The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

The mysterious identity of the "King of the North" and "Small Horn" discussed here. The "Great War" of Daniel 10:1 (NIV) discussed here. The heavenly & earthly establishment of God's Kingdom discussed here at length. Answers such questions as when does Jesus' Kingdom Rule begin and end.

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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#76 Post by Sunshine » Sun Nov 27, 2011 7:31 pm

Egypt Unrest Casts Shadow Over Polls
Image
A protester shouts in front of the headquarters of the Egyptian cabinet in Cairo November 26, 2011. REUTERS/Esam Al-Fetori.
Reuters
Article Source
By Marwa Awad

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian protesters demanding an end to army rule clashed with police firing tear gas in central Cairo on Saturday in a flare-up that cast another shadow over a parliamentary election billed as the nation's first free vote in decades.

Two days of voting begin on Monday in the first stage of a complex, drawn-out election that will be completed in January.

One protester, Ahmed Sayed, 21, died after being hit by a riot police vehicle in the clashes. His death was the first since a truce between police and protesters on Thursday calmed violence that had killed 41 people around Cairo's Tahrir Square and elsewhere.

Alarmed by the violence, the United States and the European Union have urged a swift handover to civilian rule in a country where prolonged political turmoil has compounded economic woes.
Image
A protester shouts in front of the headquarters of the Egyptian cabinet in Cairo November 26, 2011. REUTERS/Ahmed Jadallah
The latest clash occurred near the cabinet office on the second day of a sit-in to protest against the army's appointment of 78-year-old Kamal Ganzouri, a premier under ousted President Hosni Mubarak, to form a "national salvation government."

An army source said the ruling military council held separate talks with presidential candidates Mohamed ElBaradei and Amr Moussa. "I met Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi over the current crisis and discussed ways to resolve it," Moussa told Reuters later, but gave no details.

ElBaradei's office said in a statement that he had been in touch with all relevant parties to "activate the demands of the revolution." It said he had met Tantawi and army chief of staff Sami Enan to discuss these demands, without reaching agreement.

Protest groups have named ElBaradei as their choice to head a civilian body to supervise Egypt's transition to democracy instead of the army council that took over from Mubarak.

Ganzouri met with youth activists, but the April 6 movement, prominent in the anti-Mubarak revolt, disavowed those involved, saying they were "planted by the military council."

Ganzouri told reporters he had not yet offered anyone a ministerial portfolio. "I am ready to sit with all political currents. The new government will have new faces and youth will be part of it as they are the backbone of this nation," he said.

Tahrir Square protesters have dismissed Ganzouri, premier from 1996 to 1999, as another face from the past whose appointment reflects the generals' resistance to change.

A television clip circulated on Facebook in the past 24 hours shows him sitting one seat away from Tantawi on January 25, the first day of Egypt's revolt, as they listen to a speech by former Interior Minister Habib al-Adli, who is on trial with Mubarak on charges of ordering protesters to be killed.

"Down, down with the marshal," a group chanted in Tahrir, near tents set up on grassy patches. They were referring to Tantawi, who was Mubarak's defense minister for 20 years.
Image
A protester chants slogans during a demonstration against the Egyptian military council in Tahrir square in Cairo November 25, 2011. REUTERS/Esam Al-Fetori
ACCIDENTAL KILLING

The Interior Ministry said the protester had been killed by accident, an account backed by Ahmad Zeidan, 18, an activist at the sit-in who said he had seen the youth being run over.

"It wasn't deliberate. They (police) were retreating quickly because (protesters) were throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails at them," he said. The demonstrators had come from Tahrir to confront police vehicles apparently heading for the square.

The turmoil of the past week has overshadowed the election, whose initial stage involves Cairo, Alexandria and other areas.

One declared reason for the polling marathon is because judges, who retain public respect for their independence, will supervise the election and there are not enough of them available for a single day of nationwide voting.

Reflecting security concerns, Ahmed al-Zind, head of Egypt's Judges Club, told a news conference the organization had taken out private insurance to cover all the judges involved.

Protesters in Tahrir seemed in two minds about the election.

Emad Mohamed, 35, wearing a hat in Egyptian national colors, had no faith in the vote, saying it would enable Mubarak-era politicians to make a come-back. "We do not think it is in our interest. Where are the new parties?" he asked.

But Yasser Nasr, assisting at a makeshift clinic, said: "They cannot delay elections. It will mess up the situation. Once they happen, hopefully things will improve."

The Muslim Brotherhood and other mainstream parties which have not joined the protesters in Tahrir want the election to go ahead, eager to establish a strong presence in parliament.
Image
Egyptians stand on top of barricades surrounding the Interior Ministry near Tahrir square in Cairo November 25, 2011. REUTERS/Esam Al-Fetori
They have accepted the army's transition timetable, but the demonstrators are demanding an immediate end to military rule.

Instead, the generals have promised that a new president will be elected by mid-2012, sooner than previously announced.

While tens of thousands packed Tahrir Square for what activists dubbed "Last Chance Friday," at least 5,000 people demonstrated in support of the army in another Cairo square, highlighting splits between youngsters bent on radical reform and people upset by the unrest who want to restore normality.

Ganzouri described his task as thankless and "extremely difficult," saying his priority was to secure the streets and revive the economy. Egypt's pound has hit a seven-year low and foreign reserves have dropped by a third since December 2010.

Protest groups have called for another mass rally on Sunday to press demands for an immediate transfer of power.


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#77 Post by Sunshine » Sun Nov 27, 2011 7:35 pm

Yemen Presidential Election Set For February 21
Image
A woman holding a poster of Yemen's President Ali Abdullah Saleh takes part in a rally to show support for Saleh during Friday prayers in Sanaa November 25, 2011. REUTERS/Mohamed al-Sayaghi
Reuters
Article Source

SANAA (Reuters) - Yemen's vice president called presidential elections for February 21 on Saturday under a deal aimed at ending months of protests against President Ali Abdullah Saleh that have brought the country to the edge of civil war.

If the agreement goes according to plan, Saleh will become the fourth Arab ruler brought down by mass demonstrations that have reshaped the political landscape of the Middle East.

Saleh returned home on Saturday after signing the deal with the opposition in Riyadh on Wednesday under which he transferred his powers to Vice President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi after 33 years in office and 10 months of protests.

In a decree run on the Saba state news agency on Saturday, Hadi said Yemenis "are called on to vote in early elections for a new president of the republic starting at 8 o'clock on the morning of Tuesday, February 21, 2012."

"The early presidential election will take place under the management of the Supreme Commission For Elections and Referendum," the decree added.

Yemen has become engulfed under Saleh by political strife that has allowed free rein to northern rebels, southern secessionists and al-Qaeda.

Under the agreement, signed with the Yemeni opposition at a ceremony hosted by Saudi King Abdullah, Saleh will receive immunity from prosecution and keep his title until a successor is elected. Hadi was charged with calling the election within three months and forming a new government with the opposition.

Hundreds of people have been killed during months of protests seeking Saleh's overthrow. The political deadlock has reignited conflicts with separatists and militants, raising fears that al Qaeda's Yemen wing could take a foothold on the borders of Saudi Arabia, the world's top oil exporter.

Details of the power transfer deal - drawn up by Yemen's richer neighbors in the Gulf Cooperation Council earlier this year, and thwarted by Saleh on three separate occasions - were hammered out by U.N. envoy Jamal Benomar, with support from U.S. and European diplomats.

The deal has failed to appease protesters at Sanaa's Change Square, with many of them angry that it has guaranteed Saleh and his family immunity.

On Friday, opposition parties agreed to nominate the head of an alliance that led the protests, Mohammed Basindwa, to form a new government. Basindwa is a former foreign minister who leads the opposition National Council formed after the protests broke out in February.

