Refugees battling fatal snow storm

[Originally posted at NOW]

“Alexa,” which has already claimed two lives, intensified Friday, adding to the hardships faced by Lebanon’s Syrian refugee population.

Puddles left by rain and snow in the Nahiriyeh camp's mud (NOW/Alex Rowell)

BAR ELIAS, Lebanon – The “Alexa” rain and snow storm, which has already claimed two lives and shut down schools nationwide since it first struck Lebanon Tuesday afternoon, grew yet more intense on Friday, forcing the closure of the arterial Beirut-Damascus highway and covering everything more than 400 meters above sea level in fresh layers of snow.

For the residents of Nahiriyeh, one of an estimated 280 unofficial Syrian refugee camps in Lebanon’s Beqaa Valley, this means an increasingly desperate battle against the elements over the coming days with few tools at their disposal.

Small snowflakes were already falling when NOW visited the sodden camp Friday morning, trudging through inches of muddy puddles as a stiff and icy wind swept through the agricultural plains. Shivering refugees, some wearing just sandals and a single layer of clothing, came out to greet us before ushering us into their makeshift tents.

“Seriously cold,” replied Muhammad, a 27-year-old father of two from Homs, when NOW asked how the past few days had gone. Muhammad and his wife, who finally fled Syria in April after months of internal displacement, are among the luckier of Nahiriyeh’s residents: below the carpet and thin mattresses that furnish the main room is a solid concrete surface, laid by Muhammad himself using materials supplied by an NGO. Other tents NOW saw in the camp, by contrast, often had floors of gravel or bare mud.

And Muhammad’s tent also houses a metal portable fireplace, complete with piping leading up to the ceiling in lieu of a chimney. Despite the freezing temperatures outside, the heat emitted from the fire makes it possible to remove at least one layer of clothing indoors. “We only put it on when we absolutely have to, otherwise the fuel would soon run out,” he told NOW as he added a thin square of cheap wood to the flames. Though most Nahiriyeh residents have forked out the $50 necessary to buy one of these, they complain that they rarely last long before breaking apart. The fuel, at least, can be sourced free from monthly vouchers distributed by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

In preparation for what they long knew would be a harsh winter, most Nahiriyeh residents have by now installed enough layers of roofing and walls – using everything from scrap canvas fabric to former billboard advertisements to insulating sheets supplied by the Danish Refugee Council – to keep out the vast majority of the snow and rain. “Some water leaked into our kitchen, but nothing so far has come in the main room,” said Muhammad. Nevertheless, a tear in the fabric of one tent NOW saw – pictured above – had let in a thick patch of gritty snow.

And the rain has created a serious problem, indeed a health hazard, outside the tents themselves. The hole in the ground, surrounded by a telephone booth-sized wooden shed, that serves as the sole toilet for the camp’s thirty families has now flooded, leaving a large pool of raw waste congealing just meters from a row of tents. “This is definitely the biggest problem we face today,” said Ahmad, another resident. “We asked the UN a month ago to help us make proper drainage. They said they’d be back soon, but they never came.” UNHCR was not immediately available for comment.

As a consequence, Muhammad said jaundice has become widespread in the camp, and sure enough, NOW saw more than one resident with yellow-tinged eyes. Because many are without valid identity documents, their access to medical care is limited to the sporadic offerings of generally underfunded and overstretched NGOs.

Yet despite these hardships, Nahiriyeh’s residents see little point attempting to relocate.

“Where would we go?” asked Muhammad rhetorically. “If we go back to Syria, the regime will take us. And besides, our neighborhood – Khalidiyeh – like all neighborhoods in Homs, is now completely destroyed.”

Luna Safwan contributed reporting.

*Some of the above names have been changed at the interviewees’ requests.

