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| Women and children purposely massacred in Banias |
Heard the latest blah, blah, blah by the State Department's Jen Psaki on the massacre in the Bayda suburb of Banias?
Here goes, in case you did not (the highlighting is
mine):
The United
States is appalled by horrific reports that more than 100 people were killed
May 2 in gruesome attacks on the coastal town of al-Bayda, Syria. Regime and
Shabiha forces reportedly destroyed the area with mortar fire then stormed the
town and executed entire families, including women and children. We extend our
deepest condolences to the families of the victims of this tragedy.
We strongly
condemn atrocities against the civilian population and reinforce our solidarity
with the Syrian people. As the Assad regime’s violence against innocent
civilians escalates, we will not lose sight of the men, women, and children
whose lives are being so brutally cut short.
We call on all responsible actors in Syria to speak out against the perpetration of unlawful killings against any
group, regardless of faith or ethnicity. Those responsible for serious
violations of international humanitarian law and serious violations and abuses
of human rights law must be held accountable.
Internationally acclaimed Saudi journalist Abdulrahman al-Rashed, who heads Alarabiya TV news channel, says although they are
pained by the West’s indifference to regime crimes in Syria, “the Arabs stand
watching in anger and sadness without doing much.”
Here is my paraphrasing of his
column today for the leading Saudi daily Asharq Alawsat, titled “The extermination of the Sunnis of Banias”:
The small Syrian coastal town of Banias has a population
of some 50,000.
They are a sectarian mix of Sunnis, Alawites and
Christians and an ethnic Arab and Turcoman blend.
We repeatedly heard of Banias on two occasions.
The first was when there was ceaseless talk of sanctions
on Iraqi oil exports in the early Nineties, when Iraqi oil was being pumped
through the Kirkuk-Banias
pipeline that was built in the early Fifties.
The pipeline fed crude to both the Banias oil refinery
and sea terminal.
The second instance was when Banias
made the headlines in May 2011, barely eight weeks into the Syrian
uprising.
Following
is what I excerped from a May 2011 Reuters dispatch, explaining what happened
then:
AMMAN
(Reuters) - Syrian tanks stormed the mostly Sunni Muslim city of Banias on
Saturday (May 8, 2011), a rights campaigner said, raising sectarian tension in
a country swept by protests against the rule of authoritarian President Bashar
al-Assad.
The
attack came hours after the United States, reacting to the death of 27
protesters on Friday, threatened to take new steps against Syria's rulers, from
the Alawite sect, unless they stopped killing and harassing their people.
The
army entered Banias, a Mediterranean coastal city of 50,000 people, from three
directions, advancing into Sunni districts but not Alawite neighborhoods, the
campaigner said.
Most
communication with Banias has been cut but the campaigner said he was able to
contact several residents.
"Residents
are reporting the sound of heavy gunfire and seeing Syrian navy boats off the
Banias coast. Sunni and mixed neighborhoods are totally besieged now,"
said the campaigner, who did not want to be identified for security reasons.
Rami
Abdul Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights based in London,
told Reuters that regular army units were present in the center of Banias but
the authorities had now sent special units into the northern side of the city.
"They
are conducting search operation in several areas. The army has lists and
looking for people based on it," he said.
"They
have raided Bayda, Basateen and the Baseya suburbs."
Rights
group Sawasiah said in statement that the number of civilians killed since
pro-democracy demonstrations broke out seven weeks ago has reached 800. It
added that there were cuts in landline, Internet and cellphone lines with
Banias as army units backed by tanks swept into its districts...
…State
authorities said Banias was a "center of Salafist terrorism" and that
armed groups had killed soldiers near the city. Salafism is an
ultra-conservative brand of Sunni Islam.
Most Banias residents have been besieged and
virtually confined to their homes since – a total of two years.
It’s not surprising, given the tension, for the
coastal city to be a sectarian fault line -- especially that it is an extension
of areas where the majority is from Assad’s Alawite sect.
Assad’s endgame plan is to create an Alawite state in
the an-Nusayriyah
Mountains down to the Mediterranean coast region. This means he intends ethnically
cleansing Sunni areas within or bordering the planned enclave.
It looks like he already started the ethnic cleansing
campaign with this week’s twin massacres in Banias town and the Bayda suburb.
The result was the flight en masse of their Sunni inhabitants
to safer spots, especially after it emerged women and children were
specifically knifed to death and men executed with a bullet to the head.
What can be done to save peoples’ lives against a
killer regime that does not give a hoot about world public opinion, having
realized that killing thousands of unarmed civilians does not fall within the red
lines set for it?
What pains in all this are the West’s indifference
and Russia and Iran siding with Assad.
While the West, Russia and Iran are far and away, the
Arabs stand watching in anger and sadness without doing much.
The Arabs filled the world with protests against
offensive cartoons, but we see hardly any reactions and demands as concerns
Syria.
Greater support could be accorded the Free Syrian
Army.
Arab governments could be made accountable for a
political demand to bring down the Syrian regime.
The Arab street is at boiling point. Its explosion
one day could prove bigger than we imagined.
Don’t let the massacres go unchallenged – not without counter-measures commensurate with the crime.
