Finally, Assad addresses the real “terrorists” on his Damascus doorstep
President Bashar al-Assad makes no distinction between ISIS and other rebel groups – all are “terrrorists” to be annihilated, legitimate targets. He could have expelled ISIS years ago from their pockets of control in Hajar Aswad and Yarmouk in the southern suburbs of his capital Damascus. But he was content to let them to be there because since 2015 they were doing his job for him – fighting against the more moderate rebels in the suburbs and weakening them year by year.
The famous photo from February 2014 showing the residents of Yarmouk under siege, flowing out like a river of humanity to get aid.
But while I was inside Syria last week the campaign against them started, following on directly from the ‘liberation’, that is, total displacement of residents from Douma, the Ghouta’s most rebellious area. I stepped into the courtyard of my house and almost immediately the sound began of fighter jets – Russian ones by most accounts – flying in broad daylight across the centre of Damascus and almost casually dropping their cluster bombs on Hajar Aswad.
Smoke from cluster bombs exploding over Hajar Aswad, southern suburbs of Damascus
It took me a while to see them, they were flying so much higher than I expected, but as my eye grew accustomed to them, I traced their course from the Mezzeh military airport, over the Presidential Palace, and in a loop over the southern suburbs and back again. It was utterly surreal. Yet this is the new normal inside Syria. A government dropping bombs on its own people, in its own capital, and everyone helpless to do anything about it. It is impossible not to think about the people being killed and maimed beneath those bombs. Even if they survive, thousands are sleeping in the streets, their homes destroyed. There is no longer any running water and the last hospital has been targeted and destroyed. The bombing continued all that Thursday 19 April and has been going on relentlessly for a week.
‘Trapped’ was the word I heard again and again, as people are forced to listen to the constant soundtrack of destruction. They feel totally helpless in the face of Assad’s overwhelming grip, backed by the might of Russian air power and military planning.
Yarmouk was one of the earliest refugee camps in Syria, formed after 1948 when the first waves of Palestinians were displaced from the newly created state of Israel. It was home to 160,000 Palestinian refugees and over 100,00 Syrians. Now the survivors are being bussed to Idlib, where the final showdown awaits in this barbaric war.
The Orwellian outline of the Presidential Palace lowering over the city of Damascus
Related articles:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/28/shocking-image-syria-brutal-war-yarmouk
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