Don't fall for Rouhani's crude deception

[Originally posted at NOW]

It’s incredible how little it takes for otherwise rational people to give dictatorships the benefit of the doubt, and to rapidly un-learn facts they’ve spent years acquiring. To judge by the credulity of some reactions to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s recent charm offensive, culminating in his op-ed in today’s Washington Post, the cleric is only one step away from flying to Tel Aviv and singing John Lennon’s “Imagine” in a gay bar.

If you thought Putin’s musings in the NYT last week were gut-twistingly hypocritical, you’ve seen nothing yet. Perhaps encouraged by how easy his comrade made it look, Rouhani allows himself to pontificate on Syria as though he were the president of, say, East Timor, rather than the primary state sponsor of the regime that has annihilated the country and its people.

He laments the “challenges” of “terrorism, extremism, [and] foreign military interference” that plague the world, and their association with “hard power and the use of brute force.” He tells us that, “Sadly, unilateralism often continues to overshadow constructive approaches” to global crises. “Militant extremists continue to wreak havoc,” he regrets, including in Syria, “a jewel of civilization, [which] has become the scene of heartbreaking violence, including chemical weapons attacks, which we strongly condemn.” He goes on to ask everyone to “join hands to constructively work toward national dialogue” in order that the “peoples of the region can decide their own fates.”

Before anyone pulls out their acoustic guitar for a fireside Kumbaya chorus, let’s remind ourselves about some of that “hard power” and “brute force” on the ground in Syria today.

As a brilliant Wall Street Journal report documented just four days ago, citing senior Iranian military sources including Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) members, Iran has taken its direct (and rather “unilateral”) intervention in Syria to unprecedented levels in recent weeks, rigorously training co-religionists from all over the Arab world in Tehran before sending them to fight what it tells them is an “epic battle for Shiite Islam” alongside its own nationals on Syrian soil itself. The very same Guards leaders who engineered the 2009 steamrolling of the ‘Green Movement’ have now been handed the Syrian file, and are controlling not just the Lebanese Hezbollah and various Iraqi militias, but a significant portion of the Syrian army itself – an IRGC commander was recently filmed in Aleppo stating that he’d been in charge of certain regime units for over a year and a half now. This is of course in addition to Tehran’s central role in building the 100,000-strong paramilitary “National Defense Force,” modeled on its own Basij, and the $4.6bn it has offered Assad in credit this year alone.

Speaking of Hezbollah, the Lebanese Khomeinists have only bolstered their presence in Syria since driving the opposition out of Qusayr and Homs. “Today, Hezbollah independently runs Qusayr,” says the WSJ. “The Lebanese militia has established an operations base in the town’s northern section that is off-limits to most Syrian civilians.” (The Party of God, needless to add, remains quite happy with the language of force inside Lebanon itself; repeatedly threatening war if the cabinet formation doesn’t meet its expectations, and gunning down Hashem Salman, a 28-year-old student, during a peaceful demonstration outside Beirut’s Iranian embassy in June.)

As for the crocodile tears over last month’s chemical weapons attacks, Rouhani (like Putin) only condemns them because he says the rebels were responsible for them (which recent Human Rights Watch analysis, based on the UN’s findings, shows is quite impossible).

In other words, whatever rhetorical yarns Rouhani spins at the UN General Assembly next week (to which he is cannily bringing along Iran’s only Jewish MP), Tehran’s actual policy will continue to follow the ethos embodied in the words of the IRGC’s Quds Force leader, Qasem Soleimani: “Syria is the front line of resistance. We will support Syria to the end.”

The fall of Homs in context

[Originally posted at NOW]

Rebels had not posed a real threat to the Syrian regime in Homs since the summer of 2012.

The reclaiming by the Syrian regime and allied forces of one of the last remaining rebel-held neighborhoods in the central city of Homs on Monday marked a second territorial defeat for the Free Syrian Army (FSA) in two months, coming on the heels of the fall of the nearby town of Qusayr in June.

