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Syrian government forces set up a series of fires in the countryside of Latakia on the coast, burning forests, farmlands and properties, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported on March 14.
The coast is the heartland of Syria’s largest minority group, the Alawites. Over the past week, SOHR reported the death of at least 1,476 civilians, mostly Alawites, on the coast in a brutal government crackdown meant to put down a rebellion by former soldiers and officers from the sect.
The fires started by personnel from the Syrian Ministry of Defense were centered in the area of al-Qardaha, according to the London-based monitoring group, which warned that these fires “threaten the lives of civilians who fled their homes to forested areas to escape the systematic killings.”
Former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, who was overthrown last December by an Islamist coalition that’s now leading the government, is himself an Alawite from al-Qardaha.
Videos posted to social networks showed government fighters laughing after setting up the fires, which confirms SOHR’s report.
It’s worth noting that similar fires were reported in other parts of Latakia, as well as in the nearby governorate of Tartus over the last few days.
Since the start of the crackdown on March 6, the monitoring group documented some 50 massacres that mainly targeted Alawite civilians in Lattakia, Tartus, Hama and Homs.
The real death toll is expected to be much higher than the one reported by the group as many people are still missing, amid reports of government forces and loyalists burning bodies, burying them in unmarked mass graves, or even dumping them in the sea.
The Syrian interim government attempted to dodge responsibility by announcing that all operations on the coast were over, then forming an investigation committee. Nevertheless, the killings continue.
The massacres have so far displaced at least 10,000 Alawites to the governorate of Baalbek-Hermel in eastern Lebanon with more that 8,000 others taking shelter at Russia’s Khmeimim Air Base near the city of Jableh in Latakia.
In a statement drafted by both Russia and the United States, the United Nations Security Council on March 14 condemned the massacres on the Syrian coast and urged the country’s government to respect all people regardless of religion or ethnicity.
Despite facing international pressure over the killings on the coast, the Syrian government is yet to take any real steps to ease tensions or engage in any meaningful way with the Alawites. Meanwhile, the minority group seems to have lost all trust in the government, with many of its leaders demanding international protection.
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it was simply stupid how the alwite army gave up without a fight, on some very real level they deserve this.
idk if they deserve it. but i’m 100 percent behind you. they were very very dumb to surrender.
whoever put a thumbs down to your statement should tell me why the alawites were smart to surrender. i’d love to hear that point of view.
what you say is true but syria was wrecked by 14 years of genocidal sanctions. the economy fell by 85%. plus the destruction caused by 14 years of terrorist destruction. the syrian army fought quire well for most of that time. the quisling turds stole all syria’s oil and grain. sometimes there is a limit to how much people can endure. assad seems to have been suckered into a “reconciliation” with the west.r
nothing like being burned alive if you haven’t been shot in the head yet!…
special thanks to vladimir poutine and bashar a-assad!… bashar… your father would be so proud!!!
lest i forget hezbollah… where are they now???
they ran against a wall and were dead afterwards just like hamas.
more like the fifth column in iran that owns iran made a deal with their moloch kin in tel aviv!
iran lost a lot of men and a great deal of money defending syria for 10 years.
dont forget europe who have all the place in the world for refugees as long as they are sunni muslims.
hafez faced a similar foreign orchestrated uprising from the head choppers at hama in 1982. he put it down with great brutality, and saved syria from what has just happened.
ok let’s say it’s eu and erdoğan(nothing wrong with trump except minority of govern); how alawite would retaliate (can’t even defend itself) iran ignored massacre, fuck iran.
russia isn’t middle eastern, so nothing to do with russians, can’t blame them.
you got massacred and it’s ignored…
arabs best to be kept in stone age ? so after all it’s jewish/israeli mentality makes sense???
idlib should have been liberated or nuked in 2020. this is the consequence of not doing this job on time.
you hit the nail on the head, all those terrorist freaks were allowed to leave aleppo for idlib on buses instead of being exterminated and the saa offensive was stopped, now this horror is the result.
russia insisted on it.
it is sickness that commenters here think innocent people need to die . they will blame any one but the greater israel project kabal .
yes there is something wrong with them blaming the victims.
everyone who knows the european scumbags has nothing but hatred for them.
more proof that islam is nothing more than the broom of the jews.
moslems should be ashamed of themselves.
these are the uncivilized head choppers installed by amerikunts…”amerikunts have always been genocidal enjoying killing from afar”. philip slater
france,britain,turkey and usa uses sunnis against shiite historically well known. i feel for alawites