Background of mass killings on the coastal regions of Syria.
Background of mass killings on the coastal regions of Syria.
By Yunus Soner
Recent atrocities in the Syrian coastal region of the provinces of Latakia and Tartous shook the world, when civilians in huge numbers were killed by armed groups connected to the de facto Syrian government.
Local witnesses and media reported that killings occurred without discrimination, but the Alawi, a current inside Islam, were targeted mostly, spurring fears of sectarian conflict inside Syria and even beyond, in bordering Türkiye.
Professor Dr. Mehmet Yuva explains what happened which political maneuvers lie behind the atrocities. Yuva has been a professor at the University of Damascus for more than 20 years and is the Chairman of the Turkish-Syrian Friendship Association.
When we look at the picture that exists in Syria today, what will a person from all over the world see when he types the map of today’s Syria into Google? He will see red, purple, white, blue, green colors. In other words, he will see a Syria that does not have territorial integrity, that has not been able to achieve political unity, that is fragmented, but most importantly, he will see a Syria that is under the occupation of the armies of many foreign states.
This is a kind of return to 100 years ago. Back then, imperialists separated Palestine, that is, the province of Jerusalem, a province of Damascus. They separated Lebanon from Syria in 1926. Then they built an Alawite state in the coastal region of Syria, today in focus of events. On the southern front, they divided Jordan. In the north, the established the Sunni State of Aleppo and the Sunni State of Damascus.
Today’s events are only the last chapter. 2003 invasion of Iraq, the 2004 rehearsal of a Kurdish rebellion in the Qamishli region of Syria, the assassination of Lebanese President Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in Lebanon in 2005, the expulsion of the Syrian army from Lebanon in 2005, the Israeli attack on Lebanon in July 2006 and the Israeli-Lebanese War, the Hezbollah War, the events in both the West Bank and Gaza in 2007, 2008, 2009, when the intifada returned to Palestine. The Arab Spring in 2010, the developments that burned the whole of North Africa, the most reactionary and fanatical Ikhwan movement in Egypt, the Salafi wing of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and the implementation of the same thing in Syria after 2011.
Then they toppled the Assad government in Syria. Abu Muhammad al-Jolani, who arrived after December 8 to Damascus, took off his soldiers’ clothes, put on a suit, and trimmed his beard. He said ‘I will reform’, he said ‘give me a chance, I have changed, he said I broke away from al-Qaeda’. “I want to build a new Syria together,” he said. And his teachers must have trained him well to provide such explanations.
New government excluded everybody
He gradually began to get used to his seat and to experience that Syria is not Idlib, that Syria is not a small province, and that it is not as easy to govern Syria as it is to govern a town in Idlib. That’s where he made his biggest mistake. Because the HTS is made up of many constituents, it would have been very successful if it had copied the previous state to include the Druze, the Alawites and Christians while forming its government. If it had learned only from the mistakes of the old administration and if the old administration system had been preserved.
The role of the Muslim Brotherhood Organization is very interesting: When they saw that they cannot wage a struggle on their own, they invited what we call takfiris, those who accuse anyone else of infidelity, from Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Central Asia, America, Europe, to Syria. These radical Salafist groups have moved to Syria by the thousands.
Once in the driver seat, instead of including non-HTS opposition groups, Ahmed Shara appointed his closest friends and the core of this organization as ministers of the government. This, in turn, upset the Turkmens, the Alawi and the Druse, as well as the Christians.
Later, these foreign fighters were given Syrian citizenship and the duties of governors, police chiefs, etc. Ninety-nine percent of these foreign fighters and those who formed the government are names on the terror list of the United Nations and of different states. These are wanted person, these are people who have raped, who are murderers.
Alawites and soldiers of the previoys regime were the only ones to lay down arms
But they are in government. Hence, Al Shara sought legitimacy. But the Druze have not laid down their arms. Al Shara had stated that no one was going to have a gun except him and the defense ministry, and called for disarmament. But the Druse did not give up weapons, the YPG in the northeast neither did.
Do you know who was the only one who complied with this? The Alawites. In other words, the Alawite officers and Alawite soldiers in the army laid down their arms on the instructions they received, based on the assurances they received from both Russia, Iran and Ahmet Shara, and on the orders of their own general staff. And they returned to their homes.
