To Kill A Mock-Nightingale: The Rebellion Begins in Hama, Part 3

July 22, 2015
(incomplete)

Opposition Version: Killed For Singing Against the Government, for Revolution

Ibrahim Qashoush is a Syrian rebellion superstar in death - called at the time "the nightingale of the revolution." He allegedly wrote - or famously sang - the original protest song "come on Bashar, leave" in early demonstrations in Hama. But Bashar Assad's thugs allegedly kidnapped and murdered him on the 4th of July, 2011, gruesomely and symbolically; the killers cut out his throat and vocal cords, and dumped him like trash in the Orontes river.

At least, that's what these sources, citing anti-government "activists," would tell you with little to no skepticism:

* Shabab Assafir (Arabic) - July 12
* Al-Arabiya (Arabic)  - July 8
* New York Times (Anthony Shadid) - July 22
* AP, Bassem Mroue (via Huffington Post)  - July 27
* Violations Documentation Center (entry added late - martyr #1758 - after this and this from March 2012) 
The last is the source for the photo above, the less graphic of the two provided.

The Times reported on 22 July

"Residents say security forces shot him, too. But people in Hama dwelled on the detail that stands as a metaphor for the essence of decades of dictatorship: That the simple act of speaking is subversive. “They really cut out his vocal cords!” exclaimed a 30-year-old pharmacist in Hama who gave his name as Wael. “Is there a greater symbol of the power of the word?”"

His death, activists felt, "could mark a new campaign to liquidate protest leaders." (Mroue) But he wasn't a leader or even, as we'll see, the writer or a known singer of that song. And it might surprise the foolish, but his horrific slaying didn't terrorize anyone to stop singing that - in fact, it just boosted the cause; it made the song he clearly died for immensely popular, sung every Friday to defy "the regime" and its clumsy - and highly useful - brutality.

Or ... Killed For Singing To the Government, About Terrorists

As usual, the government of Syria had its own explanation blaming terrorists - bolstered here by the method they're known for. the opposing claims, far from proven or being ruled out, are at least worth considering. The Truth About Syria has what seems the definitive English-language article on this: The Truth about Ibrahim Qashoush, the Alleged Singer and Composer of the so-called “Syrian Revolution” (February, 2012 - hereafter, TAS report) This fairly notes "there are no photos of him alive nor clear photos of him singing. Qashoush is a “media bubble” that surfaced after his death not before, which indicates that the whole thing is fabricated." Indeed, for such a pivotal figure, I didn't see any videos or pictures of him in a protest, singing or otherwise.

The TAS report offers a later Syrian state TV video confession from an arrested "activist" - potentially coerced, maybe true either way - that claimed Qashoush the songwriter was a myth of the terrorists he used to roll with:

The Syrian security managed to arrest terrorist “Fadi Zreik”, and what is actually may be surprising for many of you is what he said in his confessions."

“Ibraheem Qashoush” was a normal person who was slaughtered by Syrian rebels, because they thought he was an informant who works for the Syrian government."

The report lists three other men killed in Syria first called informants and then then martyrs. These are named as Hisham Al-Kharsi, “Mamdouh Al-Akrah,” and “Muhammad Maree.” Each case is accompanied by an explanatory video claiming to show screen grabs of death threats for collaborating with "the regime," and then the victims mourned publicly as, or at least listed and reported as, victims of "the regime." The same is being alleged for this heroic "nightingale of the revolution."

Sometimes truth works this conveniently, but ... what a convenient claim by this Fadi Zreik. In this context, the removal vocal cords carries the same symbolic potency. As Anthony Shadid put it, amended: "the simple act of speaking" - the wrong things to the wrong people - "is an act of subversion" - of the plans of the subversives.

Context Consideration

And that's besides the Islamist terrorist implications of throat-cutting, one of their MOs, and Orontes river dumping. A few weeks later in the same city, at least one throat-cutting victim was among 8 executed policemen dumped, by hate-filled terrorists, into the same river on the northern edge of Hama, as explained in part 1: "Deaths by Shooting". This happened undeniably on video (although it was denied anyway). One report covered there (Storyfull, 2011), includes some efforts at blaming the government for that crime; one of these had noted that cut throat and cited this Qashoush case as a precedent:

The throat of last corpse thrown in the river seems to have been slit. Remember Ibrahim Qashush? The man who composed an anti-regime chant? His throat was also slit, and was thrown in the same river, Orontes/al Assi..

In that case, the government had to fish its own dead cops out of the river, and filmed it as just that. But here the activists found their hero first, and quickly; the imagery shows not the slightest sign of decay,water-logging, or bleaching. He was in some water long enough for his hair to get wet.

As reported, he disappeared early on July 3rd and was found sometime on the 5th (Al-Arabiya). How were they so certain July 4 was the day he was killed? It almost seems the local "activists" knew when he was killed and where he was dumped, which was convenient when it came to having the body as a dramatic prop for their story.

Was the date chosen - by whoever- to heighten the impact of the story with U.S. audiences? Specifically, were they talking about independence to the US ambassador, Robert Ford? He would visit the city of Hama, controversially, on July 6, the day after Mr. Qashoush's body was pulled up (see part 2). The activists may or may not have known that, but the authorities had apparently cleared it - just not his decision to stay until Friday's protests, as he did to scolding from Damascus. Why would they squeeze in an optional murder of a beloved songwriter just before this visit? That's just what the "activists" alleged.

July 8 was the biggest demonstration yet in Hama, half a million they said, chanting “the people want the fall of the regime” and “We will only kneel to God,” and probably singing "Come on Bahsar, leave." And they raged about the death of their nightingale who blessed them with the verses, waved olive branches, and basked in the ambassador's approval as his SUV crawled amongst them.

Can we see how well that might have all worked out? Consider also "ambassador" (saboteur ringleader?) Ford then so emphatically denied any armed rebel presence in Hama - at what seems like just the time it was really taking off.

The Real Nightingale?
The Truth About Syria adds some further video and source analysis to pin down the actual songwriter for "Come on Bashar, leave." The death of Mr. Qashouh was a huge popularity boost for the song, Its originator survived to enjoy that, and  and as one would expect, he actually appears at protests, singing the song. "According to our connections in the city of Hama," they write, the songwriter was a young guy named Abdul Rahman Farhoud. For comparison, Shadid at the New York Times heard:

Obada and others insisted that the song was actually written by a 23-year-old part-time electrician and student named Abdel-Rahman, also known as Rahmani.

Shadid spoke at length with "Rahmani," who seemed to be unworried the throat cutters would ever come after him; "Asked if he was afraid, Rahmani answered, “Of what?”"

l-r: Q. Naasan, Abdelrahman and Ahmad Farhoud

TAS identify a cohort and public singing partner of Farhoud as Quteiba Naasan, and says "the two of them escaped before a while to Lebanon then came back and joined their fellow terrorists in the so-called “Free Syrian Army”." And further,

The DJ – with the black shirt – has also disappeared for sometime to show up again in Hama.  His name is “Ahmad Farhoud”, he is Abdul Rahman’s brother. Ahmad Farhoud was among the terrorists who set up barriers in the city of Hama before the army decided to enter to restore order in the city; Ahmad Farhoud chose to be a “hero terrorist” and he was killed in the clashes.

The VDC agrees on this - DJ Farhoud, matching photo included, was killed by shooting it says, in the battle of July 31, 2011, only a week after his brother spoke so fearlessly to NYT's Shadid. That seems pretty quick, at least relative to the July 3 abduction of Mr. Qashouh. Maybe their period of absence was earlier than this PR boost for their theme song. Was it in fact just ending with their return at just about that time? That might be worth digging up.

However Ahmad died, his brother apparently lived on, as the TAS report found, getting increasing credit as “Abdul Rahman Farhoud, the real nightingale of the Syrian Revolution”. A TAS comment added later that Farhoud had also become a correspondent and analyst for the Al-Jazeera channel (see 2:47 in this video - April, 2012).

The Victim as Reported: Confused Mumbling
But at one time, it was widely believed the nightingale had died, and for that cause - like killing a mockingbird for its freedom-loving song. Or for someone else's song he was even copying. It turns out that was someone else, a mock-nightingale ... Consistent with a made-up story, what was reported about this martyr never was very clear.

