It has been more than two years since the Syrian army laid siege to the city of Homs in the centre of the country. Most of the city's population has escaped the city since then, but thousands of people still remain trapped within it, braving a virtual inferno of incessant shelling and sniper fire. Most of the city has now been reduced to rubble, a punishment that the regime led by Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad has been exacting on a city once hailed as the “capital of the revolution.” Every few weeks, the Syrian authorities have been announcing that Homs is a “liberated” territory, rid of the “terrorists” the regime is claiming to be confronting in battle. But the revolutionaries are nevertheless still in control of large areas of the city, especially those belonging to the city's Sunni community. During the recent Geneva 2 talks on the crisis in the country, the Syrian opposition demanded the lifting of the Homs siege. However, the regime's negotiators scoffed at the idea, describing the city as being a “hotbed” for terrorists and spies. Nevertheless, faced with persistent international pressures the regime relented last week by allowing hundreds of the city's old people, women, and children to leave. A relief envoy went briefly into the city, but then came under fire from Alawite sections of the city that are mostly loyal to the regime. Thousands of families are still living in Homs protected by the combatants of the Free Syrian Army (FSA). Huddled in shelters, with barely enough food and practically no medicine, these families face death every day, according to opposition reports. Syrian opposition activist Hadi Al-Abdallah, himself from Homs, has been following the news from his hometown with alarm. Speaking to Al-Ahram Weekly, Al-Abdallah said that “thousands of families are short of bread, as the Syrian regime is preventing flour from entering the city. Most families are managing on one meal per day.” “The only field hospital in Homs has closed because medicine is short and medical equipment damaged. Because of the shortages of medicine, the doctors carry out a lot of amputations that could have been avoided in more normal times.” Activists and human rights groups accuse the authorities of committing massacres in Homs, in which up to 14,000 people have been killed so far. The Syrian authorities have also cut off water, electricity, fuel and communication to those parts of the city held by the regime's opponents. Hundreds of snipers stationed on high buildings shoot at anyone trying to bring food into the besieged areas. The regime has said that it will end the siege if the combatants lay down their weapons and turn themselves in. However, the FSA has refused the offer, saying that the army would kill everyone in the city if they surrendered. Nearly 75 per cent of the population of the city is Sunni, most of them opposed to the regime. Only 20 per cent is Alawite, and most of them are supporters of the regime. The remaining 5 per cent are Christians. According to opposition sources, the regime has been bringing Alawites into Homs from other parts of the country in order to change its demography in its favour. Opposition activist Abu Jaafar Al-Megharbil is convinced that the regime plans to turn the city into an Alawite stronghold. Speaking to the Weekly, Al-Megharbil said that “the aim of the regime is to empty the city of its population in order to change its demographics. It is determined to destroy parts of the city in order to create a no-man's land and thus neighbourhoods that it can control. People are forcibly being evacuated from their homes.” Homs residents viewed the offer made by the regime last Friday with suspicion, this apparently allowing women, children under 15, and men over 55 to leave the city. Many opposition members want the regime to stop the shelling and allow relief supplies into the city instead. If the civilians are evacuated, the argument goes, the regime will stage a fully-fledged offensive against Homs. “We recognise the right of the besieged in Homs to leave the city, especially since many of them need essential surgery and some women and children have been trapped for three years and need medical care,” Al-Megharbil said. “But there is no guarantee that further massacres will not take place, as has happened in the area of Baba Amr and other parts of the city.” Al-Megharbil added that pro-regime gangs “supported by militia from Iraq and Lebanon” were poised to attack the city. “The regime will destroy Homs as soon as the besieged civilians leave, on the pretext that those who remain inside are terrorists.” Homs is of crucial importance to the regime, as it controls the road between Damascus and the coast. “The Al-Assad regime has been waging a ferocious war on Homs since the beginning of the revolution because of its strategic and military importance,” Al-Abdallah said. “If the revolutionaries take all of Homs, they can cut off Damascus from the coast, thus blocking Russian supplies of arms and ammunition to the regime,” he added. According to Al-Abdallah, Homs is at the heart of the regime's “plan B.” “Everyone knows about this plan. The regime intends to establish an Alawite state that includes the coast and Homs,” he said. “This is why the regime is trying to replace the city's original inhabitants with loyal Alawites.” “For a year-and-a-half, the regime has been replacing the inhabitants of Homs with its Alawite supporters who are brought to the city from the coastal areas. The regime gives them new identities and falsified title deeds to houses and land that are not theirs,” Al-Abdallah said. According to opposition sources, the regime is destroying areas bordering the areas it intends to claim as its future state. The opposition also claims that the regime has committed acts of ethnic cleansing in Sunni areas that fall within the borders of its intended mini-state. It speaks of massacres committed by the regime and its militias in the neighbourhoods of Karm Al-Zeitun, Baba Amr and Al-Khaldiya in Homs, all of which are Sunni areas. The regime is also said to have transported large amounts of weapons to its supporters in Homs and the coastal areas, in preparation for declaring a mini-state. In Homs, the Sunnis and Christians, making up most of the population, are strongly opposed to the alleged partitioning scheme. Fawwaz Tallo, an independent Syrian opposition activist, said that the regime must not be allowed to continue with its plans. “All Alawite areas must be disarmed, and all those who have committed crimes against the Syrian people must be punished regardless of their sectarian affiliations,” Tallo said. The revolutionaries in Homs agree with this assessment. They say that they are not just fighting for their city, but for a country that will be free from tyranny and fear.