And Ahmet Shara said that those who lay down their arms and returned to their homes will not be harmed. Everyone should come out and and sign surrender, and then return home. In this way, a general amnesty was declared.
But the Druze said, no, this administration does not represent the whole of Syria, it is not legitimate. They said that they did not accept a state, a government or an organization that did not included them politically, and they did not lay down their arms. The HTS sent soldiers and police there and attempted to take the weapons there by force.
Israel’s chance to intervene
This gave Israel a great opportunity of intervention. Israel has been steadily expanding towards Damascus since Dec. 8, the first minute Assad left the country.
They began to occupy all the villages and towns in the Golan. They immediately sent a military delegation there and told the Druze they were ready to protect them. And so began a dialogue with Israel. Some Druze even demanded that Israel annexed their region.
On the other side, there are those 5 Druze villages occupied by Israel in the Golan Heights. Israrel offered them all the privileges, to give them passports, to send their children to study in Europe and America, to become an Israeli citizen, to join the comfortable lives of their relatives in Israel. But despite that propaganda, these Druse have not accepted Israeli citizenship in any way. In other words, after Assad left the country, when Netanyahu went to these Druze villages and wanted to meet with them, they chased Netanyahu with stones. It is important to highlight that, because there is a very different narrative about them in Turkey right now.
Also regarding the Alawi: This narravtive exists in Türkiye and the world. It neglects the true character of the Baathist regime, the secular administration, the fact that 99% of the ministers under Bashar al-Assad were Sunni, that the governors everywhere were Sunni, that the head of military intelligence, the provincial minister, the head of the general intelligence were Sunni, etc. Instead, the Baath regime is presented as an Alawi regime.
New tactic: Blaming on the Alawis, winning over the Sunnis
The Alawites are a significant minority in Syria, that is, a population of 3-4 million. The idea is to identify the former regime only with them, to lay the blame of its cruelty and torture, and war crimes of the Assad regime on this group alone. Thus, they hope to win the support of the Sunnis, who are the majority, also ending the cooperation between Alawi and Sunni.
The new dominant group wants to break the bond between these communities and also to give assurances: ‘Look, when we come to power, we will not punish you Sunnis. We will only punish the members of this group. So you don’t have to be afraid’. That was their message to the Sunni who were part of close to the former regime.
In the early days of power, Ahmet Şara was smart, maybe due to Türkiye suggestions, he sent delegations to the coastal region. Both the delegations of the new administration and the intellectuals and opinion leaders of the coastal region have made mutual statements. ‘We want to work together with the new administration, we want to build the new Syrian state together, we want to sponge the past to the old, let’s build this state together in brotherhood, just as our ancestors did 100 years ago’, local leaders stated repeatedly.
Suddenly, a group was sent to the region that is affiliated to the Damascus administration, which we call general security, the police organization, the military organization. This is a little more disciplined entity and depends on the orders of the general command and the Damascus administration, that is, it obeys the orders coming from there.
Details of the attacks
That group was attacked. And this attack was carried out by the commanders and soldiers of the former Assad regime, and perhaps by individuals who have joined them from the region. And according to some figures, 70, according to others close to 100 HTS policemen, that is, police officers sent from the Damascus administration, were killed.
In immediate response, from that Idlib region, brigades such as Suleiman Shah and Hamza, those foreign fighters, poured into the region. In hundreds, if not thousands.
Upon arrival, these started killing, without making any distinction between villages and towns, between children and women, between sheikhs, shikhs and clerics. Now, not only the Alawites, but also a priest and his family were killed, many Armenian families were killed. The people who had come from Idlib and taken refuge in the coastal region were killed, because they were seen as traitors. But in the largest number, now according to some figures 700, according to others at least 2000 lost their lives. The killers were even filming very horrific videos that have already been released. And they did this on purpose.
Because there are those who do not want the dialogue between Ahmed Shara’s new administration and the coastal region. If there is this dialogue and unity, there will be peace and comfort. Thus, certain international projects will fail.
