Syria sends tanks into Deraa, where uprising began

Syrian troops and tanks poured  into Deraa yesterday, seeking to crush resistance in the city  where a month-long uprising against the autocratic 11-year rule  of President Bashar al-Assad first erupted.

A prominent activist said at least 18 people were killed in  the first reported use of tanks inside a population centre since  peaceful pro-democracy demonstrations began in the southern  city, close to the border with Jordan, on March 18.

The White House, deploring “brutal violence used by the  government of Syria against its people”, said President Barack  Obama’s administration was considering targeted sanctions to  make clear that “this behaviour is unacceptable”.

A man prepares to throw a rock at a passing tank in a location given as Deraa yesterday, in this still image from an amateur video. REUTERS/Social Media Website via Reuters TV

A U.S. official said that measures under consideration  included a freeze on assets and a ban on U.S. business dealings.

Security forces have killed more than 350 civilians across  Syria since unrest broke out in Deraa, rights groups say. A  third of the victims were shot in the past three days as the  scale and breadth of a popular revolt against Assad grew.

Assad lifted Syria’s 48-year state of emergency on Thursday  but activists say the violence the following day, when 100  people were killed during protests across the country, showed he  was not serious about addressing calls for political freedom.

A leading human rights campaigner said security forces,  which also swept into the restive Damascus suburbs of Douma and  Mouadhamiya, shooting and making arrests, were waging “a savage  war designed to annihilate Syria’s democrats”.

Yesterday’s raids suggested Assad, who assumed power when his  father died in 2000 after ruling Syria with an iron fist for 30  years, was determined to crush the opposition by force.

Opposition activist Ammar Qurabi, in contact with the Syrian opposition from Egypt, said at least 18 people were killed by  gunfire and tank shelling in Deraa alone, with many more wounded  or missing.

State news agency SANA said the army entered Deraa in  response to “appeals for help” from residents and to protect  them from “extremist terrorist groups”. It said clashes had led  to fatalities on both sides, without giving details.

TANKS OUTSIDE MOSQUE

Earlier, a witness in Deraa told Reuters he could see bodies  lying in a main street near the Omari mosque after eight tanks  and two armoured vehicles were deployed in the old quarter.

“People are taking cover in homes. I could see two bodies  near the mosque and no one was able to go out and drag them  away,” the witness said.

Snipers were posted on government buildings, and security  forces in army fatigues had shot at random at houses since the  tanks moved in just after dawn prayers, the witness said.

Tanks at the main entry points to Deraa also shelled targets  in the city, a resident named Mohsen told Al Jazeera, which  showed images of a black cloud of smoke over buildings. “People  can’t move from one street to another because of the shelling.”

Abdallah Abazaid, another activist, told Al Arabiya  television there were “20 martyrs”, and that five officers and  10 soldiers refused orders to shoot residents.

“They have quit their positions because they found us  unarmed,” Abazaid said. His comments about army defections could  not be confirmed but another witness told Al Jazeera that a unit  commander and his troops fired on their own side, apparently to  allow people to drag the wounded from the street.

“I hope that Arab and Muslim nations support the Syrian  people. The Syrian people are standing alone, unarmed and  unequipped, before an arsenal,” the imam of Deraa’s Omari mosque  said in footage broadcast by Al Jazeera.

Foreign journalists have mostly been expelled from the  country, making it impossible to verify the situation on the  ground. Grisly footage posted on the Internet by demonstrators  in recent days appears to show troops firing on unarmed crowds.