A grave in a public garden in Hama Read more: Hama, original site of the 1982 massacre at the hands of Bashar al Assad's father, has a long, sad history of military aggression, and public burial. Rania Abouzeid writes for TIME Magazine:
2104 GMT: James Miller is wrapping up the liveblog (but only because he has to start it again in 5-8 hours).
Our closing thought, the AP has compiled some video of Lattakia, taken today:
2038 GMT: The Local Coordinating Committees of Syria are reporting protests, heavy security, and the use of live ammunition against crowds in Homs, Deir Ez Zor, Aleppo, and the Qadam district of Damascus. Large protests are reported, once again, in almost every corner of Syria.
2025 GMT: Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmed Davutoglu expressed his frustration at the situatio today in Syria:
“We are asking Assad to actualize the steps we agreed on in our talks with him,” he went on to say, referring to his meeting with Assad last Tuesday. “He had taken some positive steps in the first few days. Such as the withdrawal of tanks from Hama and providing the transportation of our press members to Hama, but operations have continued in various cities since Friday. It is not possible to condone these operations, which have claimed the lives of many civilians,” he said.
“We have requested an immediate halt of these operations, and we will continue to do so. We are calling on the Syrian administration to be more sensitive to its own people and not to further increase the tension. The necessary steps must be taken immediately. The operations causing civilian losses should be stopped, particularly in this holy month of Ramadan. We will keep on with our contacts in the coming days. The Syrian issue is a matter we have been following very closely; it is a matter we are directly concerned with in every aspect.”
Davutoglu went on to deliver his strongest words yet to Syria's Bahsar al Assad:
“This is our final word to the Syrian authorities: Our first expectation is that these operations stop immediately and unconditionally,” Mr. Davutoglu told a news conference in Ankara, Turkey. “If the operations do not end, there would be nothing more to discuss about steps that would be taken,” he said, without saying what that action might include.
Some news agencies have occasionally been duped by propaganda promoted by individual "activists", but those observers tuned in, after months of experience, to the claims of the activists now know which individuals or groups produce credible information, and they know when to be extra-sceptical about reports. However, many of these claims are reliable, and the media who drop in on the Syria story need to pay attention to the journalists who are working hard to separate the "good" reports from the "bad".
Because in Syria --- to take a position --- one side is lying, one side is mostly truthful, and thousands of lives are in the balance of the two.
Today was a hot Friday in Ramadan, a day where traditionally people of faith fast during the day, and stay home out of the sun. Instead, in Syria, possibly 125,000 protesters, or possibly more, took to the streets. They marched, chanted, and prayed for change in their country. Those hopes were met with bullets more often than they were not.
The list of casualties today is likely to be between 15-30, not counting what happens tonight, and what happened today in Hama. Since Ramadan began last weekend, approximately half of the casualties in most of Syria have occurred at night. Regardless, today, and tonight, the Syrians are sending a clear message that the old ways will never return, and Syria will never be the same.
Meanwhile, still very little news out of Hama, and all of it bad. The city is under attack by at least 250 tanks, and their food, medicine, communication, and water supplies have been cut off. The people of the fourth largest city in Syria, a city larger than Boston, have no water. Tomorrow's forecast - 100+ degrees Fahrenheit.
And Yemen is heating up, Egyptians are still struggling with the military, the Libyan rebels still fight Gaddafi, and Bahrainis still protest. Ramadan is going to be a long, ugly, and important month.
We close with this live feed from an incredible and festive Lattakia, on Syria's coast:
UPDATE 1335 GMT: We struggled to find good video of last night's protests in Aleppo, but now we have found a clip of good quality:
Welcome to another night of Ramadan. Already, the opposition, and the regime, have established a routine. Each night, protesters attend Taraweeh Prayers, leave their mosques, and march through the streets. Each night, the Syrian regime beats, arrests, tear gasses, and shoots civilians.
And for the second night in a row, we have posted videos from the night.
We start with live-streaming audio from Hama, where the Syrian military shells the city with tanks. Just moments before the stream drops out, a loud explosion can be heard nearby and intense chanting can also be heard:
Artillery shelling of Hama on 8-1-2011 before/when people break their fast- Vid was uploaded today
UPDATE 1245 GMT: James Miller here, with two additional updates about this first, and now infamous clip.
The first is that if you compare the audio from the original to the audio of the State TV version, the State TV version is worse (the state TV version starts at about 08:22). They have added a low-level buzz, and then the audio drops out and the buzz swells. As an audio professional in a previous life, I can testify that a battery operated camera will not get an audio buzz, only a broadcast camera, and it never sounds like that. It is our assessment that the Syrian State TV is obviously, and clumsily, doctored.
The second update comes from the Guardian's Paul Owen, who links to us and provides a translation for the video:
Some of (the bodies) seemed to have had their throats slit - (are) being thrown into the Al-A'assi river by Shabiha ("ghosts" – pro-Assad militia). The dead people are described in the caption as "heroes of Hama". The people around the Shabiha can be heard encouraging them, and insulting and cursing the dead people. The Shabiha shout "God is greatest" as they throw the bodies in the river. "Don't film" is also heard.
The video was uploaded on 31 July. The Arabic caption reads: "Is there any crime worse than killing someone and then throwing the body in the river? Where are human rights? Where is world opinion? Where is Amnesty International?" There is no way to properly verify the clip. Many thanks to my colleague Mona Mahmood for translation.
UPDATE 0830 GMT: And now a twist in the tale....
This 11-minute clip from Syrian state TV starts with footage which claimed to be of gunmen in Hama shooting at military from the streets and rooftops.
It is the final minutes, however, that are of immediate interest. The clip uses the same footage, posted by James Miller below, of what has been claimed as pro-Assad "thugs" throwing the bodies of protesters into a river near Hama. On state TV, however, the footage is protesters throwing dead troops over the bridge --- the sound has the men talking about the bodies as "soldiers".
Hama, 22 July (Reuters)The security forces have withdrawn from Hama and Deir Ez Zor. They are trying to quell the protests in Homs and around Damascus and Aleppo, but they are not succeeding. It is hard to imagine that the regime has any strongholds of significance left. Through crackdowns, and threats of sectarian violence, the protests have only grown in both scale, scope, and reach. To repeat the rhetorical question I asked on Friday; Where AREN'T they protesting in Syria?
And now the follow-up rhetorical question: how can the Assad regime possibly expect to survive this level of democratic upheaval?
A grave in a public garden in Hama Read more:
Hama, original site of the 1982 massacre at the hands of Bashar al Assad's father, has a long, sad history of military aggression, and public burial. Rania Abouzeid writes for TIME Magazine:
1982, 