Shadid wrote for NYT "no one in Hama seems to agree on who wrote the song," although he fairly establishes that as FSA "Rahmani." Mr. Qashoush was perhaps a singer of the song, but that too wasn't certain. Shadid heard the man was "a young cement layer ... from Hadir district. He was relatively unknown before July 4," and after that he was "buried in the city’s Safa cemetery, near the highway." Why kill an unknown laborer? The allegation was he was killed as the most famous incarnation of an anti-regime song.

...rumors have proliferated ... some residents have suggested that Mr. Qashoush was not the real singer, that two men had the same name, that he was really a government informer killed by residents, that he is still alive."

“"Every day in the street, just while you’re sitting somewhere, you can hear five or six rumors, and they turn out to be wrong,” said an engineer who gave his name as Adnan.

To his credit, Shadid hovered over that important, bolded, rumor for a moment:

Many here see the government’s hand in everything. Lists of informers have circulated, but some believe security forces compiled them, hoping to discredit protesters or smear the reputations of businessmen helping them. When residents hanged an informer last month, some people in Hama suggested that government agents did it to make them look bad.

Note: he didn't buy the suggestion.

Side-note: These kinds of things can make a reporter nervous about reporting on Syria and/or likely to somehow die from it. Anthony Shadid died reporting in Syria, after insisting he'd rather not go back, just in mid-February 2012. It was officially from some asthma attack, but at the same time other journalists were being murdered and blamed on "the regime." Was he assassinated with a dusty wad of horsehair dropped on his head? Horses were his super-allergy, as everyone knew. Poor guy.  (see Wikipedia for one)

Shadid heard from one resident "the man killed was a second-rate wedding singer." The Shabab Assafir report (Arabic) adds little, but emphasizes wedding singing, and seemingly better than second-rate. He sang, at weddings, other places, - he could really sing, anything, to anyone. They give no word of other work, implying he was a dedicated professional. Still no images anywhere of that guy actually singing at a protest, a wedding, in the shower, anywhere.

Al-Arabiya (Arabic, translated) noted that it was "on the morning of Sunday (July 3)," the beginning of the work week in Arab/Muslim countries, when Mr. Qashouh "was going to work out, but was kidnapped by the security forces." Did we work singing 5 days a week, starting in the mornings? Or was that just an odd gig?  (Al-Arabiya also noted the victim "was not carrying a weapon and did not join the "armed gangs"" but they know it was the regime who killed him "because his body was found Tuesday." )

The latest report, July 27, was by AP's Bassam Mroue, which heard about work:

"The 42-year-old Qashoush, a father of three boys, was a fireman who wrote poetry in his spare time,said a close friend, Saleh Abu Yaman."

Fireman, age 42, father of 3, from a friend - sounds like perhaps the most credible account yet. But this is an effort to salvage the songwiter/singer mythos that totally ignores the information above.

The hometown son's star rose with the city. At nearly every protest, the crowds were singing his most popular lyric, "Come on, Bashar, time to leave." It was put to a bouncy tune, and his poems rang with a down-to-earth, jokey "Screw you, Bashar, and screw those who salute you. Come on, Bashar, time to leave!" hundreds of thousands sang behind a singer on stage in Hama's central Assi Square during a rally at the beginning of the month. "Freedom is at our doors. Come on, Bashar, time to leave!"
Two days later, on July 3, Qashoush disappeared.
Abu Yaman says he was told by witnesses that Qashoush was walking to work in central Hama when a white vehicle stopped, several men jumped out and muscled him into the car. They then sped away.
"We immediately knew he was captured by security agents," Abu Yaman told The Associated Press.

And yet, this famed hero fireman and protest-inspirer was called by others a "young concrete layer", unknown, and professional singer, well known. 

Shadid heard he was from Hadir district (likely northwest Hama, where Hader police station is), but the VDC says he's from Bab Qibli (city center on Wikimapia). The VDC, by the way, says little: nothing on profession, activism, the arts, not even age. Just the pictures, the district, and the note "He was kidnapped and killed , his dead body was thrown in Al-Aasi near Bab El-Nahr," and a video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_3JKyOqS6s 

But the one source said he was a fire fighter. That might be true anyway, and it intrigued me to re-examine what (now) seems to be an unrelated incident somewhere else and later (I wasn't sure when I started). But just in case it matters here, I may add and link to a post on how apparent rebel/defected soldier terrorists sometimes get their hands on fire fighters to murder and blame on "the regime." 
  

Baniyas Massacre Victim Bayan Jalloul, Martyr for Truth?

July 12, 2015
(small edits July 13)

"Specific Communities" the Other Way Around

In the 2013 al-Bayda Massacre, as I've previously reported, about 50 of the victims (from a total of around 80 to 240, depending who you ask) were related by blood or marriage to Sheikh Omar Biasi, a retired imam at a local mosque and revered by many. That was so interesting because Sheikh Omar was openly and vehemently pro-government and anti-rebellion, trying to be for reconciliation, but seeming to call for the death of all "traitors" shortly before he was killed with so many relatives on May 2. That was by rebel "terrorists" or anti-Sunni Alawite militias, depending who you ask. For those unaware of that story, please see "Targeting specific communities".

Al-Bayda is a Sunni village, and it's widely believed the killers were predominately Alawi (Alawite), like the majority of people in the coastal provinces (see map). In the following and murkier massacre in Baniyas city, May 3-6, it was the same tale of sectarian mass murder; Baniyas is more mixed, but the killings reportedly happened in the poor and Sunni district of Ras al-Nabi. The killers - mixed regular forces and local "Shabiha" militia - came from Alawite districts and villages, activists said, and there was no other reason involved; Alawites were killing Sunnis, hoping to chase away the rest, and purify their province of a rebellious religious group. Maybe it was to help create a coastal breakaway state for the Alawi as "the Sunnis" took the rest of a divided Syria. No one could know the real motive, but many people were pretty sure that was it.

In this second massacre, two families - Rajab and Jalloul - stand out about equally for heavy losses. Both were highlighted by Human Rights Watch in their September report on the two massacres "No One's Left," but it's only the latter that concerns us at the moment. "Human Rights Watch has also documented the execution of seventeen members of the Jalloul family," the report says and lists 16, including some wives (under father's name, not husband's, as usual).

I found that, including these and two Jalloul wives (married to a Suleiman and a Taha) and their children, there are as many as 36-37 clearly related entries. But that's going by the most expansive list correlated with other sources (overall comparison ongoing, report perhaps forthcoming, too tedious to re-post here now).

There was one Biasi killed in Baniyas, at the end of the killing spree on May 6. And there was one Jalloul killed in al-Bayda at the outset. And the Jalloul-related Tahas at least died heavily in both massacres. But otherwise each family name and intermarried names dominate the victim lists in their massacre. 

And like the Biasis in al-Bayda, there's a possible core victim amongst the Jallouls, with a political connotation pointing the opposite way. Bayan Abdulrahman Jalloul was a young woman, aged 21, who was supposedly "prominent" in supporting the rebel cause with an influential group. But the only source I've seen to mention this at all is a May 10 report by the UK-based Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR - cited by HRW for their report): The Most Heinous Crime of the Modern Era: Banyas Massacre ... Blatant Ethnic Cleansing in Syria.

On page 18, alleged witness "Abu Mohammed" says the attackers "raid(ed) the well known media activist's house Ms. Baian Jaloul, who had a prominent role in transferring the ongoing news and images." She was a young woman of promise, set to marry a man (unnamed) who was also a media activist. He worked with her "in Baniyas coordinating," the report says, meaning the opposition Local Coordinating Committees (LCC). These gather information from rebel fighters and various sources and issue daily reports blaming the "regime" for everything remotely possible. (English site, far behind now: http://www.lccsyria.org/en/)

The LCC works with the Violation Documentation Center (VDC - ACLOS page, not to be confused with the the similarly-named Syrian Center for Documentation). The VDC, which I cite frequently, and the LCC were both co-founded by some of the same people. But the VDC's entry for Bayan Abdulrahman Saeid Jalloul says nothing of her activist role, when they usually do note it. She's not well-known enough I can find anything prior that mentions her by name, but I didn't dig deep, and anyway, perhaps she was prominent locally. Or she was simply important and should-be prominent. Sometimes you say nice things about people to inflate their importance after they die.