SALAFI SITES SHELLED

Earlier on Saturday, 10 people were killed in north Yemen when Shi'ite Muslim rebels shelled positions held by Sunni Islamist Salafi fighters after the collapse of a week-old ceasefire, a Salafi spokesman said.

The conflict between the Shi'ite Houthi rebels and the Sunni Salafis is just one of several plaguing Yemen. In recent weeks, the Houthis have skirmished with Salafist fighters, leading local tribesmen to broker a truce between them a week ago.

"The Houthis broke the ceasefire and shelled the town of Damaj," said the Salafi spokesman, who identified himself as Abu Ismail, adding that 15 people were injured.

Members of the Zaidi sect of Shi'ite Islam, the Houthi rebels led an uprising based in the northern Saada province that Saleh's forces have struggled to crush, with Saudi Arabia intervening militarily in 2009 before a ceasefire took hold last year.

The Houthis, who effectively control Saada, are deeply wary of Saudi Arabia's promotion of puritanical Sunni Salafi creeds that regard Shi'ites as heretics.

Saleh Habra, a Houthi leader, has accused the Yemeni government of supplying arms to the Salafis, who he said were trying to build a military camp near the Saudi border. "We are trying to cut off their arms supplies," Habra told Reuters last week.

Separately, Yemeni aircraft bombed sites used by anti-government tribal militants in northern Sanaa, killing seven people, tribal sources said on Saturday.

Those sources said tribal fighters were seeking to surround a camp used by the Republican Guard, a unit led by Saleh's son.


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#78 Post by Sunshine » Sun Nov 27, 2011 7:39 pm

In Unprecedented Step, Arab League Sanctions Syria
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A Syrian immigrant shows a V-sign decorated as the revolutionary Syrian flag during a rally against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in front of the Syrian embassy in Sofia, on Sunday, Nov. 27, 2011. More than 3,500 people have died in months of anti-government protests in Syria, according to the UN. (AP Photo/Valentina Petrova)
Associated Press
Article Source
By ELIZABETH A. KENNEDY and MAAMOUN YOUSSEF

BEIRUT (AP) — In an unprecedented move against an Arab nation, the Arab League on Sunday approved economic sanctions on Syria to pressure Damascus to end its deadly suppression of an 8-month-old uprising against President Bashar Assad.

But even as world leaders abandon Assad, the regime has refused to ease a military assault on dissent that already has killed more than 3,500 people. On Sunday, Damascus slammed the sanctions as a betrayal of Arab solidarity and insisted a foreign conspiracy was behind the revolt, all but assuring more bloodshed will follow.

The sanctions are among the clearest signs yet of the isolation Syria is suffering because of the crackdown. Damascus has long boasted of being a powerhouse of Arab nationalism, but Assad has been abandoned by some of his closest allies and now his Arab neighbors. The growing movement against his regime could transform some of the most enduring alliances in the Middle East and beyond.

At a news conference in Cairo, Qatari Foreign Minister Hamad bin Jassim said 19 of the League's 22 member nations approved a series of tough punishments that include cutting off transactions with the Syrian central bank, halting Arab government funding for projects in Syria and freezing government assets. Those sanctions are to take effect immediately.

Other steps, including halting flights and imposing travel bans on some, as-yet unnamed Syrian officials, will come later after a committee reviews them.

"The Syrian people are being killed but we don't want this. Every Syrian official should not accept killing even one person," bin Jassim said. "Power is worth nothing while you stand as an enemy to your people."

He added that the League aims to "to avoid any suffering for the Syrian people."

Iraq and Lebanon — important trading partners for Syria — abstained from the vote, which came after Damascus missed an Arab League deadline to agree to allow hundreds of observers into the country as part of a peace deal Syria agreed to early this month to end the crisis.

Arab League Secretary General Nabil Elaraby said the bloc will reconsider the sanctions if Syria carries out the Arab-brokered plan, which includes pulling tanks from the streets and ending violence against civilians.

The regime, however, has shown no signs of easing its crackdown, and activist groups said more than 30 people were killed Sunday. The death toll was impossible to confirm. Syria has banned most foreign journalists and prevented independent reporting inside the country.

The Local Coordinating Committees, a coalition of Syrian activist groups, praised the sanctions but called for a mechanism to ensure compliance.

"The sanctions leave open the opportunity for the regime to commit fraud and strip the sanctions of any substance, thereby prolonging the suffering of the Syrian people at the hands of an oppressive and brutal regime," the group said.

The Arab League move is the latest in a growing wave of international pressure pushing Damascus to end its crackdown. The European Union and the United States already have imposed sanctions, the League has suspended Syria's membership and world leaders increasingly are calling on Assad to go. But as the crisis drags on, the violence appears to be spiraling out of control as attacks by army defectors increase and some protesters take up arms to protect themselves.

Syria has seen the bloodiest crackdown against the Arab Spring's eruption of protests, and has descended into a deadly grind. Though internationally isolated, Assad appears to have a firm grip on power with the loyalty of most of the armed forces, which in the past months have moved from city to city to put down uprisings. In each place, however, protests have resumed.
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In this photo taken during a government-organized tour for the media, Syrian army officers carry the coffin of one of the 17 army members, including six elite pilots and four technical officers who the military said were killed in an ambush on Thursday during their funeral procession, in Homs province, Syria, on Saturday Nov. 26, 2011. The military blamed terrorists for the ambush and has vowed to "cut every evil hand" that targets the country's security. Syria is facing mounting international pressure to end a bloody crackdown on an uprising against the rule of President Bashar Assad that the U.N. says has killed more than 3,500 people. The Arab League was meeting Saturday to consider the possibility of sweeping economic sanctions. (AP Photo/Bassem Tellawi)
The escalating bloodshed has raised fears of civil war — a worst-case scenario in a country that is a geographical and political keystone in the heart of the Middle East.

Syria borders five countries with whom it shares religious and ethnic minorities and, in Israel's case, a fragile truce. Its web of allegiances extends to Lebanon's powerful Hezbollah movement and Iran's Shiite theocracy. Chaos in Syria could send unsettling ripples across the region.

For now, Assad still has a strong bulwark to prevent his meeting the same fate as the leaders of Egypt, Tunisia or Libya anytime soon. His key advantages are the support of Russia and China, fear among many Syrians about a future without Assad, and the near-certainty that foreign militaries will stay away.

But the unrest is eviscerating the economy, threatening the business community and prosperous merchant classes that are key to propping up the regime. An influential bloc, the business leaders have long traded political freedoms for economic privileges.

The opposition has tried to rally these largely silent, but hugely important, sectors of society. But Assad's opponents have failed so far to galvanize support in Damascus and Aleppo — the two economic centers in Syria.

Sunday's sanctions, however, could chip away at their resolve.

Since the revolt began, the regime has blamed the bloodshed on terrorists acting out a foreign conspiracy to divide and undermine Syria. The bloodshed has laid bare Syria's long-simmering sectarian tensions, with disturbing reports of Iraq-style sectarian killings.

Syria is an overwhelmingly Sunni country of 22 million, but Assad and the ruling elite belong to the minority Alawite sect. Assad, and his father before him, stacked key military posts with Alawites to meld the fates of the army and the regime — a tactic aimed at compelling the army to fight to the death to protect the Assad family dynasty.

Until recently, most of the bloodshed was caused by security forces firing on mainly peaceful protests. Lately, there have been growing reports of army defectors and armed civilians fighting Assad's forces — a development that some say plays into the regime's hands by giving government troops a pretext to crack down with overwhelming force.


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#79 Post by Sunshine » Tue Dec 27, 2011 12:32 pm

Mass anti-Assad protest in Homs as monitors visit
Story by: Mariam Karouny & Erika Solomon
Date: December 27th, 2011

Source of Article

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of Syrians in Homs rallied on Tuesday against President Bashar al-Assad, emboldened by Arab peace monitors' first tour of the flashpoint city, after the army withdrew some tanks following battles that killed 34 people in 24 hours.

