Picking Daisies

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• What has been happening in Syria?

  

  Here are some of the key developments in Syria over the past year and a half: 

  Mar. 16, 2011: The Syrian uprising begins as 35 people are arrested in a “Day of Dignity” protest in Damascus. The demonstrators were demanding the release of political prisoners. In the southern city of Deraa, security forces shot and killed several protesters at a “Day of Rage” rally. The killings sparked several days of violent protests. 

  Mar. 27, 2011:Syrian forces open fire to disperse hundreds of protesters who were calling for an end to emergency laws. At least 61 people were killed in the first 10 days of violent protests. 
  Mar. 29, 2011: President Bashar al-Assad accepts the resignation of his government. The move is largely symbolic as the Syrian cabinet wields very little actual power. Demonstrators had been demanding an end to almost 50 years of emergency rule. 
  April 19, 2011: Assad announces that Syria is ending emergency rule. However, the move does little to quell a growing protest movement. Defiant crowds accuse Assad of simply trying to buy time while he clings to power in one of the most repressive regimes in the Middle East. The protesters now demand that Assad step down. 
  April 22, 2011: At least 75 people are killed on the bloodiest day of the uprising as Syrian security forces fire bullets and tear gas at tens of thousands of protesters across the country. The attacks sent a signal that the authoritarian regime was prepared to turn more ruthless to put down the revolt. Among the dead were a 70-year-old man and two children? 
  April 23, 2011: As the crackdown intensifies, Ottawa urges Canadians to leave Syria while they still can. 
  May 12, 2011: As the uprising approaches its two-month anniversary, the number of people killed is estimated at up to 800. The Syrian army takes up positions a day before planned protests in key cities, setting up sand barriers topped with machine-guns.
  Among the cities targeted was Hama, which Assad’s father had laid waste to in 1982, while crushing an earlier uprising.
  Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton slammed the government’s assault on demonstrators and said the violence showed Assad is weak, though she stopped short of saying he must quit. 
  Aug. 13, 2011: After months of increasing violence, Canada announces it’s imposing more sanctions on Syria. The government is barring additional members of President Bashar al-Assad’s government from travelling to Canada and has frozen assets of more entities linked to the regime.
  The move follows a call from the U.S. secretary of state for a global trade embargo on oil and gas from Syria. 
  Aug. 18, 2011: U.S. President Barack Obama calls for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to resign, saying the brutal crackdown on anti-government protesters makes the heir to a long Middle East family dictatorship unfit to lead. The call was accompanied by an executive order freezing all Syrian government assets in the U.S. and targeting the country’s lucrative energy sector. Just before Obama made his demand, UN rights investigators said Syria’s crackdown “may amount to crimes against humanity” and should be referred to the International Criminal Court. 
  Nov. 7, 2011: Syrian troops storm a defiant neighbourhood of the embattled city of Homs. They kick in doors and arrest people after nearly a week of violence pitting soldiers against army defectors and protesters demanding the downfall of President Bashar al-Assad, according to activists. 
  Nov. 16, 2011: Renegade troops launch their most daring attack yet on the military. France recalls its ambassador to Damascus in the wake of recent attacks against diplomatic missions and increasing violence stemming from the eight-month-old uprising. French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe warned that “the vise is tightening” around Assad, and a government spokeswoman said Paris is working with the Syrian opposition to find an alternative to the regime.
  The move came as the 22-member Arab League formally suspended Damascus over the crackdown, which the UN estimates has killed more than 3,500 people, and threatened economic sanctions if the regime continues to violate an Arab-brokered peace plan. 
  Nov. 27, 2011: The Arab League overwhelmingly approves sanctions against Syria to pressure Damascus to end its deadly eight-month crackdown on dissent, an unprecedented move by the League against an Arab state. Syria blasts the move as a betrayal. The sanctions include cutting off transactions with the Syrian central bank and halting Arab government funding for projects in Syria. 
  Dec. 15, 2011: Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird says the time for Canadians to leave Syria is now. He says it’s becoming increasingly difficult for Canadian diplomats and consular officials to do their jobs under restrictions imposed by President Bashar al-Assad. 
  Dec. 22, 2011:Arab League delegates arrive in Syria in the midst of a new international uproar over activist reports that government troops killed more than 200 people in two days. The United Nations says more than 5,000 people have been killed as Syria has sought to put down the uprising. 
  Dec. 27, 2011: Tens of thousands of protesters throng the streets of Homs, calling for the execution of President Assad. In a sign the government was somewhat complying with Arab League monitors, the army pulled its tanks back from the city. Yet, there were also signs troops were firing on protesters. 
  Jan. 2, 2012: The head of the Arab League says Syrian security forces are still killing anti-government protesters despite the presence of foreign monitors in the country. But he insisted the observer mission has yielded important concessions from the Damascus regime, such as the withdrawal of heavy weapons from cities. 

