Syrians Here Decry Violence, Look for Democracy in their Homeland

CLEVELAND, Ohio — As the soaring death toll from a crackdown on dissent threatened to push Syria into full-scale civil war, representatives of the country’s government in exile told a Cleveland audience today that they now see the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad as inevitable.

"All we can do is support the people on the ground," said George Stifo of Boston, a member of the Syrian National Council and president of the U.S. branch of the Assyrian Democratic Organization.

"Our strength is the people on the ground," he said. "People on the ground are willing to die for freedom, for being willing to say we want democracy.

"The future is democracy; we’re looking for a democratic state."

George Jabboure Netto, a physician at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, said the Syrian National Council is a coalition of opposition to the Assad regime, with about 250 members, and is now recognized as the political arm of the revolution.

"The SNC is not going to be the new government," he said. "We’re going to be involved in the transition, assisting as a new constitution is drawn."

They and others spoke to more than 125 people at a forum sponsored by the local Syrian Expatriates Organization at Executive Caterers at Landerhaven.

The event raised more than $100,000 for Life Syria, a relief organization that provides medical aid and food to orphans and refugees of the 11-month-old conflict.

Netto said the number of children detained and tortured by Syrian government forces, put at 380 by UNICEF last month, has now risen to 420 — "a shock even for us who knew how criminal this regime could be," he said. The United Nations issued a report in November that said more than 250 children had been killed by Syrian security forces.

"It’s not even human what’s happening to people over there," said Khalid Saleh, an SNC member from Detroit. "The regime took away our pride and dignity for a long time."

One of his own earliest memories, he said, was fleeing the country at age 6 in the middle of the night with his family more than 30 years ago.

Assad inherited Syria’s dictatorship from his father in 2000. He fueled unrest in his country and drew condemnation outside of it last March by launching a harsh crackdown against demonstrators protesting the torture of students who had put up anti-government graffiti. The United Nations said the death toll from the unrest passed 5,400 last month.

Assad has claimed his regime protects minority populations, a point the SNC speakers disputed. Netto said Syria is politically, religiously and ethnically diverse, and that his group contains a broader representation than does the government.

"We represent everyone," he said.

Naser Danan, a Cleveland doctor among the local organizers, said the fear employed by Assad is felt far beyond Syria. Though Assads deadly weekend assaults on opposition groups added urgency to Sundays forum, some in the local Syrian community feared attending thinking, Danan said, that their attendance might be reported by Assad spies, and bring reprisals against relatives in Syria.

Source: The Plain Dealer