"There are at least 70,000 protesters. They are marching towards the city centre and the security forces are trying to stop them. They are firing teargas," Rami Abdelrahman of the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told Reuters.

The observers want to determine if Assad is keeping his promise to implement a peace plan to end his uncompromising military crackdown on nine months of popular revolt that has generated an armed uprising, edging Syria towards civil war.

Some protesters shouted "we want international protection" in a video posted on YouTube apparently showing a street encounter with the Arab League observers in which some residents argued and pleaded with them to venture further into the Baba Amr quarter, where clashes have been especially fierce.

Bursts of gunfire erupted towards the end of a video, after a resident yelled at one monitor to repeat what he had just told his headquarters.

"You were telling the head of the mission that you cannot cross to the second street because of the gunfire. Why don't you say it to us?" the man shouted, grabbing the unidentified monitor by his jacket.

Gunshots crackled nearby as two monitors and two men wearing orange vests stood amid a crowd of residents, one begging the team to "come and see; they are slaughtering us, I swear."

Damascus has barred most foreign journalists from the country, making it hard to check events on the ground.

The head of mission said the first visit was "very good."

"I am returning to Damascus for meetings and I will return tomorrow to Homs," Sudanese General Mustafa Dabi said. "The team is staying in Homs. Today was very good and all sides were responsive."

Activist reports just before the monitors arrived said up to a dozen tanks were seen leaving Baba Amr but others were being hidden to fashion a false impression of relative normality in the city while observers were around.

"My house is on the eastern entrance of Baba Amr. I saw at least six tanks leave the neighborhood at around 8 in the morning (0600 GMT)," Mohamed Saleh told Reuters by telephone. "I do not know if more remain in the area."

Al Jazeera television showed an estimated 20,000 Syrians in a square in Khalidiya, one of four districts where there has been bloodshed as rebels fight security forces using tanks.

They were whistling and shouting and waving flags, playing music over loudspeakers and clapping. Women were advised to leave because of the risk of bloodshed. But a speaker urged the men to "come down, brothers."

The protesters shouted "We have no one but God" and "Down with the regime." An activist named Tamir told Reuters they planned to hold a sit-in in the square.

"We tried to start a march down to the main market but the organizers told us to stop, it's too dangerous. No one dares go down to the main streets. So we will stay in Khalidiya and we will stay here in the square and we will not leave from here."

ASSAD ISOLATED

The autocratic Assad is internationally isolated. Western powers and his neighbors Turkey and Jordan have called on him to step down, which would end a 41-year-old family dynasty.

He says he is fighting Islamist terrorism steered from abroad and has defied calls to make way for a reformist succession as has transpired in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia after popular uprisings toppled dictators this year.

Armed insurgency is eclipsing civilian protest in Syria. Many fear a slide to sectarian war between the Sunni Muslim majority, the driving force of the protest movement, and minorities that have mostly stayed loyal to the government, particularly the Alawite sect to which Assad belongs.

Analysts say the Arab League is anxious to avoid civil war. Western powers have shown no desire to intervene militarily in a volatile region of Middle East conflict. The U.N. Security Council is split, with Russia - a major arms supplier to Assad - and China opposed to any hint of military intervention.

Assad's opponents appear divided on aims and tactics. He retains strong support in important areas - including Damascus and the second city Aleppo - of the country, and maintains a critical anti-Israel alliance with Iran.

WAIT AND SEE

Homs protesters appeared to take heart from the monitors' sudden presence. They want to impress on the Arab League mission that it must not let its teams be hoodwinked by the state and be shown places where life looks relatively normal.

As the monitors arrived, tanks were seen leaving the Baba Amr district which activists say was pounded for the past four days. Hundreds have been killed in Homs in the revolt - among the 5,000 the United Nations have died as a result of violence nationwide since protests began in March.

In Baba Amr on Monday, activist video showed bodies in pieces and buildings smashed as if by heavy weapons. The images were impossible to verify.

"We do not want to jump to conclusions and say that this delegation is not objective or did not look for the truth," said Moulhem Droubi, top ranking Muslim Brotherhood member on the Syrian National Council, the opposition umbrella group in exile.

"It is not fair yet to judge. Let's wait and see what it will do," he told Reuters by phone from somewhere outside Syria.

"I expect it will be able to write a report with many facts because the facts are so clear. If they go to Baba Amr they will see that there is destruction."

On the border with Turkey, Syrian forces killed "several" men from an "armed terrorist group" trying to cross into Syria, the state news agency SANA said on Tuesday.

The northern border has become the route of choice for infiltration by army defectors fighting to topple Assad since Turkey's government, once a close ally, parted ways with him over the bloody repression of protesters.

SANA also reported that said "an armed terrorist group targeted and sabotaged a gas pipeline near Rastan in Homs province" on Tuesday. The pipeline has been attacked several times in recent months and returned to operation each time.

Syria stalled the Arab League for months before accepting the monitoring mission, the first significant international intervention on the ground since the start of the popular revolt inspired by Arab pro-democracy uprisings this year.

The Arab delegation started with 50 monitors who arrived on Monday. About 100 more are to follow soon.

(editing by Mark Heinrich)

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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#80 Post by Sunshine » Sat Jan 28, 2012 3:52 pm

Arab League Suspends Syria Mission As Violence Rages

Image
Actors wearing giant masks of Bashar al-Assad and Vladimir Putin dump dozens of bloodied body bags outside the UN Security Council building January 24. The Syrian National Council has urged Syria's diaspora to protest outside Russian diplomatic missions against Moscow's opposition to a draft resolution on Syria at the UN Security Council. (AFP Photo/Timothy A. Clary)
Reuters
Article Source
By Ayman Samir and Erika Solomon

CAIRO/BEIRUT (Reuters) - The Arab League suspended its monitoring mission in Syria on Saturday due to deteriorating conditions in the country, as state security forces battled rebels holding three suburbs just outside the capital Damascus.

The decision comes days after the Arab League called for President Bashar al-Assad to step down, following 10 months of revolt against his rule. It will take an Arab peace plan to the U.N. Security Council next week.

"Given the critical deterioration of the situation in Syria and the continued use of violence ... it has been decided to immediately stop the work of the Arab League's mission to Syria pending presentation of the issue to the league's council," Secretary-General Nabil Elaraby said in a statement.

Arab League foreign ministers are expected to discuss early next month the possibility of withdrawing monitors completely, a League official said, but added that the secretary general could pull monitors out at any time if necessary.

A Syrian official said the government could not yet comment.

The Arab League's job was to observe implementation of its peace plan. Though its mandate was extended for a second month, critics lambasted the mission for its failure to stem bloodshed. It was further undermined when Gulf states withdrew their monitors last week, saying the team could not stop the violence.

Diplomatic pressure, tempered by continued support from Russia and regional power Iran, has yet to halt Assad's crackdown on unrest that it blames on foreign-backed militants.

FIGHTING, DEFECTIONS NEAR CAPITAL

Fighting raged outside three rebel-held suburbs of Damascus on Saturday, activists said. They said the army was trying to prevent insurgents from solidifying a stronghold just 15 minutes outside the capital.
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Demonstrators protest against Syria's President Bashar al-Assad after Friday prayers in Hula near Homs, January 27, 2012. REUTERS/Handout
But insurgents were emboldened by a string of reports of army desertions amid the fighting. Activists said a group of deserters brought with them the three tanks they operated.

A spokesman for the rebel forces, known as the Free Syrian Army (FSA), said he did not have a complete tally but estimated that over 100 soldiers deserted in the area.

Activists told Reuters by telephone that rebels who control the towns of Saqba, Kafr Batna and Jisreen were exchanging fire with soldiers. Military forces earlier fired from tanks and had used anti-aircraft guns and mortars, they said.