  Jan. 11, 2012: A French cameraman becomes the first Western journalist killed in the Syrian uprising. Gilles Jacquier, 43, worked for France-2 Television. He was part of a government-sponsored trip to Homs. 
  Feb. 4, 2012: Russia and China veto a UN resolution that backed calls for Assad’s resignation as president of Syria. The vote came hours after the regime’s bloodiest crackdown in the 10-month old conflict, which the UN had already characterized as a civil war. At least 200 people were reported killed in heavy shelling in Homs. There was international outrage at the veto by Russia and China. 
  Feb 6, 2012: The U.S. closes its embassy in Syria. 
  Feb. 22, 2012: Two western journalists are killed as Syrian gunners shelled an opposition stronghold in Homs. Marie Colvin was working for Britain’s Sunday Times and Remi Ochlik was a French photojournalist. 
  Feb. 24, 2012: North American, European and Arab officials meet in a major international “Friends of Syria” conference in Tunisia to work out the details for their 72-hour ultimatum to end the violence and allow in aid, which will be backed by as yet unspecified punishments.
  A draft of the conference’s final declaration also states that the Syrian National Council, an umbrella group of opposition organizations, will be recognized as “a legitimate representative of Syrians” and promised additional “practical” support for opposition groups.
  Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister says arming Syrian rebels “is an excellent idea.”

  Feb. 29, 2012: Syrian troops advance on a key rebel-held area in the central city of Homs, where three Western journalists are among 100,000 residents trapped by a government assault that has raged for weeks. The forces appeared to be starting a ground operation to retake the area that has become a symbol of the uprising to oust President Bashar Assad.

  March, 4, 2012: Saudi Arabia says  Syrians have a right to take up arms to defend themselves against the regime and accused the Damascus government of “imposing itself by force.” Red Cross teams handed out food, blankets and medical kits in central Homs province, but the government blocked access to the worst-hit district of Baba Amr. It was the third consecutive day that access was blocked to Baba Amr.

  March, 5, 2012: Canada closes its embassy in Syria and has pulled diplomats out of the country.

  March 8, 2012: Syria’s deputy oil minister defects and posts his parting words to President Bashar Assad in a video on YouTube, calling the regime criminal and urging his colleagues to also abandon the “sinking ship.”

   March 9, 2012: The Syrian government says they will allow the United Nations to assess the basic medical needs of Syrians in four areas where opposition forces have clashed with government troops and to also carry out a preliminary humanitarian needs assessment.

  March 10, 2012: Former U.N. secretary-general Kofi Annan visits Syria as part of a ,high-profile international attempt to find a solution to the worsening conflict. Assad responded to Annan’s call for a ceasefire by saying the plan was doomed as long as armed terrorist groups were destabilizing the country. Assad’s comment dampened hopes peace talk could be held.

  March 13, 2012: The Syrian army recaptures most of the northern rebel stronghold of Idlib near the Turkish border, pushing hundreds of military defectors out of a major base they had held for months even as pockets of resistance kept up their fight.
  The three-day operation to capture the city followed closely after a similar offensive to dislodge the opposition from another key piece of territory it had controlled, the Baba Amr district in central Homs.
  The two victories give President Bashar Assad’s regime unmistakable momentum as it tries to crush the armed opposition fighters.

  March 14, 2012: Thousands pour into the streets of the Syrian capital Thursday in a show of support for the regime as soldiers tightened their siege in opposition areas on the one-year anniversary of the country’s uprising.

  Rallies to commemorate the start of the revolt have been planned in cities across Syria and abroad, but local activists report increased army presence near opposition strongholds in an apparent attempt to quash dissent.

  March 17, 2012: Twin car bombs struck intelligence and security buildings in the Syrian capital, killing at least 27 people and wounding nearly 100, according to state media reports. Gruesome images of the scene were aired, with mangled and charred corpses, bloodstained streets and twisted steel.

  March 27, 2012: U.N. envoy Kofi Annan said Tuesday he has received the backing of both Syria and China for his plan for a negotiated end to the bloody Syrian conflict.

  April 2, 2012: Syrian government troops clash with rebel forces across the country as international envoy Kofi Annan prepares to brief the U.N. Security Council on the progress of his mission to ease the nation’s crisis.

  April 3, 2012: A Syrian government official says troops have begun withdrawing from some cities and are returning to their bases. The official tells The Associated Press that the withdrawal was mainly from calm cities while in tense areas, regime forces are redeploying and taking positions on the outskirts.

  April 8, 2012: There has been a major setback on the peace plans devised by Kofi Annan that were supposed to go into effect on April 10. President Bashar Assad’s government raised new, last minute demands that were swiftly rejected by the country’s largest rebel group. Annan’s spokesman had no comment on the setback. The envoy has not said what would happen if his deadlines were ignored. Even before the setback, expectations were low that the Assad regime would honour the agreement.

  April 10, 2012: Today was supposed to be the day Syrian military forces were to withdraw from villages and towns, but activists say there have been no signs of the pullback committed to by Assad.

  April 11, 2012: The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says “tens of army vehicles” are deploying in the southern town of Maaraba amid intense shooting.The cease-fire is scheduled to go into effect at 6 a.m. Thursday.

  April 12, 2012: A fragile cease-fire brokered by the U.N. took hold in Syria on Thursday with regime forces apparently halting widespread attacks on the opposition but still defying demands by international envoy Kofi Annan to pull troops back to barracks.

  April 14, 2012:The UN approves an observer mission to oversee the Syrian ceasefire. It comes on a day during which clashes between troops and rebel fighters leave at least nine people dead.

   April 15, 2012: Syrian troops shelled neighbourhoods dominated by rebels in the central city of Homs Sunday and activists said at least three people were killed hours before the first batch of United Nations observers were to arrive in Damascus to shore up a shaky truce.
  April 16, 2012: U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Monday it is the Syrian government’s responsibility to guarantee freedom of movement within the country for U.N. observers monitoring the nation’s 5-day cease-fire, which appeared to be rapidly unraveling as regime forces pounded the opposition stronghold of Homs with artillery shells and mortars, activists said.

