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REBELS REASSURE CHRISTIANS AFTER CAPTURING KEY SYRIAN BORDER TOWN
TIME Magazine
March 27 2014
Hania Mourtada / Beirut
3:05 PM ET
A rebel fighter checks a launcher near the village of Kessab and
the border crossing with Turkey, in the northwestern province of
Latakia, on March 23, 2014. Rebels seized Kessab a day later.Amr
Radwan al-Homsi--AFP/Getty Images
Kessab, the latest Christian-majority town to fall to rebels,
has become the newest focal point of a media war pitting the Assad
regime against a splintered opposition, as rebels seek to dispel the
perception that they are intolerant of Syria's religious minorities
It wasn't long after several Syrian rebel battalions overran the
Armenian-Christian town of Kessab, on the border between Syria and
Turkey, that apocalyptic reports of looting, abduction and mass murder
started appearing in news accounts around the world. "Reports Cite
80 Dead in Kessab; Churches Desecrated," read one headline in the
diasporic Los Angeles-based Asbarez newspaper. Christian residents
who had fled to nearby towns told reporters they later called home
only to have rebels pick up to tauntingly tell them they had nice
furniture and tasty food.
It has become a familiar trope in the Syrian conflict. Islamist rebels
launch a string of military offensives against a Christian-majority
town to root out government forces there, the latter respond by
indiscriminately bombarding the town, residents run for their lives,
and the government is quick to portray it as another incident of
ethnic cleansing carried out by foreign-sponsored fundamentalists.
Lately, however, rebels have been making a concerted effort to counter
such claims, in online published statements, and, more often, on
YouTube. "[This is] the church of the Armenians in Kessab after its
liberation," one rebel videographer narrated as he took viewers on a
video tour of one of the city's perfectly intact churches a day after
rebels took the town. Islam, he declared proudly, teaches respect for
all religions, including Christianity. "The jihadist brothers do not
harm anyone. This is our religion and this is our Islam."
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Coastal Kessab, the northernmost town in the government stronghold of
Latakia province, has become the latest flashpoint in a battle between
regime forces and rebels determined to secure Syria's entire northern
border. It has also become the war's latest ideological battleground,
as both sides attempt to craft competing narratives in a race to come
out on top, not just militarily but also morally. For all the anguished
reports of persecuted Armenian Christians trumpeted by Syrian and
international media outlets, few concrete details have emerged. The
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an anti-government monitoring
organization that has tracked casualties throughout the conflict,
makes no note of dead civilians. Nor is there any photographic or
video proof of destroyed churches in Kessab to date.
Most Christians, according to activists and residents, fled long
before the fighting started, leaving behind a deserted town.
"Contrary to what the flashy Asbarez headlines will have you believe,
the rebels didn't come in to slaughter Armenians and destroy their
churches," writes Filor Nigo, an Iraqi-Armenian activist based in the
U.S, on Facebook. "Kessab is a strategically important point in this
military conflict...Syria is engulfed in war and Armenians in Syria
cannot honestly believe that these events would not affect them."
Increasingly aware of their unflattering image in the media, moderate
rebels are beginning to realize the necessity of deflecting regime
propaganda. They are circulating a message which, whether genuine
or not, borrows from the language of international human rights law
to reassure observers. They insist they are waging their warfare
according to universal principles even as the government portrays a
different reality.
"Considering the interests and well-being of the Syrian population
are our most important priorities, we confirm our commitment to
international human fights law by focusing on military targets and
protecting all civil institutions including schools, hospitals,
places of worship, and houses," read a recently-circulated social
mediastatement, signed by three major rebel factions including the
Al-Qaeda affiliated Nusra Front. The statement has since been removed
from its original source, with no explanation, but various clips,
with a similar message, are still available on YouTube.
One such clip shows a stilted exchange between Islamist fighters and
three elderly Christian people as they venture out of a building. The
rebels shout reassurances at them while the activist behind the
camera keeps reiterating that this shows how the rebels are keeping
Kessab residents safe. The latter however are visibly perturbed,
if not frightened, and the exchange appears somewhat forced as if
playing out solely for the screen.
