the people there urgently need help, humanitarian intervention, but there is no echo and no reaction. So every free Syrian believes that there is no more conscience any more, anywhere in the world.
To people who argue: We do not know what happens there! I will advise them to put Homs in any internet browser they want and then chose a video and listen to what people say during any short film or just follow the pictures ….
The Syria of today is more open than ever. People are filming the daily life under shelling and are uploading everything in internet.
Unfortunately, Homs which once was the most humorous city in Syria now turned to be the saddest one. Today there is sectarian clash between Sunni Muslims against Alawit Muslims and Christians.
And at the same time the regime violently attacks Sunni Muslim areas.
Back to very beginning of the Syrian revolution: In his speech in March 2011, Bashar AlAssad told a story about two groups from different religious sects, living in close neighborhood. He argued that people from the one group will attack the other and vice versa. It was not real story at that time. It is one of the myths the regime uses to create sectarian tension and to convince people that only the regime can guarantee safety especially for religious minorities. It is a delusion.
Tote in Homs
In my opinion the regime uses this story to divide people deeply as they always did during forty years of rules of repression handed down from father to son. It is the reality but it is not totally true. There is a lot of activists from different minorities involved in freedom movement, for example: Samar Yazbek (writer, Alawit), Fadua Suliman (actor, Alawit), Basel Shehada (director, Christian) and hundreds of young people. Alawites as well as Christians are demonstrating, are being arrested and sometimes get killed. But the most of the people belonging to minorities believe that the regime lies. So they are either silent or support the regime in repressing opposition. Those ate the people who distort the image of minorities. The AlAssad regime exploits the sectarian clash to justify armed violence against rebellions areas in Homs.
A friend from Homs living in Damascus told me when I asked: How do you keep in touch with your relatives? She said: In general there is no communication. Moreover, we know if we get a connection, we will receive the news of someones death. So we do not call them even we can sometimes. (She is from a minority sect).
Another friend together with some activists founded an urgent intervention project to shelter families who fled from Homs, leaving behind them as they said: bombed and destroyed houses, dead bodies not buried, thousand of injured people and an unpredictable future.
This friend added: one of the families that fled from their home have three children who all suffer from cerebral palsy and they do not have anything just hope. Many other people suffer from chronic diseases. Pregnant women remain without any medical care. …[ mehr ]
