Eva
Bartlett breaks down the dizzying array of information surrounding
the mounting humanitarian crisis in Syria’s Eastern Ghouta. With
accusations abound, parsing the reality on the ground is becoming
more challenging by the day.
by
Eva Bartlett
Part
1
On
February 20, from Amman, Jordan, UNICEF Regional Director for the
Middle East and North Africa, Geert Cappelaere, issued a statement of
“outrage” titled: “The war on children in Syria: Reports of
mass casualties among children in Eastern Ghouta and Damascus.”
The
“statement” — consisting of blank lines with the preface “No
words will do justice to the children killed, their mothers, their
fathers and their loved ones” — dovetails with corporate
media’s increasingly hysterical rhetoric on the Damascus suburb of
Ghouta, which has been plagued with chemical weapons attacks for over
four years, perpetrated by U.S.-backed proxies allied with the Nusra
Front attempting to frame the Syrian government with war crimes.
UNICEF
further wrote: “We no longer have the words to describe
children’s suffering and our outrage. Do those inflicting the
suffering still have words to justify their barbaric acts?”
Where
was UNICEF’s dramatic blank-lined protest when 200 civilians,
including 116 children, were slaughtered by terrorist factions while
in convoy from Kafraya and Foua in April 2017? These factions
included Ahrar al-Sham (supported by Turkey and Saudi Arabia),
al-Nusra (al-Qaeda), and factions of the Free Syrian Army. The Free
Syrian Army was armed by the U.S. And, according to the words of
former Qatari Prime Minister Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber al-Thani,
Qatar — with the support and coordination of Saudi Arabia, Turkey,
and the U.S.—was from the beginning supporting armed groups, even
al-Qaeda, in Syria.
This
seemingly outraged UN statement has made the rounds in corporate
media reports on eastern Ghouta, most of which cite the U.K.-based
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), run from his home by a
sole person, Osama Suleiman, who uses the pseudonym Rami Abdul
Rahman. In its recent Ghouta reports, SOHR itself does not provide
sources.
On
February 22, in the UN Security Council, UN Emergency Relief
Coordinator and head of OCHA, Mark Lowcock, spoke for just over 10
minutes about eastern Ghouta and “400,000 people besieged.”
Not once
did he mention the designated terrorist factions within. These
terrorist factions include: Jaysh al-Islam (Saudi-backed), Hayat
Tahrir al-Sham (al-Qaeda), Ahrar al-Sham, and Faylaq al-Rahman (the
main faction in Jobar, and reported to have received BGM-71 TOW
anti-tank guided missiles).
The UN
would garner much less public support and outrage if, instead of
easily-misconstrued emotive statements, it showed training videos
like this one depicting then-leader Zahran Alloush’s Army of Islam
training in eastern Ghouta with their armored tanks. This is the
reality of eastern Ghouta. Jaysh al-Islam is the group infamous for
caging civilians, including women, to use as human shields.
The UN
would garner less support still were the UN and corporate media to
show videos of civilians like this woman cursing the armed groups,
blaming them for hunger and for hoarding food, telling them to leave
Ghouta.
With
hindsight, we know now that in other formerly-occupied areas of
Syria, like East Aleppo, Homs, Madaya, al-Waer, and elsewhere, when
finally resecured from terrorist factions, civilians in these areas
spoke of terrorists hoarding food and medicine, and preventing them
from leaving — holding them hostage as human shields.
It also
transpired that the numbers the UN and corporate media were citing
about eastern Aleppo’s population —250,000 to 300,000 – were
highly inflated, double the actual numbers of civilians in eastern
areas. As I wrote previously: “110,000 civilians registered at
the Jibreen Registration center; another estimated 10 percent might
have gone straight to stay with family instead; and according to the
Red Cross, 35,000 people (“fighters” and their family members)
were evacuated out of Aleppo. The total number was thus at most
150,000, most likely significantly lower.”
In his
February 22 address, only once did the UN’s Lowcock address
terrorists’ shelling of Damascus, saying: “shelling from
eastern Ghouta is reportedly killing and injuring scores of civilians
in Damascus City.”
Why
reportedly? Why did Lowcock not take and read the testimonies of
civilians as he claims to have done of civilians in eastern Ghouta?
Damascus is far more accessible than al-Qaeda-occupied Ghouta:
Lowcock could very easily travel to the Syrian capital and meet with
some of the many civilians affected by the years of constant
mortaring from terrorist factions in eastern Ghouta. Instead, he
seems to prefer to repeat testimonies collected from afar, solely
from and on Ghouta.
For
weeks, Jaysh al-Islam, al-Qaeda, Ahrar al-Sham, and Faylaq al-Rahman
have intensified their heavy-shelling of Damascus, intentionally
targeting heavily-populated civilian areas of the city, including
schools, homes, and crowded public spaces.