We might note the flip-side of Bayan's murder in May; she operated freely until this time spreading opposition propaganda, despite the "regime's" total access here. The government had stifled all violent rebellion in the area through 2011, 2012, and much of 2013 until these few special days. And it could have had her killed at any time. But only then, just after the massacre of Sheikh Biasi's kin in al-Bayda, did someone punch the hole in that usual security that took her life. They say it was "Shabiha."  

But now that I notice this, I should write on it, for balance, and open the question; did the regime kill its own supporters in one case to bolster its claim that "terrorists" had killed their own supporters in Baniyas? Or did the rebels behind al-Bayda kill one of their own supporters in Ras al-Nabi to blame the regime and cancel out the problem they had there? Or does victim politics just not matter, like rebels say, because this is now a logic-free sectarian slaughter?

Bayan, Her Sister, Their Fiancés, A Confusing Drama

Among the Jallouls, HRW heard the most about those killed in the home of Abdulrahman Said Jalloul, aka Abu Said. He was killed along with his unnamed wife ("Um Said"), his adult son Said, and three daughters, Sanaa, Rawan, and Bayan.

While his oldest girl, 21-year-old Bayan, waited to wed her activist sweetheart, supposed neighbor "Aya" told HRW her little sister Rawan - age 17 - was also engaged. "Muhammad al-Zouzou, Rawan’s fiancé and a member of the Free Syrian Army" was, "Aya" told HRW, the only family link to the armed rebellion. There's her sister, the alleged media activist, but that's not "rebel" in the same way, and it's not even mentioned by HRW. All they heard about her was from "Aya," who says she went to the Abu Said house and found them all dead or near it. "I saw Bayan Jalloul, who is 21, shot in the head. I turn around and I saw Rawan, her 17-year-old sister, also shot in the chest but she was still alive." Therefore, "Aya" says "I spoke to her and she told me that she was burnt…Their living room was on fire."

Rawan's FSA fiancé was careful to be out of the scene during the attack; his presence couldn't possibly be a motive, leaving the sectarian massacre narrative extra clear. Witness "Selwa" (but not Aya) told HRW that Mohammed only "came to their house after the attack. When he saw that [Rawan] was injured he left to get help," but being unarmed amidst the government attack, he never came back. "Zouzou was himself later killed elsewhere in the village," HRW reported. They also heard from "Ahmad" that one pile of bodies contained "Mohammad al-Zouzou, and Bassam al-Zouzou," besides two Lolo brothers.

But I checked the VDC's records and there's no match, that day or ever. The closest are the three al-Zozo men killed in the massacre; maybe he's Abu Yousef al-Zozo, already married with a kid named Yousef, or one of the other two (Bassam and Samer) under a different name. Or maybe this is a minor story goof-up.

Alleged witness "Aya" says she arrived to find Bayan and everyone but her sister already dead. It must have been before this that Bayan's fiancé, the media activist, "came to her before she died," as the SNHR report says. "She asked him to drink water (or vice-versa?), then she died in his hands." Rawan would be alive then too, awaiting her ill-fated opposition fiance, but that's not mentioned. And while Mr. Zozo was killed too, this unnamed activist may have survived the day (that's not clarified).
 
Furthermore, Bayan and Rawan's cousin Ahmad Jalloul also showed up following the massacre, HRW heard, apparently during this same fiancé free-for-all. He apparently tried loading the ladies' bodies into his car during the lull, but moved too slowly and was shot dead by his car when the killers suddenly returned. Was neither fiancé there to help? Or were all three men and Aya each there alone in their own little shifts, as it sounds? Or is one or more of these stories just not true, as it kind of seems?

They Rip Her Face With Knives

HRW heard that Bayan, and everyone killed, was simply "shot" with regime guns. To read their report, no one was hacked up with regime blades. These can easily evoke incredulity and then unsettling images of the dreaded Islamist terrorist blades.

It's not clear if that's why HRW didn't hear about that part. But they developed that guns-only picture citing the SNHR. And the SNHR, in their own report targeted more to Arab audiences, described the victims in general as "slaughtered and shot by Syrian government's armed forces," where slaughtered usually means killed with blades, from stabbing to beheading. Citing Abu Mohammed, the SNHR report relates how that played out for the activist Bayan:

"... they took revenge and killed her in a very horrific way , they rip her face with knives, cut her nose, stamped her in her hands and foot, and half-slaughtered her to leave dying in pain."

That description - especially the "ripped face" part - makes me wonder if she's the woman with the infamous face in the picture you can hardly find around anymore. I have a copy somewhere, but here's the blurred version saved at ACLOS, of the main pile of dozens of bodies. Just above the center is the one who could be her: white headscarf, eyes and mouth frozen open as if gasping in pain. The right side of her face as seen here is pretty much the inside of her face hanging out, it's that bad. A little girl nearby is similarly halved. It's horrible.

That woman looks perhaps around 21, and the headscarf is consistent with pro-salafist media activist. Her hands and feet are invisible, so "stamping" isn't clear. Her nose might be tweaked even more than the rest of her face, if not visibly cut. The gash continues from chin to eyebrow, but might include a first hack near the nose. It's doubtful anyone could survive that for more than some shock-obscured moments. In fact it may well have been done after her death; there's no sign of massive blood loss from that gash, and there seems to be a separate hole in her forehead (a horribly clear view, labeled as from Bayan's own LCC and cropped on this victim, is available here). Maybe she was simply shot, at first.

SNHR's witness "Abo Mohammed" says he witnessed the singular killing of "35 members of my family," including women and children who were then piled on each other (in more detail below). There's no known gathering of 35 members of any family in one spot. Only the Jallouls died, perhaps, in just about that number but at different sites combined. Did Shabiha collect them all here, before piling them un-guarded in the open?

In fact, "Abo Mohammed" says the pile of 35 included a baby they finished off afterwards, and "two children after they killed them, they burned their hands and legs" as one would know "if you have seen the pictures." I have. This must be the infamous pile shown blurred above, looking like they were tossed out a window to land this way. I estimate it contains about 30-35 bodies. If this does all line up, it means Bayan must be in there, and that hacked face is quite likely to be hers.

Truth-Teller to the End?

One difference between Ms. Jalloul and Omar Biasi in Baniyas is in their most recent politically relevant statement. In early April 2013 Sheikh Omar (perhaps - an Omar Biasi in Tartous) spoke out on the Internet against rebels, more harshly than usual, calling for them to be eliminated. That's about one month before the rebels - I think - came and massacred him and dozens of relatives.

He may have more recent statements around I haven't located, but the sheikh did not provide - for example - a running record of the actual attack. People don't usually do that, as power and communications tend to be cut off before an attack by whoever. Bayan, however, did allegedly manage that unusual feat.

The name Bayan ( بيان ) translates "statement." It's perfect for a person whose whole life conveys - or is consumed by - some kind of a worthy message. Joining the LCC to spread the truth during this time of revolution and horror in Syria might seem like a good one. But statements work best delivered at the right time, as early as that was in her young life. Whoever set it, the deadline came on May 3, and the SNHR report says Bayan "was publishing the news of what's happening to kill and death to the last moments." She allegedly sent a series of messages from shortly before 7:00 PM (apparently meaning local time) as the report says, linking to a screen grab posted here. These are transcribed in English in the report, saying in part:

"Allahu Akbar ... they are pouring gasoline in houses and burning them ... extermination in Ras Alnabaa my friends ... pray for us ... no one is helping us ... martyrs on the streets ... we will die too."

However, on the page just before this, the same report noted the attack began as usual with shelling and, before 2:30 PM, the regime "cut off electricity and communications." The purpose, rebels would say, is to keep people from broadcasting the truth in real time like that. The government would say it's to block terrorist communications in the coming fight. But either way, it allegedly didn't work. Bayan was allowed to watch and report for a while before they finally came and killed her, in this narrative.

Perhaps this LCC activist was equipped with special gear ("Thuraya phone", etc.) to evade the block. But it seems average locals were also able to call around fine. "Aya" told HRW "that her relative, who she saw at Abu Sa`id’s house shortly after the government and pro-government forces left, had spoken to Umm Sa`id (Bayan's mother) just before she was killed “She told me that she was speaking with Umm Sa`id at around 8:30 or 9:00 [p.m.] on the phone and that suddenly she heard Umm Sa`id screaming and pleading for mercy,” Aya recounted. “Then she heard gunshots.”

