We Crossed a Bridge and It Trembled

by Wendy Pearlman

  Demonstrations were amazing. There were so many heroes—heroes who never knew how heroic they were. Amazing people who took huge risks just to spread leaflets or to bring someone to the hospital. I also did crazy things to rescue total strangers, things that could have gotten me killed. Because we were together, shouting for the same goals.

  During that period, my mother was crying all the time. I wanted her to accept the reality that I might die. I didn’t want to feel like I had special privileges; that my parents were going to send me to Europe to wait until the revolution was over. If other people were going to get beaten in the streets, I was going to get beaten in the streets. And if they were going to prison, then I was going to prison.

  The security forces started calling me to come for weekly interrogations. I’d go to interrogation in the morning and protest at night. I was sleeping at friends’ houses because it became too dangerous to spend the night at home.

  I started to see my mother less and less. One day I came home to visit. She was going to a wedding that evening. On her way back, the car stopped at a checkpoint and troops opened fire by accident. She was shot and killed immediately.

  It was at the hospital that I realized I was no longer a normal person. My sister was crying, but I couldn’t grieve normally. Some very close friends didn’t even come to visit at the hospital, because they were afraid that the security forces would arrest them there. The odd thing was, they were regime supporters. The more someone supported the regime, the more he was scared of it.

  I started to think. The revolutionary activists were going to hear that my mother died. They’d say that the regime killed her, and she is a martyr, and they would want to come to the church to pay their respects. I didn’t want there to be conflict with the congregation, so I met with other activists. I told them that I wanted everyone to wear white T-shirts and carry red roses. No slogans. No chants. We want to do something that Christians would understand, and something peaceful that reflected the revolution itself. I told them to trust me on this. If they came and shouted slogans, the people at the church would get scared. And then the regime would come and beat the protesters, and people would think that it was justified because the protestors had started it.

  In the end, almost five hundred people attended the funeral. They came into the church silently and peacefully, just as I’d asked. There were security forces nearby, but they couldn’t come shoot people in church, simply because they were holding red roses.

  It was amazing. I respected how all the activists wanted to shout against Bashar al-Assad. But they saw how impressed these ordinary civilians were with them. One person from the church said to me, “God bless you. What you managed to do peacefully today was really important.” I didn’t know how strong I was. Having to hold that message, in that situation. I had the courage even to make my mom’s death a revolutionary statement.

  Part IV

  Crackdown

  Miriam, former student (Aleppo)

  If Bashar had only come out in his first speech and said, “I am with you, my people. I want to help you and be with you step by step,” I can guarantee you one million percent that he would have been the greatest leader in the Arab world. He had that kind of potential. Instead, he assumed that the Syrian people love him, that they don’t understand anything, and that they’ll follow him no matter what. But we weren’t as foolish as the government thought we were.

  Jamal, doctor (Hama)

  I was working at the hospital when Bashar delivered his first speech after the demonstrations began. All the doctors and nurses and other staff gathered to watch it on TV.

  There were probably fifty of us. We were very hopeful. But he showed no understanding at all of the people’s demands and the reasons for the protests. He said, “If you want war, we are ready for war.” He actually laughed out loud. And then he abruptly ended his address, saying, “As-salamu alaykum—Goodbye.”

  We couldn’t believe what we were hearing. There were even some regime supporters in the room, and they were shocked, too. It became painfully clear: This person should not be ruling us. He is too stupid to deserve to be our president.

  Tayseer, lawyer (Daraa)

  On April 24 they laid siege to Daraa city. They surrounded the city and used airplanes to survey it. Then they attacked from different fronts, using all kinds of weapons: artillery, tanks, missiles. They cut water, electricity, and communications.

  Soldiers would raid houses and spill the cooking oil on the floor. They’d spoil the food that people had stored in their winter pantries so they had nothing to eat. They’d shoot at water tanks so there was no water left.

  They took over the main public hospital. If they put their hands on any injured person, it would be the end of him. So people started to treat the wounded in private homes instead. The dead were left in the streets, and people put them in warehouse coolers normally used for storing fruit and vegetables.

  They positioned snipers that shot at anything that moved, even animals. They divided the city into grids and checkpoints. They cut off travel within the city to kill any sort of social life. This whole city was frozen. The atmosphere was one of complete terror. Imagine the children who experienced this. What social and psychological problems will those children face in the future?

  They maintained a curfew for thirteen days. After that, people were allowed out for an hour or two a day. I was wanted by the police and stayed in another house so they wouldn’t find and arrest me. It was only after curfew was lifted that I learned that they’d raided my home. They destroyed everything and arrested my son, my two brothers, and my four nephews.

  My son was in prison for six months. He was tortured severely. We resorted to bribes and finally were able to get him released. Imprisoning people became an extortion trade. Those whose parents were able to pay got out. Those who couldn’t stayed in prison and were done for.