Six residents were killed and dozens wounded as fighting raged, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

A video uploaded by activists, purported to be from a rebel-held Damascus suburb, showed smoke rising from behind a mosque and heavy gunfire erupted in the background as residents screamed "Allahu Akbar (God is greatest)."

It was not possible to verify the video or many of the details from activists, as media access is restricted in Syria

The FSA agreed a truce last week for state forces to withdraw from rebel-held Zabadani, 30 minutes from Damascus. It says the number of desertions there had forced the army's hand.

What began as peaceful protests against four decades of Assad family rule last March has grown more violent as rebels, including army defectors, began fighting back.

"I think they want to try to avoid another Zabadani situation here, so they hope to crush this. But there have been several army defections and we hope this will force them to negotiate," Abu Ishaq said on Skype from the town of Saqba.

Fighting also flared in central Homs province, activists said, after an oil pipeline was blown up on Saturday morning.

The United Nations said in December that more than 5,000 people had been killed by Syrian forces. Syria says over 2,000 security forces have been killed by militants.
Image
Syrian people carry a coffin during the funeral of Mazen abou Dhahab who killed in a protest in Saqba in Damascus suburbs, January 27, 2012. REUTERS/ Ahmed Jadallah (SYRIA - Tags: CIVIL UNREST POLITICS)
The state news agency SANA said "terrorist groups" killed seven soldiers, including an officer, in the Damascus suburbs on Saturday. SANA also reported the burial of 28 members of Syrian security forces killed in several revolt hotspots across the country, showing pictures of bloodied corpses and a funeral procession lead by soldiers carrying flower wreaths.

U.N. RESOLUTION TALKS

In the central city of Hama activists said they found the bodies of 17 men previously in security force custody, shot in the head. They said the killing took place during a military offensive on the town this week.

On Friday, the Security Council discussed a European-Arab draft U.N. Security Council resolution aimed at halting the bloodshed in Syria. Britain and France said they hoped to put the draft resolution to a vote next week.

The Arab League's deputy secretary general said the group was also in talks with Russia ahead of its Security Council meeting this week.

There was no comment yet from Russian officials, but Moscow's U.N. ambassador Vitaly Churkin previously said Russia found the plan unacceptable though he said Moscow was willing to "engage."

Russia joined China in vetoing a previous Western draft resolution in October and which has since promoted its own draft. Churkin said Moscow wanted a Syrian-led political process, not "an Arab League-imposed outcome of a political process that has not yet taken place" or Libyan-style "regime change.

The prominent opposition Syrian National Council said it was joining the Arab League at its Security Council meeting to request "protection." The SNC has previously called for international forces to implement a no-fly zone in Syria.

Turkish officials say the number of Syrians seeking sanctuary in Turkey has risen in the past six weeks, with 50 to 60 arriving daily, taking the total living in refugee camps to nearly 9,600.

More than 6,000 Syrian refugees have fled to Lebanon.

(Additional reporting by Shaimaa Fayed in Cairo, Khaled Yacoub Oweis in Amman, Joseph Logan in Dubai, Steve Gutterman in Moscow, Louis Charbonneau at the United Nations and Simon Cameron-Moore in Istanbul)


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#81 Post by Sunshine » Sun Apr 22, 2012 7:33 pm

Unrest Continues in Syria
Image
Syrians wave Islamic and revolutionary flags at a large protest in Douma, a suburb of Damascus, April 20, 2012.
Voice Of America
Edward Yeranian
Article Source
April 21, 2012

The United Nations Security Council has approved a resolution sending 300 unarmed observers to Syria, boosting the strength of a previously approved force of 30. The move comes as a ten-day-old cease-fire agreement has failed, so far, to bring an end to violence in many parts of the country.

A mostly young crowd swarmed the U.N. observer team in Homs Jourt al-Shiyah district, presenting their complaints against the Syrian government and chanting slogans against it. Witnesses say government forces halted shelling earlier and withdrew tanks from some areas. Other reports say shelling resumed elsewhere in Homs, later.

Near the capital Damascus, an explosion rocked the Mazzeh military airport, sending plumes of black smoke into the air. It was not immediately clear what caused the blast, but Syrian troops closed off the area, diverting traffic from a nearby highway.

Syrian government media accused what it calls “armed terrorists” of causing an explosion on an oil pipeline in eastern Deir el-Zour province. The Syrian government once relied on oil exports for several billion dollars of revenues each year. EU sanctions in late 2011 brought much of that trade to a halt.

Witnesses also reported that Syrian troops pounded the Arbeyne district of Hama, as tanks entered the area. Al-Arabiya TV also reported that Syrian helicopters strafed parts of Bou Kamel along the border with Iraq.

Opposition sources also claim that that Syrian security forces made numerous arrests after storming areas outside Idlib, Daraa and the capital Damascus. A U.N.-Arab League peace plan calls on Syria to withdraw its forces from urban centers and to release thousands of prisoners.

An advance team of 7 U.N. observers has visited parts of the capital Damascus, the southern city of Daraa and Homs in the week since it began its mission. More observers are expected to deploy soon.

Hilal Khashan, who teaches political science at the American University of Beirut, argues that the international community has yet to implement strong measures against Damascus.

"The international community and the [U.N.] Security Council are continuing to give Assad one reprieve after another," said Khashan. "The Russians will never allow the Security Council to adopt a serious measure against the regime. If something dramatic were to happen it would have to be the labor of the Syrian people and they should not really expect the world to do anything for them."

The U.N. estimates that over 9,000 people have been killed in the Syrian government's crackdown on the popular uprising which began in March 2011. Opposition sources put the death toll much higher.


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#82 Post by Sunshine » Sun Apr 22, 2012 7:44 pm

Fighting in Syria Kills 17 as UN Monitors Visit 2 Towns
Image
In this Saturday, April 21, 2012 photo, Syrians carry the bodies of an infant, Adam al Najjar, and Free Syrian Army fighter, Mowaffaq al Nablsi, 42, during their funeral in Douma, a suburb of Damascus, Syria.
VOA News
Article Source
April 22, 2012

Syrian activists say attacks by government and rebel forces have killed 16 people across the country as a small U.N. team visited more towns to monitor a 10-day old truce that has failed to end the year-long conflict.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says soldiers backed by tanks stormed the opposition hub of Douma near Damascus on Sunday, firing artillery and machine guns and killing two people. They say four soldiers also were killed in the district when a roadside bomb struck their armored personnel carrier.

Elsewhere, the Observatory says Syrian security forces killed six people in the central province of Homs and four people in other areas, including the northern region of Idlib. Syrian state news agency SANA says a roadside bomb also struck a convoy in the country's north, killing an officer and raising the day's death toll to at least 17. None of Sunday's casualties could be independently confirmed.

Several unarmed U.N. truce monitors who have been stationed in Syria for the past week visited the opposition stronghold of Rastan and the central city of Hama on Sunday. Amateur video showed Free Syrian Army rebels escorting the monitors in Rastan, while Syrian state television showed the U.N. personnel touring Hama.

The U.N. Security Council voted Saturday to expand the U.N. observer mission in Syria from 30 to 300 members in the hope of salvaging the April 12 cease-fire mediated by international envoy Kofi Annan. Fighting between government and rebel forces has eased in some areas when observers are present, but has continued in others.

In a statement released Sunday, Mr. Annan praised the Security Council resolution as a "pivotal moment" in stabilizing Syria. He urged security forces and rebel fighters to put down their weapons and work with the U.N. observers to consolidate the cease-fire.

But Mr. Annan singled out the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, saying it has a "particular" duty to desist from using heavy weapons and honor its pledge to withdraw them from population centers. He also called on the government and its opponents to prepare for a political process to resolve their conflict, which began in March 2011 an uprising against Mr. Assad's 11-year autocratic rule.