Alternatively, of course, the phone call was likely made up. And perhaps so were were Bayan's final observations shortly before, albeit with an aspect of actual text. Perhaps that was even typed by someone else logged into her secured account (I won't name any names). 

More Failed Cover-Up, Foiled by All-Seeing Witnesses

It's suggested the killers intended to cover up this whole crime, and just failed spectacularly. HRW heard from its several witnesses in Lebanon how everyone witnessed this massacre, got calls in and out, had chances to check on neighbors, speak to the dying, and take the videos we've seen. They managed all this during a lull, they say, when the killers just walked away for a while.

This alternation of control - government in charge during the killings, not even present for a time after, and then in charge again during body removal - is the usual formula in Syria. Opposition access to a crime scene is essential for the continuing documentation of regime crimes, but continuous access is a troublesome notion, so it's always cut short by the soldiers coming back. Aya tells how "after they located the bodies, government or pro-government forces returned to the scene and fired repeatedly in their direction." Then theyy let her just run away, then move to to Lebanon and tell the whole story, but not without a show of trying to keep people from seeing the truth.

Another woman Human Rights Watch heard about "played dead when the security forces returned." Laying there, she claims, she "saw them shoot and kill Ahmad," the cousin killed by his car, after Rawan and Bayan were loaded inside.

SNHR's "most important" and all-seeing witness in their report is "Abo Mohammed." He says he watched Alawites he knew and named by family, arriving from a long list of towns he named, murdering Sunni families he knew with their "Russian weapons." He questions their humanity, as many do. With his own eyes - not with anyone else's - Abo Mohammed says he witnessed a woman stripped and gang-raped by the bests, who cut her hands and left her "half slaughtered" (bladed but alive - similar to but apparently not Bayan).

Abo Mohammed  also watched a family executed by a wall, saw them turn and face it before being gunned down, and saw one woman play dead and live. In a possible contradiction, as previously cited here at ACLOS, this or a similar "Abu Mohammed" told al-Arabiya news he heard this from a basement he was "forced" to hide in, and the victims "were around 35 members of my family," gathered and shot in one outside spot and then piled on each other. In all, he told HRW he saw with his own eyes the murder of what he estimates as  250 victims. However, oddly enough, "there are many areas in the neighborhood that I couldn't see," so the number might be even higher! In fact he told al-Arabiya earlier that "the number of dead exceeds 1500. They are over 1000 only in Ras-elnabe’." For reference, all other sources top off between 150 and 200 documented dead in Ras al-Nabi - a number that might be high but could also be accurate.

This massive and cruel massacre was reportedly a government/Shabiha crime, and as usual it's one they would try to blame on "terrorists." But as also usually happens, rebels or sympathizers had continuing and relaxed access to the victims, amazing observation, victim ID age-memorization, and tallying skills. They were able to film the horrible pile shown above, with an array of dead children next to it, at night, and also for different hours in daylight. Some photos were taken from the second floor of this same building the victims were apparently tossed from. Did the Shabiha leave this scene open continuously that whole time, or did they come and go repeatedly in the span?

One thing about the pile that few have noticed is that some victims display more than a day's worth of decay - rigor mortis has faded away, faces are blue or greenish and puffy, bodies starting to bloat. I'm not clear enough on the photo timeline to say how big of a problem this is (another scene of male victims suggests killings before May 3 - ACLOS).

But it is obliquely noted that the bodies were starting to rot as people wandered around snapping pictures, before they were taken away by the "regime" and the Red Crescent. They were photographed again by rebel sympathizers during that process, the photos published as further proof bodies were left rotting because "families were unable to bury them or even come close." Maybe some people were effectively kept way, but it seems if they had just arrived with a camera and ready to blame Assad, they could have gotten as close as they wanted, as often as they wanted. 

Abo Mohammed told SNHR about refrigerated trucks, four of them, hauling away the dead. Two loads were buried in Alnaznada, two at Maqrab bridge cemetery. This and other clues are what the competing UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) calls "evidence proving that the dozens of civilians who were in the torched houses or under the rubble were secretly buried by the Syrian security forces." (source - Facebook, but still active!) Why were they hidden away like that, while these killings were done so blatantly, with so many witnesses left around, and this most shocking pile of slaughtered innocents tossed out in the open for rebel cameras to shock the world with?

The Baniyas Ambush of Syrian Soldiers, April 10 2011

July 2, 2015
major edits July 7
last edits November 26, 2015
(Ayrout edit and link updates)

This is a fascinating incident I heard about early on and only just now decided to revisit. It's from the first weeks of the Syrian "Arab Spring" uprising that began on March 15, 2011. And it was in Baniyas, Tatrous province - an area that - following a brief flash here at the start - remained fairly calm and secure up until the present, by the standards of death and destruction most of the rest of Syria has witnessed.

A Loss in the Family: Landis Reports

Joshua Landis, director of the Center for Middle East Studies and a professor at the University of Oklahoma, is recognized as one of the top expert on Syria in the US. It was noteworthy, but little-noted, when he posted on April 11, 2011:

Lt. Col. Qash'ur's widowed wife Rudayna, at the funeral

The Syrian revolution struck home yesterday. My wife, Manar Qash`ur [Kachour], burst into tears last night as she read the Facebook page that has kept her updated on events in her hometown, Latakia. Lt. Colonel Yasir Qash`ur, who was Manar’s cousin and 40 years old, was shot in Banyas on Sunday. He was one of two Lt. Colonels and 10 military personnel killed – more were wounded. Yasir’s funeral was held in the village this morning – Monday. My brother-in-law, Firas, and father-in-law, Shaaban, both attended.

He then cites a lower (correct) death toll in this article from al-Watan (the Nation), a pro-government paper (in Arabic - auto-translated and hopefully corrected right)

"Nine died, including two officers .. and to raise the status of a martyr, and 46 wounded from the army, police and civilians, some seriously wounds. This outcome of the real battle witnessed by the Banias city yesterday in which a large number of militants barricaded raised the slogan "jihad", and used explosives, grenades, machine guns, those interested in making the Banias an arena for chaos and murder under the Freedom lid and under financial cover have been arrested to explain that arms were financed by Abdel-Halim Khaddam (exiled Sunni opposition leader from Baniyas, linked to Hariri in Lebanon) and a man named Mohammed Ali Biasi aka Ahmed Musa, is prominent for securing weapons coming from Lebanon and distributing shipped guns to "rebels" ...

He doesn't say that's the true story, just passes it on. (Mr. Biassi likely refers to  "Abu Ali" Biassi, defense minister of an embryonic Islamist "emirate" in Baniyas - see here) 

The activist-informed mainstream news of the attack broke quickly - the "Assad regime" sent its troops to "crackdown" on Baniyas after Friday protests (April 8) allegedly got out of hand or violent. Then nine soldiers were killed by their own side for disobeying orders to kill innocents (see below). This spurred Landis to a second report two days later; on April 13, he declared Western Press Misled:  Who Shot the Nine Syrian Soldiers in Banyas? Not Syrian Security Forces (Eurasia Review mirror) In this he cites an alleged survivor - "colonel `Uday Ahmad, brother-in-law of Lt. Col. Yasir Qash`ur" - who describes the attack so:

Uday Ahmad was sitting in the back seat of the truck which Yasir was driving when he was shot dead on the highway outside Banyas. Uday said that shooting was coming from two directions. One was from the roof of a building facing the highway and another from people hiding behind the cement median of the highway. They jumped up and shot into the two trucks carrying Syrian troops, killing 9. Col. Uday survived. Here is video of the shooting shown on Syrian TV sent by my brother-in-law, Firas, who lives in Latakia.

Below is that Ad-Dounia video of the attack, seeming to show both alleged angles of fire, occupied by armed me seen running around. At this resolution, the action isn't really clear, but it's analyzed below anyway.

Location, Geo-Location, Incident Analysis

This is in Baniyas, a city in Syria's coastal Tartous province (governorate), a major port city north of Tartous city and bordering on southern Latakia province. Tartous is Alawite-majority, like Latakia, but Baniyas is historically more Sunni, although fairly mixed today. Ras al-Nabi ( راس النبع ) ("head of the spring") on Wikimapia is a southeast district of the city - it would also be the site of the infamous and brutal 2013 Baniyas Massacre of perhaps hundreds of people we know very little about - the only one of its kind to ever occur in the city.

