Francesca Borri: Aleppo (1)

Der folgende Text ist eine Übersetzung aus dem Englischen. Die Autorin Francesca Borri (@francescaborri) beschreibt ihre Eindrücke, die sie in Syriens nördlicher Metropole gesammelt und mir zur Verwendung zur Verfügung gestellt hat. Ihr gilt mein Dank.

Grateful credits to Francesca for providing me her English text to translate and publish it in German. Grazie tanto.

Der gefährlichste Ort hier ist das Hospital. Das ist das erste, das man einem sagt, wenn man ankommt; wer es ruhiger haben will, sollte an der Frontlinie bleiben.

Vergiss alle Regeln und Gesetzmässigkeiten, du, der du das Land betrittst. Aleppo besteht aus Detonationen in diesen Tagen,aus Schutt, aus nichts anderem. Und wer es wagt, sich auf die Suche nach Brot, Wasser, einem Arzt zu begeben, auf den feuern die Scharfschützen. Assads Kampfjets fliegen tief über den Boden, sie zerschmettern einen förmlich mit todbringendem Wind. Und doch sind sie so unpräzise, dass sie niemals die Gegend um die Frontlinie bombardieren; sie könnten die Rebellen verfehlen und die eigenen Leute treffen.

Die Einheit der Freien Syrischen Armee, in die wir eingebunden sind, besteht aus dreizehn Mann, zwei von ihnen tragen Flip-Flops - und die anderen haben nicht immer ein gleiches Paar Schuhe an. Sie waren zu siebzehnt, drei von ihnen starben, als sie den Leichnam eines Vierten bergen wollten, der immer noch dort liegt, am Ende der Strasse. Sie haben ihr Quartier in einer Schule errichtet und jeder von ihnen trägt ein Gewehr, eine Kalashnikov, ein Messer. Ein Heranwachsender putzt im Büro des Hauptquartiers auf einem Teppich die Familienjuwelen, zwei RPG‘s und eine Bazooka. Ausser dem Captain, einem Offizier, der die Regimestreitkräfte vor sechs Monaten verlassen hat, sind sie allesamt siebzehn bis achtzehn Jahre alt. Alaa ist Philosophiestudent, zwischen den Schichten an der Front liest er Habermas. Deserteure erkennt man leicht, sie tragen Tarnshirts, die sie aus den Regimearmeebeständen entwendet haben, die anderen tragen das Konterfei von Messi oder Che Guevara auf ihrer Brust.

Der syrische Frühling ist zum Krieg in Syrien geworden. Und die Entwicklung dahin kann am leichtesten im Unterschied zwischen der libanesischen und der türkischen Grenze erklärt werden. Beirut ist der Untergrundhimmel der bemerkenswertesten Aktivisten, diejenigen, die alles auf die Beine gestellt haben, Protest für Protest, Treffen für Treffen - und deren Revolution nun konfisziert worden ist. Sie halfen Journalisten nicht nur über die Grenze, sondern vor allem auch, die Ansprüche und Gründe derer zu verstehen, die sich dem Regime entgegenstellen. Heutzutage ist die Grenze zum Libanon unzugänglich. Auf der anderen Seite öffnete sich die Grenze zur Türkei, die Rebellen verwalten das Grenzkontrollbüro, man betritt Syrien, indem man über eine Fußmatte mit dem Porträt Assads läuft. Wie auch immer, das neue Syrien, dessen selbsternannte Sprecher sie sind, ist Terra Incognita. Es ist schwierig, mit ihnen über Politik zu reden. Sinnlos, sich nach UN-Beobachtern, Islam, Sunnis, Alawis zu erkunden. Hier geht es darum, 500 US$ zu bezahlen; ausländische Korrespondenten sind das Geschäft des Tages - das ist die Gebühr für eine Touristentour in ein Aleppo unter Beschuss.

Theoretisch handelt es sich um vier Frontlinien. Doch in Wirklichkeit gibt es nur eine einzige Frontlinie, nämlich zwischen der Erde und dem Firmament. Und wer ausser Kugeln und Messern den Kampfjets nichts entgegenzusetzen hat, dem bleibt kein Ausweg. Ohne Intervention von aussen kann die FSA nicht die Oberhand gewinnen. Und doch schafft sie es bis heute, den Kampf nicht zu verlieren.