The U.N. resolution says the expansion of the monitoring team depends on U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon making an "assessment" about the security situation in Syria and the compliance of security forces and rebels with the terms of the truce.

A spokeswoman for the exiled opposition Syrian National Council said Sunday the U.N. Security Council's approval of a 300-strong observer mission in Syria is not enough to protect people from government attacks. After meeting Arab League Secretary General Nabil Elaraby in Cairo, Basma Kodmani called for at least 3,000 monitors to be sent to Syria quickly.

The United Nations estimates that more than 9,000 people have been killed in the Syrian government's 13-month crackdown on dissent, while activist groups put the death toll at more than 11,000.


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#83 Post by Sunshine » Fri Jul 06, 2012 9:07 am

Diplomats Press Assad, Top Syrian General Defects
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US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, right, speaks with French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius during a meeting , in Paris, Friday July 6, 2012. Syrian opposition leaders are pressing diplomats at an international conference for a no-fly zone over Syria, but the U.S. and its European and Arab partners are expected to focus on economic sanctions instead. (AP Photo/Brendan Smialowski, Pool)
Associated Press
Article Source
Friday, July 6, 2012

PARIS (AP) — France's foreign minister says a top general who defected from Syria is en route to France, where international diplomats are meeting to put pressure on Syrian President Bashar Assad.

French minister Laurent Fabius told the international Friends of Syria conference Friday that Brig. Gen. Manaf Tlass "has defected."

The defection dealt a major blow to Assad, who has been sharply criticized for his regime's violent crackdown on dissent.
Image
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, left, walks with French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius before their meeting in Paris, Friday July 6, 2012. Syrian opposition leaders are pressing diplomats at an international conference for a no-fly zone over Syria, but the U.S. and its European and Arab partners are expected to focus on economic sanctions instead. (AP Photo/Brendan Smialowski, Pool)
At Friday's conference in Paris, Washington urged countries around the world to pressure fellow U.N. Security Council members Russia and China into forcing Assad to leave power.

Tlass was a member of Syria's elite Republican Guards and a son of a former defense minister.


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#84 Post by Sunshine » Sat Jul 07, 2012 5:17 pm

Report: UN Envoy Annan Says Efforts For Peaceful Political Solution in Syria Have Failed
By Ben Hubbard
Article Source
The Associated Press

BEIRUT - Special U.N. envoy Kofi Annan acknowledged in an interview published Saturday that the international community's efforts to find a political solution to the escalating violence in Syria have failed.

Annan also said that more attention needed to be paid to the role of longtime Syrian ally Iran, and that countries supporting military actors in the conflict were making the situation worse.

"The evidence shows that we have not succeeded," he told the French daily Le Monde.

Annan, the special envoy for the United Nations and the Arab League, is the architect of the most prominent international plan to end the crisis in Syria, which activists say has killed more than 14,000 people since March, 2011.

His six-point plan was to begin with a cease-fire in mid-April between government forces and rebels seeking to topple the regime of President Bashar Assad. But the truce never took hold, and now the almost 300 U.N. observers sent to monitor the cease-fire are confined to their hotels because of the escalating violence.

Activists reported more than 50 people killed on Saturday alone, after some 800 people last week.

Annan defended the unarmed observers, saying it was not their job to stop the violence, but to monitor the sides' adherence to the truce.

He offered few suggestions on how the plan could be salvaged, only saying that Iran "should be part of the solution" and that criticism too often focused on Russia, which has stood by the regime.

"Very few things are said about other countries that send arms and money and weigh on the situation on the ground," he said, without naming any specific countries.

It is unclear what role Annan envisions for Iran, a longtime Syrian longtime ally that has stood by the regime throughout the uprising. Tehran's close ties could make it an interlocutor with the regime, though the U.S. has often refused to let the Islamic Republic attend conferences about the Syria crisis.

Russia provides the Assad regime with most of its weapons. No countries are known to be arming the rebels, though some Gulf Arab states have spoken positively of doing so. The U.S. and other Western nations have sent non-lethal aid, like communications equipment.

The Syrian uprising began in March, 2011, when people first took to the streets to call for political reforms. Since then, the government has waged a brutal crackdown, and many in the opposition have taken up arms, sidelining peaceful activists and changing the conflict into an armed insurgency.

Scores of independent rebel groups now operate in the country, regularly attacking regime bases and convoys.

Activists in Syria on Saturday reported fierce government offensives to try to retake rebellious areas outside of the northern city of Aleppo and near the capital Damascus, as well as government shelling across the country.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on an activist network inside Syria, called the bombardment of a number of villages in Aleppo province "the most violent" since the army launched a recent campaign to retake control of the area.

The group said that rebels in the area had killed many regime soldiers in recent months. Three rebels and three civilians were killed in the province Saturday, it said. Five government soldiers also were killed when rebels blew up their vehicle.

The Observatory said at least 35 rebels and civilians were killed nationwide, plus 19 government soldiers.

The activist claims could not be independently verified. The Syrian government rarely comments on its military operations and blames the uprising on foreign-backed gangs seeking to weaken the country.

The violence has raised fears that the unrest will spill over into Lebanon, which has extensive sectarian and political ties to its eastern neighbour.

On Saturday, shells fired from inside Syria killed two Lebanese civilians and wounded 10 others, security officials said, in the latest incident of violence spilling across the border.

One woman was killed when a shell hit her home in the Wadi Khalid area of northeast Lebanon, also wounding five others. Another shell hit the nearby village of al-Hisheh, killing an 8-year-old boy and wounding his father and four other children.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity in line with government regulations.

Despite mounting international condemnation, Assad's regime has largely held together. On Saturday, however, France announced the defection of Brig. Gen. Manaf Tlass, an Assad confidant and son of a former defence minister who helped ease Assad into power.

Tlass is the highest ranking official to abandon the regime so far, and Western powers and anti-regime activists hoped his departure would encourage others to leave, too.

News of the defection largely overshadowed an international conference in Paris on Saturday attended by the U.S., its European and Arab partners and members of Syria's fractured opposition.

The so-called "Friends of Syria" said they would provide means for the opposition in Syria to better communicate among themselves and with the outside world and increase humanitarian aid.

They also called on the U.N. Security Council to adopt a resolution that would force the regime to comply with the two peace plans that have been largely ignored by both sides in the conflict.

Syrian allies Russia and China would likely veto any resolution seen as too critical of the Syrian government, as they have in the past.

About 100 demonstrators marched against Assad's regime in Paris on Saturday. Many were disappointed that the Paris conference had not led to more specific actions against the regime.

"Meeting just to talk is useless," said protester Hende Khattav, a Syrian who has lived in Paris for 37 years. "We have to do something. There has to be a useful action to make this massacre of the Syrian people stop."


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#85 Post by Sunshine » Sat Jul 07, 2012 5:46 pm

Syria Fighting Spills Into Lebanon


Oliver Holmes, Reuters
Article Source
Toronto Sun
First posted: Saturday, July 07, 2012 10:10 AM EDT | Updated: Saturday, July 07, 2012 05:01 PM EDT

BEIRUT - Syria’s conflict spilled further into Lebanon on Saturday when mortar fire from President Bashar al-Assad’s forces hit villages in the north, killing five people after rebels crossed the border to seek refuge, residents said.

Rebels fighting to unseat Assad have used north Lebanon as a base and his forces have at times bombed villages and even pursued insurgents over the border, threatening to stoke tension in Lebanon, whose sectarian rifts mirror those in Syria.

Residents of Lebanon’s Wadi Khaled region said several mortar bombs hit farm buildings five to 20 km (3 to 12 miles) from the border at around 2 a.m. At midday villagers reported more explosions and said they heard gunfire close to the border.

In the village of al-Mahatta, a house was destroyed, killing a 16-year-old girl and wounding a two-year old and a four-year old, family members told Reuters. A 25-year-old woman and a man were killed in nearby villages, residents said.