A bridge near Ras al-Nabi is specified. Here's a bridge it's near but labeled un-clearly - I suppose it means the overpass into the city proper: this is like a "gate" local rebels want to control. But I was easily able to geo-locate the spot, for whatever it's worth, to a different bridge just north of that where the highway itself bridges over the (??) river into the Baniyas harbor. First, a composite from the Addounia video's main view. This is a low-resolution copy - I might've hunted for better, but it seems to suffice.

A satellite dish (off-frame here) pointing roughly left means that's approximately south, and this view is partly west-facing, across a partly north-south highway. The stretch of highway through Ras al-Nabi is the best fit for this (below, left). Then a second, more distant view (below, lower right inset), makes it clear the trucks are on a bridge over a river when attacked, and about in the middle of it. The combined clues point to only one spot, as indicated (red circle) just at the northern edge of the district. That's a good spot to spring an ambush - it left them no cover to run to unless they wanted to leap into the river.

They were driving in from the northeast. It seems the shooters were on the roof of the black-circled building, at the edge of Ras al-Nabi. The other shooters were at about the yellow circle. (Orange marks the smaller bridge just northwest, green the taller trees that way. The white-circled building is just for reference.)  

Orders to Kill Protesters, and Objectors?

The widely-reported opposition claim - taken as fact by the most prominent news media to ever consider this event - is much different from the narrative suggested by the video or the survivor accounts cited above. The Guardian, most prominently, reported Syrian soldiers shot for refusing to fire on protesters. That report was filed by Katherine Marsh – a pseudonym that's not "Gay Girl" – in Damascus.

"Syrian soldiers have been shot by security forces after refusing to fire on protesters, witnesses said, as a crackdown on anti-government demonstrations intensified. ... Human rights monitors named Mourad Hejjo, a conscript from Madaya village, as one of those shot by security snipers. “His family and town are saying he refused to shoot at his people,” said Wassim Tarif, a local human rights monitor."

An AFP report passes on about the same story, adding the claim of Yasser, a shopkeeper, that "Security forces were responsible for killing soldiers in Banias because they had refused to attack the city." Commentators were practically giddy at the obvious implication - the Syrian government was unable to enforce its brutal will without brutalizing its own enforcers. That was clearly unsustainable, and the system would surely crack soon at this rate.

It seems the city was not attacked, whether that was ever planned or not - it's hard now to prove. But the opposition Center for Documentation of Violations in Syria (VDC) lists zero civilian "martyrs" from Tartous province on the 10th, or even in the span April 8 to 12 (local civilians would start dying soon, 16 of them between April 16 to May 18, real circumstances unclear). But on the 10th, it seems not one soldier followed up on this alleged order to the tune of even one unarmed protester killed.

AFP's report added "a crackdown on demonstrators on the weekend ... left at least 30 people dead in Banias and another flashpoint town, Daraa." Did they have to combine two areas to get a newsworthy number? Apparently. If you check the VDC for the whole weekend, Friday to Sunday, nationwide you'll see 15 martyrs total - 7 in Deraa, none in Tartous, 8 between  Homs, Damascus, Dier Ezzour...

... and one officer from Aleppo killed April 10, unclear where. martyr #166 Rami Qattash, Lieutenant Colonel. Notes: "He was martyred for refusing to open fire at the residents" He's the only non-civilian "martyr" listed for all of Syria that day - and the only martyr at all. According to this Arabic list of "Assad victims" he's #323, "ninth battalion, third-execution in banias, for refusing to hit the demonstrators 10/4/2011." So he's part of this story, and the second Lt. Colonel.

Those Syrian Arab Army soldiers presented by the VDC as defecting, or killed for trying, are usually put on the "martyrs" list. But Lt. col. Qattash is the only one here. There are many soldiers listed by the VDC as killed on April 10, explicitly or probably in Banyas - but they're listed as regular "regime forces," usually meaning 'bad guys' killed by rebel fighters - which didn't officially exist at this time. And none of them aside from martyr Qattash is noted as for refusing that order. Perhaps the usual system just wasn't decided on this early, or perhaps the VDC is being more "credible" here and acknowledging the obvious - to some degree.

See  27 regime forces fatalities "from" Baniyas (meaning from unknown and killed there?) plus 4 from other areas killed in Baniyas, another that fits, (killed on Latakia-Tartous highway) and another - Murad Hajjo - killed in Deraa, it says, but everyone else says in Baniyas. Including martyr Qattash, it's apparently 34 soldier total that were killed. That number is higher than any reports I've seen would explain; the ambush story only supports about nine or ten killed. The VDC entries' scant details add a separate "explosion" perhaps. Do they reflect other unreported attacks? Or is this a padded record, for whatever reason? For example, did some 20 rebel fighters they couldn't acknowledge wind up getting killed in the clash, and swept under this rug? Is AFP's line "left at least 30 people dead in Banias and another flashpoint town, Daraa" actually an understatement?

The list of 27 includes Landis' cousin-in-law by name: Yaser Ahmad Qashour Lieutenant Colonel, from Tartous  Qadmous - Beit Marij, age 43, Martyrdom location Tartous - Banyas. Notes: "in an ambush that targeted army equipment in Banyas near Ras Nabie bridge." As we've seen, it was actually on the bridge. But this seems to bear out everything else we've seen, although the VDC doesn't attribute blame clearly for this whole large batch, and suggests the same as other opposition sources.
    

So there was an alleged order to kill demonstrators, and then there was something of a one-sided fight between the Army's members sent in for that reason - a fight over this important and controversial order. Some were so upset by it they refused, probably despite threats. Others were so gung-ho about it they'd kill the Sunni protesters plus their own soldiers. The ones refusing apparently lost this fight, and those willing to kill innocents must have won. But then it seems no one wound up acting on the order. So... what was so important about it to begin with?

Logic aside, activists would allege a paper copy of the order to kill dissenting soldiers was found by them before April 13 - somehow intercepted by unarmed activists, and smeared with blood. Landis called it clearly fake (same second link - I'd love to have a picture of that but the old link there doesn't seem to have it anymore).

And further, the first reports already contained hints that rebels themselves knew this story might fall apart. The Guardian's "Marsh" report added "Activists said not all soldiers reported dead or injured were shot after refusing to fire. "We are investigating reports that some people have personal weapons and used them in self-defence," said Tarif," the "human rights monitor." That was the only credible thing he heard remotely similar: improvised, individual "self-defense" ... against an army allegedly too busy killing itself to have killed anyone else. One wonders how that investigation came out. It probably just didn't. 

The Tell-All Soldier
At the time, opposition and mainstream media sources they wrote the news for had published this video (Arabic dialog, no subtitles):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3nveUVbSPk - description:
اعتراف الجندي الذي جاء إلى بانياس أنه مغرر بهم من قوادهم وأن إطلاق النار كان من خلفهم من قوات الأمن بتاريخ
"The soldier who came to Banias that deluded them of their leaders and that the fire was behind them of the security forces on recognition"

So, one of the soldiers shot by his own side in the back, then left around for these unarmed activists ... to find and ... get medical help for. That in itself makes fairly little sense. He was probably captured, by the attackers, who were them. Anyway, in their custody, they say he explains how he was shot in the back after he refused the alleged order. Considering how duress exists, he just might say that. People generally accepted that he did. But it was hard to be sure - it's all in Arabic.

Then Joshua Landis had a look, and published that in his second article Western Press Misled - already cited above - which focused largely on this video. He contended, after reviewing the dialog - that is, what's said - that it had been "completely misconstrued," and "the Guardian irresponsibly repeats a false interpretation of the video provided by an informant."

"The soldier denies that he was ordered to fire on people. Instead, he says he was on his way to Banyas to enforce security. He does not say that he was shot at by government agents or soldiers. In fact he denies it. The interviewer tries to put words in his mouth but the soldier clearly denies the story that the interviewer is trying to make him confess to.  In the video, the wounded soldier is surrounded by people who are trying to get him to say that he was shot by a military officer. The soldier says clearly, “They [our superiors] told us, ‘Shoot at them IF they shoot at you.’”