Es geht in diesen Tagen in Aleppo darum, die Stellungen zu verteidigen. Kein Schritt vorwärts möglich. Die Stadt ist von Scharfschützen und Blut übersät, während die Bombardierungen von oben weitergehen. Die Karte an der Wand des Büros im Hauptquartier erinnert einen an ein Zeichenlabyrinth, in dem man den richtigen Weg von A nach B finden muß, nur dass hier zwischen A und B noch dutzende Familien leben - und dies ist die Karte, die die Scharfschützen markiert. Innerhalb einer halben Stunde werden drei Leichen beim Shifa-Hospital abgeladen, eine von ihnen die eines achtjährigen Kindes. Direkt draussen der Fußabdruck eines Kampfjets, gestern am frühen Abend, zwei Meter tief. Um der Bevölkerung Mut zu machen, kurven die Rebellen auf Pick-Ups herum, die mit Doshkas dekoriert sind; es handelt sich dabei um ein MG-Placebo, dessen Effekt auf einen Kampfjet einer Erbsenpistole gleichkommt. Und um die restliche Welt zu ermutigen, ihre Unterstützung zu gewinnen, schleppen sie Journalisten an die Frontlinie, direkt zu den unsichtbaren Schützen. Zu dritt, viert verstecken sie sich an den ersten Kreuzungen, hundert Meter davor. Und dann rennen sie blindlings feuernd durch die Strassen. Hin und her. Manchmal, im Eifer des Rambo-ähnlichen Gefechts, vergessen sie, ihre Waffen nachzuladen.

Es gibt keine Regeln in Syrien. Bomben auf die Zivilbevölkerung, Moscheen, die in militärische Einrichtungen umfunktioniert wurden. Kalashnikovs in Krankenwägen, Rebellen in Regimearmeeuniformen. Regimeeinheiten ohne Uniform. Und dieses Camp sieht mehr wie eine besetzte Schule als wie ein Armeeposten aus. Die Rebellen diskutieren alle zehn Minuten. Wer kochen soll, wie man den nächsten Häuserblock einnimmt. Welche Taktik anzuwenden ist. Du hast mir meine Schuhe weggenommen, nein, du hast mir meine Decken entwendet. Und das ist nicht bloß der Mikrokosmos dessen, was sich innerhalb der verschiedenen bewaffneten Einheiten abspielt, das ist generell das, was sich innerhalb der Oppositionsbewegung wie ein roter Faden durchzieht. Es gibt hier weder einen einheitlichen Führungsstab noch eine einheitliche Strategie. Weder unter den Zivilisten noch unter den Kämpfern. Und das ist die derzeitige Stärke Assads, mächtiger als jedes Waffenarsenal; die Gespaltenheit der Bevölkerung.

In der Schule hängen inmitten der Waffen ein paar Kinder herum. Ahmed ist sechs Jahre alt. Heute werde ich dir beibringen, wie man ein wahrer Syrer wird, sagt ihm der Captain. Ein freier Syrer. Er drückt ihm sein Gewehr in die Hände und lässt ihn in die Luft feuern in dieser engen Strasse, gesäumt von achtstöckigen Gebäuden, deren Fenster bereits zuhauf zerborsten sind. Ein weiteres geht zu Bruch. Eine junge Frau rennt angsterfüllt die Treppen runter, die Kugel ist in ihrer Küche eingeschlagen. Sie greift nach meinem Stift und meinem Notizblock. Was für ein Syrien wird erwachsen aus Männern wie diesen, schreibt sie und versteckt sich unten im Haus.

Aleppo Ansteuernd / Entering Halab (D/E)

Nachdem wir Haken schlagend diverse bewaffnete Kontrollposten hinter uns gebracht hatten, befanden wir uns nun auf der Haupteinfallstrasse von Nordwesten kommend. Die Zerstörungen, die unsere Fahrt von da an säumten, wirkten allesamt willkürlich, ein bizarres Muster durch die Häuserzeilen ziehend. Schlaglöcher und herumliegende Trümmer, die diagonal voneinander arrangiert wurden, zwangen uns zu permanentem Ausweichen und Herumkurven, manchmal war es für ein derartiges Manöver einen Tick zu spät und der Van krachte mit Wucht durch eine der mitunter mannsbreiten, knietiefen Aussparungen im Asphalt.

