Fighting to the Death in Syria

Fifty-five explosions rocked the city of Homs, Syria, in the span of 15 minutes. Artillery and automatic gunfire pound neighborhoods. Snipers perch on rooftops, firing at civilians. Families crowd in makeshift basement shelters to avoid the violence, and the military is reportedly on a campaign to flatten every single neighborhood where opposition can be found. This is the state of play under Bashar al-Assad’s regime of terror, and those who stand against him have died by the thousands in an 11-month revolt against the government. Amid these horrid conditions, there are actions the United States can and should take to help bring aid to this suffering people.

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The explicit details of the conditions in Homs come from the eyewitness account of CNN correspondent Arwa Damon, one of the few reporters in Syria. “You can just imagine the situation people are under,” she reports, “not just from a dangerous standpoint, but the psychological impact that this is having on these families, these civilians, who are stuck in these areas unable to get to safe ground or unable to get adequate medical treatment should they be hit in these attacks.” The violence has taken its toll. To date, the regime has killed more than 7,000 people, most of whom were unarmed demonstrators, has jailed more than 10,000, and “disappeared” thousands more. Yet opposition to Assad continues in the face of escalating attacks, with some indications that the military is losing ground as the army loses thousands of defectors. As the suffering continues, the international community has done precious little to halt the violence. The Arab League sent an observer mission to Syria but withdrew when the Assad regime failed to keep commitments to halt its repression. The United Nations has been ineffectual, with Russia repeatedly vetoing efforts by the Security Council to take action. China, which also vetoed U.N. action, is sending a diplomat to Syria but opposes regime change. And today, the U.N. is scheduled to vote on a resolution to strongly condemn the human rights violations and to back an Arab League plan to end the conflict, but the action would be non-binding, merely sending a message to the Assad regime, with no teeth attached.

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