  Abdel-Samed, business owner (rural Daraa)

  The regime brought in forces to destroy Daraa completely. All of the neighboring villages held demonstrations that Friday, which we called “the Friday of Breaking the Siege.” The regime arrested everyone there. Buses were filled with detainees. Only those who could run away managed to escape arrest.

  Later, they returned the body of Hamza al-Khatib.* He’s a cousin of mine and looks just like my son. He’d been tortured. They didn’t leave any spot on his body without cigarette burns. His body was full of stab marks and his neck was broken. They’d cut off his genitals.

  His mutilated corpse arrived and people saw what the regime had done to him. And that’s when they realized that the regime was finished. There was no more trust. A delegation had gone to meet with the president, and he had promised that he would address their concerns. Instead he sent them this present. It was a way of telling them, “Either you be quiet, or we will do this to you.”

  Before this, people had some hope that the regime might listen to their demands and try to make reforms. After Hamza, people realized that the regime is on one side and the people are on another. That’s it. The only thing our leaders know how to do is kill, kill, kill, kill, and kill. And after that, kill again. Kill anyone. It doesn’t matter if he’s a civilian or a child.

  The regime went even further in terrorizing us. It said, “We won’t just kill you. We’ll kill your entire family, too.” I’ve heard that in some countries the government only arrests the wanted person himself, not his brother or mother or sister. In Syria, the entire family and the entire neighborhood is accused and targeted.

  Adam, media organizer (Latakia)

  The regime dealt with each region in Syria differently. In some places, they tried soft politics. In other places, like Latakia, they went extreme from the very beginning. It was a manipulative, evil way of doing business.

  One night I woke up to heavy shooting. Being the idiot I am, I got in my car and went to trace the source of the shooting. I got to this huge square in Latakia and found all these shabeeha. Shabeeha were the on
ly ones armed at that time, apart from the security forces and the army. They were civilian, most likely Alawites, working for somebody connected to the Assad family or other influential families. They did whatever they wanted and nobody dared to stop them.

  So I reached the shabeeha, and they’re all sitting there, shooting in the air. It’s four o’clock in the morning and they’re blasting pro-Assad songs. Many of them were drunk or just being stupid. But they couldn’t have gone out and started shooting without authorization. So there was a purpose. The regime wanted to say, “We’re still in control and if you try anything we’ll break your face.”

  They were celebrating in an Alawite neighborhood. After ten or fifteen minutes, they went to one of the biggest squares in a Sunni neighborhood. They went as this huge convoy, waking everybody up, shooting in the air, playing the songs. These huge guys, on steroids, with guns, just showing off. As if to say, “Don’t even think that what’s going on in other places is going to happen here.”

  The next day was the first demonstration in Latakia. After Friday prayers, people shouted, “Daraa, we’re with you!” There was nothing about the government or the regime. Riot police came and cracked down.

  I heard gunfire. I don’t know who was shooting, but I’m pretty sure it was the shabeeha. They were filled with rage. A big reason why was that rumors were circulating that jihadists from all over the world were coming to behead Alawites. I heard the rumors, too, because I was living in an Alawite neighborhood. You know, many Alawites hated the Assad regime, and I think the regime knew that. They also know that the Alawite community is their lifeline, their base for survival.

  So from day one, the regime was saying that groups of radicals were coming. It was like, “Imagine what will happen to you if one of those terrorists get into power.” Alawites felt that they had no choice but to be 100 percent behind the leadership. And Bouthaina Shaaban, the regime spokesperson, got on TV and said, “Those radicals, they want to make strife between the Shia and blah blah blah.” Are you kidding me? Our children are in prison and we have a shitty government and you’re talking about Shia and Sunnis? I didn’t even know the difference between Shiite and Sunni until this whole thing started, because nobody cared. Don’t get me wrong—Shia and Sunnis have been fighting forever. But nobody was mentioning any of that in Syria at the time. In 2011, the needs, the goals, and the demands had nothing to do with that. The goals were political reform, participation, real representation, and some actual active citizenship in the country.

  The people in power saw those goals as a fundamental threat to their grip over the country. The only way they could maintain full control was by reframing the argument from reform to Shia and Sunnis and radicals. They implemented that policy through their political speeches and military approach. And they imposed it on the ground through all those things that they used shabeeha for: burning Qurans, going into mosques, etcetera. Those were the tools that they used to reframe the argument. And eventually things ended up where we are now.

  There is another event that I still remember. One night, people started shouting from their balconies, “Freedom, freedom! God is great!” They were just shouting and banging on pots and pans. There was an army detail on the street. The soldiers formed a circle, with the officer in the middle. They faced outward, pointing their machine guns all over the place. I served in the military so I know this formation. It’s what you do when enemies are coming at you from all sides or when you don’t know where the enemy is. This formation is your last stand.