Während die Spannung in Erwartung auf die Ankunft in Bustan al-Qasr stieg, schweifte mein Blick über die Vorstadt, die wir gerade durchquerten. Selbst wenn ich das Aleppo vor Ausbruch der Kampfhandlungen nicht kennengelernt hatte, so konnte ich mir doch vorstellen, wie es gewesen sein muß. Es fehlte das Pulsieren einer Großstadt, der Herzschlag kollektiver Alltagssorgen in Friedenszeiten. Man brauchte nur kurz in die Mienen der wenigen am Autofenster vorbeischweifenden Passanten zu blicken, sie bestätigten den erzwungenen Wandel der Lebensumstände. Auch wenn sich die Distrikte, die wir durchfuhren, unter der Kontrolle der Freien Syrischen Armee befanden, es herrschte die permanente Bedrohung durch Luftschläge oder willkürlichen Beschuss aus einer vom Gegner gehaltenen Stellung. Jenes Risiko, dem man in dem Moment ausgesetzt ist, wenn man syrischen Boden betritt.

Was hatte ich eigentlich erwartet? Zur erleichternden Überraschung mehr Normalität als geschätzt? Oder apokalyptisch aneinander gereihte Zerstörung, den grellen Medienbildern gerecht, die täglich in die Welt hinaus kolportiert werden? Es ist nicht einmal als Mittelding von beidem zu bezeichnen, was sich mir an Atmosphäre in Aleppo bot. Es kam am ehesten einer milchig glasigen Glocke gleich, die über den Ort bis hin zu den Landesgrenzen gestülpt wurde und einem eine bleierne Schwere auf die Brust legte, bestehend aus in den Wahnsinn treibende Ungewissheit und panischer Angst, zuviel vom Erlebten reflektieren zu müssen.

Verstörende Skulpturen in Form von ausgebrannten Buswracks zu meiner Rechten rissen mich aus meinen Gedanken. Vor uns lag der nächste Kontrollposten, man konnte die Wachen bereits aus der Ferne aufgrund ihrer Bewegungen erkennen. Das Verkehrsaufkommen war insgesamt übersichtlich, höchstwahrscheinlich kein Vergleich zur emsigen Betriebsamkeit auf dieser Strasse in Friedenszeiten. Doch nun war alles anders, und diese Veränderung war förmlich in der umgebenden Atmosphäre zu greifen ..

After we passed criscross various armed control posts behind ourselves we headed at one of the main roads northwest. The destructions I noticed watching out of the side window looked all arbitrarily, like a weird pattern in the housing blocks and flat rows. Potholes and debris arranged diagonally of each other forced us to permanent elusiveness and cruising about, sometimes it was too late for a such manoeuvre and the van crashed with force through one of the knee-deep man-wide recesses in the asphalt.

While the tension rose in expectation on the arrival in Bustan al-Qasr, my look wandered around the suburb which we just crossed. Even if I had not got to know Aleppo before outbreak of the fightings, nevertheless I could imagine how it must have been. There was no pulsating anymore, the heartbeat of collective everyday worries in peacetime. A brief look into the passers-by minds sweeping away on the car window confirmed the enforced change of the living conditions. Even if the districts we drove through were under the control of the Gesh al-Hor, the permanent threat ruled by aerial beating or arbitrary bombardment from a position held by the opponent. That risk which everyone is committed the moment entering Syrian ground.

What had I expected, actually? To the my own surprise more normality than respectedly? Or apocalyptic lined up destruction, in accordance with the garish media pictures spread daily in the world out? It wasn‘t even a middle thing of both what came up in my mind  regarding the atmosphere in Aleppo. It is most rather to describe as a milk glazed bell which was turned over the place up to the country‘s borders and laid to one a lead gravity on the breast, consisting of insanity causing uncertainty and fear to have to reflect too much from the experienced.

Distressing sculptures in the form of burnt-out bus wrecks to my right tore me from my thoughts. Before us appeared the next control post, the guards already from a distance easy to recognize on account of their movements. The traffic amount was straightforward, most probably no comparison to the industrious activity on this street in peacetime. However, now everything was different, and this change was almost to be taken in the surrounding atmosphere.

