Leaving Ghouta @AFPphoto
by Louai Beshara: image via gersende rambourg @gersende75, 16 March 2018
#Syria #Ghouta Death and exodus as two Syria assaults escalate #AFP Photo Louai Beshara: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 16 March 2018
Thousands of Syrian civilians flee from a rebel pocket in eastern Ghouta in the first mass exodus from the besieged enclave since Syrian government forces launched an assault to capture it.: image via Reuters Pictures @reuterspictures, 16 March 2018
Thousands of Syrian civilians flee from a rebel pocket in eastern Ghouta in the first mass exodus from the besieged enclave since Syrian government forces launched an assault to capture it.: image via Reuters Pictures @reuterspictures, 16 March 2018
The
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which is based in Britain and
tracks the conflict though a network of contacts, said that as many as
20,000 people had fled the region for government-held areas.
: photo by Louai Beshara/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
Louai Beshara/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
Video
of beleaguered civilians carrying satchels and children, some piled
high onto trucks and tractors, aired on Syrian state news media. Some
people had been wounded in the recent airstrikes by Syria and its
Russian allies that have reduced much of the area to rubble.
The mass migration served as a new reminder of the seven-year-old war’s great cost to Syria’s civilians and the brutal means the government has used to crush the remnants of the rebel movement that sought to topple it.
Many
left on foot, carrying what they could on their backs. Trucks, vans and
buses crammed with civilians and their belongings traveled dirt roads,
while huge crowds milled around waiting for transportation. The booming
of the continuing bombardment echoed as the government pressed its
offensive against neighboring towns.
Louai Beshara/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
Louai Beshara/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
The
intensity of the government assault left civilians in a confused panic,
said Mohammad Adel, an activist in Douma. Though the majority evacuated
to government-controlled areas, he said, some fled farther into rebel
territory because they feared the government.
“There
was no food, no medicine, nothing,” a woman leaving the enclave said on
Syrian state television. “We were dying in there.”
Marwan Habaq, whose family was from Arbin, said he, his wife and infant daughter had spent the past month fleeing the bombardment, each trip more dangerous than the last.
Louai Beshara/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
Louai Beshara/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
“We
don’t know what will happen,” Mr. Habaq said in a voice message, the
sound of rocket fire in the background. “I run to Hammouriyeh, they bomb
it. I run to Zamalka, more bombing is ahead of us.”
About 1,200 civilians have been killed since the Syrian government began its campaign to take the area last month.
The
roughly 400,000 people that the United Nations estimates are in the
area have faced harrowing challenges. The United Nations Security
Council endorsed a 30-day cease-fire for the region nearly a month ago,
but attacks have continued unabated. While government warplanes drop
bombs, rebel snipers on the ground have shot civilians trying to reach the government side.
: photo by
Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
: photo by Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
For
many, the bleak situation in eastern Ghouta reflected the state of the
war seven years to the day after the first protests that led to Syria’s
conflict. Inspired by Arab Spring revolts in other countries, Syrians in
a number of areas took to the streets to demand political changes. The
government responded with force and the conflict escalated.
Now, the rebel movement that had once controlled large parts of Syria holds very few areas, and civilians are leaving.
The war has been characterized throughout by increasing brutality.
United
Nations investigators said Thursday that Syrian government troops and
affiliated militias had raped and sexually assaulted women and men in a
systematic campaign to terrorize, humiliate and punish civilians seen as
linked to the opposition — actions that amounted to crimes against
humanity.
: photo by Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
: photo by
Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
Opposition
armed groups had also committed rapes and sexual violence. Although
such acts by rebels were “considerably less common,” the investigators
said, extremists had carried out executions and harsh punishments to
enforce their rigid social order.
The United Nations Commission of Inquiry monitoring Syria’s conflict said it had documented the rape of women and girls in 20 government detention facilities and military intelligence branches between 2011 and 2016, and the same violence against men and boys in 15 branches.
Such
attacks were “not isolated incidents but rather part of a pattern
observed countrywide,” the investigators said in a 29-page report, which
the panel’s chairman, Paolo Pinheiro, said was “based on 454 powerful,
devastating interviews” with victims and witnesses.
Credit Hamza Al-Ajweh/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
Credit Hamza Al-Ajweh/Agence France-Presse, 15 March 2018
The
panel’s hope, he added, was that the report would serve as “an equally
powerful trigger for accountability,” he told a meeting at the United
Nations in Geneva. It was “particularly repulsive” that such violence
continued to go unpunished, he said.
During house raids searching for opposition supporters in the early years of the conflict, troops and militias raped women and forced family members to watch the assault, the panel said.
