Syria and UN Security Council Decision

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An update on the death toll - from SOHR, the source that was quoted over and over again in the "western" press ... until they started to break down the numbers in their reports and the picture didn't fit the narrative.

Daily Star said:
[...] "Ever since the first casualty of the Syrian revolution was registered on March 18, 2011 in Daraa province, the deaths of 171,509 people have been documented," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Among the dead were 56,495 civilians, including 9,092 children, according to the toll, which included casualties documented up to July 8 this year.

Another 65,803 were regime troops and pro-regime militiamen, while 46,301 were rebels seeking President Bashar Assad's ouster and members of the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) jihadist group.

The rebel toll includes 15,422 non-Syrians who traveled to the war-torn country to join the ranks of jihadists or local Islamist opposition groups.

Among the ranks of loyalists killed were 39,036 regular troops, as well as 24,655 members of pro-regime militias, 509 fighters from Lebanon's Shiite Hezbollah, and 1,603 other non-Syrians fighting on Assad's side in the war.

Meanwhile, the deaths of 2,910 unidentified victims were also documented, according to the Observatory. [...]
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Those numbers are terrible.

Though the percentage of civilians is lower than I would have guessed.

Hezbollah's casualties are pretty low compared to the SA. I wonder how that happened.
 
Eddie Dane said:
Those numbers are terrible.

Though the percentage of civilians is lower than I would have guessed.

Hezbollah's casualties are pretty low compared to the SA. I wonder how that happened.
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You wonder how that happened? Maybe what you read about their involvement was exaggerated? Like what they told you about "the dictator is killing his own people" while the largest group of casualties are regular soldiers of the Syrian Arab Army? Maybe you have been lied to, Eddie? ;):rolleyes:
 
Childlike Empress said:
You wonder how that happened? Maybe what you read about their involvement was exaggerated? Like what they told you about "the dictator is killing his own people" while the largest group of casualties are regular soldiers of the Syrian Arab Army? Maybe you have been lied to, Eddie? ;):rolleyes:
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Not sure why I'm getting rolling eye smiley's here.

The Assad regime's tactic for repressing an uprising was always the use of extreme and disproportionate violence. See Hama massacre.
So, the initial violent reaction to the early Arab spring movement was in character and most certainly not a 'lie'.

What was a lie, was the Western liberal narrative that all those Islamophobic pessimists were wrong in thinking that the opposition would be hijacked by extreme Islamists.

In 2011 it was a choice between a fascist and a democracy movement. The West (team America) backed the democratic movement because the fascist belongs to the a different power-bloc (team Russia/Iran). I have no illusions they act out of principle.
But after the rise of the Islamic militias, the choice is now between the equivalents of Mussolini and Pol Pot.

My question regarding HB casualties: they went in and turned the tide for the SA, yet only lose 500 guys. Both the SA and the "Rebels" have casualty figures that approach the US losses in the Vietnam War.
Is HB that much better trained? Or just fresh troops arriving when the rebels were exhausted had bad logistical support?

It's probably unknown, too much chaos, too much distortion.
 
I like to play the following video when someone parrots the lie that it has been a peaceful movement in the beginning. It shows the burning court house and cars in Deraa on March 20, 2011, the first week of the events in the city where it started. From our evidence collection March 2011. You get the rolling eyes for really not paying attention while hanging around here all the time.

 
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Full text of Assad's speech at the swearing-in ceremony yesterday. Interesting read, no matter where you come from. One thing this guy surely doesn't lack: confidence.

President of Syria said:
[...] They preached: “They bow only before Allah” – your response was to never bow before their masters, to never surrender, to never give up. You stood fast and held fast to your homeland, always believing in one God, a God who doesn’t share His powers with super-nations and who can never be substituted for oil or dollars. And when they said; “Allahu Akbar” – God was greater than them and their supporters, because God is always on the side of justice and justice is on the side of the people. [...]
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I see CLE still carrying the torch and doing a bang-up job documenting all the hypocrisy in this story.

Fun to see how the Syrian rebels are bad guys now. Well, at least when they're in Iraq.

Western Media: "ISIS is bad!"
Syria: "Stop the presses!" [/sarcasm]
 
Captain.Sassy said:
I see CLE still carrying the torch and doing a bang-up job documenting all the hypocrisy in this story.

Fun to see how the Syrian rebels are bad guys now. Well, at least when they're in Iraq.

Western Media: "ISIS is bad!"
Syria: "Stop the presses!" [/sarcasm]
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I've never seen a situation where the alliances were such a garbeled mess.

Governments have always covered the reasons why they back certain groups with stories of principles.
We could see why Pinochet was 'our monster', he was anti-commie and commies were scary.

But now we have groups that are our enemy here, and our monster there.
 
From my new report on the Houla Massacre (inviting review here), after the part about Assad's strategy to wipe out Syri'a Sunnis:
See also the voting record of Syria's people; almost exactly two years after the Houla Massacre, on June 3, 2014, the “dictator” Assad won*the popular vote for president with a widely-accepted 88.7% of the votes cast, by 73% of Syria's eligible voters. In a nation that hosted about 20-22 million people before the war, with many millions since then either: convinced by the massive effort to get Syrians to violently oppose Assad; killed in fghting, shelling, or massacres that unleashed; fallen into rebel-held areas where voting wasn't allowed; or fed to “democratic” countries where voting wasn't allowed. Despite these accumulated losses, the returns say, over 10.3 million votes for Assad were cast. [49] That's roughly 50% of all Syria's people, including babies and rebels. This cannot refect anything but widespread support among all segments of society, including the Sunni majority. It doesn't impress Barrack Obama, for example, but that's irrelevant to the facts on the ground.