The interviewer tried to get the wounded soldier to say that he had refused orders to shoot at the people when he asked : “When you did not shoot at us what happened?” But the soldier doesn’t understand the question because he has just said that he was not given orders to shoot at the people. The soldier replies, “Nothing, the shooting started from all directions”.  The interviewer repeats his question in another way by asking, “Why were you shooting at us, we are Muslims?” The soldier answers him, “I am Muslim too.”  The interviewer asks, “So why were you going to shoot at us?” The soldier replies, “We did not shoot at people. They shot at us at the bridge.”

Landis' analysis clearly wins over that of "Katherine Marsh." S/He never explains how it was decided the soldier actually said "he was shot in the back by security forces." Clearly, he didn't - activists said he did, and tried to get him to, but he didn't say that.  He said, instead, what all credible evidence does.

Consider how the Hariri-linked Now Lebanon panned Landis in September 2011 as the Professor of Propaganda: "To read Landis’ commentary about Syria over the past half year is to track the development of Baath propaganda." For example, "Landis has persisted in his denial of the claim, in the face of mounting evidence compiled over a series of months, that the Syrian regime has carried out a policy of killing soldiers who refuse to fire on unarmed civilians." They would love to share any debunk of that one video analysis, but there apparently was none - the author skipped to newer allegation, mostly verbal claims by successfully defected soldiers - that is, anti-government, and largely Sunni extremist partisans. He also failed to mention the blood-smeared paper copy that was once supposed to prove the order.

Indeed, defector and "desperate regime collapsing" claims in 2011 went well beyond this one case, including others like the alleged regime killing of over 100 rebelling soldiers in Jisr al-Shughour next to Turkey, weeks later. Do note, it's shady too, with Islamist eye-gouging and a real FSA defector behind it that even the Turks  - if not the ruling ones - sent back to Syria to stand trial (see ACLOS page, on-site defector profile)). Whatever one makes of those, the one claim at least remains pretty clearly fake, concocted to obscure a covert pattern of armed mayhem to destabilize the state. (see also: Peter Lee, Counterpunch - Sharmine Narwani, al-Akhbar English)

AFP/Al-Arabiya Version and Rahman Mosque
Interestingly, there's another account of the day's violence that might be an abortive early version of the rebel story where the dead weren't soldiers at all, but mosque-oriented   "people" - implicitly protesters. In this report of April 10 (Arabic text - app. video version here) from al-Arabiya (Saudi Arabian-owned) unnamed activist told AFP that:

"security forces fired on the perimeter of the Al-Rahman mosque in the outskirts of Baniyas that resulted in at least four dead and 15 wounded ... Activists said that the connections to mobile and landlines with Baniyas were cut off completely. As reported by activists fired on the mosque of Abu Baker al siddique in the city, what resulted in the injury of 5 people." 

The five injured story seems to be at a different place - perhaps "mosque Abu Bakr, may Allah curse" as currently labeled in Arabic here on Wikimpaia. But the 4 dead story near "Rahman mosque" is what matters; as we've seen, there were no protesters killed that the record still show, and the only people to die in numbers of "at least 4" were the ambushed soldiers. But they didn't die at the perimeter of Rahman mosque. Or did they? That's locatable, by labels anyway, here on Wikimapia, 300 meters northwest of the bridge where the ambush happened, with a clear line of sight to see how far away that is - too far to be relevant, unless ... it's close enough that perhaps a sniper in its minaret could have provided a third angle of fire no one noticed at the time.

And this seals the location that the video and everyone agrees on, and that clarifies the activists were talking about the same batch of "people" shot by "security forces."

The al-Arabiya report also mentions, as less credible, "according to the official authorities one officer was killed and another wounded in an ambush of a Syrian military unit in the region of Baniyas." So both of these competing stories sound like early and incomplete reports of the same thing - one was less informed of the death toll (1/9 known) but correct on circumstances, and the other was more aware of the death toll (at least 4 dead, couldn't get a full count yet - 15 or so injured anyway...) but fudging the details, quite badly as we can see. 

To add: Original AFP report cited by al-Arabiya, via Muscat Daily)

"Syrian security forces have been firing for the last two hours in the (Sunni) neighbourhood of Ras al-Nabee where there is the Al-Rahman mosque," a focal point of demonstrations, two witnesses said by telephone. "At least three were killed and dozens wounded," they said, providing the names of the casualties and referring to the violence as "a real massacre with snipers shooting to kill."

The gunfire, according to both witnesses, came from the Alawite neighbourhood of Al-Quz. A third witness, a rights activist, said the shots were aimed at the mosque and left "four dead and 15 wounded." All of the witnesses and activists who spoke to AFP requested anonymity, citing security concerns. 

(Another version via Saudi Gazette)

Syrian government forces killed at least four people and wounded 17 when they strafed a residential area of the coastal town of Banias with gunfire for hours Sunday, witnesses told AFP.

A Syrian security officer was later killed and another was wounded when their patrol was ambushed in the northwestern coastal town, the official SANA news agency reported.

Digesting all of this: I cannot locate this "al-Quz district" on Wikimapia. In fact Ras al-Nabi is the only set aside and marked district I see. I have no clue but this what any other districts are even named. This IRIN article on increasing sectarian segregation explains how Alawi tend (more so now) to live in the north and Sunnis in the south of Baniyas. The mosque is not in Ras al-Nabi, as labelled, but there is no other match for Rahman mosque in Baniyas, and for no Rahman anything inside the district. Shooting towards both would best be done from the north.

But then I remembered I've heard of this Rahman mosque before. In connection with the Khaddam-backed Baniyas emirate mentioned above, it's interesting that, as I summarized some time ago:

A confession aired on May 23 claimed one "Abu Ali" Biassi was the "defense minister" of an "emirate" planned for Baniyas in these first days. The "emir" was a local, Sheikh Anis' (? - انس ) Aarot. All were paid and provided weapons from outside, explosives, rifles and pistols from Lebanon. Rahman Mosque was their warehouse. There was a plan of minister Biassi's to rig explosives at the Baniyas refinery and the thermal station, to be blown up on the orders of the ministers. They had the explosives, the captive driver says, but this was apparently where they were busted instead.

See, again, here - needing update now or here, already updated partly. Sheikh Anas Ayrout was later "a member of the Syrian National Coalition who is from the coastal city of Banias,"who praised (openly encouraged, see here) the massacres of hundreds of Alawi civilians and seizure of hundreds more in Latakia province, August 2013, for bringing a "balance of terror" against Syria's Alawi citizens and in the rebellion's favor.

Anyway, here's the scene and the claims. One can guess why they dropped the first story and decided "okay, it was soldiers killed, and not at the mosque, but..."

Bad Blood Between Neighbors
And note how this first and fakest story blamed shooting from an "Alawite neighborhood" ... they were getting blamed for a reason. Was it to justify some premeditated punishment? Or just to terrify people with that possibility? It never played out fully, because security forces and the city at large came together, shut down the terror cells, and kept the peace there, at least until the infamous massacres two years later.

As for those, the May 2013 al-Bayda and Baniyas massacres: in both cases, rebels said Alawites has slaughtered hundreds of innocent Sunnis on purely sectarian grounds. The first one targeted the family of a government-loayalist Imam after a deadly ambush of soldiers, in a purely Sunni town. So we know the "Alawite Shabiha" were targeting Sunnis, as virtually everyone has dutifully noted. But the second massacre with a murkier death toll happened in Ras al-Nabi, not rebel-held but accessible at least, of use in the case of a new surge of fighters sneaking in from the al-Bayda direction. And it's fairly near a lot of Alawite civilians - like the ones in al-Quz - who can be kidnapped in times of chaos.

A Civilian Death After All

Back to April 10, 2011... what else happened in Baniyas on this bloody day of the peoples' peaceful uprising against the "Alawite dictatorship"? One civilian at least was killed - 30-year-old Nidal Jannoud - an Alawi farmer who had the sense to not even live in Banyas, but in a village outside the city. But he did pass through that day, April 10, and was accosted by a group of lively Sunni "activists" before he could get back home.