Two Bedouins were killed in the village of Hishe, which straddles a river demarcating the border, when two rocket-propelled grenades fired from within Syria hit their tent, according to local residents.

Lebanon’s army confirmed one of the deaths and said several Syrian shells had landed in Lebanese territory, but had no further information. Lebanese President Michel Suleiman issued a statement regretting the deaths and promising an investigation.

Syria’s bloodshed has also encroached on Turkey, a much bigger, more powerful neighbour that once backed Assad but turned against him over his violent repression of unrest.

Turkey has reinforced its border and scrambled fighter aircraft several times since Syria shot down a Turkish reconnaissance jet on June 22 over what Damascus said was Syrian territorial waters in the Mediterranean. Ankara said the incident occurred in international air space.

DIPLOMATIC IMPASSE

The diplomatic stalemate that has frustrated international efforts to bring about a peaceful transition in Syria persisted on Saturday as China joined Russia in rejecting a U.S. accusation that Beijing and Moscow were obstacles to a solution.

In Syria, the army bombarded towns across northern Aleppo province on Saturday in a concerted effort to root out insurgents who have taken control of some areas, the anti-government Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

“The bombing is the heaviest since the start of military operations in rural Aleppo in an attempt to control the region after regular Syrian army forces suffered heavy losses over the past few months,” the British-based activist group reported.

It said three people had died, including two rebels.

The official Syrian news agency SANA said troops foiled infiltration attempts by armed men from Turkey and Lebanon on Friday. It said one clash “resulted in the killing, injury of dozens of the infiltrated gunmen”.

In Idlib province, SANA said, an armed terrorist group was prevented from infiltrating from Turkey in Harem region. It quoted a source as saying a number were killed “while the rest managed to flee back into the Turkish territories”.

The Observatory said many families had been displaced and water, electricity and medical supplies were running short.

DANGER AROUND ALEPPO

Aleppo, Syria’s second largest city and commercial hub, has been largely spared of the violence. But the outskirts of the city and the wider province have seen rebels gaining territory since the uprising began 16 months ago.

SANA reported a clash “with an armed terrorist group in Azaz area north of Aleppo as it was attacking the citizens and perpetrating killings”. It said eight gunmen were killed and six cars equipped with machineguns plus a stolen ambulance were destroyed. The agency named the dead.

Opposition activists say at least 15,000 people have been killed since the uprising began. Assad says the rebels are foreign-backed terrorists who have killed thousands of army and police troops in hit-and-run attacks and roadside bombings.

The Observatory said 93 people, mostly civilians, were killed across Syria on Friday, when protesters took the streets to call for a “people’s liberation war.”

Syria’s crisis began with street protests against Assad and evolved largely into an armed insurgency after he tried to crush unrest by military force. It has become increasingly sectarian in nature with rebels from Syria’s Sunni Muslim majority pitted against Assad’s minority Alawites, a branch of Shi’ite Islam, dominating the military and security services.

CHINA BRISTLES AT CLINTON’S ACCUSATION

Russia and China have repeatedly used veto power at the U.N. Security Council to block international attempts to push Assad to relinquish power to make way for a democratic transition in the pivotal Arab country.

At a “Friends of Syria” meeting grouping Assad’s Western and Arab opponents, Clinton urged them to make Russia and China “pay a price” for helping the authoritarian leader stay in the office he, and his late father before him, have held for 42 years.

On Saturday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin shot back: “Any words and deeds that slander China and sow discord between China and other countries will be in vain.”

Russia and China say they are committed to the peace plan of U.N. envoy Kofi Annan that prescribes national dialogue, but reject the position of Western powers and their Gulf Arab allies that Assad must step down to enable reform in Syria.

Annan told French daily le Monde in an interview published on Saturday that Western criticism of Russia was diverting attention from the role of other countries in backing Assad and arming his soldiers, notably Iran.

“Russia has influence, but I don’t think that events will be determined by Russia alone. What strikes me is that there is so much talk about Russia and much less about Iran, and little is said about other countries that are sending money and weapons,” he said.

“All of these countries say that want a peaceful solution, but they undertake individual and collective actions that undermine the very meaning of (U.N.) Security Council resolutions,” he added.

Assad has been Shi’ite Iran’s main ally in the Arab world.

Annan conceded that U.N. efforts to resolve the crisis so far had been a failure. “Clearly, we have not succeeded. And maybe there is no guarantee that we will succeed,” he said.

News on Friday that one of Assad’s personal friends had defected and was headed for exile in France was hailed by Clinton as proof that members of the Damascus leadership were starting to “vote with their feet” and leave a sinking ship.

Manaf Tlas, a Republican Guard brigadier and son of the longtime defence minister under Assad’s father Hafez, has yet to surface abroad or clearly to throw his lot in with the rebels.

But his desertion, leaked by family friends, was confirmed by the French government, giving a boost to the “Friends of Syria” conference it hosted in Paris where participants agreed to “massively increase” aid to Syria’s opposition.


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#86 Post by Sunshine » Wed Jul 18, 2012 12:08 pm

Bomb Kills Syrian Ministers At Heart Of Assad Rule
Reuters
Article Source
By Dominic Evans and Khaled Yacoub Oweis
July 18, 2012 – 1 hr 15 mins ago
Image
BEIRUT/AMMAN (Reuters) - Syria's defense minister and President Bashar al-Assad's brother-in-law were killed in a Damascus suicide bomb attack carried out by a bodyguard on Wednesday, the most serious blow to Assad's high command in the country's 16-month-old rebellion.

The bomber, said by a security source to be a bodyguard assigned to Assad's inner circle, struck a meeting attended by ministers and senior security officials as battles raged within sight of the presidential palace.

State television said Defence Minister Daoud Rajha and Assad's brother-in-law Assef Shawkat, the deputy defence minister, had been killed in a "terrorist bombing" and pledged to wipe out "criminal gangs".

A Syrian security source confirmed Shawkat, 62, - a pillar of Assad's rule - was killed and said intelligence chief Hisham Bekhtyar was wounded. State television said Interior Minister Mohammad Ibrahim al-Shaar had also been wounded in the blast.

The men form the core of a military crisis unit led by Assad to take charge of crushing the revolt and the authorities immediately appointed a new defence minister, Fahad Jassim al-Freij, previously the armed forces' chief of staff, to avoid appearing paralyzed by the attack.
Image
Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Dawoud Rajha attends a Syrian air defence live ammunitions exercise in an undisclosed location in this undated file handout distributed on July 9, 2012. Daoud Rajha was killed by a bomb which exploded during a meeting of ministers and security officials at a national security building in Damascus on July 18, 2012, state television said. REUTERS/Sana/Files
Assad has not appeared in public since the attack or made any statement, but sources with knowledge of the situation said he was not at the meeting where it took place.

The explosion appeared to be part of a coordinated assault on the fourth day of fighting in the capital which rebel fighters have called the "liberation of Damascus".

Five explosions were heard later on Wednesday close to the base of the elite 4th armored division, led by Assad's brother Maher, residents said. The division has been instrumental in confronting dissent, quelling protests in Deraa, Homs and Idlib.

Rebels say they have brought reinforcements from outside the city to end four decades of rule by the Assad family by attacking the power base of the ruling elite for the first time.
Image
Assef Shawkat, brother-in-law of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, stands during the funeral of late president Hafez al-Assad in Damascus in this June 13, 2000 file photo. Shawkat was killed in a bomb attack which targeted a meeting of Assad's top security and military officials on July 18, 2012, Hezbollah's al-Manar television and a security source in Syria said. REUTERS /Khaled al-Hariri/Files
Republican Guard troops sealed off the Shami hospital near the site of the explosion at the security meeting, activists said. An army statement issued after the blast said Syria was "more determined than ever to confront all forms of terrorism and chop off any hand that harms national security".