Furthermore, the remaining 1.23 million or so votes cast for the other guys also endorsed the “farce” of an election and so defied the rebels and their Western patrons. All told, if the numbers are correct, 11.53 million Syrian voices said no, once again, to the plan others had made for them.
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And those numbers don't make you think that maybe the votes were padded?

In a nation fighting a lengthy civil war, nearly every eligible voter cast their vote, including those in areas where the government wasn't going to be able to set up a polling station, and in a country of 22 million pre civil war, they say that about 70% of the population is of voting age?

Guess Assad listened to the old Upper Canadian adage on elections: "Vote early, vote often."
 
That's a neat guess.

It's possible it's padded or whatever, but I see no easy flick-o-the-wrist observation that could support a "guess" of any weight. "Eligible voters" I think means you don't register. You're (over 18?) a citizen, not wanted for a crime, etc. 73% of those voted. All major cities remain gov. held for the most part. Towns of all sizes on the coast. The biggest portion by far who fled were to Lebanon and guess what? They were allowed to vote there. Displaced people with nothing else to do will vote like hell - early and emphatically.

Early and "often" is illegal. Please provide evidence if you really allege that.
 
I discussed that with him earlier. He (like many also regarding ISIS lately) has a complete false idea of how many people are in "rebel"-controlled areas. Even the Kurds, the largest group somehow not under central rule, voted, although likely with lesser participation rate. Can't find a post vote article just now but read some comments indicating that at least in Hasaka and Qamishli the participation was much higher than predicted. But here's an interesting pre vote article about the election in Rojava.
 
Childlike Empress said:
I discussed that with him earlier. He (like many also regarding ISIS lately) has a complete false idea of how many people are in "rebel"-controlled areas. Even the Kurds, the largest group somehow not under central rule, voted, although likely with lesser participation rate. Can't find a post vote article just now but read some comments indicating that at least in Hasaka and Qamishli the participation was much higher than predicted. But here's an interesting pre vote article about the election in Rojava.
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Well voting didn't take place in opposition controlled areas (source: Al Jahzeera, and voting was not allowed by Syrians in a number of countries. including Turkey where there are a large number of refugees, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE - all in all there are about 2.5 million refugees, and 5.1 million displaced persons within Syria.

The official results had nearly 16 million people vote (73.42% of the eligible voters, or 21,582,096 eligible votors - impressive in a country with a pre-civil war population of 23 million) - which would lead one to question the official figures for voter turn out - either Syrian election officials padded their numbers, or practically all eligibile Syrians voted (even those in rebel areas), or the voting age in Syria is ridiculously low.
 
Border Reiver said:
Well voting didn't take place in opposition controlled areas (source: Al Jahzeera, and voting was not allowed by Syrians in a number of countries. including Turkey where there are a large number of refugees, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE - all in all there are about 2.5 million refugees, and 5.1 million displaced persons within Syria.

The official results had nearly 16 million people vote (73.42% of the eligible voters, or 21,582,096 eligible votors - impressive in a country with a pre-civil war population of 23 million) - which would lead one to question the official figures for voter turn out - either Syrian election officials padded their numbers, or practically all eligibile Syrians voted (even those in rebel areas), or the voting age in Syria is ridiculously low.
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The fact that you quote Al Jazeera on anything regarding Syria says a lot about your knowledge of the topic. Al Jazeera has blood on its hands and many good reporters have left it over their Syria coverage.

You seriously messed up the numbers this time, btw. It's ~16 million eligible voters and ~11,5 million turnout officially. No wonder it looks nonsensical to you if you make it up to look so.
 
Childlike Empress said:
The fact that you quote Al Jazeera on anything regarding Syria says a lot about your knowledge of the topic. Al Jazeera has blood on its hands and many good reporters have left it over their Syria coverage.

You seriously messed up the numbers this time, btw. It's ~16 million eligible voters and ~11,5 million turnout officially. No wonder it looks nonsensical to you if you make it up to look so.
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first - mea culpa on the figures - I misread them and yes, the numbers in in my post immediately befor this are wrong.

That being said, I still doubt that with all the population disruption of the civil war, the number of countries where ex-pats could not cast a ballot and the inability of Syrians resident in rebel controlled areas that those numbers have not been padded. Not withstanding, Assad very likely did win the popular vote in the areas controlled by the Syrian government - given that his opposition candidates had to be vetted and approved by the Syrian Parliament in order to run, claiming that this was an exercise in free democracy is frankly ludicrious.
 
JihadJane said:
Lol.

What a difference a year makes. From calling Assad the "new Hitler" the US is now cooperating with Syria's president in combatting ISIS

US military action in the Middle East virtually never fulfills the stated goals, says Glenn Greenwald, and achieves little other than justifying endless military action for its own sake.
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Breaking news: Policy decisions in a large democracy are subject to politics!
 
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