Terrible, horrible events took place. In other words, there were really terrible events. What was done to women, especially on March 8, is to destroy the joint identity of Kurds, Turks and Arabs that had been built over a thousand years, two thousand years, five thousand years.
Israel seeking protectorate
The Syrian National State will be destroyed. That’s the goal. And Israel says, ‘Do you see it now? These are animals, these are terrorists, these are barbarians’. In other words, Israel and its allies, who have been bombing Syria from the air for years, saying that Assad should go and be substituted by whoever, that is, by forces Israel has crated, fed and armed caused, are now saying: ‘Do you see? They cannot be taken from the terror list. Embargoes cannot be lifted either. The arms cannot laid down. The YPG’s cannot surrender. In fact, we need to arm the Alawites now’.
Truely, the Israeli Minister of Defense came out and said that he wants to be the protector of the Alawites like the Druse.
Interestingly, there were many people protesting against this massacre and genocide in the Turkish border city of Hatay. Among them a man who calls himself an Alevi sheikh. But despite myself being a child of this region, I saw his face for the first time in my life. He grew himself a beard and gathered a hundred people on behalf of the Alawites. I looked at him and there was the husband of Tülay Hatimoğulları, co-chair of the PKK-affiliated Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party. This is how they gathered together in the square of Samandağ.
And indeed, such a great massacre, such a genocide could only have been organized by a mind that wanted Israel to intervene there.
Some claim even that, if necessary, a force of the United Nations or the Russians should help the Alawites. The Russians, it is argued, can do that because they have military bases and they are on the ground right now. The United Nations can send a force to enter the Syrian coast.
If that happens, the Syrian coast will be separated from Damascus, unless the government is built a sane, secular, democratic state of law that embraces everyone. And it will be very difficult to unite the region with the rest of the country.
Whatever you want to call it, whether it is the Latakia state, the Syrian coastal state, or the Alawite state, which France established 100 years ago, when the Syrian coastal region is torn away, the inland areas will turn into a land country deprived of the sea. The most important mountains, forests and mines of Syria are there. Syria’s most important water resources are there. Syria’s most important natural gas fields are there, in the sea. The most important historical civilizations of Syria, tourism tourist regions there will be deprived in this region of other parts of Syria.
Divisions with the HTS
HTS is made up of many components. This includes Ahmed Shara and al-Nusra, but there is also the Hamza Brigade, the Suleiman Shah Brigade, foreign fighters, the Caucasian Union, the Turkestan Islamic Union, the Balkan Islamic front, there are different mercenaries from many parts of the world. HTS controls the administration of this organization. Now, Ahmed Shahra wants to break away from here, we can see that. For this reason, there are now two radical fronts within HTS.
The more radical groups opposing this cleanup inside the HTS are very strong. They are few in numbers, but professional mercenaries, who have been fighting in Syria for 14 years, who come from different parts of the world and have a structure that had established an independent emirate in Idlib.
There is this gradual aim of opening to the outside world, by step by step liquidating thıse more radicals inside. You can easily purge them from the government. You can quickly change ministers. But what’s necessary is to neutralize the armed force behind them first.
Now, when we look at the reality on the ground, there is no alternative other than Ahmet Shara. This is also very interesting. What other force is there? The YPG? The Druse, the Alawites, the Christians? The Turkmens? The Syrian National Army? No one represents any other power in Syria today except itself. Everyone has retreated into their shells.
And this is the message the radical front has sent with the latest genocide to Ahmet Shara. They criticize him to be too smooth. They say “this is not how we got along. We don’t agree with you. We don’t sit down and eat with Christians. We did not fight them to build this kind of state. We supported you to establish a religious state that is suitable for us, suitable for our religion, suitable for our character.”
As a first step, Türkiye needs to send delegations to the coastal region, to the Druse region. Ankara must establish contact with the people. Until now, Türkiye did not do so.
We propose to open the border gate of Yayladağ, between Hatay and Latakia, immediately. This helps to change negative thoughts. People are waiting for help from Türkiye. Türkiye needs to support the Armenians, the Orthodox Christians in Turkey, the Alawis, the Secular Sunnis. A large Turkish delegation should be formed and visit Latakia. No one would dare to attack a delegation or a military convoy from Türkiye, not even the foreign fighters.