An army barracks near the "palace of the people", a huge Soviet-style complex overlooking the city from the western district of Dummar, came under rebel fire around 7.30 a.m. (0030 EDT), activists and a resident said.

"I could hear the sound of small arms fire, and explosions are getting louder and louder from the direction of the barracks," Yasmine, an architect, said by telephone from Dummar.

Dummar is a secure area containing many auxiliary installations for the presidential palace and the barracks is just hundreds of meters from the palace itself.

REBEL CLAIMS

Two rebel groups claimed the attack on the security meeting.

"This is the volcano we talked about, we have just started," said Qassim Saadedine, a spokesman for the Free Syrian Army, a group of army defectors and Sunni youths.

Liwa al-Islam, an Islamist rebel group whose name means "The Brigade of Islam", said it had carried out the attack after weeks of planning and gave a different version of events.

"Our men managed to plant improvised explosives in the building for the meeting. We had been planning this for over a month," a spokesman for the group, who asked to be identified as Abu Ammar, said by telephone.

State television said earlier that it was a suicide bombing.

"The terrorist explosion which targeted the national security building in Damascus occurred during a meeting of ministers and a number of heads of (security) agencies," it said.

Fighting also erupted overnight in the southern neighborhoods of Asali and Qadam, and Hajar al-Aswad and Tadamun - mainly Sunni Muslim districts housing Damascenes and Palestinian refugees.

Assad and the ruling elite belong to the minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam that has held power in Syria since a 1963 coup.

It has endured more than a year of rebellion but recent high level defections signaled support beginning to fall away.

Two Syrian brigadier-generals were among 600 Syrians who fled from Syria to Turkey overnight, a Turkish official said on Wednesday, bringing the number of Syrian generals sheltering in Turkey to 20, including a retired general.

OPPOSITION CAUTIOUS

In Damascus, government troops used heavy machine guns and anti-aircraft guns against rebels moving deep in residential neighborhoods, armed mostly with small arms and rocket-propelled grenades.

Rebels directed their fire overnight at a large state facility turned headquarters for pro-Assad militia, known as shabbiha, drawn mainly from Alawite enclaves in nearby hills.

Army tanks and anti-aircraft guns, used as an infantry weapon, took positions in the northern neighborhood of Barzeh, where hundreds of families from the neighboring district of Qaboun are seeking shelter.

"Anti-aircraft guns are firing at Qaboun from Barzeh. There are lots of families in the streets with no place to stay. They came from Qaboun and from the outskirts of Barzeh," said Bassem, one of the activists, speaking by telephone from Barzeh.

In the central neighborhood of Midan tanks and infantry fighting vehicles known as BDMs took positions in main thoroughfares and sporadic fighting was reported.

"Armor have not been able to enter the alleyways and old streets of Midan. The neighborhoods of old Zahra and the old area near Majed mosque are in the hands of the rebels," said Abu Mazen, an activist in the district.

Rebel fighters have called the intensified guerrilla attacks in recent days, which have targeted shabbiha buses, unmarked intelligence patrols and armored vehicles in the capital, the battle "for the liberation of Damascus".

But senior opposition figures took a more nuanced view.

"It is going to be difficult to sustain supply lines and the rebels may have to make a tactical withdrawal at one point, like they did in other cities," veteran opposition activist Fawaz Tello said from Istanbul.

"But what is clear is that Damascus has joined the revolt," Tello, a Damascene, told Reuters. "By hitting well known Sunni districts of the city, such as Midan, the regime is exposing the sectarian nature of the crackdown."

The United Nations Security Council was scheduled to vote later on Wednesday in New York on a Western-backed resolution that threatens Assad's government with sanctions unless he stops using heavy weapons in towns and cities. Russia has declared it will block the move.


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#87 Post by Sunshine » Fri Jul 20, 2012 9:41 am

Syria Attack: Security Chief Ikhtiar Dies From Wounds
BBC News
Article Source
20 July 2012 Last updated at 07:50 ET
Image
Video was posted on the internet of rebels defacing a poster of Bashar al-Assad at a crossing into Turkey.
Syria's national security chief has died from injuries he received in an attack in Damascus on Wednesday, state TV has announced.

Hisham Ikhtiar is the fourth high-ranking official killed by the bombing at the national security bureau.

Clashes have continued in Damascus, with the military repelling a rebel assault in the Midan area of the city.

Meanwhile, Russia's envoy to France has sparked a row after saying President Bashar al-Assad was ready to step down.

Alexander Orlov said Mr Assad had, in effect, agreed to step down last month at a conference in Geneva which had planned for a democratic transition.

"Assad nominated his representative to lead the negotiations with the opposition for this transition. That means he accepted to leave, but in a civilised way," said Mr Orlov.

His comments triggered an angry response from Syria, where the information ministry said the claims were completely baseless.
Border skirmishes

The announcement of Mr Ikhtiar's death came as the other three high-profile victims - the defence minister, his deputy who is also Mr Assad's brother-in-law, and a former defence minister - were buried.

Syrian official TV said a state funeral was held in Damascus for the three men, and that there was a big official turnout for the occasion.

However, the report did not mention whether Mr Assad attended, and no pictures have so far been shown, itself a clear sign of extraordinary times, says the BBC's Jim Muir in neighbouring Lebanon.

The attack at the National Security Bureau came shortly after rebels declared an all-out assault on the capital, calling it Operation Damascus Volcano.

Eruptions of violence have been seen across the city since Sunday.

In the latest fighting, state media announced the area of Midan had been "cleaned" of "terrorists".

Rebels said they had withdrawn from Midan after coming under bombardment.

Journalists were allowed into Midan on Friday, and pictures showed dust-covered corpses lying in the streets, with tanks and burnt-out cars littering the area.

But elsewhere in the country rebel fighters managed to seize control of several border posts late on Thursday.

The rebels attacked crossings both on the southern frontier with Iraq and the northern border with Turkey.

Government forces have been trying to retake some of the areas since, and it is unclear who is in control of the borders.

The UN's refugee agency says it is receiving reports of between 8,500 and 30,000 people fleeing across the border into Lebanon over the past 48 hours.

Other reports suggested more than 3,000 had crossed into Iraq in the past day.

Activists said more than 300 people were killed on Thursday, making it the bloodiest day since protests against Mr Assad began in March last year.

Some 16,000 are estimated to have died in the past 16 months.
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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#88 Post by Sunshine » Sun Aug 26, 2012 9:59 am

Syria Regime Accused of 'Massacre' Near Damascus
AFP
Article Source
August 26, 2012

Syrian opposition activists accused the regime on Sunday of a gruesome "massacre" after several hundred bodies were found in a small town near Damascus following a ferocious army assault.

Grisly videos issued by opposition militants showed dozens of charred and bloodied bodies lined up in broad daylight in a graveyard, and others lying wall-to-wall in rooms in a mosque in the town of Daraya.

At least 320 people were killed in a five-day onslaught on Daraya by troops battling to crush insurgents who have regrouped in the outskirts of the capital, according to a toll from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Local Coordination Committees, a network of activists on the ground, described it as a "massacre" by President Bashar al-Assad's regime and said many victims had been summarily executed and their bodies burnt.

"The shabiha (pro-regime) militias... have been transformed into a killing machine that threatens the Syrian people and our future," it said.

Human rights groups have accused the regime of committing many atrocities since the uprising against Assad's rule erupted in March last year, and a UN panel said earlier this month it was guilty of crimes against humanity.

In all, at least 183 people were killed nationwide on Saturday, the Observatory said, as the brutal conflict that has convulsed Syria for more than 17 months showed no signs of abating.

In the first reaction by a world power, Britain said that if confirmed, the Daraya massacre "would be an atrocity on a new scale, requiring unequivocal condemnation from the entire international community."

