25th/May/2012

Umayya for Researches and Strategic Studies

The Daily Monitoring Report

The Military Situation
- Al-Assad's troops continued shelling the city of Al-Rastan in Homs, killing three civilians and destroying an automatic bakery. A UN observer team arrived at the scene of the shell to inspect the situation.(1)(2)(4)(5) - Al-Assad's forces stormed into Homs and Deir Balaba, launched crackdowns and a detention, searched more than fifty houses amid heavy gunfire, which resulted in 150 deaths and several injured people.(1)(2) - Following the government force's mortar and artillery shelling of the districts Baba Amr and Jobar, explosions shook the neighborhoods of Jobar and Al-Inshaat.(2) - Nine members of the Assad troops were killed in the Damascus rural neighborhood of Darya, and five others were killed while they were storming into Al-Qadam neighborhood during clashes with the Free Syrian Army (FSA).(1) - During exams, the security forces broke into a girls' high school in the Damascus rural town of Harasta and arrested 18 students.(1) - Hundreds of people took to streets in AlQalamoun district of Al-Nabk, demanding the release of children, who were abducted when armed group attacked their school bus and seized jewelries and cell phones of the teachers.(1) - After detaining them from their houses, AlAssad's forces publicly executed four people in the woodland of the Idlib village of Basamis.(1)(4) - Clashes took place between the Assad troops and the Free Syrian Army (FSA) in the area between the Idlib villages of Deir Sunbul and Ihsem, killing four FSA elements.(1)(4) - Al-Assad's brigades slaughtered a mother and her five children aged between four months and nine years in Hama.(1)(2)(4) - The government forces bombed the Aleppo city of Azaz.(2) - Al-Assad's troops bombed Jabal Al-Akrad's villages in Latakia's countryside, and carried out wide-scale security deployment and a detention campaign the area of Al-Hassa in the same province.(1)(2)

Statistics

The Internal Situation

- Sheikh Ibrahim Al-Zoaby, head of Free People of Syria Party, said efforts were being made with several sides in Lebanon, Europe and some Arab countries to secure the release of two Lebanese people, who were kidnapped today. "The regime is responsible for their safety," said Al-Zoaby.(1)(3) - Google allowed Syrian users to download some of its programs that were banned in Syria because of the economic and technological sanctions imposed by the US Administration on Syria several years ago.(2)

24th/May death toll: 33

The Political Mobility

- Burhan Ghalyoun, who has recently resigned as head of the Syrian National Council (SNC), said that the SNC failed to live up to the sacrifices of the Syrian people, adding that he resigned due to splits between the Islamists and the secularist.(2)(4) - Farouk Tayfour, deputy mentor of the Muslim Brotherhood group in Syria, announced that the Brotherhood has a conviction that changing the head of the SNC at this stage would not be useless, as Burahn Ghalioun, the SNC former head, has become an expert in the Syrian case, and that he created a wide network of relations with world leaders. Tayfour denied that the Brotherhood rejects George Sabra as the new head of the SNC due to being a Christian.(1) - The Free Syrian Army (FSA) announced its main three goals, mainly "protection of peaceful protests", "helping the Syrian people obtain their freedom" and "referring to international courts those responsible for war crimes against the Syrian people."(1)(4) - The SNC said Syria would need $11.5 billion in reconstruction funds in the first six months after the collapse of President Bashar Al-Assad's rule, mainly to support its currency and pay public sector wages.
(3)

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25th/May/2012
Activities of Civil Organizations
- In its annual report on human rights in the world, Amnesty International fiercely criticized the UN Security Council, adding, "The UN Security Council is suffering a failure of leadership which makes it seem "tired, out of step and increasingly unfit for purpose."
(2)(6)(7)

Umayya for Researches and Strategic Studies

- The Turkish Interior Minister Idris Naim Sahin accused the Assad authorities of supporting rebels belonging to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) in an apparent act of revenge against Turkey's pro-popular protests in Syria. Sahin said that Turkish intelligence's reports indicate remarkable increase in number of the PKK militants in northern Syrian areas close to the Turkish borders, adding that this action is a clear violation of the good-neighbor policy. Sahin warned the Assad regime of consequences of such a step.(1) - US officials revealed that the Barack Obama Administration is preparing a plan that essentially would give US approval to arms transfers from Arab countries to some Syrian opposition fighters. "The plan would vet members of the Free Syrian Army and other groups to determine whether they are suitable recipients of munitions to fight the Assad government and to ensure that weapons don't wind up in the hands of alQaeda-linked terrorists or other extremist groups, such as Hezbollah," added the US officials.(5) - The American CNN channel quoted US military sources as saying that the US Army and the Jordan one are currently doing joint exercises, in addition to the "Eager Lion 2012" exercises, which include other countries, which are meant to train Jordanian forces to intervene to protect Syria's chemical and biological weapons. The exercises also include the way through which Jordanians can deal with the large influx of Syrian refugees.(2) - France's new Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius says his country is deeply concerned about effects of the Syrian tragedy on Lebanon, hoping such a tragedy will not reach Lebanon.(1) - A senior French source says that there are "red lines" that France can not abandon in dealing with the Lebanese situation with its Syrian dimension, including Lebanon's handing over of Syrian refugees to the AlAssad's authorities, and the entry of Al-Assad's forces into the Lebanese territories.(1)

- Salil Shetty, Secretary-General of Amnesty International says, "There is a clear and compelling case for the situation in Syria to be referred to the International Criminal Court for investigation of crimes against humanity."(6) - The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights accused the Assad regime of detaining children as hostages to force their relatives to surrender, adding that the regime arrested wife of opposition activist Said Mahmoud Hamada, his children, his parents and his brother together with his his wife and son.(2)(4)

Sources:
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9) (10) (11) (12) (13) (14) (15) (16) Asharq Al-Awsat The London-based Al-Hayat The Kuwaiti Al-Watan Al-Quds Al-Arabi The Lebanese Al-Mustaqbal The Syrian Al-Baath Reuters AFP The Qatari Al-Jazeera The Israeli Haaretz Washington Post wall Street Journal The Israeli Yedioth Ahronoth The Guardian The Telegraph Russia Today

Syrian Political Stances

- during his meeting with the Iranian Minister of Information and Communication Reza Taipour, President Bashar Al-Assad said, "Syria was able to overcome pressure and threats which it was exposed to, and with it will be able to come through the present crisis."(1)(2)(3)(4)(5) - The newly-elected Syrian People's Council held its first session and elected Mohamed Jihad Al-Lahham, member of the ruling Al-Ba'ath Party, as the new speaker. The Council is composed of 250 members, of which over 200 are new members, and 30 are women.
(2)(4)

- Bashar Al-Assad did not appear in the first parliamentary session, and so the officials, who said to be poisoned, including Al-Assad's brother in law Asif Shawkat, chief of intelligence services, the Defense Minister Dawood Rajaha, Hisham Bakhtiar, Hassan Turkmani and Mohammed Said Bekheitan.(1)

International Political Stances

- UN diplomats expect that the UN-Arab envoy Kofi Annan to visit Syria soon to meet with officials of the Assad regime, in an attempt to rescue his peace initiative.(3)

This Report was issued by Umayya for Researches and Strategic Studies, and it contains pure news that do not reflect an opinion. Edited by Abed Alrhman Alsarraj Page 2