SYRIA WITNESS: Traveling to the Dark Side of the Nation

Mousab Alhamadee is a media liaison for the opposition Local Coordination Committees (LCC) of Syria. He  lives in Hama and writes here about traveling to the scene of an alleged massacre, hours after a team of U.N. monitors were able to reach the site. Read his account further below.

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By Mousab Alhamadee, Hama, June 12, 2012 

The village of Qubeir was only 20 kilometers away, but it took me two hours to drive there by motorcycle to investigate reports of a massacre in that small village west of the Orontes river. I passed through 11 towns and villages in order to avoid seven checkpoints manned by government military.  Free Syrian Army members in every village offered me help by passing me to their colleagues in the next village. Danger was growing as we got closer to Qubeir.

Shabiha (government militiamen), the villagers told me, were keen that no journalist or cameraman could sneak in and film anything, or talk with the survivors of the massacre – Mousab Alhamadee

Last Wednesday, Qubeir witnessed what we had been told was one of the most horrible massacres in the Syrian revolution. Approximately 80 people in this isolated Bedouin village were killed, allegedly by government-sponsored shabiha who came from neighboring villages to follow up after an hour of the shelling of the small village. The population of the village was approximately 130 Bedouins.  About 50 had already left the village to look for work in Lebanon or to tend their sheep in the countryside. Only two men and four women who stayed in Qubeir escaped the massacre.

Bad luck by the Orontes River

Qubeir is unlucky because it is west of the Orontes, near the bank of the river where Sunni villagers have been driven out by Alawite units of shabiha who have been well-armed by the regime to push the Sunni population to the east of the river. The shabiha appear to be trying to establish some kind of sectarian entity for the Assad regime in case the regime loses control over the rest of Syria. Such a state would combine Lattakia and Tartous on the more fertile Mediterranean coast with territory that spreads from the al-Alawiyin Mountains in Hama and Homs provinces to the Orontes river, turning the river into a border and buffer against a Sunni population.

Traces of violence were left on the floor of one home (both photographs by Mousab Alhamadee)

When we reached Qubeir, villagers from neighboring Murzaf were quick to supply us with gallabiahs, the hooded Bedouin dress that locals usually wear so we would not be detected by shabiha who they said were watching us through field glasses from their neighboring villages. Shabiha, the villagers told me, were keen that no journalist or cameraman could sneak in and film anything, or talk with the survivors of the massacre.

There, I met Laith, a man in his 50s, who said he lost all of his family in the massacre. People from neighboring villages said Laith may have been saved from execution because he had talked to the U.N. monitors when they visited the village immediately after the massacre.

In my disguise, I roamed the village and was so surprised that with all the attempts of the Syrian intelligence to cover up the scene of the crime, I could still detect horrible scenes – Masoub Alhamedee

Laith told me that after the U.N. monitors left Qubeir, the shabiha detained him and tortured him for meeting the U.N. monitors.  I could see fresh wounds and injuries on his face, especially the bruises around his eyes.

Wearing a Bedouin disguise

In my disguise, I roamed the village and was so surprised that with all the attempts of the Syrian intelligence to cover up the scene of the crime, I could still detect horrible scenes: I saw spots of blood on the walls of homes; I picked up sticks and knives still laying on the ground that survivors say were used to kill women and children in front of the half- destroyed houses.

Dressed as a Bedouin, the author was led past the abandoned homes of Qubeir. His guide said the disguises were necessary because shabiha from nearby villages were watching them with field binoculars.

The smell of burnt bodies was still coming through the doors and windows of the empty houses. The only mosque in the village was completely burnt, including the holy Qurans in it. I filmed a mass grave where Laith said he and his friends from neighboring villages had buried victims. He said it told contained 14 martyrs, while the rest of the victims were buried in two other mass graves, one in Murzaf and the other in Jraijes.

The only mosque in the village was completely burnt, including the holy Qurans in it – Mousab Alhamadee

During our Syrian revolution, I have seen the bodies of martyrs almost every day. In some cases I have filmed beheaded bodies or only heads or legs or hands while the rest on the bodies were lost. But the view of the empty houses of a complete village, with the spots of blood and the smell of burnt human flesh in Qubeir will stick in my memory forever.

The Qubeir massacre in social media:

David Arnold

David Arnold coordinates the Syria Witness project at Middle East Voices and reports on Middle East and North Africa affairs for both Voice of America and MEV. The Syria Witness project publishes on-the-ground citizen reporting, giving Syrians the opportunity to offer to a global audience their first-person narratives of life on the streets of their war-torn country.