Charred Bodies Proof of Syria's al-Qubair Massacre
The charred bodies of women and children lay scattered in houses across farmland in central Syria on Thursday after a brutal massacre allegedly carried out by pro-regime militiamen, a witness told Agence France Presse.
"Burned bodies of children and women and girls were on the ground," Laith, a young villager, told AFP by telephone from near al-Qubeir, a small Sunni enclave in Hama province after the killings on Wednesday.
"I saw something you cannot imagine. It was a horrifying massacre... People were executed and burned. Bodies of young men were taken away," Laith said, his voice trembling.
He gave only his first name for fear of retribution.
The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 55 people were killed.
Laith said the killings in al-Qubeir, where not "a single demonstration" had been held against the regime, began at around 2:00 pm (1100 GMT) on Wednesday, when tanks surrounded it.
"They (Syrian troops) started to shell al-Qubeir, and did not stop until 8:00 pm," he said.
Pro-regime militiamen, known as shabiha, from nearby Alawite areas entered the hamlet, he said.
"They had guns and knives ... They went there from nearby villages like Asileh, which is Alawite," he said of the offshoot of Shiite Islam from which Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his family hail.
Laith claimed he had heard that the bodies of some young men from al-Qubeir were taken to Asileh and that "the shabiha militiamen drank and danced around their corpses, chanting songs praising Assad."
He said the murders were triggered when a farmer wanted to enter al-Qubeir but was turned away at a checkpoint between Asileh and al-Qubeir.
"The farmer still managed to get into al-Qubeir, and that's when regime forces started to deploy around the farmland," Laith said.
He vented his fury at U.N. observers for not arriving on Wednesday when they were called "about 30 times, begging them to come to al-Qubeir to see what was happening."
"But they did not come. They might as well be working with the shabiha. We just can't take this anymore... people are being killed, everything is a set-up, a lie."
On Thursday, observer chief Major General Robert Mood said the army and local residents were preventing his men from reaching the village to verify the massacre claims.
Activists from Hama also blamed the shabiha for the murders in the hamlet, where some 150 shepherds and farmers lived.
"I think they (the regime) used the thugs to deliver a message to the Syrian people that 'either you are with us or against us'," Abu Ghazi al-Hamwi -- not his real name -- told AFP via Skype.
"People who do not take sides are a target, because the regime is running out of options on how to stop the revolt. The regime tries to prove this is a war, not an uprising. And this is how they do it."
"The violence is worst in areas where Sunni and Alawite live near each other. The regime is trying to break society in half," he said.
Hamwi said he spoke to a survivor of the massacre.
"He played dead in order to survive. He could barely speak. He was in a very bad shape. You can imagine, he'd just lost 35 members of his family," Hamwi said.
The survivor, he added, escaped al-Qubeir during the night, and returned the next day. "About 25 people had already been buried, and more were buried this morning."
Hamwi also blamed U.N. observers for not heading to the massacre site quickly enough, and denounced the regime for preventing them from reaching al-Qubeir the day after the killings.
"If what the regime says is true -- that armed groups killed the people of al-Qubeir -- then why aren't they letting the U.N. monitors in?" he asked.
Another Hama-based activist, Mousab al-Hamadi said: "The regime wants to create a sectarian clash in the country. The regime wants to burn down the whole country."
Hamadi said Syrians had lost faith in the international community.
"Everyone here is depending on the FSA (Free Syrian Army)," he said, referring to rebel forces. "The international community has failed us."
Hamadi said there was no FSA presence in al-Qubeir, which he said had not been reported to have taken sides.
Asked why he thought regime forces had targeted an FSA-free farming area, Abu Saleh, another Hama-based activist, told AFP via Skype that "the regime is trying to make Syrians turn against the revolt. Activists protected by the FSA suffer fewer attacks by regime forces."
"They want to show the Syrians, the people who are neither for nor against the revolution, and who do not have arms, that they will suffer the consequences of the uprising," Abu Saleh added.
Several demonstrations were held across Hama city on Thursday in protest against the massacre, and there were strikes in the restive province, Abu Saleh said.
"Hama is important to the revolt because people from all sects have joined it here.
"Druze, Christians, Alawites and Ismailis are all demonstrating together against the regime. That is why the regime wants to make sure the movement in Hama is destroyed," Hamwi said.
Source: Agence France Presse
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