The Khalidiyeh neighborhood, which regime forces battered for weeks with air strikes and surface-to-surface missiles in coordination with Lebanese Hezbollah units, was a key link in the rebels’ chain between the Old City and the few remaining adjacent ‘liberated’ neighborhoods of the city once known to the opposition as the “capital of revolution,” or the “citadel of the terrorists” to the regime.

Its fall prompted speculation that regime forces would soon sweep the entire city, and then turn their attention northwards to Aleppo, Syria’s largest city and now the only major one in which the rebels have a sizeable and comparatively secure presence. However, as of Saturday the fighting in Homs is continuing, and according to both activists on the ground and foreign analysts NOW spoke with, the regime is unlikely to be in a position to advance on Aleppo any time soon.

“In Homs, the opposition is still holding on in Jurat al-Shiyah, al-Qusur, al-Qarabis, Bab al-Dreb, Bab Turkman, Bab Houd, and Wadi al-Sayeh,” said Muhammad Radwan Raad, a Homs-based activist. He added, however, that “it is very unlikely that they will be able to keep hold of these neighborhoods because they only have AK-47s and RPGs.” Asked to estimate the number of rebels remaining in the city, Raad said it was in the hundreds, although “it is very hard to determine [because] many [have been] killed after the battles.”

As for what would likely follow the complete fall of Homs, Raad was in agreement with analysts NOW spoke to that it is the roads and countryside between Homs and Damascus, rather than Aleppo, that will be the next targets, although preparations for an eventual showdown in Aleppo will also be made wherever possible.

“The regime recently took control of the strategic village of Abel, on the Homs-Tartous highway. Now, it is seeking to take control of another road leading to Aleppo and a third one that links Homs with Damascus. Clashes are ongoing and once the regime takes control of these roads, it will move on to Homs’ northern fringes.”

There are several reasons the regime will likely avoid a substantial Aleppo offensive in the near term, according to Elizabeth O’Bagy, senior research analyst at the Institute for the Study of War.

“The interesting demographic balance in Homs actually favored the regime because you had so many Shiite – specifically Lebanese Shiite – and Alawite villages in the surrounding countryside,” O’Bagy told NOW. “You don’t see that in and around Aleppo so I think it’ll be much more difficult for the regime to find the right areas to launch operations from. This is exactly what we saw with some of the defeats that the opposition was able to inflict on Hezbollah.”

“I think after the regime won Qusayr it made the mistake of trying to advance onto Aleppo too quickly without consolidating its gains and so the recent offensive in Homs was actually their realization that they’d overplayed their hand. I think that for some time you’ll see them continuing to consolidate in and around Homs. They’re going to have to send significant reinforcements from Homs back to Damascus because of the rebel offensive going on there right now.”

Indeed, O’Bagy argues that recent rebel accomplishments in Damascus – such as the seizure of an anti-tank and ground-to-ground missiles depot Saturday – defy an increasingly current media narrative of the regime being close to military victory over the opposition.

“Momentum is clearly in favor of the regime right now, and there has been a shift in the tide of battles because of Hezbollah’s involvement [and] assistance from Iran and Russia, but what is often ignored is the fact that when the regime makes significant gains in one area they often lose territory in others. There is a major [rebel] offensive going on in Damascus right now. The opposition is able to enter neighborhoods that it has never been able to enter before. And they’ve also had some significant victories in and around Aleppo.”

Moreover, argues O’Bagy, many observers exaggerate the tangible significance of rebel defeat in Homs.

“The opposition hasn’t really had a strong presence in Homs since the summer of 2012. It’s important psychologically because it’s seen as an essential part of the resistance front but strategically the opposition hasn’t really been able to do much from Homs and they’ve never been able to effectively combat regime forces in and around that area.”

Christine Sleiman contributed reporting.

Qusayr resisting all-out attack

[Originally posted at NOW]

The streets of the western Syrian town of Al-Qusayr were enveloped in clouds of grey cement powder on Sunday as President Bashar al-Assad's air and ground forces, backed by Lebanese Hezbollah militiamen, commenced a long-awaited major assault on the lynchpin rebel-held town and its surrounding villages. Humanitarian observers including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, have warned that this may lead to massacres reminiscent of those in the coastal towns of al-Bayda and Banias earlier in the month.

