The Syrian Diaries

I've been quite for a while, because I was in Syria, before and after the constitutional referendum, which ridiculed by the United States and applauded by Russia and China. A Turkish authority, on the other hand, admits me off-the-record that this referendum is "too little, too late" for now, but it could indeed save the Assad regime if it could be put into vote last spring. What I see in Damascus and around can hardly be described as signs of an imminent regime change, though. Of course, it was probably what people were thinking on the eve of the fall of the Berlin Wall, as well.

Because of the extraordinary conditions, there are only two ways of entering Syria and they both mean that you will become embedded. If you illegally cross the border, you become embedded to the armed opposition. If you enter and tour the country legally, you become embedded to the Syrian administration.

Although I respect the courage of my colleagues who chose the prior method, I believe that the latter option is more appropriate in a journalistic sense. When you become a part of the armed opposition, you get pinned down to a certain district of a rebellious town, seeing only one side of the conflict and forced to feel symphaty for those who protect you from tanks and artillery. But if you are allowed to be in the whole country, you can do whatever you want, trying to watch and listen as much as you can. When the authorities obstruct you, you can still force them to let you work freely, if they don't want to face a PR disaster.

Of course, after all, a low-grade civil war is taking place in Syria and it's always better to be there to get first hand information, either from a few hands or more, instead of being a subject of the propaganda war with big lies from both sides.

That's why I opt to apply for a visa to cover the referendum, just like the Washington Post did last week. As far as I see, the Post was rejected by the Syrian authorities, while a group of Turkish journalists, including me, was granted it (I applied for it on August, by the way). Interestingly, our group of eleven included a journalist from an Islamist newspaper who advocates that Turkey should militarily intervene in Syria, as well as mainstream newspapers like mine and the three leading news channels in Turkey that all tried to remain unbiased.

We arrived in Damascus last Saturday and I returned to Turkey yesterday. My stories (in Turkish) can be found here and here and here and here. In English, a colleague from CNN-Türk summarized our first observations and our interview with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Al-Moallem. I also noticed that a Twitter user that I don't know translated my first story into French.

Almost nothing, except the calmness of the Syrian people, was unexpected for me. Syrian authorities told that we should stay in the safe districts of Damascus. By insisting strongly, we managed them to take us to riskier places like Douma and Harasta (a trip to Homs got cancelled in the last minute because of increased violence and we couldn't reach Zabadani because the intercity road was reportedly mined by the opposition).

When we try to interview some people in a suburb of Douma, Syrian soldiers interrupted us frequently. But no control can be ultimate and we take advantage of it, listening to harshly criticial views, too. In downtown Damascus, we were completely free, although we could feel that the secret police was almost everywhere.

For us, eleven journalists from Turkey, being a Turk was one of the biggest obstacles, as many people refused to speak to us because of our ethnicity. Whether pro-regime or  pro-opposition, almost all Syrians are angry at the Turkish government and showed their reactions to us.

I chose from my album the following photos to summarize the trip:

On Saturday, I interviewed more than thirty people in downtown Damascus. Adil, a Turkmen who sells lottery tickets near Bab Tuma, said that he lost his job as a Turkish-speaking tourist guide after the crisis between Turkey and Syria. Although he's got no links to the regime, he reiterated that the conflict was imposed by external forces. "Until recently, we didn't know who's a Kurd, who's an Alewite," he said, "When I was visiting my brother's grave last Ramadan, some Libyans with bags full of weapons came to the graveyard and threatened us to rise against the government or be killed."

On Sunday, it was the referendum day. We were taken by the government officials to an election office. That place seemed completely staged. An official even presented a ballot as a gift to one of my friends. The ballot was not unused, it was a "yes" vote!

So, I left all the officials behind and hanged around the city, trying to find a "normal" ballot box. I finally found one around 4pm in a school. There were 360 votes inside the box, but nobody voted for more than half an hour that I stayed there. When I tried to take a photo with the officials in the room, all but one left the room, saying that they were police officers! Moreover, there were other problems with the referendum, like the fact that serving soldiers were also voting and Sunday was not declared an official holiday to let working people comfortably vote.

On Monday, we met Al-Moallim. The most important thing that he told was about the reason of souring relations between Turkey and Syria. He said that Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan was raising the issue of the Muslim Brotherhood every time he met President Bashar Assad, arguing that they should be a part of the democratic transformation. Assad allowed them to return to Syria as individuals, but didn't give permission to establish a party. "Erdoğan got unhappy," Al-Moallim said.

On Tuesday, we went to Douma, firstly. In a restive neighborhood called Sifhoniyya, the government officials showed a room what they called a recently revealed weapons depot of the armed opposition. I saw a U.S. made assault rifle there. Later on, I would be asked by the Syrian state television about the Turkish made weapons of the opposition. "We also saw lots of AK-47s in Sifhoniyya. Do you also blame Russia because of it?" I would counter with another question.

I wanted to check the allegations of the Syrian army about the weapons depot. I knocked the neighboring doors. The people were in fear, but I managed to start talking to a woman, living just a street  away the so-called "terrorist arsenal." It seemed to me that she was about to say something important, but an army official came, rebuked her and shut close the door.

Our next stop was Harasta. I stood on the ruins of the tomb of a Sunni saint. The opposition claims that it was attacked by the army three months ago, while Syrian authorities insist that it was "bombed by terrorists, in order to undermine Harastan people's loyalty to the state." An official admitted to me that she was forced to flee this neighborhood just a few days ago, because there were opposition snipers on the balconies. Now there were Syrian soldiers (I didn't see any sniper when we were there), resting there comfortably. 

Of course, it was looking like a temporary comfort. "Come here at night and see the reality," a resident told me. "The armed ones," as residents call them, take the streets after it is dark. "Some soldiers keep cursing at us. We want to return to a normal life," a shopkeeper bravely told me. Another resident alleged that armed groups forced them to close their shops earlier. Shopkeepers who refuse to do it keep getting shot by the same armed groups, who were allegedly paid as little as 30 dollars by Syrian exiles.

To summarize, I can easily say that the Syrian problem is more complicated than the black-and-white picture that is being painted by the "unilateral" media like CNN or Al Jazeera. It seemed to me that Bashar Assad was hugely popular before the unrest. Now, his image is stained even among his strongest supporters. However, many Syrians -and probably most of them- don't want him to be ousted by any kind of "intervention", although they criticize his recent decisions. Whether it is true or not, many Syrians believe that the conflict is driven by external forces. The minorities are especially worried because of the interference of Sunni radicals, including Salafis, Wahabis and Al Qaida. 

As a human being, I wish that this referendum could take place last April in a more democratic and transparent fashion, paving the way for a genuine transition in Syria. Not only I mourn for the children who were killed by the army or the armed opposition whether intentionally or by accident, I'm also extremely worried for those who are orphaned by such actions. Who will they become? In what kind of a Syria and a world will they live? I care only about them and the good Syrians from both sides who refuse and condemn violence. Down with this disgusting fight for power.