In
detention centers, guards subjected women to humiliating invasive
searches, gang rapes and torture to force confessions and extract
information. Low-ranking officers were often the perpetrators, the panel
found, but “numerous cases of rapes by high-level officers have also
been documented.”
: photo by
Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 13 March 2018
: photo by Amer Almohibany/Agence France-Presse, 13 March 2018
Male
detainees, some as young as 11, also suffered a wide range of sexual
abuse, including rape, torture and genital mutilation. Investigators
said they had documented such abuse in the political security and
military intelligence branches in Aleppo, Hama, Idlib, Tartus and
Damascus, including the infamous Sednaya Prison, sometimes “seemingly
for amusement.”
Rape and sexual violence by armed opposition groups was not systematic, the panel said, but throughout the conflict it had received regular reports of extremist groups attacking people suspected of being gay, including throwing them off rooftops.
Militant
groups such as the Nusra Front and the Islamic State had sentenced
women accused of adultery to death by stoning, and subjected women who
violated their dress codes to lashings. In areas controlled by Islamic
State, women and girls as young as 14 were forced to marry fighters.
#Syria Thousands flee Syria rebel enclave after month-long bombardment #AFP #Ghouta Photo @abdfree2: image via Aurelia BAILLY @AureliaBAILLY, 16 March 2018
Kashmiri
villagers cross a temporary bridge made by lining up boats for people
to cross a river to attend the funeral of Shabir Ahmad, a suspected
rebel in Awantipora, south of Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir. |
Photo @Daryasin: image via AP Images @AP_Images, 16 March 2018
Encounter pictures at Balhama pampore on the outskirts of Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
Encounter pictures at Balhama pampore on the outskirts of Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
Encounter pictures at Balhama pampore on the outskirts of Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
Encounter pictures at Balhama pampore on the outskirts of Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
Picture speaks itself.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 14 March 2018
Pigeons take flight as it rains in Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 14 March 2018
A man carries a child in his lap as it rains in Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
You can jail a Revolutionary, but you can't jail the Revolution. (Huey Newton) Photojournalist Kamran Yusuf released after six months in jail. - Photograph by @lookaround81 in Pulwama Kashmir on March 16, 2018.: image via Faisal Khan @lookaround81, 16 March 2018
Watch you don't step
on my shine, punk
Between my elbows
and my glasses
is No-Fly
Between my fly
and my thigh
is outer-space capsule
You just be quiet to we
Hanging 'ffense, mon cul
To all non-binary guerilla cadres:
His gender mind's
a scant two inches
To all multi-maroon intransigent cliques:
His color lacks obedience
To all fernhead body-downs:
Lay them down
on denialers' werewolf
Ain't no living wage
in Armor Garden
Ironic camouflage is our exposition
Observe without you hide
Change mode of muck wash
Can't predict change
So change like it's yours to do
Them who back walk
don't see the curtain drops
Don't see the separated
baby head ain't Martian
Them who back walk
Stay in their way
29XI16
@realDonaldTrump walks off Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews following a two day trip San Diego, Los Angeles and St. Louis, MO.: image via Doug Mills @dougmillsnyt, 14 March 2018
@realDonaldTrump looks over a Boeing EA-18G Growler during a tour of the Boeing Company in St. Louis, MO. @Boeing #taxes.: image via Doug Mills @dougmillsnyt, 14 March 2018
#President @realDonaldTrump steps off Air Force One after arriving at Andrews Air Force Base.: image via Evan Vucci @evanvucci, 14 March 2018
Encounter pictures at Balhama pampore on the outskirts of Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
Encounter pictures at Balhama pampore on the outskirts of Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
Encounter pictures at Balhama pampore on the outskirts of Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
Encounter pictures at Balhama pampore on the outskirts of Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
Picture speaks itself.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 14 March 2018
Pigeons take flight as it rains in Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 14 March 2018
A man carries a child in his lap as it rains in Srinagar.: image via BASIT ZARGAR @basiitzargar, 15 March 2018
You can jail a Revolutionary, but you can't jail the Revolution. (Huey Newton) Photojournalist Kamran Yusuf released after six months in jail. - Photograph by @lookaround81 in Pulwama Kashmir on March 16, 2018.: image via Faisal Khan @lookaround81, 16 March 2018
John Godfrey: Civ Dis
Watch you don't step
is No-Fly
Hanging 'ffense, mon cul
To all non-binary guerilla cadres:
a scant two inches
Subvertationist catwalk knows time
Observe without you hide
Change mode of muck wash
Can't predict change
Them who back walk
29XI16