A video posted by militants on YouTube showed dozens of bodies in dimly lit rooms, with a commentary referring to "an odious massacre committed by the gangs of the Assad regime in the Abu Sleiman Addarani Mosque."

In another LCC video, Daraya's dead, among them at least two children, were shown being prepared for burial, their bodies lying in a hastily dug trench covered with blankets and strewn with palm fronds.

State media said Daraya, a mainly Sunni Muslim town of some 200,000 people, was being "purified of terrorist remnants."

A pro-government television said "terrorists" carried out the attacks, as it interviewed residents including traumatised children and showed a number of bloodied bodies lying in the streets.

"Our valiant armed forces cleared Daraya of the remnants of armed terrorist groups which committed crimes that traumatised the citizens of the town and destroyed public and private property," government newspaper Ath-Thawra said.

Activists described the Daraya offensive as a bid to crush "once and for all" the insurgency in Damascus after rebel Free Syrian Army fighters regrouped to the southern outskirts following an army offensive to retake the city last month.

The LCC accused the regime of blockading Daraya to choke off supplies and indiscriminately bombarding the town with heavy weapons and warplanes.

"Afterwards the gangs of killers entered the town and carried out summary executions, before dismembering and setting fire to the bodies."

Reports by activists cannot be independently confirmed because of severe restrictions on media operating in Syria.

Assad's Alawite-led regime insists it is fighting foreign "terrorists" aided by regional Sunni Muslim rivals and the West, but has been hit by a wave of defections, including several high-ranking officials, as the violence escalates.

On Sunday, Vice President Faruq al-Shara -- the regime's top Sunni Muslim official -- made his first public appearance in over a month, following rumours that he had tried to defect and was under house arrest.

Shara and Assad held talks with the head of the Iranian parliament's foreign policy committee, Aladin Borujerdi, who vowed that Tehran will "stick by our Syrian brothers".

"We see Syria's security as our security," he said, Iran's state-owned IRNA news agency said.

Tehran -- Damascus's staunchest ally -- has said it will submit a plan for ending the conflict to a Non-Aligned Movement summit it is hosting on Thursday and Friday.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem also said any negotiations between the government and the opposition would only begin "after purging Syria of armed groups," IRNA reported.

Tehran's initiative comes as its foes in the West seek to ramp up the pressure on Damascus, with Washington and London threatening action if it uses its chemical weapons and Paris voicing support for a partial no-fly zone.

The Observatory also reported shelling or air strikes in other parts of the country including the battered northern city of Aleppo and Daraa in the far south, the cradle of the uprising.

A veteran Japanese war reporter shot dead covering the conflict in Aleppo, the fourth foreign journalist to be killed in Syria, was hit by nine bullets, according to results of an autopsy published Sunday.

A report by UN investigators this month said government forces and their militia allies had committed crimes against humanity and that rebels had also carried out war crimes, although on a lesser scale.

In particular, it held government forces responsible for a massacre in the central town of Houla in May when 108 civilians, including 49 children, were killed in an atrocity that shocked the world.

August is already the deadliest single month of the conflict with at least 4,000 people killed, according to the Observatory, while around 25,000 have died since March 2011.

The United Nations puts the death toll at more than 17,000 and has warned of a major humanitarian crisis with more than 200,000 refugees fleeing to neighbouring countries and 2.5 million in need inside Syria.

New international envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who takes over from Kofi Annan next month, said on Friday he was "scared" of the enormity of the task he faces to try to end what he describes as civil war.

Syria warned Brahimi on Sunday not to follow the same path as Annan, with Ath-Thawra accusing the former UN chief who quit this month after the failure of his peace plan of "bowing to US and Western pressure."

Damascus said last week it would cooperate with Brahimi to try to pave the way for "national dialogue," while also suggesting it was ready to discuss Assad's exit as part of any negotiated solution.


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#89 Post by Sunshine » Mon Sep 03, 2012 10:42 am

France Warns of Syrian Chemical Weapons Attack
Image
Associated Press/Muhammed Muheisen - A boy looks back while he and another boy play on a Syrian military tank, destroyed during fighting with the Rebels,
in the Syrian town of Azaz, on the outskirts of Aleppo, Sunday, Sept. 2, 2012. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)
By ANGELA CHARLTON
Article Source
Associated Press – 3 hrs ago

PARIS (AP) — Western powers are preparing a tough response in case Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime deploys chemical or biological weapons in its civil war, France's foreign minister said Monday.

Syria's leadership has said the country, which is believed to have nerve agents as well as mustard gas and Scud missiles capable of delivering them, could use chemical or biological weapons if it were attacked from outside.

President Barack Obama has called it a "red line" for the U.S. if Assad's regime were to use such lethal weapons, and France has been ratcheting up its language on the issue.

If Syria uses such weapons, "our response ... would be massive and blistering," French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said on RMC radio Monday.

He said Western countries are monitoring the movement of the weapons in Syria to be ready to "step in" immediately.

Fabius said "we are discussing this notably with our American and English partners."

Fabius added that Russia and China are "of the same position," but did not elaborate. Fabius acknowledged frustration at their continuing support for Assad.

The foreign ministries of both China and Russia declined immediate comment on Monday.

Since the start of the Syrian conflict, Beijing has been consistent in its stance that it should be settled through negotiations and not by outside forces.

Moscow is Syria's chief ally, and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov told the AP in a recent interview that Russia has the Syrian government's assurances that chemical weapons will not be used. Gatilov said Russia will "work toward the goal of preventing such things from happening."

China and Russia have repeatedly used their veto powers in the U.N. Security Council to block U.S.- and Arab-backed action that could have led to sanctions against Assad's regime.

Syria's opposition has urged outside military help against Assad's armed forces.

"I am going to be very clear, we are requesting military intervention in order to protect Syrian civilians who have been constantly murdered over the last year and a half," the head of the Syrian National Council, Abdelbaset Sieda, said in Madrid on Monday.

"The European Union should take the initiative and pressure Russia ... so we can lay down some protected areas for refugees," Sieda said after meeting Spain's Foreign Affairs Minister Jose Manuel Garcia Margallo.

Margallo said Spain would continue to press for a united EU approach to Syria and urged Syrian opposition groups to overcome their divisions and join together against the Assad regime.

The new U.N. envoy to Syria, Lakhdar Brahimi, acknowledged Monday that brokering an end to the civil war is a "very, very difficult task."


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Re: The "Small Horn" Of Bible Prophecy Emerges!!!

#90 Post by Sunshine » Fri Sep 14, 2012 10:30 am

Egyptians Clash With Police Blocking Way to U.S. Embassy
Reuters – 5 hrs ago
Article Source

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian protesters angry at a film they say insults Prophet Mohammad hurled stones on Friday at a line of police in Cairo blocking their way to the U.S. embassy, which was attacked earlier this week.

Police in riot gear fired tear gas and threw stones back at the demonstrators. A burnt-out car was overturned in the middle of the street which leads to the fortified embassy from Tahrir Square.

Police had tried to clear the Square on Friday ahead of a nationwide protest called by the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's most influential group that propelled President Mohamed Mursi to power following popular protests that toppled president Hosni Mubarak and ushered in the first democratic elections in decades. But shortly after they cleared Tahrir, demonstrators returned.

The Egyptian authorities had erected large concrete blocks to block the route to the embassy.

"Before the police, we were attacked by Obama," shouted one demonstrator, blaming U.S. President Barack Obama and the U.S. government for insulting the Prophet.

One banner held aloft by demonstrators read: "It is the duty of all Muslims and Christians to kill Morris Sadek and Sam Bacile and everyone who participated in the film."

Several demonstrators waved green and black flags with Koranic verses on them.

The crowd was a mixed collection of people - some were bearded Islamists wearing traditional gallabiya robes, but most were youths and young men in T-shirts and jeans.


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