Mourning Assad’s Soldiers. Anne Barnard of the New York Times has a terrific dispatch from an Assad soldier’s funeral in the town of Daqaqa, in Syria’s coastal foothills.
“The funeral last week — and the stately, flag-bearing convoy that brought the body from the provincial capital, the city of Latakia — gave a glimpse of the confidence of loyalists in the coastal region, where many men pursue military careers, and of the nationalistic way they frame the conflict,” Barnard writes.
The Guardian’s Jonathan Steele gives us another glimpse of the regime side in the coastal city of Tartous, where “hundreds of pro-Assad fighters’ faces adorn a wall that shows just how many pro-government fighters are dying.
“Aisha Shahada and her husband come to the wall every day, sometimes on their way to or from the shops, sometimes with the sole purpose of seeing their dead son’s face. There it is, on a poster, against the red, white and black colors of Syria’s national flag, and stuck up alongside images of several hundred other soldiers who have given their lives for the government side in more than two years of civil war,” Steele writes.
There are no official figures for the death toll among Assad’s soldiers, but according to the piece, “The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an antigovernment monitoring group that tracks the conflict, says that of the 110,000 deaths it has tallied, nearly 29,000 are from the army and more than 18,000 are from pro-government militias.”
Syrian Rebels Rely on Homemade Weapons. France 24 reports from the outskirts of Aleppo, where the TV channel says rebel fighters are “relying on arms fabricated in makeshift workshops.
“At a makeshift workshop on the outskirts of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, teenagers are busy sorting through metal scrap while a man, sitting cross-legged in a corner, makes homemade rockets. ‘The regime is supported by all the big, rich countries,’ says Samir, never once taking his eyes off his delicate task. ‘All we have is the help of God. Western countries were supposed to send us weapons. Well, here we are. We have to build everything ourselves. Everything here is homemade – 100 percent homemade.’”
France 24 also says that, coupled with Western powers’ fear of imported weapons ending up in extremist hands, “the asymmetrical use of force and lopsided access to arms by the two sides has seen the rise of dozens of workshops making all sorts of weapons for the rebel fighters.”
Mortars Hit Syria’s Central Bank. AFP reports: “Two mortar rounds hit Syria’s central bank in the capital Damascus today causing damage, but there were no reports of injuries.
“Syrian rebels seeking to overthrow the government regularly target the center of Damascus with mortar fire from rear bases on the outskirts of the capital. The bank, in Damascus’ Sabaa Bahrat Square, has been targeted in violence before.”
Suggested Reads from Our Editorial Team:
NY Times: Second Team of Weapons Experts Heads to Syria
Reuters: Iran Rejects U.S. Condition for Joining Syria Peace Conference
Reuters: Momentum for Diplomacy Hides Chasms Between Syrian Foes
Al Jazeera: Lebanon Rebukes Syria for Cross-Border Raid
ABC: Syria’s Cultural Heritage Among Threatened Sites
The Atlantic: Syria’s Most Important Rebels are Islamists, And We Have to Work With Them Anyway
Al Monitor: Kurdish Groups Take Control in Northeast Syria