  April 17, 2012: The wives of the British and German ambassadors to the United Nations release a video urging the wife of Syrian President Bashar Assad to stop being a bystander and speak out to demand that her husband stop the violence now.

  April 18, 2012: Syrian forces fire a barrage of mortar shells at an opposition stronghold, even as the foreign minister promised the regime would respect a week-old ceasefire and withdraw troops from urban centres in line with an international peace plan.

   April 21, 2012: The U.N. Security Council unanimously approves a resolution expanding the number of U.N. observers in Syria from 30 to 300. They’re also demanding an immediate halt to the violence that has been escalating since a cease-fire took effect over a week ago.
  April 22, 2012: U.N. cease-fire monitors toured a rebel-held town in central Syria Sunday with army defectors, while government troops pounded a Damascus suburb with artillery and heavy machine-guns, activists said.
  April 26, 2012: U.N. observers inspect the site of a deadly explosion that flattened a block of houses in the central Syrian city of Hama a day earlier and killed at least 16 people.

  The government and the opposition traded blame for the blasts. Syrian state-run media said rebel bomb-makers accidentally set off the explosives, while anti-regime activists said intense shelling by government forces caused the extensive damage.

  The state news agency also said two separate roadside bombs killed 10 members of the security forces and a civilian in northern Syria.

  April 27, 2012: Syrians protest  throughout the country against the government of President Bashar Assad. Activists say thousands of people protested in the northern city of Aleppo, the central region of Hama and in a northern province. In the capital Damascus, at least five civilians and police were killed and 20 wounded when a suicide bomber blew himself up near a mosque.

  April 29, 2012: The head of the U.N. observer mission in Syria calls on President Bashar Assad and the country’s opposition to stop fighting and allow a tenuous cease-fire to take hold.  Maj. Gen. Robert Mood spoke after arriving in the Syrian capital, Damascus, to take charge of an advance team of 16 U.N. monitors trying to salvage an international peace plan to end the country’s 13-month-old crisis.

  April 30, 2012: State media says two suicide bombers blow up cars rigged with explosives near a military compound and a hotel in a city in northwestern Syria, killing at least nine people and wounding nearly 100.

  May 3, 2012: Syrian security forces storm dormitories at Aleppo University to break up anti-government protests, killing at least four students and wounding several others in an hourslong rampage that ended in the morning and left part of the campus in flames, say activists and opposition groups.

  May 4, 2012: Opposition groups plan mass rallies in Syria to protest yesterday’s raid by security forces against a state-run school which left four students dead.

  May 5, 2012: A bomb struck a car wash Saturday in Aleppo, killing at least five people, a day after government troops opened fire to break up large protests against a violent university raid in Syria’s largest city.

  May 8, 2012: International envoy Kofi Annan says world powers share a “profound concern” that Syria’s violence is spiralling into civil war, but have pledged to deploy 300 truce monitors there by the end of the month. 

  May 9. 2012: A roadside bomb strikes a Syrian military truck, wounding six soldiers just seconds after a convoy carrying the head of the U.N. observer mission passed by.  

  May 10, 2012: Two strong explosions rip through the Syrian capital, killing more than 40 people and leaving scenes of carnage in the streets in an assault against a centre of government power, officials said. Syria’s state-run TV say 170 people were wounded in what one official said may have been the most powerful of a series of blasts that have hit the capital this year.

  May 13, 2012: Syrian forces killed at least five people and torched a number of homes in a raid on a farming village Sunday that activists said showed worsening relations between Syria’s myriad religious groups. The continuing violence further undermines a U.N.-backed peace plan that is supposed to bring an end to the country’s 14-month-old crisis. 

  May 16, 2012: A team of international observers is evacuated from a tense town in northern Syria a day after their convoy was hit by a roadside bomb.

  May 18, 2012: A suicide bomb killed nine people in a military parking lot attack.  Debris filled a street that was stained with blood. State television said the vehicle was rigged with 1,000 kilograms (2,200 pounds) of explosives and that U.N. observers based in the city visited the site of the blast.
  May 24, 2012: The Syrian regime and an increasingly organized rebel force are carrying out illegal killings and torturing their opponents, but government forces are still responsible for most of the violence stemming from the country’s uprising, says a U.N. panel.

  May 25, 2012: Activists say Syrian forces are shelling opposition strongholds as thousands gather across the country in weekly anti-government protests.

  May 26, 2012: Activists say Syrian regime forces have killed more than 90 people in the Houla area, many of them women and children. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says Arab nations and the international community were “partners” in the killing “because of their silence about the massacre that the Syrian regime has committed.”

  May 27, 2012: The death of more than 100 people, including children, in an alleged massacre in the Houla area has sparked international outrage and renewed fears of the relevance of a month-old peace plan that has not stopped almost daily violence.

  May 28, 2012: Canada calls for tougher sanctions against Syria following Sunday’s attack on the town of Houla.

  May 29, 2012: Canada joins international condemnation of the recent massacre in Syria, announcing Tuesday morning that Ottawa is expelling all Syrian diplomats. France’s President Francois Hollande announces similar measures, saying France says it is expelling the Syrian ambassador to increase pressure on Damascus.

  May 30, 2012: Syria’s state-run media denounces Tuesday’s diplomatic expulsions by the United States, Britain, Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Bulgaria, as “unprecedented hysteria.”

  May 31, 2012: U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says every day of slaughter in Syria is strengthening the case for tougher international action, yet stresses that military intervention would need international support, including from Syrian ally Russia.

