Bomb blast hits military bus near Damascus, killing 6

[News_Editor]

Bomb blast hits military bus near Damascus, killing 6

2012-01-30 21:52:52 GMT+7 (ICT)

DAMASCUS, SYRIA (BNO NEWS) -- Six people were killed on early Sunday morning when a bomb blast hit a bus carrying army personnel near the Syrian capital of Damascus, state-run media reported on Monday. Several others were injured.

The attack happened on early Sunday morning when an explosive device hit a minibus near Sahnaya, a suburb of Damascus. The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) quoted sources as saying that the device was 'planted by an armed terrorist group' and remotely detonated.

The blast left six people killed, including two officers, while six others were injured. Sergeant Major Fares al-Omar, one of the officers on board the bus and was injured in the attack, said the bus took off at around 7 a.m. local time and was transporting army personnel to their regiment.

The powerful blast caused the vehicle to overturn and catch fire before gunmen opened fire, SANA said. Photos from the scene showed the vehicle was completely burned out with nothing left intact, but details about the reported incident could not be independently confirmed.

SANA said the fatalities were identified as First Lieutenant Mahdi Mohammad al-Ahmad, First Lieutenant Ahmad Abdullah Ali al-Mohammad, and Sergeants Yousef Ibrahim, Jihad Ibrahim, Shadi Idris and Najeeb Hassan.

Also on Sunday, another attack targeted a vehicle carrying Brigadier General Sharif Kheirbek and Conscript Monzer Jom'a Abdul-Rahman when two bombs detonated on the Balyon-Kamsafra road in Idleb countryside, according to SANA. Both individuals survived but they were transported to the Lattakia Military Hospital for treatment.

Syria has been part of the wider Arab Spring movement which began in early 2011 and has been riddled by violence ever since. Pro-democracy demonstrations have spread across the country since mid-March, resulting in a fierce government crackdown which has left at least 5,400 people killed. UNICEF has said at least 384 children are among those killed.

Unrest has also spread to Damascus which was the scene of three deadly suicide bombings in recent weeks. At least 26 people were killed and more than 60 others were injured when a suicide bomber blew himself up near a school in the al-Midan neighborhood of Damascus on January 6. It followed two suicide bombings which targeted Syrian government buildings on December 23, killing 44 people and injuring 166.

The Syrian government has repeatedly claimed that violent acts against protesters have been carried out by 'terrorists dressed as soldiers,' although international observers have rejected these claims. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad previously admitted that mistakes were made, but claimed protesters were no longer being targeted.

On Saturday, Arab League Secretary-General Nabil el-Araby decided to suspend its observer mission in Syria due to an escalation of violence. The 100 observers arrived in Syria late last month to verify whether the regime has taken measures to protect civilians, but many of the observers refused to leave their hotels in Damascus on Friday and Saturday amid reports of increasing violence.

-- © BNO News All rights reserved 2012-01-30

[Scott]

I've spent time in Syria, but the broader political situation is something I am not fully up-to-date on. Is this country headed toward civil war?

I noted that there are/were Arab observers in Syria, and they had called for Bashar to step down, they also were planning to leave the country. What's the current situation with regard to the observers?

What is the relationship between the countries doing the observing and Syria? Are they friendly toward Syria? Are there religious differences?

[Morch]

I've spent time in Syria, but the broader political situation is something I am not fully up-to-date on. Is this country headed toward civil war?

I noted that there are/were Arab observers in Syria, and they had called for Bashar to step down, they also were planning to leave the country. What's the current situation with regard to the observers?

What is the relationship between the countries doing the observing and Syria? Are they friendly toward Syria? Are there religious differences?

Well, there the demonstrations started about a year ago, and actual fighting been going on for months, with some cities and towns already not under the regime's military control. Now there's fighting on the outskirts of Damascus. So yes, this is pretty much what happened in Libya.

There are numerous reports about army deserters joining up with rebels, allegedly also some quite high ranking officers. Also unconfirmed rumors of trying to smuggle Assad's family out,

Most Arab leaders expressed a view that Assad needs either to step down or come to an understanding with the people. They are also uniformly against the killing of civilians. That said, while the Arab League did suspend Syria's membership, there's not support for hard sanctions or military intervention. By Arab League standards, btw, membership suspension and open criticism are quite harsh measures toward another Arab nation, so that says quite a bit. The observers/monitors from the Arab League were supposed to stick around until the end of February, but a few days ago it was said that the mission will be suspended - not quite sure what is the exact situation with that right now (over a 100 of them, from different countries, so may take a few days to clear).

"Friendly" is not exactly a term relavant to Middle East politics. Alliances change quite a bit, and are based more on necesitity or having a common foe/competitor. Some member countries were never happy with Syria's de-facto control of Lebanon, some aren't too hot about the (current) close relationship with Iran. There's also a measure of broadcasting a message home here - "Look, we're dictators too, but we're against THAT sort of dictatorship". There's not a single Arab regime that feels very secure following the aftermath of the "Arab Spring", methinks,

Religion-wise, most (well, a lot anyway) of the ruling class or those holding power are Alawi, both a distinct ethnic group and sort of Shi'a Muslim. They amount to about 15% of the population, which is otherwise predominantly Sunni. That said, Syria has taken a mostly secular stance for a long time, and such differences were always played down. Not sure how much of a real issue this is nowadays.

I'd hazard a guess that most Alawis aren't different from the rest of Syria, basically meaning not a very devout form of Sunni Islam (how the current uprising will effect that is still too early to say).

[Scott]

Thanks, a very informative post.

[Steely Dan]

Somewhat bizarrely the head of the Arab league mission was a high ranking Sudanese citizen who was responsible for setting up the militia that carried out a genocide in Southern Sudan, but setting that aside I think the monitors pulling out could be a precursor to war - the Iranian Shia block and Sunni states have been on collision course for a while with Iran funding Shia protests in Bahrain and Saudi money aiding rebels in Syria.

[Steely Dan]

Here is the latest I have on Syria, speculation mounting that external moves to remove Assad are taking place.

http://www.debka.com/article/21693/

According to exclusive reports reaching debkafile, President Bashar Assad Sunday, Jan. 30, pulled in the Syrian Republican Guard and the 4th armored divisions commanded by his brother Maher Assad from the northern rebel centers and over to Damascus. He ordered them into battle positions in the capital for the first time in the ten month uprising after receiving an intelligence tipoff that western powers had won over one of the armored division commanders posted in the capital and persuaded him to stage a coup d'etat to topple him.