At least 58 Qusayr residents were killed Sunday – many of them civilians – and over 600 wounded in continuous air and artillery strikes, according to local opposition spokesman Hadi al-Abdallah. He also claimed some 30 Hezbollah fighters had been killed by rebel forces. Syrian state TV reported 100 opposition militants dead, with no mention of regime casualties. NOW was unable to reach the Hezbollah press office for confirmation of the Party's losses.

Regime fighter jets continued to pound residential quarters of the town center Monday, according to Al-Abdallah, as contradictory reports emerged regarding the territorial gains made by Assad loyalists. While regime soldiers claimed Sunday to have conquered the central town square, raising the Syrian flag over the municipality building, numerous opposition sources asserted that no territory had been lost by the rebels whatsoever.

"It's not true what the regime is claiming," said Qusayr-based activist, Ahmad al-Qusayr. "They're saying this to raise the morale of the fighters, because the rebels are giving them a beating."

Indeed, Al-Qusayr was confident that the rebels could and would withstand the attack. "The Free Syrian Army is still there on every corner and they have increased their defenses to face any invasion. They will fight until the last drop of blood," he told NOW.

Though such claims are impossible to verify, there is evidence that rebels have put up stiff resistance thus far. A video purportedly filmed Sunday night shows a number of destroyed regime tanks and the corpse of an apparent Hezbollah fighter – one of a number of similar videos uploaded by the opposition in recent days.

Indeed, the past few weeks have seen a significant escalation in the comparatively low-intensity war of attrition that has been underway in Qusayr since it fell to rebel brigades in February 2012. Meeting with Lebanese allies one month ago, Assad reportedly described the fighting in Qusayr as the "main battle" in all of Syria, one that must be won "at any cost." On 11 May, regime sources said they warned civilians to leave the town (a claim denied by the opposition) as an attack was imminent, and on 13 May, Abdallah reported the arrival of 30 regime tanks in the Qusayr countryside, sparking "very violent battles." The following day, AFP reported the fall of three rebel-held villages to loyal Assad forces – Dameina al-Gharbiyah, Eish al-Warwar and Haidariyeh – situated between Qusayr town and the allied neighborhoods of Homs, with sights set next on the rebels' captured military base at al-Dabaa.

The town and its surroundings are deemed strategic for two key reasons. First, lying just 10km from the Lebanese border, it acts as the major buffer between the Hezbollah-controlled northeast Beqaa Valley and the rebel-held areas of Homs. In the words of Syrian Observatory for Human Rights director Rami Abdel Rahman, "If the army manages to take control of Al-Qusayr, the whole province of Homs will fall."

Second, it flanks the main highway linking Damascus to the coastal Alawite heartland north of Lebanon, the principal bastion of support for the regime to which some analysts believe Assad may flee in the event that Damascus falls to the rebels.

Given this strategic importance, the town has also been a magnet for Lebanese militants opposed to the regime. As fighting intensified last month, prominent Salafist clerics Ahmad al-Assir and Salem al-Rafei issued calls for "jihad" against Assad loyalists in Qusayr, with several hundred reportedly signing on to assist their allies across the border. Yet long before these calls, anti-Assad Lebanese were known to be fighting in Qusayr. NOW met and interviewed one last October who had battled regime and Hezbollah forces there as early as May 2012.

As the indiscriminate loyalist assault continues, however, the stakes are not only strategic but humanitarian, according to local opposition sources.

"There are 40,000 civilians in the Qusayr town," said Muhammad Radwan Raad, a Homs-based activist. "They have no water, no electricity, and no safe passage to escape. Already, some families have been bombarded while trying to flee. We don't know what to do with them," he told NOW.

"If the situation continues as it is, there will be no Qusayr in the future."

Yara Chehayed contributed reporting.