Exploring Freedom - The Political Side

After one week staying in Antakya a reliable estimation of the situation inside Syria is still as foggy as the week, the month, the year before. Only fact given is the dramatical situation of the refugees staying here in this tiny Southern Turkish province.

Haven‘t counted all those tipping points felt and red lines crossed. But they are indeed enough to devalue completely any form of prognosis close to that what we call reality on the ground. All we see are daily counted more than hundred victims under the civilians, sometimes the bodycount is triple as high if another mass killing is committed. Some say i‘s a question in between few weeks that the regime is finished, others guess it‘ll take some months, maybe more, depending on the next steps the global powerful decide.

Exactly the same global powerful fueling the conflict with their hesitating and calculating stance preferring an as-long-as-possible draw between both sides, the regimers and the revolutionaries.

The question why the play such a dirty game at the cost of tens of thousands lives might lead to different, nevertheless shocking possible answers:

One is that most of all Syria‘s neighbors, Israel and Iran, profit from an unstable battleground. Israel, to shift the perception away from it‘s own questionable policy especially in Palestine and Gaza and to renew automatically the necessarity to protect its‘ population and its‘ borders with more arms facing the threat of chaos in Syria as well as the threat of getting invaded by militarized Muslims. Iran, to keep up the own oppressive system which in the case of a successful revolution in Syria might get endangered by an encouraged Iranian population trying to get rid of the authoritarian hydra the third time in more than three decades.

Regarding the global players and bigger blocks the answer might get more bitter. Immediate help for one of both sides, be it Russia in the case of Assad or the United States in the case of some revolutionaries‘ factions, might lead to an early success of one side wasting the historical chance of studying and analyzing the uprising in all its‘ ugly consequences if pushed into the right direction, the stalemate. Studying to learn about the mechanisms and the nature of revolutions, analyzing to understand how to avoid a similar situation in their own countries if the people start an uprising. This kind of field test crowns the top of the divide-et-impera pyramid. The wanted war. Probably best sold to the public as a serious situation too complicated to intervene in a hurry.

Poor Syrians. Being both forgotten and abused by all those asked to help and support them against their ruthless ruling elites. The more their unbroken will to finish this uprising by overcoming the regime has to be honored.

Exploring Freedom - The Personal Side

Syria: The War Next To Your Door

Writing these lines while I'm located at Hatay province in Southern Turkey. Of Antakya is spreading on the surface that kind of busy normality you expect in an average city. But a closer look and also listening carefully on the streets uncovers the tensions between Sunnis and Alawis.

This afternoon I sat on a bank at the Orontes reflecting that the river runs on its' way down here through Hama's waterwheels when I realized a group of young Alawi Syrians playing with their smartphones. Classical adolescent behavior I thought in that moment. When they jumped up to cross the street direction old city two Sunni women at the sidewalk turned their look off them until they vanished in the traffic. The women's facial expression was speaking a clear language.

It's not open hostility you find here, more a consensus of live-and-let-live. But those small signs you can register tells you a lot about the poisoned atmosphere the regime and his ruthless policy is completely responsible for. Even natives confirmed in talks I had that those tensions are no longer hidden since a few months.

That was exactly one of my crucial questions I had to answer myself by investigating on close location as possible. How real are the chances that after the downfall of the Assad tyranny a together between both Muslim groups will become true? I guess that's also one of the questions the think tanks and officials of the global community are trying to figure out.

Without coloring the future outlook too dark we have to face the fact that those tensions are having to take serious, particularly the longer the regime is playing its' barbaric role. Each new massacre creates new incomprehension, new feelings of rage, in the worst case the poison of hate. Even the desire for revenge is understandable when you try to imagine the feelings of people who've lost their children, their beloved ones, their whole families. Speaking about those feelings is the first necessary step to overcome the risk of realizing them sometimes later. Making the experience of sharing those emotions with other people able to have a certain understanding for that makes it definitely easier to avoid common cruelties and to crackdown the vicious circle of violence.

The world's powerful have failed to prevent the Syrian people from the regime atrocities until now. As disillusioning this is, it's never to late to change a dead end path. In this case by building up trust and faith in a slowly but constantly together growing Syria after Assad. The least the world could do now.

Just Think About

Coming home after a long day at work.

Stuck in the traffic.

Angry about one of the colleagues' comments.

Train missed, an hour waiting in the cold.

Favorite bread sold out.

