For the last 50 fifty years, Syrians have endured two plagues, both by the name Assad; first the by father, Hafez from 1971-2000 and then by his son to the present day, Bashar, referred to as the lion and the lion’s son.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989, the end of the Cold War, Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, and Syria’s joining of the coalition forces in the Gulf War in 1991 with the start of the peace process, Western countries have pressured the Syrian government to release the Syrian detainees as a prerequisite for the West’s openness to the isolationist regime in an attempt to reverse the behavior of the oppression that was infamous for its massacres.
In the city of Hama and the notorious Palmyra prison, Rifaat al-Assad, the brother of Hafez al-Assad, committed seven terrible massacres, in addition to the rest of the prisons and detention centers inside the rest of the security branches. The foundations of these prisons and detention centers and the methods of torture were taken from a “play book” by a Nazi officer who was responsible for many mass graves during World War II. From here begins the story of this oppressive regime that has turned Syria not only into detention centers and prisons, but into human slaughterhouses, as described by Amnesty International in its recent reports.
During the Assad son era, the brutality of this criminal regime on the majority of the Sunni population increased with the recruitment of followers from the Iranian, Iraqi, Lebanese, Afghan and sectarian Shiite militias to begin the bureaucracy of death, torture and field executions of all forms on the Syrian people in an attempt to curb the popular movement against this criminal regime.
Then, with the help of the Russian bear, Bashar Al Assad instituted a whole new phase for killing innocent Syrians by target bombing cities, towns, villages, hospitals, schools and vital community buildings and has
not stopped. The Syrian hell inside prisons includes rape, killing by starvation and torture, not to mention the pandemic Covid 19 Corona, which occupies most countries of the world. And thus, it is the responsibility of the international community to pursue the perpetrators of these violations against humanity.
Observers believe that Bashar Al-Assad will get away with impunity just as his father, Hafez Al-Assad escaped punishment during the Hama massacres, thanks to the efforts and favor of Moscow, which obstructed the efforts of the international community through the Russian-Chinese veto against any project presented by member states or others. Thereby, overriding the need to negotiate with the Red Cross to reveal the fate of the missing.
Within the last couple of years, the horrific massacres exposed through the leaked “Caesar” photos, have given proof beyond doubt of Assad’s atrocities, which include over 11,000 victims of torture and field executions practiced by the Syrian regime since the start of the Syrian revolution since 2011.
Today, there is still no end in sight to the Syrian violence that has killed or displaced over 12 million of its citizens. Detention is a weapon of war against humanity that the Syrian regime uses to complete its plans. Among them is the process of demographic change that has pushed the country into internal displacement of its citizens and asylum in foreign countries.
There is mounting pressure for the Syrian repressive authorities to reveal the fate of thousands of Syrian detainees after years of denial. But, so far, their has only been a deafening silence from the regime.
There must be a clear signal from the world leaders confirming the end of the most important obstacle to the Syrian tragedy, its “torture prisons”…It is a ‘responsibility of the international community’.
Bridge of Peace Syria does not publish the authors of articles in order to protect their identities.
Bridge of Peace Syria 