The clashes between the new Syrian authorities and the armed men faithful to the external dictator Bashar al-Assad killed at least 147 people in the last two days, said a war monitor on Friday, in the bloodiest fights from the collapse of the old regime.
The problems broke out through the provinces of Latakia and Tartus, longtime strongholds of Mr. Al-Assad along the Mediterranean coast of Syria. The area has become a Tinder box since Mr. Al-Assad was overturned in early December.
The clashes began on Thursday afternoon, after Assad’s lealists killed 16 security staff for the government in the Latakia campaign, the most fatal attack on the new security forces of Syria, according to government officials and the Syrian observatory for human rights, which monitored the Civil War of Syria.
The government responded in force, deploying dozens of safety personnel in the countryside and directing thousands of other cities to the coast while trying to restore the authority for some cities and villages where armed men had actually seized control overnight. On Friday afternoon, the Syrian authorities had not yet torn full control over some areas, raising the spectrum that the new government could lose control on the coast.
The lealists armed with Assad also kept several hostages of the security personnel in Jableh, a coastal city in the province of Latakia, where they had actually seized control, according to Nour al-Din Primo, spokesman for the government in Latakia.
It was not immediately clear how many of those killed were fighters on one side or the other, or if some were civilians.
A video, verified by Reuters and the New York Times, shows the bodies of at least 20 people who seem to have been shot in the Alawita village of Al-Mukhataria, about 12 miles east of the provincial capital of Latakia. The blood can be seen around several bodies, while mourning throw themselves on them.
The fighting on the coast have become a point of flammability for the fractured nation while it emerges from a civil war of almost 14 years and more than 50 years under the dictatorship of the Assad family. Flame tensions have become a critical test for the new leaders, whose rebellious coalition has overturned Mr. Al-Assad and installed an Islamist transition government that tried to consolidate control.
“From the first day, we have been and continue to face both a secret war and open time to break the will of the Syrian people,” said the interim foreign minister of Syria, Asaad al-Shaibani, in a place on Friday.
The war was fought “sowing chaos on the one hand and attempting political isolation abroad on the other,” he added. “Reassure our people that Syria today has passed the test and is forgiving a way towards the future with force and determination.”
Most of the Tartus and Latakia residents were repairing in their homes on Friday, while military convoys patrolled the roads and security forces led “hairstyle operations” to eradicate the armed remains of the Assad era, according to the state media.
The confrontations and security operations fueled panic throughout the coastal region. In several villages and cities, the residents said that the government’s security forces had attacked the civilians as they crossed.
On Friday afternoon, dozens of security personnel poured to Basnada, a city in the province of Tartus, to conduct a swept for safety, according to Yamen, 31 years old, residing in Basnada who asked to be identified with its name only for fear of retaliation.
He said he had been standing near the window of his apartment on the fifth floor when a member of the security forces raised his rifle towards him and shot the apartments complex. In the hours that followed, he saw the security forces beat some of his neighbors.
Jad, an eighteen year old who lives in Banyas, a suburb on the outskirts of the provincial capital of Latakia, said he had repaired himself in his house with relatives when the security forces knocked down the front door on Friday afternoon. He also asked to be identified with his name only for fear of retaliation.
He said the forces rushed to his house and asked the family to deliver money and any weapons and seized the family car. He and his relatives later heard from other family members that his cousin, his husband and their 6 -month -old boy had been killed during the swept. Their dead could not be verified independently.
The upheaval along the coast has unleashed protests in competition across the country, while thousands of people poured into the streets of the main cities on Thursday evening and Friday, either to show their support for government forces or to ask that those forces will distinguish and retire from the coastal campaign.
Those were the first large -scale manifestations against the new authorities since they took power.
The coastal provinces represented a significant challenge for the Sunni government led by Muslims. The region is the heart of the Alawita minority of Syria, including the Assad family.
Although only 10 percent of the country’s population, the Alawiti exercised an out -of -measure influence on the country during the domain of the Assad family. The Alawiti, who practice a derivation of the Shiite Islam, dominated the dominant class and the upper ranks of the army under the Government of Assad.
The new government has invited all members of Al-Assad’s security forces to renounce their ties with the former government and sell their weapons in “reconciliation centers”. While thousands of people took part, some remains of the security forces of the former government no.
In recent weeks, armed men affiliated to the Government of Assad have carried out sporadic attacks affected by the security forces in Latakia and Tartus. But the ambush on Thursday afternoon seemed to be the most coordinated attack and arrived among the calls between some loyalists of Assad to organize himself against the new government.
In draykish, a city on the tartus mountains, the streets were almost empty by Thursday evening while news of clashes were spread to other coastal areas, according to a resident, Ghamar Subh, 35.
So, around 20:30, the heavy shots echoed to the whole city, said Subh. A few hours later, the speakers of some mosques transmit a message that asks government forces to abandon their weapons and leave the city.
The armed men surrounded the district center, where some government security forces were stationed, according to Mr. Subh and other residents.
At dawn on Friday, the government forces had abandoned their places in Draykish and armed men had created checkpoints along the main streets of the city, the residents said.
“Nobody knows how the events have intensified so quickly,” said Subh. “Who coordinated it? Who attacked? Nobody is completely sure. “
The night scaramucce came hours after the security staff conducted an operation in the Latakia campaign to arrest an official of the Assad government, according to a government official who spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to speak with the media.
While the security forces left a village, Beit Aana, armed men stretched an ambush to their convoy, said the residents of the village and the official. At least 16 members of the security personnel were killed, according to the war monitor.
Beit Aana’s ambush has unleashed further clashes between government forces and loyalists armed with Assad in rural Latakia.
The fire of artillery and machine gun resounded throughout the area throughout the afternoon while hundreds of people from Beit Aana and nearby villages fled to the countryside, The residents said. It was not immediately clear if civil or loyalist of Assad had been killed.
In Tartus, a port city, the demonstrators on Thursday evening sang: “One, one, Tartus and Jableh are one”, referring to the Jableh area in which the clashes had taken place, according to the residents.
In other parts of the country, including the central city of Homs and Northwestern Idlib, thousands of people have joined the protests to support the government. In the capital, Damascus, a crowd of demonstrators gathered at Umayyad Square on Friday afternoon, some asked for a repression of the armed remains of the Government of Assad.
Crescent hostility had put the communities in Latakia and Tartus to the limit. Many in the region, although skeptical on the new authorities of Syria, do not support the armed resistance of the remains of the Assad government.
Friday, the security convoys have patrolled the roads.
“There is a total curfew in the area,” said Ahmad Qandil, leader Alawita to Jableh, adding that most people in the city wanted the situation to be stabilized.
“We want security, security” more than anything else, including money for the bases such as food, he said. “The situation is very confused.”
The report was contributed by Reham Gurshed by Damascus, Syria; Hwaida Saad from Beirut, in Lebanon; Malachy Browne by Limerick, Ireland; Devon Lum from New York; AND Sanjana Varghese from London.