Syria 1st-Hand: "Daraa Changed Everything" (Streets, Inc.)

Protest in Daraa, SyriaStreets, Inc. presents the stories of three Syrians whose lives have been changed by events since the beginning of anti-regime protests on 15 March:

Fadi was a Syrian laborer from Daraa working in Lebanon to feed his family back home. He had a simple but hard life. He moved to Lebanon more than 30 years ago in the pursuit of higher incomes and he’s been living there ever since. He takes advantage of long weekends to go back home to his family and give them whatever money he managed to save. Work was becoming scarce and every time he went back with less money but he was surviving. His last trip back home changed him.

Fadi kept to simple topics. A typical conversation with him centers on whatever is popular then. He knew the name of the president of his country and those of some Lebanese politicians. He knew them purely out of courtesy as he did not ever discuss politics. Fadi never bothered with “all those other guys” let alone memorized their names. Does it really take that many people to get things done?

Fadi went to visit his family over the weekend but did not show up to work on Monday as he typically does. He did not come back until Friday. He was stuck in Daraa as the army laid siege to it and had to sneak his way back via Damascus. Fadi was suddenly talking about toppling the regime. This simple man who had never bothered with politics before started talking about regime change.

Fadi returned to Daraa just in time for the burial of a relative of his. It was a mass burial of fifteen people who were gunned down the previous night by security forces and the army. The funeral quickly turned into a protest against the regime, the first protest Fadi had ever participated in. As the march proceeded over a narrow bridge, the security forces opened fire again, killing a further four. He escaped unscathed, but the event changed him. Later that day he joined a group that marched on a police barracks and torched it.

His fury is clearly visible. He had only returned to Lebanon as he was contracted for a job and he plans to go back home, to help topple the regime. Fadi was talking about his right to free expression, his hatred of an oppressive regime, and his desire for reform that could one day to allow him to work back home, near his family. This aging man who thought computers were fancy toys, ordered me: "Get yourself a fake identity and blog this revolution!" The events in Daraa turned him into a revolutionary.

Dignity or Death

Qamishli, a Kurdish-majority town in Syria’s northeast, had been protesting every Friday since the uprising first broke out. Syria’s Kurds are not new to protesting. While the regime oppressed all Syrians without discrimination it has also denied Kurds nationality and basic services. The Kurds had even more reason to be mad at the government. Protesting, and dying for it, is not new in this region of Syria. Every year the Kurds use their Nowruz New Year’s celebration to launch a demonstration demanding better living conditions, and every year the security forces break it up, often with fatalities.

Rather unusually, the protests in Qamishli and other Kurdish towns had been allowed to go on without any repression. There’s always been tension between Syria’s Arab and Kurdish communities. Analysts suspected that Assad was trying to play on those sentiments to separate the Kurds from the uprising. One of the reform decrees issued by the new government started a process of naturalization of the Kurds who have been denied any nationality for decades. Many believe that move was aimed at sending the Kurds back home and lessening the geographic area of the protests.

Mohamad lives in Qamishli, in Syria’s northeast. He’d participated in every Friday protest there since the uprising began. He continued participating in protests despite the decree that responded to his core demand. When Mohamad was asked why he continues to protest, he responded “we must save Daraa.” Asked if he feared an army incursion like the one in Daraa, he responded defiantly insisting that “Daraa must be saved, whatever the cost.” Daraa is a predominantly Arab province yet that was never a consideration by the Kurds of Qamishli. Mohamad’s view is that Syrians must unite to collectively face their oppressors, regardless of race, religion, or ethnicity.

Omar is a resident of Homs who fled to Lebanon following the army’s assault on the town. He rounded up his family and found his way there after he had heard that women are being arrested. Omar first participated in the current protests on Friday, April 29, almost six weeks after the uprising began. He was a contract painter who led a simple life. He lived comfortably with his wife and his children, not caring much about politics.. He did not pay much attention to the protests when the revolution kicked off.

After he got word of the army’s intervention in Daraa he felt compelled to act, perhaps to relieve some pressure off the people of Daraa. So he joined a protest in Homs that gathered at a mosque. Security forces immediately turned the protest violent. Hired thugs, backed by security forces, attacked the protest just as people were leaving the mosque. Omar says that everyone in that mosque was hit. Even those who were only there for Friday prayers and not to protest were not spared harm. The thugs hit everyone leaving the mosque without discrimination.

As the week progressed the government felt it needed to apply the “Daraa solution” to Homs as well. The army joined the security forces in oppressing the peaceful movement. The army brought its tanks and armoured vehicles onto the streets of Homs. There are many reports that these tanks have been used in the shelling of civilian structures in the city, with claims that a prominent mall was flattened and that even mosques are not immune to the army’s attack.

Omar says it is what he saw in Daraa that made him join the protest movement. He says that it is what made him realize that he is ruled by a brutal regime. Omar sees this as a fight to the end. “The path Assad has chosen clearly demonstrates he does not know the Syrian people, we are willing to lose millions of people in the struggle to remove him.” What this painter saw in Daraa changed his perspective on life.

Three average Syrians who had never before concerned themselves with political matters now find themselves fighting against oppression. All three credit their newfound political activism to the brutal security solution employed by the regime; now locally know as the “Daraa solution.” Their voices were full of defiance and their message was clear, “dignity or death".