Syrian rights group: 24 killed on first day of Ramadan

Three-day death toll rises to 134, 90 in Hama alone; Italy recalls its ambassador to Damascus; state says 8 police officers killed.

By REUTERS
Hama residents duck to avoid bullets from Syrian army 311 R (photo credit: REUTERS)
Hama residents duck to avoid bullets from Syrian army 311 R
(photo credit: REUTERS)
AMMAN - The death toll in Syria's violent crackdown on opposition to Syrian President Bashar Assad in the city of Hama and elsewhere climbed on Tuesday, spurring Western efforts to pile diplomatic pressure on Damascus.
Tanks pounded residential neighborhoods across Hama, the scene of a 1982 massacre, after evening prayers on Monday, the first day of Ramadan, the Muslim fasting month, witnesses said.
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Human rights campaigners said assaults by Assad's forces across Syria overnight and on Monday had killed at least 24 civilians, including 10 in Hama, where troops and tanks began a violent operation to regain control on Sunday.
That brought the total to about 134 dead throughout Syria in the past three days, 90 of them in Hama, according to witnesses, residents and rights campaigners.
Syria's state news agency said "armed terrorist groups" had killed eight policemen in Hama. The government blames such groups for most killings in the five-month-old revolt, saying more than 500 soldiers and security personnel have died.
The plight of Hama has prompted many Syrians to stage solidarity marches since the start of Ramadan, but Assad's tough response suggests he will resist calls for change that have swept Syria and much of the Arab world this year.
Syria has incurred international opprobrium for its harsh measures, but need not fear the kind of foreign military intervention that NATO launched to back rebels in Libya.
The top US military officer called for a swift end to violence in Syria, but only diplomatic pressure was in view.
"There's no indication whatsoever that the Americans are, that we would get involved directly with respect to this," Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the end of a visit to Iraq.
Consultations at the UN Security Council on Monday failed to produce agreement on adopting a Western-backed draft resolution condemning Syria or settling for a less binding statement.
Click for full Jpost coverage of turmoil in the Middle East
Click for full Jpost coverage of turmoil in the Middle East
Italy recalled its ambassador from Syria on Tuesday in protest at the "horrible repression of the civilian population" and urged other European Union members to do the same.
The EU formally added five more Syrian officials to an existing list of 29 individuals headed by Assad, whom the 27-nation bloc has targeted with asset freezes and travel bans.
Apart from the 10 deaths in the latest violence in Hama, two civilians were killed in the town of Albu Kamal on the Iraqi border, which was also stormed by tanks, three in house-to-house raids in the city of Homs, two in the port city of Latakia and six in the Damascus suburb of Erbin after protests that followed night-time Ramadan prayers, rights activists said.
A score of tanks and troops carriers entered the town of Zabadani near the border with Lebanon after people demonstrated in support of Hama following evening prayers, residents said. At least three protesters were wounded by machine gun fire.
'Shells are falling once every 10 seconds'
The attack on Hama has evoked memories of a bloody 1982 confrontation when Assad's father Hafez al-Assad crushed an armed Islamist revolt, killing many thousands of people.
"The shells are falling once every 10 seconds," a witness in Hama told Reuters by telephone on Monday. The thump of artillery and explosions could be heard in the background.
YouTube footage, purportedly from Hama, showed tanks and smoke, with the sound of explosions and shouts of "Allahu Akbar (God is great)...We are witnessing the reforms of Bashar".
Another video shows a man lying on a street with his head sliced off by shrapnel.
With most foreign reporters barred from Syria, it was impossible to verify the content of the clips.
Nor was it possible to verify footage shown on Syrian state television, also said to be from Hama, which showed gunmen firing at the military from streets and rooftops. It also shows scenes of dead soldiers being thrown into a river.
Security forces, dominated by Assad's minority Alawite sect, had besieged Hama, a mainly Sunni Muslim city of 700,000, for nearly a month before the assault.