20,000 March In Syria, 37 killed yesterday

[n2doc]

4 MAR 2011 08:05 PM

Despite a high turnout of Syrians and preliminary signs of concession by the Assad government, today was an especially bloody day:

Security forces opened fire on hundreds of youths on the outskirts of Deraa on Wednesday, witnesses said, after nearly a week of protests in which seven civilians had already died. The main hospital in Deraa, near the Jordanian border, had received the bodies of at least 37 protesters killed on Wednesday, a hospital official said. That brings the number killed to at least 44 in a week of protests.

The Jerusalem Post is putting that figure at more than 100. The above video "shows protesters carrying their friend's bloodied bodies through the streets as gunshots can be heard in the background." Enduring America has several more clips of today's bloodshed. After the jump is graphic footage posted yesterday:

video at link
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/20...

What if they ask for help?

[notesdev]

1. if they ask for help

you can be assured that there will be no one listening, as all the ears with such special attunement are presently pointed elsewhere.

Syria, having no oil to speak of, is unlikely to be find itself on the agenda of the West anytime soon.

[pampango]

6. There was an effort to help Burma in 2007 when the junta cracked down there, but China and Russia

vetoed UN involvement. As far as I know Burma doesn't have any oil, but the US, UK and France were trying to get the UN to intervene there, to no avail.

[kenny blankenship]

2. What kind of help do you think we should give them?

Have you thought about what is possible here, and what else might be at risk - or are you just spankin' it?

[quinnox]

3. If they want help then the UN and US

are honor bound to step in militarily and help the glorious revolution just like Libya.

We are freedom liberators ready to lend a hand whenever an oppressed people need help.

Let freedom ring! Freedom isn't free though, so we have to cough up more billions to continue our glorious crusade.

[Selatius]

4. We don't do significant business/trade with Syria.

And Syria is a land-locked country with relatively few natural resources that can be exploited by western business interests. If they ask for help, maybe our governments will help them. Maybe they won't help them, but if they had a large amount of natural resources to exploit, I would say that our governments would be more likely to intervene in that scenario.

[kenny blankenship]

5. But they've been a very "problematic" regime for US foreign policy for decades, yes?

We -meaning not you and me but the foreign policy elites of the US- would like the Assad family and the Syrian Ba'ath Party out of the way, wouldn't we?

[Selatius]

7. Problematic, but as far as the elites in Washington go, Syria is a contained problem.

If the House of Assad were replaced, the fear would be that something even more virulent would arise in its place, something that is even less likely to obey western firepower. There was fear, for instance, that if the Egyptians sacked Mubarak, the new regime would be even less friendly to Israel.