  June 4, 2012: A Washington-based NGO has called on the world to assist Syrian refugees, saying they are stretching the meagre resources of Jordan and Lebanon and threaten the countries’ political stability.
  June 5, 2012:  UN officials say Assad’s government has agreed to ease humanitarian access to Syria’s hardest-hit provinces, after Syria labelled a string of U.S. and European diplomats unwelcome. 
  June 6, 2012: Syrian President Assad appoints a new prime minister.

   June 7, 2012: Syria denies claims by opposition groups about a new massacre in the central Hama province in which government forces allegedly killed dozens of people, including women and children.
  UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says unarmed UN monitors came under fire as they tried to reach what they believed to be the scene of the latest mass killing.

  June 8, 2012: Syrian troops shell a rebel-held neighbourhood in the flashpoint central city of Homs as President Bashar Assad’s troops appears to be readying to storm the area that has been out of government control for months, activists claim.

  June 9, 2012: Syrian troops shelled the southern city of Daraa early on Saturday, killing at least 17 people, activists said. And in Damascus, residents spoke about a night of shooting and explosions in the worst violence Syria’s capital has seen since the uprising against President Bashar Assad’s regime began 15 months ago. The nearly 12 hours of fighting in Damascus suggested a new boldness among armed rebels, who previously kept a low profile in the capital.

  June 11, 2012: U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland expresses concern about reports the regime “may be organizing another massacre” in Latakia province, where U.N. monitors have been impeded. Speaking to reporters in Washington, Nuland warned, “People will be held accountable.”

  June 12, 2012:UN envoy Kofi Annan asks governments with influence to “twist arms” to halt the escalating violence in the country.

  June 13, 2012: Syrian forces push out scores of rebels holed up in a rebellious area near the Mediterranean coast. State television says they retook control of the region following eight days of fierce shelling and clashes. The mountainous Haffa region is one of several areas where government forces are battling rebels for control in escalating violence.
  June 16, 2012: Internationalefforts to stop the violence is Syria are disintegrating after the U.N. suspends its observer mission. Major Gen. Robert Mood said rising bloodshed over the past 10 days was posing significant risks to the lives of the 300 unarmed observers in the country, and was impeding their ability to carry out their mandate.
  June 22, 2012: An online video showed more than a dozen bloodied corpses, some in military uniforms, dumped beside a road in northern Syria in what the government called a mass killing by rebel forces. Syria also shot down a Turkish reconnaissance plane by “accident” - a sign that the violence gripping the country is spreading outside its borders.
  June 24, 2012: NATO leaders announce they will plan a meeting to discuss whether and how to respond to Syria’s downing of the Turkish jet. The incident spikes regional tensions caused by the conflict in Syria, where reports say nearly 40 people died in new clashes between rebels and regime forces.

  June 25, 2012: Dozens of military personnel defect to Turkey overnight. A total of 33 soldiers - including a general and two colonels - slipped across the border overnight. It was the largest defection of members of the military since the uprising began - and it comes at a time of heightened tensions between the two countries after Syria shot down a Turkish warplane.

  June 26, 2012: Syria’s elite Republican Guard forces clash with rebels just outside Damascus, in some of the most intense fighting involving the special forces guarding the capital since an uprising against President Bashar Assad’s regime began last year, activists said.

  On the same day, Assad says his country was in state of war and ordered his new cabinet to crush the anti-regime uprising as Turkey vowed to retaliate the downing of one of its jets.

  June 27, 2012: Gunmen raid the headquarters of a pro-government Syrian TV station, killing seven employees, kidnapping others and demolishing buildings, officials say. They denounce what they call a “massacre against the freedom of the press” and hold it up as an example of rebel atrocities.
    June 28, 2012: A strong explosion in the Palace of Justice rocked the Syrian capital on Thursday. Rebel fighters are said to be launching increasingly violent attacks on regime targets. 

  June 29, 2012: Government troops rain tank and artillery shells down on a rebellious suburb of the Syrian capital of Damascus, killing at least 43 people over two days, opposition groups and say activists.

  June 30, 2012: A conference called by special envoy Kofi Annan to end the Syria crisis appeared on the brink of failure as it opened Saturday, with the U.S. and Russia still divided over a role for President Bashar Assad in a transition government. Annan seemed confident of his plan a few days ago, but Russia has refused to back a provision that would call for Assad to step down to make way for a unity government, a stance that could scuttle the entire deal. 

  July 2, 2012: The head of the Arab League called Monday for the fragmented Syrian opposition to unite and said a U.N.-brokered plan for a transitional government in Syria fell short of expectations. Arab League Secretary General Nabil Elaraby addressed nearly 250 members of the Syrian opposition at a meeting in Cairo in an effort to coax the disparate groups to pull together. The gathering marked the first time the Arab League had hosted a gathering of the Syrian opposition.
  July 3, 2012:  Syrian President Bashar Assad said that he regrets the shooting down of a Turkish jet by his forces, and that he will not allow tensions between the two neighbours to deteriorate into an “armed conflict,” a Turkish newspaper reported Tuesday. Commenting for the first time on a UN-brokered plan for a political transition in Syria that was adopted by world powers at a conference in Geneva on Saturday, Assad said he was “pleased” that the decision about Syria’s future was left to its people.
  July 6, 2012: Canada and its international allies called Friday for new, global sanctions against President Bashar Assad’s regime, seeking to step up the pressure after the defection of a top general dealt a major blow to the Syrian leader. 