Of course, attempts to reassure minorities by the mostly Sunni
opposition are far from new, writes Frederic C. Hof, a senior fellow
at the Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East, in a recent blog post.
"Opposition leaders have spoken publicly and eloquently about their
vision of a Syria where citizenship will trump all other forms of
political identification, and where Syria's ethnic and sectarian
diversity will be protected and celebrated." It's a comforting vision,
but members of Syria's minority groups still fear that it will never
make the leap from policy statement to real-world implementation. The
insurgency, plagued by deep schisms, has yet to demonstrate a unified
coherent message. "There is a large disparity in how different rebel
groups envision treating minorities," says Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi,
a Shillman-Ginsburg Fellow at the Middle East Forum, a nonprofit
organization based in Philadelphia which promotes American interests
in the Middle East. "For the jihadi groups, for example, Alawites
are branded as apostates and Christians are definitely second-class
citizens. Other rebel coalitions speak of protecting minorities
within the framework of Islamic law, but that hardly reassures those
minorities." More generally, he concludes, "anti-Alawite and anti-Shi'a
sentiment has become mainstream within the insurgency."
That breakdown in messaging is readily apparent in Kessab. Even
as some rebel groups refute regime propaganda with media-savvy and
conciliatory takes, others have no qualms describing their mission in
overtly sectarian terms. In one clip, a Saudi rebel commander in the
Nusra Front, standing near a sign that reads "Welcome to Kessab,"
promises that the Nusayris, a derogatory term for Assad's Alawite
minority sect, shall be defeated at the hands of the Sunni Muslims.
"You have your planes, but we have God with us."
The dizzying array of contradictory clips and statements which have
emerged in the wake of the Kessab takeover reveal two conflicting
currents within the insurgency: defiant ideologically-driven fighters
whose declared mission is a struggle against "apostates" rather than
democracy are sabotaging the images of coexistence that moderate
leaders are putting forward. The question is whether enough factions
will ever rally behind one straightforward message.
http://time.com/40378/syria-kessab-christians/
TIME Magazine
March 27 2014
Hania Mourtada / Beirut
3:05 PM ET
A rebel fighter checks a launcher near the village of Kessab and
the border crossing with Turkey, in the northwestern province of
Latakia, on March 23, 2014. Rebels seized Kessab a day later.Amr
Radwan al-Homsi--AFP/Getty Images
Kessab, the latest Christian-majority town to fall to rebels,
has become the newest focal point of a media war pitting the Assad
regime against a splintered opposition, as rebels seek to dispel the
perception that they are intolerant of Syria's religious minorities
It wasn't long after several Syrian rebel battalions overran the
Armenian-Christian town of Kessab, on the border between Syria and
Turkey, that apocalyptic reports of looting, abduction and mass murder
started appearing in news accounts around the world. "Reports Cite
80 Dead in Kessab; Churches Desecrated," read one headline in the
diasporic Los Angeles-based Asbarez newspaper. Christian residents
who had fled to nearby towns told reporters they later called home
only to have rebels pick up to tauntingly tell them they had nice
furniture and tasty food.
It has become a familiar trope in the Syrian conflict. Islamist rebels
launch a string of military offensives against a Christian-majority
town to root out government forces there, the latter respond by
indiscriminately bombarding the town, residents run for their lives,
and the government is quick to portray it as another incident of
ethnic cleansing carried out by foreign-sponsored fundamentalists.
Lately, however, rebels have been making a concerted effort to counter
such claims, in online published statements, and, more often, on
YouTube. "[This is] the church of the Armenians in Kessab after its
liberation," one rebel videographer narrated as he took viewers on a
video tour of one of the city's perfectly intact churches a day after
rebels took the town. Islam, he declared proudly, teaches respect for
all religions, including Christianity. "The jihadist brothers do not
harm anyone. This is our religion and this is our Islam."