The list is pretty much longer and can be easily continued searching for explanations of the own bad mood, the crabiness.

Instead of take a closer look to the five mentioned luxury problems.

The day at work might have been a long one. At least you have work, probably not your dream job, but just think about how many of us in the meantime don't even have one. Even in the richer states and welfare nations the numbers of jobless and low-income earners are increasing. How many aren't even allowed to work, forced to do nothing, prevented from building an own existence.

So you're stuck in the traffic? With a company car or your own one? Even if you're on your way to work and back home with the public transport system, busses, trolley lines, it means you can travel safe from a to b. Before continuing to complain just think about those not having the possibility to travel safe and free, in between their countries of from one to another. For refugees fleeing from violence traffic can become in the worst case a lethal threat. More like for you in that situation.

Some work colleagues tend to scratch on your sovereignity, and a handful of them might get named sociopaths analyzing their intentions and their behavior. But is it really your reaction like that worth? Inhale, take a deep breath and just think about workers and employees in totalitarian systems. Not only that they might lose their job as a result of directed denunciation, they might also get tracked by the authorities, imprisoned, isolated from their loved ones. You definitely won't be in their situation, believe me.

You're luckily living in a country where trains arrive more or less hourly to manage the distance between your origin and your destination. That's not a reason to moan over the injustice of life dragging yourself down. Just think about all those not able to pay for a ticket. All those not living in the near of a railway station. All those forced to walk dozens of miles, daily, because they can't afford buying a car, even a bicycle.

To have a preferred fresh bread sort is conceded to everyone. Insisting upon an alltime disposability only if you are the bakery's owner. As a regular customer you have good chances that your baker shop reserves the object of your desire for you. Just think about those people standing for hours in front of nearly empty bakeries for some bread when suddenly a grenade caused by an air raid shells into the crowd.

You see, all of these complaints are for sure luxury problems when you live in those parts of our world where your existence is directly not endangered, not threatened.

Just think about.

Merry pre-Christmas time everyone.

The Ghost Of Chemical Warfare

It appears that the Syrian regime has unleashed its' last shabeeh. His soul consists of lethal chemical substances like Sarin and other ugly stuff, able to end the lives of tens of thousands in only a few seconds.

Since a long time that threat is known to the global representatives. So it wonders a bit that the raised forefinger telling 'hands off chemical WMD's' is put exactly now direction Damascus. Because instead of intimidating the regime it looks in the meantime as a gesture of desperation, of helplessness. Despite interpretating one or the other statement of U.S. spokesmen as a possible mobilization of ground troops to prevent the Assad faction of using those weapons.

Fact is that the regimers will not hesitate to start a chemical warfare against so-called terrorists if they see a way in it to regain lost ground in a battle they are inevitably loosing.

The world's powerful watched tea-zipping the increasing brutality of the regime's crackdown measures. They noticed gruesome massacres committed on civilians, women, children, ordering their PR officers to restate earlier given expressions of indignation, repacked until they degenerated to abstract empty phrases.

Acting in an adequate time was never a fortitude of the political class but in the case of Syria the slow motion management became in the meantime a disgusting taste of bitterness. Time to prepare really effectful measures was a lot. At the latest with the start of the Ramadan massacres in summer 2011 the global community should had engage itself into constructive politics being aware of the regime's tightening screws of mass murder and blind rage slaughter.

So it might not surprise when we'll have to witness similar images in the nearer future reminding us on the horrible footages of Sadam Hussein's chemical warfare against the population in Northern Iraq. Men, women and children, mouth and eyes teared wide open in their moment of death, covered in white dust ..

Alive Or Not? Guesswork And A Strange Feeling ..

The night of Dec 2, 2012.

Recapturing the puzzling news of the recent day. After such a long time struggling against the tyranny in Syria we all are cautious due to rumors.

It was never easy to confirm some tweets and posts filed under 'BREAKING' or stuff like that.

But this night is somehow exceptional.

All I'm writing now down expresses my own subjective views about the ongoings I've witnessed online the last three days. Therefore the drawn conclusions represent exclusively my personal point of view.

First of all there was the mysterious internet shutdown in whole Syria. Attempts of analysis tracked the regime as responsibles for that. Comprehensible, because the revolutionaries would have no interest in putting the whole country offline, especially when it comes to the meanwhile legendary Fridays when they upload evidence footages of protests taking place all over.