  July 7, 2012: Special U.N. envoy Kofi Annan acknowledged in an interview published Saturday that the international community’s efforts to find a political solution to the escalating violence in Syria have failed. Annan told the French daily Le Monde that more attention needed to be paid to the role of longtime Syrian ally Iran, and that countries supporting military actors in the conflict were making the situation worse.

  July 9, 2012: International envoy Kofi Annan tried to breathe new life into his moribund peace efforts in Syria, saying he has reached a new framework with President Bashar Assad and would discuss it soon with rebel leaders.
  July 12, 2012: The Syrian ambassador to Iraq has defected, denouncing President Bashar Assad in a TV statement Wednesday, becoming the most senior diplomat to abandon the regime during a bloody 16-month uprising.

  July 13, 2012: Activists say government gunners rained shells on a poor, farming village before armed thugs moved in, leaving scores of people dead in what rebel backers claim is one of the worse single days of bloodshed in the uprising.

  July 14, 2012: A spokesman says UN observers in Syria have entered a central village where government forces reportedly killed dozens of people this week to “seek verification of the facts.” Also on Saturday, Turkey’s prime minister warned Syrian leaders that the Syrian people will “make them pay” for massacres like the reported killing.

  July 15, 2012: The International Committee of the Red Cross said it now considers the Syrian conflict a civil war, while the country denied UN claims that government forces used heavy weapons during a military operation that left scores dead and brought immediate international condemnation.

  July 16, 2012: Syrian troops and rebels clash inside the tightly controlled capital for the second day in what activists called some of the worst fighting since the country’s crisis began 16 months ago. The clashes briefly closed the highway linking the capital with Damascus International Airport to the city’s south - an unprecedented development, said Mustafa Osso, an activist based in Syria. Meanwhile, Russia accuses the West of effectively trying to use blackmail to secure a new U.N. Security Council resolution that could allow for the use of force in Syria.

  July 18, 2012: Rebels penetrate the heart of Syria’s power elite, detonating a bomb inside a high-level crisis meeting in Damascus that kills three leaders of the regime, including President Bashar Assad’s brother-in-law and the defence minister.

  July 19, 2012: Anti-regime activists say Syrian government forces are shelling a number of neighbourhoods in and around the capital Damascus.
  July 21, 2012: The U.N. Security Council has given the go-ahead for a 300-person observer force to monitor the events unfolding in the country. The U.N. suspended the observers’ patrols and most of their other activities on June 16 because of increased violence, and its mandate had been set to expire Friday.

  July 22, 2012: Syrian rebels made a run on Aleppo in some of the fiercest fighting seen in the country’s largest city, which has been a key bastion of support for President Bashar Assad over the course of the 17-month-old uprising. Fighting continued in the capital, Damascus, although reports suggest the rebels are being held off by Assad’s troops.  

  July 23, 2012: The Syrian regime threatens to use its chemical and biological weapons in case of a foreign attack, in its first ever acknowledgement that it possesses weapons of mass destruction.

  July 26, 2012: The fighting in Syria’s largest city, Aleppo, stretched into a sixth day amid expectations of a major government ground assault.This has made July the bloodiest month so far in the uprising against Assad’s regime that began peacefully in March 2011.

  July 29, 2012: The Syrian regime accused regional powerhouses Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey of trying to destroy the country and vowed Sunday that it would defeat rebels who have captured large swathes of the commercial hub Aleppo. Military forces in Aleppo fired tank and artillery shells at neighbourhoods as rebels tried to repel the government air and ground assault.

  July 30, 2012: Civilians flee as Syrian government forces mount new ground attacks against rebel-controlled neighbourhoods in Syria’s commercial hub of Aleppo.

  August 1, 2012: Arab countries pushed ahead Wednesday with a symbolic U.N. General Assembly resolution that tells Syrian President Bashar Assad to resign and turn over power to a transitional government. It also demands that the Syrian army stop its shelling and helicopter attacks and withdraw to its barracks. A vote is set for Thursday morning.
  
  The draft resolution takes a swipe at Russia and China by “deploring the Security Council failure” to act. Moscow and Beijing have used their veto in the smaller, more powerful Council three times to kill resolutions that could have opened the door to sanctions on Syria.

  August 2, 2012: Kofi Annan announced his resignation Thursday as Syria’s peace envoy and issued a blistering critique of world powers, bringing to a dramatic end a frustrating six-month effort that failed to achieve even a temporary cease-fire as the country plunged into civil war. Speaking to reporters in Geneva, Annan blamed the Syrian government’s intransigence, the growing militancy of Syrian rebels and a divided Security Council that failed to forcefully back his effort.  

  August 3, 2012: With the U.N. Security Council deadlocked over the Syrian crisis, the General Assembly prepared Friday to denounce Syria for unleashing tanks, artillery, helicopters and warplanes on the people of Aleppo and Damascus, and demand that the Assad regime keep its chemical and biological weapons warehoused and under strict control.

  August 4, 2012: Heavy explosions shook the Syrian capital Saturday and helicopters circled overhead as rebels appeared to be renewing their offensive in the city, witnesses and activists said.  

  August 6, 2012: Syria’s prime minister - Riad Hijab - defects on Monday, evidence that the widening cracks in President Bashar’s Assad’s regime have reached the highest echelons of government.

  August 7, 2012: A Turkish official says more than 1,300 Syrians fled to Turkey overnight to escape spreading violence.

  August 11, 2012: Baird calls the Syrian conflict “tremendously horrifying” and promises more aid money while visiting a refugee camp in Jordan. Meanwhile, gunmen detonated back-to-back roadside bombs and clashed with police in central Damascus.