POPULAR AMONG SUBSCRIBERS
Geopolitics and the New World Order
Subscribe
Mad Men's Conquest of Cool
Eric Garcetti Writes a New LA Story
Coastal Kessab, the northernmost town in the government stronghold of
Latakia province, has become the latest flashpoint in a battle between
regime forces and rebels determined to secure Syria's entire northern
border. It has also become the war's latest ideological battleground,
as both sides attempt to craft competing narratives in a race to come
out on top, not just militarily but also morally. For all the anguished
reports of persecuted Armenian Christians trumpeted by Syrian and
international media outlets, few concrete details have emerged. The
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an anti-government monitoring
organization that has tracked casualties throughout the conflict,
makes no note of dead civilians. Nor is there any photographic or
video proof of destroyed churches in Kessab to date.
Most Christians, according to activists and residents, fled long
before the fighting started, leaving behind a deserted town.
"Contrary to what the flashy Asbarez headlines will have you believe,
the rebels didn't come in to slaughter Armenians and destroy their
churches," writes Filor Nigo, an Iraqi-Armenian activist based in the
U.S, on Facebook. "Kessab is a strategically important point in this
military conflict...Syria is engulfed in war and Armenians in Syria
cannot honestly believe that these events would not affect them."
Increasingly aware of their unflattering image in the media, moderate
rebels are beginning to realize the necessity of deflecting regime
propaganda. They are circulating a message which, whether genuine
or not, borrows from the language of international human rights law
to reassure observers. They insist they are waging their warfare
according to universal principles even as the government portrays a
different reality.
"Considering the interests and well-being of the Syrian population
are our most important priorities, we confirm our commitment to
international human fights law by focusing on military targets and
protecting all civil institutions including schools, hospitals,
places of worship, and houses," read a recently-circulated social
mediastatement, signed by three major rebel factions including the
Al-Qaeda affiliated Nusra Front. The statement has since been removed
from its original source, with no explanation, but various clips,
with a similar message, are still available on YouTube.
One such clip shows a stilted exchange between Islamist fighters and
three elderly Christian people as they venture out of a building. The
rebels shout reassurances at them while the activist behind the
camera keeps reiterating that this shows how the rebels are keeping
Kessab residents safe. The latter however are visibly perturbed,
if not frightened, and the exchange appears somewhat forced as if
playing out solely for the screen.
Of course, attempts to reassure minorities by the mostly Sunni
opposition are far from new, writes Frederic C. Hof, a senior fellow
at the Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East, in a recent blog post.
"Opposition leaders have spoken publicly and eloquently about their
vision of a Syria where citizenship will trump all other forms of
political identification, and where Syria's ethnic and sectarian
diversity will be protected and celebrated." It's a comforting vision,
but members of Syria's minority groups still fear that it will never
make the leap from policy statement to real-world implementation. The
insurgency, plagued by deep schisms, has yet to demonstrate a unified
coherent message. "There is a large disparity in how different rebel
groups envision treating minorities," says Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi,
a Shillman-Ginsburg Fellow at the Middle East Forum, a nonprofit
organization based in Philadelphia which promotes American interests
in the Middle East. "For the jihadi groups, for example, Alawites
are branded as apostates and Christians are definitely second-class
citizens. Other rebel coalitions speak of protecting minorities
within the framework of Islamic law, but that hardly reassures those
minorities." More generally, he concludes, "anti-Alawite and anti-Shi'a
sentiment has become mainstream within the insurgency."
That breakdown in messaging is readily apparent in Kessab. Even
as some rebel groups refute regime propaganda with media-savvy and
conciliatory takes, others have no qualms describing their mission in
overtly sectarian terms. In one clip, a Saudi rebel commander in the
Nusra Front, standing near a sign that reads "Welcome to Kessab,"
promises that the Nusayris, a derogatory term for Assad's Alawite
minority sect, shall be defeated at the hands of the Sunni Muslims.
"You have your planes, but we have God with us."
The dizzying array of contradictory clips and statements which have
emerged in the wake of the Kessab takeover reveal two conflicting
currents within the insurgency: defiant ideologically-driven fighters
whose declared mission is a struggle against "apostates" rather than
democracy are sabotaging the images of coexistence that moderate
leaders are putting forward. The question is whether enough factions
will ever rally behind one straightforward message.
http://time.com/40378/syria-kessab-christians/