These
shellings are breaches of the de-escalation zones agreement of May
2017, co-signed by Russia, Turkey and Iran. Eastern Ghouta is one of
the four areas included in the agreement of cessation of hostilities.
According to the article “6th Astana Process Talks Produce
De-Escalation Zone Agreement”: “The guarantor countries noted
‘progress in the fight against terrorism and elimination of ISIL,
Jabhat al-Nusra and all other individuals, groups, enterprises and
organisations associated with Al-Qaida or ISIL as a result of the
functioning of these de-escalation zones’ and confirmed their
determination ‘to take all necessary measures to continue to fight
them both inside and outside de-escalation zones.’”
Jaysh
al-Islam — whose political leader, Mohammed Alloush, was supposed
to participate in the May and subsequent 2017 Astana peace talks —
is one of the factions attacking Damascus. The Syrian website
Muraselon reported that the February 23 bombing of Damascus, which
killed at least one civilian, was a powerful missile, likely fired by
Jaysh al-Islam. The article referred to the terrorist group’s own
social media bragging about possessing and intending to fire said
missile on Damascus. That deserves a little outrage and more than a
passing comment.
Following
the Security Council meeting, Syria’s permanent representative to
the UN, Ambassador Bashar al-Ja’afari, spoke to the press, noting
Mr. Lowcock’s lack of objectivity in his Security Council
statement. Ambassador al-Ja’afari said: “We have an official
letter from the Resident Coordinator in Damascus, the chair of OCHA
in Syria, saying that during 2017, OCHA — with the cooperation of
the Syrian government, and Syrian Red Crescent, and International
Committee of the Red Cross — have provided humanitarian assistance
to 2.3 million people. Mr. Lowcock denied this information, while we
have it in written form coming from the head of OCHA in Damascus. So,
something is wrong. Either these people here in New York don’t read
what they get from … their own people in Damascus, or they mislead
the Security Council members about what’s going on in Syria.”
He also
corrected the lexicon of a “stifling siege,” saying: “[This]
is not consistent with the reality on the ground. Commercial trucks
have been moving constantly between Damascus and east Ghouta. The
Syrian government has been facilitating aid to eastern Ghouta, and
medical evacuations to hospitals in Damascus. The UN is ignoring
video footage posted by these terrorist groups showing women and
children pushed into metal cages on the streets.”
Regarding
the heavy shelling of Damascus that Mr. Lowcock stated is reportedly
happening, at a Security Council meeting one week prior, Ambassador
al-Ja’afari cited the over 1,000 shells from eastern Ghouta that
had targeted Damascus. On February 22, al-Ja’afari stated that the
number of shells on Damascus was now over 1,200, noting that 8
million people in Damascus were at risk.
According
to Syrian state media, SANA, the following terrorist attacks on
Damascus have occurred in the past week:
February
24: “Armed groups positioned in eastern Ghouta on Saturday
targeted with more than 55 mortar and rocket shells and with sniper
fire the residential neighborhoods in Damascus and its countryside.”
February
23: “Armed groups fire 70 rocket shells on Medical Surgery
Hospital and residential areas in Damascus and Jaramana: One civilian
was killed and 60 others were injured on Friday due to 70 rocket
shells fired by the armed groups on the residential neighborhoods of
Damascus and its Countryside.”
February
22: “Three civilians, two children among them, were killed and
28 other citizens were injured, six of them children, when the armed
groups fired shells on Damascus and its countryside.”
February
21: “A woman was killed on Wednesday while 22 persons were
injured in fresh attacks by armed groups on different Syrian
regions.” Dozens of shells.
February
20: “Thirteen civilians were killed and 77 others were injured
on Tuesday as armed groups in the Eastern Ghouta area continued their
breach of the de-escalation zones agreement, targeting residential
areas and public facilities in Damascus and its countryside with 114
rocket and mortar shells.”
February
19: “Fifteen civilians, among them children, were injured Monday
in attacks by armed groups who targeted Damascus and its countryside
with shells.”
February
18: “Armed groups positioned in some areas in Eastern Ghouta on
Sunday evening fired several shells on Bab Sharqi neighborhood in
Damascus, killing a person, injuring another.”
February
15: “Armed groups, positioned in Eastern Ghouta, launched four
shells on al-Wafideen Camp near Harasta, injuring a civilian…
Later, the armed groups targeted al-Assad Suburb with four shells,
killing one civilian and injuring others.”
The
February 23 shelling of Damascus killed a Syrian doctor: Dr. Hassan
Haj Hassan, an anesthesiologist and a professor at the Institute of
Health Technology in Damascus. He was killed by #EGhouta terrorist
shelling of Damascus.
In his
latest address at the UN Security Council, Ambassador al-Ja’afari
noted that the main headquarters of the Red Crescent in Syria, based
in Damascus, was targeted with 10 missiles, originating from Ghouta.
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