  August 14, 2012: Riad Hijab made his first public statement urging others to join the rebel side on Tuesday. He left his post and fled to Jordan with his family last week. Hijab is the highest-ranking political figure to defect from Assad’s regime. The U.N. said an estimated 2.5 million Syrians have been injured, displaced or face problems securing food or other necessities, a sharp rise from about 1 million three months ago.

  August 18, 2012: The Syrian government on Saturday welcomed the naming of a former Algerian diplomat as the U.N.’s new point-man in efforts to halt the country’s escalating civil war. Activists reported more shelling by regime troops, including an air attack on a northern border town where scores died earlier this week. 

  August 19, 2012: Syrian President Bashar Assad attended prayers in a Damascus mosque to mark the start of a Muslim holiday on Sunday, his first appearance in public since the bombing last month that killed four of his top security officials. 
  August 20, 2012: The second day of Eid al-Fitr, a major Muslim holiday, brought intense fighting between rebels and Syrian regime forces killing six people in Daraa, according to two rights groups.

  August 23, 2012: A new Amnesty report released Thursday said air and artillery strikes against residential neighbourhoods are indiscriminate attacks that seriously endanger civilians.
  August 24, 2012: Fresh clashes broke out Friday in northern Lebanon between supporters and opponents of the Syrian regime, killing two people and wounding 17 others, Lebanese security officials said.

  August 27, 2012: A Syrian military helicopter went down in a ball of fire Monday after it was apparently hit during fighting between government forces and rebels in the capital Damascus, activists said.

  August 31, 2012: Syrian rebels have begun a major operation in the Aleppo region, aiming to strike at security compounds and bases around Syria’s largest city, activists said.

  September 1, 2012: Syrian warplanes and ground forces pounded the country’s largest city Aleppo with bombs and mortar rounds on Saturday as soldiers clashed with rebels in its narrow streets, activists said.

  September 2, 2012: Two bombs exploded near the Syrian military’s joint chiefs of staff’s offices in central Damascus on Sunday, lightly wounding four army officers and causing damage to a building and cars, state television said.
  Activist groups said Sunday that about 5,000 people were killed in Syria’s civil war in August, the highest figure ever reported in more than 17 months of fighting as President Bashar Assad’s regime unleashed crushing air power against the revolt for the first time.

  September 3, 2012: Government warplanes bomb a town in northern Syria on Monday, killing at least 19 people, activists said, while the new UN envoy to the country acknowledges that brokering an end to the nation’s civil war will be a “very, very difficult” task.

  September 4, 2012:Assad tells the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross that the group is welcome to operate on the ground in the country as long as it remains “neutral and independent.”

  September 5, 2012: Egypt’s president gives his first major foreign policy speech, telling the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad to step down before it is too late.

  September 9, 2012: A Jordanian militant leader linked to al-Qaida warned Sunday that his extremist group will launch “deadly attacks” in neighbouring Syria to topple President Bashar Assad, as Damascus lashed out at France for backing Syrian rebels.

   September 15, 2012: The new international envoy tasked with ending Syria’s civil war summed up his first foray to Damascus Saturday with a startling and frank admission that he still has no plan for stopping the bloodshed which he warned could threaten world peace. Veteran Algerian diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi made the commnet after three days of meetings with Syrian officials, including Assad, and the opposition.

  September 23, 2012: Syrian opposition figures call for the overthrow of President Bashar Assad at a rare meeting of anti-regime groups held in the government-controlled capital Damascus, a possible attempt by the gathering to position itself as an alternative to the armed rebellion.

  September 25, 2012: Several bombs go off inside a school in the Syrian capital that activists say was being used by regime forces as a security headquarters. Ambulances rushed to the area and an initial report on state media said seven people were wounded.

  Also, a new report by the charity Save the Children includes first-hand accounts of alleged atrocities against children in Syria’s civil war.
  In the report, a 14-year-old boy describes how his family members were blown apart when a rocket fell on a funeral procession.

  October 4, 2012: Turkey’s Parliament authorized military operations against Syria and its military fired on targets there for a second day after deadly shelling from Syria killed five civilians in a Turkish border town. For its part, Syria admitted it was responsible for the shelling that killed five people in Turkey and formally apologized for the deaths, a top Turkish official said.

  October 13, 2012: Turkey’s prime minister sharply criticizes the U.N. Security Council  for its failure to agree on decisive steps to end Syria’s civil war, as NATO ally Germany backed the Turkish interception of a Damascus-bound passenger jet earlier in the week.
   

  October 16, 2012: Syrian airstrikes hit the northern provinces of Idlib and Aleppo on Tuesday, with activists describing them as some of the worst since rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Assad made advances in the region in the past week. 

  October 18, 2012: Syrian residents in the northern provinces of Idlib and Aleppo are searching through mounds of rubble for survivors. This comes after activists say government forces hit four towns with airstrikes. Videos of the strikes posted online show levelled buildings and survivors pulling bodies from the debris. Activist claims and videos could not be independently verified.
   October 22, 2012: A Jordanian soldier is killed in clashes with armed militants trying to cross the border into Syria and sectarian clashes overnight in Lebanon left two dead as Syria’s civil war spilled into neighbouring countries.

  October 23, 2012: Syrian warplanes strike a strategic rebel-held town in the country’s north in an attempt to reopen a key supply route, three days before the U.N.-proposed start of a truce that appears increasingly unlikely to take hold.