It may be a hard rock hit or, more likely, a blade they used to split or slice his cheek open badly. That left him pouring blood as he apparently tried to carry on, to calmly get away to somewhere safe. But he was captured on video continually hounded by the mob in a city street in broad daylight. The inset shows one view, with Mr. Jannoud threatened with both a rock and a pistol by these vanguards of Syria's "dignity revolution." Shortly after these scenes and off-camera, the farmer died of a gunshot, after what other abuse is not fully clear (see here at ACLOS)

Some reports say the rebels had actually blamed Janoud's murder on "Assad's" security forces. But it's also said that "Omar Ayrout and Yahya Al Rayes confessed later that they killed Janoud. Their confessions appeared on the Syrian TV." (source) Omar Ayrout is the protest leader in Baniyas, and quite likely related to would-be Baniyas emir and Alawi massacre cheerleader, Anas Ayrout. 

Perhaps the VDC didn't want a list of just a murdered Alawi farmer for civilian deaths in Tartous that day. For whatever reason, he was shifted to regime forces, rank: civilian, and martyrs (civilian) were left at zero. The revolution was clearly winning in Baniyas that day, and we can see what that looks like, as it would look later but on a bigger scale; soldiers killed, security upended, exposed Alawites or other civilian enemies butchered, "Assad" blamed anyway, and outside help against the "Alawite regime" pleaded for on that fake moral basis.

Rousing Conclusion

The corporate and controlled media at the time failed to fill us in on any of these details. All we heard was there was an order to kill and soldiers killed for refusing it, and then a widely-decried crackdown. The increase in civilian shootings, we were told, meant the activists would have to take up arms and form a "Free Syrian Army" to get all these defectors safely into and start protecting the people of Syria.

And now here we are, more than four years after this little-understood event, and probably over 400,000 people of all kinds killed, often horribly like Mr. Jannoud. It's gotten so insanely bad with all of Syria's empty desert in Islamist hands and the North in other Islamist hands, there are increasing claims - still as horribly wrong as ever - that Syria has passed some tipping point it can't survive, at least in one piece; maybe the best thing to do now is accelerate the inevitable end.

But that in fact still depends on a lot. I think we can keep on this course another three years - or an accelerated one for 18 months - and still debate ending the project finally before we hit the dreaded mark of one million dead. And Syria would still survive, if maimed. It is not too late to turn this thing back and leave it at "badly injured."

We - the actual international community with no specific leaders or recognized powers - should work towards that frustrated end. Let's spread the truth so more people can see the wisdom of that. Late is far, far better than never.  

1988: Iran Air 655 - Casus Belli Behind Lockerbie Bombing?

Caustic Logic
July 4, 2015

Note, July 4, 2015: I'm simply re-publishing this post from another of my blogs (original posting from March 15, 2010) to mark the 27th anniversary today of this horrific and dubious incident that seems to have sealed the fate of Pan Am 103 later in the year (see whole site connected to that post).

The USS Vincennes and the Downing of IA655:
Iran Air Flight 655 was a scheduled 28-minute flight from Bandar Abbas airport to Bahrain, on July 3 1988. An Airbus A300B2 flown by Capt. Mohsen Rezaian, IA655 left the ground at 10:17 am local time to cross the Straits of Sidra. It seems the plane was talking normally with ground control on open frequencies, was listed in flight registries, flying well within an established civilian air corridor, and transmitting the right civilian transponder code that clearly means something like the car window sign "Baby on Board." [1]

As IA655 steadily climbed to cruising altitude (14,000 feet for this short journey), it was suddenly struck with two powerful SM2 missiles fired from an American ship in Iranian waters below. The 290 passengers and crew (including 66 children) were all killed, either in the explosion and breakup, or after a three mile fall to the Persian Gulf below.

Officially, the crew of the USS Vincennes, which had opted to fire the missiles at that plane, had simply gotten confused in the thick of a separate naval battle they'd gotten into. After missing IA655's listing in the 'do not shoot' registry, misreading its transponder code as of military origin, and erring on its speed, heading/location, and altitude profile, the crew had decided the airbus was a fighter jet swooping down towards them for the attack, as all their misreadings jointly suggested. [2]

The troubling details and explanations of this bizarre accident are worth covering elsewhere, but ascribing the best intentions, the Vincennes fired in what seemed clear-cut self-defense, while they happened to be within Iranian waters. As such they fully earned their later commendations, like the responsible air-warfare coordinator, who won a navy medal for "heroic achievement [...] under fire." [3]

End of the War
At the Iraq-Iran war's commencement in 1980, the United States had sanctioned the bloodshed, so long as Iraq was on top. By the latter 1980s, the situation had shifted. Increased U.S. assistance and even direct shooting reflected fears that Iraq might lose forever the territory Iran was gaining. By the end of 1987, “we became,” a senior U.S. officer told ABC News, “forward air controllers for the Iraqi air force.” [4]

Operation Praying Mantis responded to Iranian mining of the Gulf with escalated U.S. attacks on Iranian gunboats, oil platforms, and tankers in April. [5] Immediately, protection of "neutral shipping" was also expanded; it was to enforce this protection that the Vincennes had been called to the Gulf. 

At the same time, Washington and thence the UN Security Council was calling, with Resolution 598, for the war to simply end with past borders restored. Both sides had to see the benefit of an end to the grueling war, but after their own heavy sacrifices had improved their odds, Iran was reluctant to concede on the West's terms and timetable.

Along with a renewed Iraqi air and chemical offensives into Iran's cities in the spring and summer of 1988, the bizarre accident of IA655 had to have hastened  Iran’s effective surrender a few weeks later. The precise role it played – minor, major, or peripheral - cannot be known for sure. However, an Iranian scholar stated at a conference hosted by the Woodrow Wilson Center [paraphrased]

"A turning point in Iran's thinking came with the shooting down of an Iranian passenger plane in July 1988 by the American cruiser USS Vincennes. That incident apparently led Ayatollah Khomeini to conclude that Iran could not risk the possibility of U.S. open combat operations against Iran and he decided it was time to end the conflict." [6]

There is every reason to believe that’s just what the Americans wanted to get across, after the tragedy if not shortly before as well. Aside from unapologetic "regret” over the loss of innocent life, and blaming Iran for the warship's mistakes, the American message was best put by White House media handler Marlin Fitzwater in putting the accident in context:

Only an end to the war, an objective we desire, can halt the immense suffering in the region and put an end to innocent loss of life. Our goal is peace in the Gulf and on land. We urge Iran and Iraq to work with the Security Council for an urgent comprehensive settlement of the war pursuant to Resolution 598. Meanwhile, United States forces will continue their mission in the area, keenly aware of the risks involved and ready to face them. [7] 

That is, as the Iranians likely read it, "we’ll keep on shooting at anything that might possibly be a threat as long as we “have to” hang around there, which is until Iran surrenders." About seven weeks after IA655 was torn down, an agreement was reached and hostilities between Iraq and Iran were officially and physically ended on August 20 1988. No territory was lost, but nearly a million people were. 

But even after the cease-fire, one more battle loomed. It would be just as one-sided as the battle of IA-655, just about as deadly, and just as unacknowledged. Again, the perpetrators would go unpunished as innocents paid the price for others' crimes.  

Revenge Pronouncements / Connective Tissue
Only in 1996 was a comprehensive legal agreement over the incident settled between Iran and America. Officially Iran accepted the accident story and took a small settlement $132 million and no acceptance of any guilt, exactly as offered by the US eight years earlier. [8] "Official" acceptance doesn't always mean that much; especially when the blood was fresh and tempers hot, Tehran never bought the bland American statements that the shoot-down was purely accidental. It's not even an unreasonable suspicion on their part - it's their apparent response I can't agree with.

