A dissident in Damascus sent me his view (I am translating parts and took pains to protect his identity):
"You are fully right, doctor, in disbelieving both sides but the reality is worse than what is being talked about. Opposition lies a lot in terms of the number of martyrs or the circumstances of their martyrdom, or the nature of military operation, like when they talk about storming this town with tanks or hundreds of soldiers, the reality is that the storming was by a patrol of 3-4 cars or trucks and sometimes there are is no storming. Sometimes the broadcast aims at warning the activists in the town about an impending searches especially given the cut off of communication. As for the regime, it trades with the blood of military martyrs, without count and lies without count on many issues. Damascus lives on another planet in relation to the rest of Syria. And despite the heavy security presence in it, and the bad economic situation, and the car bombs every few weeks (they have unfortunately become normal), people are still going to their business every day, and I am one of them. Practicing normal life to a large degree. The restaurants and cafes in old Damascus still have their customers, even if they are less in number. But what is horrific is the class differences between city and town. Rural Syria area contains two cities with more than 100,000 people, and many towns have between 30,000 and 80,000, and all are considered the suburbs more than rural areas and people settled there to avoid the wild real estate prices in Damascus. Abject poverty led people in those suburbs toward extreme religiosity and consequently resentment against the regime...The social conditions are very bad, there is not a single person who does not have a relative in jail or wanted by Mukhabarat, if he himself has not been arrested. All this less than 10 km from the heart of Damascus. Sectarian polarization is intensely present, and the regime succeeded in scaring off the minorities to a large degree. This is not visible in Damascus although it has appeared on the surface. In Damascus there is an area called Mazzah 86 and it is an area of `ashwa'iyyat and people from the Syrian coast live there and I am ashamed to to frankly identify their sect, and most work in the security or government jobs...and this area is now object of anger by most people of Damascus because the regime is deliberate in bringing in Shabbihah to repress demonstration from this area...So simply you find the following logic: the blood of the folks of 86 is religiously permissible although this area houses university students and people who work hard for their living and city like Damascus and have nothing to do with Tashbih (armed thuggery). But the regime used this strategy to imprison this sect and succeeded. As for the areas of real sectarian contact like Homs or the countryside of Hamah, and it is a rural mosaic in a ways that are not imaginable, the situation is much worse. And many thugs have exploited the lack of security and resorted to kidnapping of individuals in return for large ransoms (large for the Syrian citizen, raning between $20,000 to $100,000. I am from the governorate of...and when I travel I have to make sure that roads are not witnessing robberies and kidnapping through asking people who constantly travel. I am an opponent of the regime but the situation is bad and the official opposition is lost at best, and agent (to foreign powers at worst). Regime is merciless. Cases of torture and arbitrary arrests can't be counted, and the biggest fear for the regime are the universities. I have personally seen horrific chapters of repression of the movement at the University of Damascus last year, through brutal beatings and arrests and the transfer to disciplinary committees, and this transfer suspend the grades of the student in question until he signs a confession to various offenses, including agitation and the like. They extract a confession of something that you have not done in return of passing courses that you had passed before...Arrest among doctors exceeded 50 doctors and most are young...My position is sensitive...On the other hand, media rarely cover university activism in favor of armed activism, which is undisciplined and the armed men are local and very very few defectors, and conduct that varies from one place to another, the best being in Zabadani and some areas of Dir`a and the worst in Idlib and the Salafis of Hums. I strongly apologize for the elaboration but frankly what I described is 1% of the bad situation in Syria, which I live lightly compared to the people of Homs or Hamah or Idlib."
"You are fully right, doctor, in disbelieving both sides but the reality is worse than what is being talked about. Opposition lies a lot in terms of the number of martyrs or the circumstances of their martyrdom, or the nature of military operation, like when they talk about storming this town with tanks or hundreds of soldiers, the reality is that the storming was by a patrol of 3-4 cars or trucks and sometimes there are is no storming. Sometimes the broadcast aims at warning the activists in the town about an impending searches especially given the cut off of communication. As for the regime, it trades with the blood of military martyrs, without count and lies without count on many issues. Damascus lives on another planet in relation to the rest of Syria. And despite the heavy security presence in it, and the bad economic situation, and the car bombs every few weeks (they have unfortunately become normal), people are still going to their business every day, and I am one of them. Practicing normal life to a large degree. The restaurants and cafes in old Damascus still have their customers, even if they are less in number. But what is horrific is the class differences between city and town. Rural Syria area contains two cities with more than 100,000 people, and many towns have between 30,000 and 80,000, and all are considered the suburbs more than rural areas and people settled there to avoid the wild real estate prices in Damascus. Abject poverty led people in those suburbs toward extreme religiosity and consequently resentment against the regime...The social conditions are very bad, there is not a single person who does not have a relative in jail or wanted by Mukhabarat, if he himself has not been arrested. All this less than 10 km from the heart of Damascus. Sectarian polarization is intensely present, and the regime succeeded in scaring off the minorities to a large degree. This is not visible in Damascus although it has appeared on the surface. In Damascus there is an area called Mazzah 86 and it is an area of `ashwa'iyyat and people from the Syrian coast live there and I am ashamed to to frankly identify their sect, and most work in the security or government jobs...and this area is now object of anger by most people of Damascus because the regime is deliberate in bringing in Shabbihah to repress demonstration from this area...So simply you find the following logic: the blood of the folks of 86 is religiously permissible although this area houses university students and people who work hard for their living and city like Damascus and have nothing to do with Tashbih (armed thuggery). But the regime used this strategy to imprison this sect and succeeded. As for the areas of real sectarian contact like Homs or the countryside of Hamah, and it is a rural mosaic in a ways that are not imaginable, the situation is much worse. And many thugs have exploited the lack of security and resorted to kidnapping of individuals in return for large ransoms (large for the Syrian citizen, raning between $20,000 to $100,000. I am from the governorate of...and when I travel I have to make sure that roads are not witnessing robberies and kidnapping through asking people who constantly travel. I am an opponent of the regime but the situation is bad and the official opposition is lost at best, and agent (to foreign powers at worst). Regime is merciless. Cases of torture and arbitrary arrests can't be counted, and the biggest fear for the regime are the universities. I have personally seen horrific chapters of repression of the movement at the University of Damascus last year, through brutal beatings and arrests and the transfer to disciplinary committees, and this transfer suspend the grades of the student in question until he signs a confession to various offenses, including agitation and the like. They extract a confession of something that you have not done in return of passing courses that you had passed before...Arrest among doctors exceeded 50 doctors and most are young...My position is sensitive...On the other hand, media rarely cover university activism in favor of armed activism, which is undisciplined and the armed men are local and very very few defectors, and conduct that varies from one place to another, the best being in Zabadani and some areas of Dir`a and the worst in Idlib and the Salafis of Hums. I strongly apologize for the elaboration but frankly what I described is 1% of the bad situation in Syria, which I live lightly compared to the people of Homs or Hamah or Idlib."