  October 27, 2012: Activists say Syrian warplanes have bombed a building in a suburb of the capital Damascus in the first airstrike since an internationally mediated cease-fire went into effect.
  The attack and other violence casts further doubt on the chances that the four-day truce that began Friday will be a springboard for ending the civil war.

  October 31, 2012:A fresh wave of bombings hits Damascus. SANA says “terrorists detonated” three bombs in Al-Mazzeh district of Damascus late Wednesday night, targeting a mosque, a sports club and a shop.

  November 2, 2012: A new video appears to show Syrian rebels killing a group of captured soldiers, drawing condemnations from human rights groups who warned on Friday that the gunmen may have committed a war crime.
  An anti-regime activist organization said the killings took place near the northern town Saraqeb, which has been the scene in past weeks of heavy fighting between rebels and forces of President Bashar Assad’s regime.

  November 3, 2012: The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says the rebels have launched a dawn offensive to take Taftanaz air base, a day before a crucial opposition conference in Qatar.

  
  November 4, 2012: The head of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdul-Rahman, said rebels overran the Al-Ward oilfield in the province of Deir el-Zour near the border with Iraq early Sunday. About 40 soldiers were guarding the facility that the rebels had been pounding for the past three days, he said, adding that opposition fighters also captured several regime troops.

  November 8, 2012: Syrian President Bashar Assad vowed to “live and die” in Syria, saying in an interview broadcast Thursday that he will never flee his country despite the bloody, 19-month-old uprising against him. The broadcast comes two days after British Prime Minister David Cameron suggested that Assad could be allowed safe passage out of the country if that would guarantee an end to the nation’s civil war, which activists estimate has killed more than 36,000 people.
  
  November 9, 2012: Senior U.N. officials say 11,000 Syrians have fled the country in the past 24 hours in what they call an unusual spike in the number of refugees.

  November 10, 2012: The newly elected leader of Syria’s main opposition bloc in exile strikes a combative tone Saturday, saying international inaction rather than divisions among anti-regime groups are to blame for the inability to end the bloodshed in Syria. George Sabra, the new head of the Syrian National Council, told The Associated Press in an interview that the international community should support those trying to topple President Bashar Assad without strings attached, rather than linking aid to an overhaul of the opposition leadership. 

  November 12, 2012:Israeli tanks strike a Syrian artillery launcher after a stray mortar shell flew into Israel-held territory, the first direct clash between the neighbours since the Syrian uprising began nearly two years ago.

  
  November 14, 2012: An Associated Press journalist in the Turkish town of Ceylanpinar witnessed Syrian airstrikes in the adjacent Syrian town of Ras al-Ayn, where rebels say they have ousted troops loyal to President Bashar Assad.
  November 17, 2012:  Activists say Syrian rebels have taken control of an airport in the country’s east along the border with Iraq after days of heavy fighting with the forces of President Bashar Assad.

  Novenber 19, 2012: A group of extremist Islamist factions in Syria rejects the country’s new opposition coalition, saying in a video statement they have formed an “Islamic state” in the embattled city of Aleppo to underline that they want nothing to do with the Western-backed bloc.

  November 20, 2012: Britain formally recognizes the newly formed Syrian opposition as the sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people.
  
  November 28, 2012: Twin car bombs ripped through a Damascus suburb on Wednesday, killing at least 34 people and leaving dozens critically wounded, according to state media and hospital officials.
  
  November 29, 2012: Syrian activists say authorities have blocked Internet and cellphone signals in parts of the nation’s capital, where rebels and government troops are engaged in fierce clashes.

  December 3, 2012: Syrian warplanes on Monday bombed a security building that had been taken over by rebels along the Turkish border, wounding at least 11 people and sending dozens of civilians fleeing across the frontier, a Turkish official said. A day earlier, Lebanese soldiers exchanged fire with Syrian rebels across their border, media reports said, fueling concerns that the Arab Spring’s longest and deadliest revolt could draw in neighbouring countries and spark a regional war. 
  
  December 4, 2012: NATO foreign ministers are expected to approve Turkey’s request for Patriot anti-missile systems to bolster its defence against strikes from neighbouring Syria.
  
  December 6, 2012: Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird is calling on China and Russia to lean on the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad as reports emerge he could unleash chemical weapons on his own people.

  December 10, 2012:Syrian rebels capture parts of another large army base in the country’s north, just west of the city of Aleppo, tightening the opposition’s grip on areas close to the Turkish border, activists say.

  Meanwhile, Germany expels four employees of the Syrian embassy in Berlin in a diplomatic move to put pressure on the regime of President Bashar Assad.

  December 11, 2012: The Obama administration has declared a Syrian rebel group with alleged ties to al-Qaida as a terrorist organization.

  December 13, 2012: NATO’s top official says he thinks Syria President Bashar Assad’s regime is on the brink of collapse. Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said the regime’s collapse is “only a matter of time.”

  Also, Syria’s Foreign Ministry denies claims that the government is using Scud missiles against rebels. The ministry says  that the reports are nothing more than a conspiracy.
  
  December 14, 2012: Russia issued a clumsy denial of a statement from its point man on Syria, who said a day earlier that Syrian President Bashar Assad is losing control of the country.
  
  Also on Friday, the Pentagon announced the U.S. will send two batteries of Patriot missiles and 400 troops to Turkey as part of a NATO force meant to protect Turkish territory from potential Syrian missile attack.

  December 24, 2012: The international envoy given the task of pushing to end Syria’s civil war says he’s worried after discussing the crisis with Syrian President Bashar Assad in the capital Damascus.
  