Researcher Ludwig De Braeckeleer has assembled a useful compendium of Iranian death threats following the supposed accident. By this, various officials and ambassadors accused the United States of ''a barbaric massacre'' and an "act of terrorism." They pledged to launch "an appropriate response," to the "American crime," to "avenge the blood of their martyrs," and mete out "punishment to prevent further occurrence or recurrence of such unfortunate incidents." Most pointedly, hardliner Ali Akbar Mohtashemi (alt Mohtashemi-Pur), widely believed to have headed up the "appropriate response" planning, publicly "swore that there should be a "rain of blood" in revenge." [9]


This wasn't just hardcore posturing for the Iranian street, but something representing a real danger; everyone in the know expected retaliation, and likely in-kind - the Iranians would seek to now kill American civilians on an airplane and see how we liked it.  While uncertainty persists with no adequate investigation, the supposed payment was $10 million to the Ahmed Jibril's PFLP-GC. An early 1991 report, prepared by the National Security Agency for Gulf War intelligence use, stated:

"Mohtashemi is closely connected with the Al Abas and Abu Nidal terrorist groups. He is actually a long-time friend of Abu Nidal. He has recently paid $10 million in cash and gold to these two organizations to carry out terrorist activities and was the one who paid the same amount to bomb Pan Am Flight 103 in retaliation for the US shoot-down of the Iranian Airbus." [10]

The revenge moved swiftly, it seems, perhaps starting before the cease-fire even. It was in early October that the GC cell in Neuss, West Germany was set up, October 13 that bomb maker Khreesat arrived and set to work, and October 26 when the cell was busted up in Operation: Autumn Leaves. Most have always suspected their goal had been to destroy an American airliner on Iran's instruction and with support from Syria, using the type of radio-disguised altimeter bomb found in the car with Khreesat.

Three other such bombs were missed in the first raid and only found later, and one bomb at least was never intercepted. Vincent Cannistraro, who headed the CIA's Lockerbie probe, was interviewed for a program Shadow Over Lockerbie:

"[Cannistraro] says authorities focused on the likelihood that Marwan Khreesat's fifth bomb had blown up the Pan Am 747 over Lockerbie. "The immediate feeling was: we've missed someone. That someone in that cell had escaped with one of the explosive devices and succeeded in planting it on Pan Am 103." [11]  

In other words, the terror tree was shaken and the "Autumn Leaves" had fallen and scattered, but they weren't all raked up neat. One may have drifted into the belly of PA103.

Obvious, Then Nothing
When the other shoe fell, the horror and carnage clearly mirrored IA655 with a mid-air explosion leaving 259 to deal with five miles of pure gravity however they did before dying against the cold winter soil of Scotland. To clarify the issue, just hours after the attack, two phone calls were placed from London to the Associated Press and UPI declaring in broken English:

"We, the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution, are undertaking this heroic execution in revenge of blowing the Iran Air plane by America a few months ago." [12]

A CIA memo of the following day listed this first among a short list of responsibility claims. Among Islamic Jihad, the Ulster Defense League, and Mossad, the report said "we consider the claim from the Guadians of the Islamic Revolution as the most credible; previous attacks claimed by this group suggest it is pro-Iranian." It then listed several, with responsibility usually called in by an anonymous man: two assassination attempts on exiled Shah era leaders in exile, a plane hijacking a plane to secure the release of said assassins, and killing by car bomb a German businessman accused of selling missiles to Iraq while the war was on. [source]

Avenging the killing of 290 innocent Iranians by a US gunship seems in-line with the Guardians' philosophy, or perhaps some other Iranian agency, and most likely with technical help of the altimeter-triggered kind. Investigators, media reports, and the whole public mind went that way at first for at least a year, from no later than this ABC News broadcast of Feb 16 1989. Behind the suspicions of the PFLP-GC cell and its Khreesat bomb "a senior source overseeing the investigation" revealed that  "some hard-line members of the Iranian revolutionary guard" may have arranged for the attack through these suspects. "Revenge for the shooting down of the Iranian Airliner by the USS Vincennes in the Persian Gulf last summer was their motive," said reporter Brian Dunsmore in Lockerbie.  [13]

And still in early 1990 Steve Emerson and Brian Duffy wrote in The Fall of Pan Am 103 how sponsorship ran with Syrian supports up to Tehran, driven by revenge for IA655, "shot down for the Fourth of July holiday, the Mullahs believed, to celebrate America's independence." [14] To repay these expensive 4th of July fireworks with an early Black Christmas present, followed by a Body Boxing Day and a few more, might be a potent signal.

Officially, Iran denies involvement in the bombing, but some, like suspected mastermind Mohtashemi, have claimed a leading role on candid occasions. In 1995, an Iranian magazine ran an interview where "Mohtashami-Pur said that he would soon reveal the "Lockerbie files" to the readers." The report was quashed from above and the magazine closed down. [15] Former Iranian president Abdulhassan Bani Sadr also has admitted proudly, in the 1990s, that “Iran ordered the attack and Ahmed Jibril carried it out,” [16] a claim he repeated to deBraeckeleer in 2008. [17]

As these statements were made and as of late 1991 the U.S. was officially and exclusively pursuing Libya for the crime, freeing some Persian tongues to confess with impunity, it seems. And yet, the U.S. says, there was no Iranian revenge. The faint possibility of Tehran's involvement in Libya's atrocity has been whispered, but never clarified or pursued in the slightest. [see: Iranian vs. Libyan Role in the Lockerbie Bombing]

Iranian leaders had planned to take down an American plane (at least one), had paid for it and had bombs built and ready to go. With hard cash, glory, and blood vendetta driving them, Mohtashemi and and his contractors must have given up after the Germany bust. This is just what the FBI, CIA, USG, Scottish Police, Camp Zeist judges, and others claim to find most likely. And then just as precisely as item 8849 from Malta replaced the Bedford suitcases in the luggage container's deadliest corner, the Libyans took their own incidentally identical revenge at just that time. 

It's never been decided which motive drove the Libyans, but it's widely presumed to be the nearly three-year-old Operation: Eldorado Canyon bombings by U.S. forces. For the death of his adopted toddler daughter and a few dozen other Libyans, he ordered the Lockerbie bombing, while the level-headed Iranians waited for the court settlement and reparations after IA-655.  


At least, that's what the FBI's SCOTBOM evidence strongly illustrates. A desperate defector, an amazingly resilient timer fragment, a bizarre unverifiable printout, and a pliable soon-to-be-millionaire witness, all prove the Libyans did it through Malta, however much sense that makes. And nothing solid implicating Iran or Syria or the PFLP-GC was found anywhere in there. Move along, nothing to see here - the real Lockerbie bomber was behind bars for a while.  
---Sources: 
[1] Ghasemi, Shapour. “Shooting Down Iran Air 655 [IA655]” Iran Chamber Society: History of Iran. 2004. http://www.iranchamber.com/history/articles/shootingdown_iranair_flight655.php
[2], [3] Charles, Roger. "Sea Of Lies: The Inside Story Of How An American Naval Vessel Blundered Into An Attack On Iran Air Flight 655 At The Height Of Tensions During The Iran-Iraq War-And How The Pentagon Tried To Cover Its Tracks After 290 Innocent Civilians Died." Newsweek. July 13 1992. http://www.newsweek.com/id/126358
[4]  "The USS Vincennes: Public War, Secret War" ABC Nightline, Aired July 1 1992. Full Transcript, with extensive notes. ...
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/jksonc/docs/ir655-nightline-19920701.html
[5] Operation Praying Mantis. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Praying_Mantis
[6] Steinberg, Dana. "The 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War: A CWIHP Critical Oral History Conference." http://wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=news.print&news_id=90411&stoplayout=true 
[7] See [1]
[8] Wikipedia. Iran Air Flight 655. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655
[9] DeBraeckeleer, Ludwig. "Tehran: 'The Blood of Our Martyrs Will Be Avenged' [Diary of a Vengeance Foretold] Part 2." Oh My News International. July 4 2008.
http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?menu=c10400&no=383015&rel_no=1
[10], [15], [17] DeBraeckeleer, Ludwig. "Former Iranian President Blames Tehran for Lockerbie." http://www.thetorah.tv/misc/Former%20Iranian%20President%20Blames%20Tehran%20for%20Lockerbie.htm
[11] Biewen, John and Ian Ferguson. Shadow Over Lockerbie. 2000, American Radio Works. http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/lockerbie/story/printable_story.html 
[12]  Emerson and Duffy p 56
[13] ABC News. Feb. 16, 1989: Pan Am 103 Flight Investigation. "A bomb hidden in a cassette player brought down Pan Am 103 in December 1988." Anchor, Ted Koppel. Reporter, Barry Dunsmore, Lockerbie. Video currently viewable at:
http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=9443717 
[14] Emerson and Duffy, p 59.
[16] The Maltese Double Cross. Produced, written, and directed by Allan Francovich, Hemar Enterprises, released November 1994. 2 hours, 36 minutes. Quote at 34:00 mark. Google Video