  So they thought that they were surrounded by enemies. And they were in their own city. And nothing was happening except that people were shouting.

  The regime was basically doing everything possible to put sects against each other and create a toxic environment, where nobody trusts anybody and nobody knows who’s in control. Every side had its own enemy. For Alawites, the enemy was extremist radicals. For Sunnis, it was the shabeeha. For the soldier on the streets, it was the Israelis or whoever they were told that they were fighting. And this is what made things escalate. It was literally being pushed by the regime and the forces connected to it.

  Kareem, doctor (Homs)

  On April 16, there was a vigil in Homs. An officer came to clear it, but people didn’t respond. He started shooting, and seventeen people were killed. People moved the casualties to the hospital where I was working. The scene was unlike anything I’d ever seen in my life.

  The next day there was a funeral for the martyrs. Thousands and thousands of people participated. When the funeral ended, people wanted to do something. So they started shouting, “To the square! To the square!” It was a spontaneous reaction. There was so much anger. The crowd turned around and walked toward Clock Square, in the center of the city.

  People gathered and more people joined. All the shops closed. People set up tents and ate and drank. They chanted and delivered speeches. Night came and people decided to sleep there. There was a feeling: This is an opportunity that we should not lose. This is our square and we should stay here until the regime falls.

  Security forces gathered near the sit-in and decided to storm it. Negotiations were ongoing between the regime and some representatives of the people. And here the regime betrayed us. I was at home in bed about three kilometers away. I woke up to a sound that I thought was heavy rain. I went to the window and realized it was bullets.

  Security forces were attacking the square. People were being slaughtered. I called the hospital and asked them to send me an ambulance. What I saw on the road from my house to the square was extraordinary: All of Homs was on the streets. People didn’t know what was happening. They were running, afraid.

  Security forces opened fire on the ambulance, so it wasn’t possible to move a single injured person. Only one or two wounded people managed to escape and make it to the hospital. We just sat there and waited and cried. There was nothing we could do. People were dying and we couldn’t even reach them to offer first aid.

  The next morning, people saw that the square had been hosed down with water. There was no trace of anything whatsoever. They took away the people and removed all traces of the crime. The only thing that remained was the bullet holes on the buildings.

  This was the turning point in Homs. After that, people felt that there was no going back to the way things were. Before there was a 50 percent chance of no return. Now it became 150 percent.

  Abdel-Samed, business owner (rural Daraa)

  In the beginning, things were spontaneous. People were just angry. Later, we saw that people needed to get organized.

  Coordination started from the second week. Leading figures in the community, and anyone with drive and an eagerness to contribute, gathered together. They divided themselves into groups to deal with specific tasks. Some worked in media. Some organized demonstrations, figuring out where and when they’d be held. Some wrote the speeches that were delivered at demonstrations. Some worked on slogans—demonstrations were being shown on TV to the entire world, so we needed to send the right message. Some secured the sound system; we only had one in town, so it was crucial that people hide the stereo speakers so the security forces couldn’t confiscate them. Some people provided security for demonstrations. The thinking was, if the regime attacks, how do we minimize the number of martyrs?

  Each village started having meetings. At the same time, we communicated with people in other towns and villages who were doing the same thing. So we all got to know each other.

  Ibrahim, former student (rural Hama)

  In every neighborhood, someone took charge of chanting, someone made signs, someone took photographs, etcetera. Some people would be stationed at the entrances of the neighborhood during demonstrations; as soon as they saw police coming, they’d tell everyone else to escape.

  We’d film demonstrations, upload the video, distribute it, and then delete everything so we’d have nothing on us if we got caught. We used protest names in our communications with each other. That way, if
someone was arrested and was forced to report on the others, he couldn’t reveal anyone’s real identity.

  At first, each province had a different name for demonstrations. Then people started coordinating to choose one name for all of Syria. That made protest more powerful and meaningful.

  Women didn’t go out to protest in Hama in the beginning. But after a while they came out, too, and played a major role. There was a seamstress who sewed flags for us.* If the regime caught her, they would have slaughtered her. She refused to take any money for her work. She also knew calligraphy, so she would draw beautiful banners. One guy would pick them up and hide them somewhere that only the neighborhood activists knew about. They wouldn’t leave them in anyone’s homes because the whole family would be in danger if they were discovered.

  Abu Tha’ir, engineer (Daraa)

  During the first few days of the revolution, we weren’t careful, and we brought the wounded to government-run hospitals. In the morning, we’d take an injured person to the hospital with a gunshot wound in his leg. That night, we’d return to find him dead with a gunshot to the head. Guys would die and they’d force their families to say that their sons had been killed by terrorist gangs.

  So we created field hospitals. A friend of mine donated his house and transformed it into a place to help the wounded. There were doctors and nurses, and young women and men volunteered to help. If the regime caught them, it would kill them.