  Envoy Lakhdar Brahimi says he and Assad exchanged views on the conflict and discussed possible steps forward, which the envoy did not disclose.
  
  The two met hours after a government strike on a bakery in a rebel-held town in central Syria killed more than 60 people.
  
  December 25, 2012: Syrian rebels fully captured a northern town near the Turkish border after weeks of heavy fighting and attacked a regime air base in a neighbouring province, activists said. 

  December 28, 2012: Syrian rebels stepped up their siege of a military base in north of the country Friday as government warplanes bombed surrounding areas to support the defenders, activists said.
  
   

  © Global News. A division of Shaw Media Inc., 2012.
  
  
  

  12/29/12

• The Sound of Silence in European Media

  

  Terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip fired some 55 rockets and mortar shells at southern Israel early Monday morning. The shells landed in communities in the Eshkol Regional Council. There were no reports of injuries, although two buildings were lightly damaged and several goats were killed due to an explosion in an animal corner.
  
  Hamas’ military wing Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades and the Ansar al-Quds group have claimed responsibility for Monday morning’s attack on the south. They claimed the attack was a response to the IAF’s airstrike on Gaza on Sunday.

  The first rockets were launched shortly after 6:00 am. Palestinians in the Gaza Strip fired at least three mortar shells which then exploded in Israel. One of the shells exploded near a residential building in the Eshkol Region, slightly damaging it.
  
  The two other shells exploded in open areas.
  
  Around 9:00 am, additional shelling was reported. Authorities have asked residents of the Eshkol region to remain in close proximity to shelters.
  
  Yehuda Kedem, a resident of one the communities in Eshkol said that “at 5:50 am we heard a large explosion. Apparently the mortar exploded nearby to the kibbutz synagogue. About 6-7 mortar shells hit our area.”
  
  One mortar landed in an animal corner in one of the communities in Eshkol. Ilan, who is in charge of the livestock in the kibbutz where the mortar hit said that this was the first mortar to ever hit the community.
  
  “I never imagined that our kibbutz would be hit. This is the first time a mortar has exploded inside the kibbutz. Some of the goats are severely injured and some are dead. Usually the animal corner is packed with children but we don’t work on the holiday. We avoided a great tragedy,” he said.
  

  10/08/12

• The Murders at the Olympics in Munich - 1972

  THE murder of 11 Israeli athletes and staff by Palestinian terrorists at the Olympic village in Munich in 1972 was the bleakest day in the history of the modern Games.

  The Olympics had returned to Germany for the first time since the Berlin Games of 1936, which Adolf Hitler used to showcase Nazi ideals.

  With that notorious event in mind, German officials were keen to promote openness and freedom in and around the Olympic village. It was a naive policy with disastrous consequences for security, and the Israeli team became easy prey.

  At 4.30am on September 5th, eight members of the Palestinian terrorist group “Black September” – later confirmed as having links with Yasser Arafat’s Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) – scaled the fence surrounding the Olympic village.

  Wearing ski-masks and brandishing machine-guns they raided the Israeli team’s apartments. Yossef Gutfreund, an Israeli wrestling judge, was woken by scratching at his apartment door.

  He immediately got up and threw himself against the door, allowing weightlifting coach Tuvia Sokolovsky time to escape.

  But in the ensuing struggle to prevent the terrorists capturing more members of the team, the wrestling coach Moshe Weinberg and weightlifter Yossef Romano were shot and killed.

  At 6am, with two dead and nine Israeli hostages seized, Black September issued a ransom note demanding the release of 236 political prisoners and safe passage out of Germany.

  Negotiations with German and Israeli officials lasted throughout the day, in the full gaze of the world as television screened the unfolding drama.

  The live images handed the terrorists priceless publicity – and allowed them to watch German police positioning snipers on the roof.

  Bizarrely, the Games continued throughout the morning and part of the afternoon, to the anger of Israeli officials. Only at 4pm were they suspended.

  Israel’s government resolutely refused to negotiate with the terrorists, and a plan was hastily hatched by German authorities.

  The terrorists had demanded a plane to Cairo and had agreed to be taken by helicopter to a NATO airbase at Fürstenfeldbruck where a Boeing 727 would be waiting.

  During the transfer to the airport it became clear there were eight terrorists and not five as German police had first thought.

  Crucially, this undermined a planned ambush and rescue at the airport, where only five police snipers were in position.

  At 10.30pm the captors and hostages arrived at the airport.

  Two terrorists inspected the Boeing and, finding the cabin empty of flight-crew, realised they had been duped and ran back to the helicopters.

  At 11pm German police gave the order for their marksmen to fire. In the ensuing gun battle two kidnappers and one policeman were killed. The hostages were still tied up in the helicopters and a stalemate developed as the remaining terrorists fired sporadically at the airport building.

  A short time after midnight the terrorists, realising the futility of their situation, began their final act.

  They shot four of the hostages in one helicopter and then tossed a grenade into the other. In all, 11 Israeli team members were killed.

  The German rescue had been a disaster.

  Three of the eight terrorists escaped death that night, and amazingly, were all released the following month when the German government caved into demands for their release following the hijacking of a Lufthansa jet by Islamic terrorists.

  Two were later assassinated by the Israeli secret service. One, Jamal Al-Gashey, is still alive and living in North Africa.

  Related articles

  • ‘Just One Minute,’ Israelis demand for athletes, coaches killed at ‘72 Games (edition.cnn.com)
  

  06/29/12