(By AFP)
More than 73,000 people were killed in Syria in 2013, the bloodiest year yet in the brutal civil war that began in March 2011, an NGO said on Wednesday.
73,000 dead in Syria in 2013, war’s bloodiest year (via AFP)
More than 73,000 people were killed in Syria in 2013, the bloodiest year yet in the brutal civil war that began in March 2011, an NGO said on Wednesday. The tally from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights came as renewed regime air strikes in the…
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We are accustomed to the US media’s false claim that 100,000 or more people have been killed by the Syrian government forces in the almost 3 years of the civil war there.
In fact, even the most widely quoted pro-opposition source in the western media, the “Syrian Observatory on Human Rights” in London link to syriahr.com, admits the largest group of the 130,433 deaths it claimed to have counted through Dec. 30 are those of pro-government combatants. Other opposition sources such as “The Center for Documentation of Violations in Syria” link to vdc-sy.info count far fewer (95,152) total deaths for the same period.
This is the”Observatory’s” breakdown:
Syrian government soldiers: 32,013
Pro government militias: 19,729
Total 51 ,742
armed opposition fighters 19,937
Army defectors 2,233
Jihadists 6,913
Total 29,083
Civilians
(killed by both sides) 46, 266
Total deaths since 3/11: 127,091
Wikipedia link to en.wikipedia.org says “Al Jazeera journalist Nir Rosen reported that many of the deaths reported daily by activists are in fact armed insurgents falsely presented as civilian deaths, but confirmed that real civilian deaths do occur on a regular basis. A number of Middle East political analysts, including those from the Lebanese Al Akhbar newspaper, have also urged caution.
This was later confirmed when in late May 2012, Rami Abdulrahman of the [Other] Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which is one of the opposition-affiliated groups counting the number of those killed in the uprising, stated that civilians who had taken up arms during the conflict were being counted under the category of “civilians”. In May 2013, SOHR stated that at least 41,000 of those killed during the conflict were Alawites [most of whom support the government].”
would you like to do this as a guest op-ed, Michael?
Sure. What do I have to do?
Send me an 800 word essay by email
The Syrian intifada has created a nakba.