In the beginning of the internet shutdown we feared a regime strategy using chemical weapons against the Free Syrian Army and other freedom fighter groups in liberated areas as a last attempt to crackdown the revolution and to regain ground in an almost lost battle. Fortunately that didn't happen up to now, several usage of white phosphorus ammunition was reported but a major attack with lethal chemicals wasn't reported yet. Maybe the regimers realized that such an attack could also hit their own people; by examining the map the liberated areas are closely mixing up with regime held areas, especially in Damascus.

We can only speculate about what really happened in those more or less 60 hours of virtual darkness. But another event of this Saturday tracked our interest more than usual: despite heavy clashes between the Free Syrian Army and regime forces around the Damascus International Airport flights were cancelled. It seemed that from that moment on no one was able to leave the capital with the help of an airplane. Then an A320 from the Syrian Airlines, flight SYR441, was reported to start direction Moscow, destination Vnukovo, the smaller airport of the Russian capital.

Some unusual details about that flight drew our attention: the machine flew above average speed, a sign that only a few passengers or/and little cargo was on board. If it had been a Russian airplane it wouldn't had wonder me at all, years ago I flew with the Aeroflot from Germany to St Peterburg arriving approximately 20 minutes before the scheduled time. That had to do with the circumstance that the captain of the Tupolew switched on the auto pilot after reaching the ordered flight height heading straight towards the destination .. and .. that we were only six passengers on board.

Another interesting detail was the announcement that the closure of the Damascus International Airport will be compensated by opening the military airport of Tartous for civil airlines' arrivals and departures. Not that they tried to assure the public to do everything to renormalize the situation at the capital's airport. True or not, that message should prepare the public for a longer closure due to the ongoing clashes. Regarding that, flight SYR441 appears retrospectively even more suspicious.

Examining the route of the plane raised another question. Instead of flying via Eastern Turkey and the Black Sea across the Ukraine to Russia flight SYR441 took a route around Turkey over the Mediterranean, crossed Greece and Bulgaria before heading direction Moscow. Well, maybe they were instructed to follow that route by the international air space control agency. Maybe.

Then one of the Brotherhood party members announced during a pro-Morsi rally in Cairo that 'Bashar al-Assad is probably dead or has left Syria'. My first thoughts were like: c'mon, you don't need to use such kind of rumors to heaten up the protesting masses (it worked well what the footage on Al Jazeera proved). In the moment I wanted to reject that occurance I remembered Lakhdar Brahimi's last comments and estimations about Assad's actual situation and possible future. His undertone changed slightly but perceptable from trying to defend Bashar's status as representant of (at least a handful of) the Syrian people to a much more clearer rejection. Not that I'm fully trusting in politicians like him but something says me that this could have been a signal to a certain group of the regime's circle to drop down, to get rid of Assad.

In the language of the Chess game said: in a situation like the regime's top one the king had switched the position with the checkers to get sacrificed. We can only suggest who might become the replaced king in that game, probably it will take another time before he will be presented. But Bashar al-Assad is according to that theory off the board.

And to all appearances on board of that ominous flight SYR441. The last remaining question is now: in what condition he might have been on board? Speculation 1 - alive after being urged (I don't suppose convinced, mainly after his last public announcement some weeks ago) to leave Syria. Speculation 2 - in a wooden case. Maybe it came to a violent dispute after the lobby of those trying to save their own asses as far as possible with the hardliners' circle around Bashar. That would explain a possible successful coup d'etat during the well-planned internet shutdown. Certain things can only become realized when the lights are out.

Alive or not - the powerful friends of the Syrian regime will try to prevent all kind of exposed clearness around these possible ongoings if my assumptions become proven true. The reason for that is a) keeping the Syrians as long as possible in the dark to construct a new follow-up able to act for their interests and b) to avoid a sudden push for the revolution movement when the end of the Assad era becomes - from the regime's allies point of view - too early confirmed.

As previously mentioned, this summary bases upon combining observations of unconfirmed occurances (the only facts are the two and a half days' internet shutdown and the Syrian Airlines flight SYR441 from Damascus to Moscow) and personal estimations after monitoring twenty months the people's revolution in Assad's Syria, a jungle of rumors, myths and speculations.