This does not sound like the multiple party changes that Assad promised. The protesters seem to be fans of Donkeys. Maybe they are cheering for Obama?(Bloomberg) At least 150 people were killed in Syria yesterday, al Jazeera reported, as soldiers sought to reassert control over a restive nation in one of the deadliest bouts of violence since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began more than four months ago.
The army took action the day before the start of Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting and prayer. Tanks shelled Hama, Syria’s fourth-largest city, where at least 113 people were killed, the Qatari-based television network said, citing the National Organization for Human Rights in Syria.
The regime “has been very frightened by Ramadan’s onset,” Joshua Landis, a Syria specialist who directs the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma in Norman, said in a telephone interview.
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is “deeply concerned” by the reports of killings in Syria, his office said in a statement yesterday. The U.S., France, Turkey and the U.K. joined Ban in condemning the violence.