Rethymno, Crete, Greece, December 2, 2017: photo by Andreas Katsakos, 2 December 2017
While it’s part of culture now that those in attendance want to take
photos, the photo historical record of an event is so often blocked by
hands in the air.: image via Kelly O'Donnell @KellyO, 15 March 2018
While it’s part of culture now
to put your devices
between you and anything real
(the photo historical
record of an event
is so often blocked
by hands in the air)
it's also part of culture now
for you to be without devices
to protect you
from your devices
and for you to not mind
(so often blocked
by hands in the air)
because direct exposure to reality
is what you fear most
While it’s part of culture now
for you to be without devices
to protect you
from your devices
to put your devices
between you and anything real
it's also part of culture now
and for you to not mind
because direct exposure to reality
is what you fear most
While it’s part of culture now
to put your devices
between you and anything real
(the photo historical
record of an event
is so often blocked
by hands in the air)
it's also part of culture now
for you to be without devices
to protect you
from your devices
and for you to not mind
(so often blocked
by hands in the air)
because direct exposure to reality
is what you fear most
While it’s part of culture now
for you to be without devices
to protect you
from your devices
to put your devices
between you and anything real
it's also part of culture now
and for you to not mind
because direct exposure to reality
is what you fear most
@realDonaldTrump walks off Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews following a two day trip San Diego, Los Angeles and St. Louis, MO.: image via Doug Mills @dougmillsnyt, 14 March 2018
@realDonaldTrump looks over a Boeing EA-18G Growler during a tour of the Boeing Company in St. Louis, MO. @Boeing #taxes.: image via Doug Mills @dougmillsnyt, 14 March 2018
#President @realDonaldTrump steps off Air Force One after arriving at Andrews Air Force Base.: image via Evan Vucci @evanvucci, 14 March 2018
7 comments:
How did you put this together in the time being?
You are the news. What focus!
Germania Anno Zero | Roberto Rossellini 1948 - Edmund
Germania Anno Zero | Roberto Rossellini 1948 - The strong eliminate the weak
Germany Year Zero: Rossellini - the ending
Great to see (and read) a John Godfrey poem here. Thank you for that, Tom. McCabe's statement is truly depressing. Republicans really know how to fuck people, including other republicans.
Jack and Terry - thanks my heroes!
The poem came yesterday in an actual typescript in an actual envelope from the legendary dashing cavalier JG, whom, like everyone else worth knowing, I haven't seen in forever - but is my hero!
I hope he is reading / seeing this. The both of us may or may not inhabit Electronica. If me, surely not much longer, for (Jack), this simply can't go on. The world - the death of me. In a way good riddance. But still.
His letter reminds me of certain propinquities.
He reminds me he was present among a small group convened and loitering with intent at Peter Schjeldahl's apt on E 3rd St on the sorta fateful day I got off the boat from Angleterre with swiss pharmaceutical LSD packed under my fingernails... except that, in the III class bar of the United States, passing the Statue of Liberty, a minor concern about the trunk full of olympia press pornography that was about to be offloaded from the hold... took aholt of me... and (none of this is true of course) I licked it all off.
Making it difficult to tell the players w/o a scorecard, the rest of that day.
At one point the subway. Linda O'Brien of Oak Park, RIP. Pete snapped a picture. My purple or was it pink portobello road tie with polkadots, my potato dyed portobello road hospital orderly's jacket.
Long day it was, as Ted insisted on awarding me the Golden Ticket Cook's Tour of the LES. Garfinkel's Surgical Supply, upstairs of which Frank... and so on.
Some Fiorello LaGuardia businesses & c. Before the Age of Busy, there was so much more time for inessentials.
At one point Jim Brodey wouldn't peel off from the tour so Ted charmingly appointed a meeting. Jim would wait on the corner of whatever, I think it was 3rd St & B, and meet us there.
Ted's way of ditching the baggage.
And they say Ghouta was brutal.
The other propinquity and though JG doesn't remind me of it, we hung out in Buffalo the week after a beautiful and innocent (??) stranger made the terrible mistake of marrying me, in St Marks Church of all places. Then Niagara Falls iced and so on.
Brutal I tell you.
This is fifty years ago this coming Monday I think. Simply can't go on.
We listened to a lot of Sam & Dave, and then... nutty LSD eclipse viewing by no not the newlyweds but the very people who were about to drive us off a cliff.
JG wisely loitered on the civilized coast. Surely he will survive us.
Meanwhile Happy St Paddy's Day!
Edmund - Don't look down!
Ghouta - What can we do for you but wait and believe. Time may be circular.
Kashmir - You beauties!
Republicans - In what way do you differ from Democrats and vice versa? You both are every asshole in an SUV who tries to run me over on the freeway feeder.
And on the Golden yet!
For context
Martha & The Vandellas: Jimmy Mack, live (sync), Shebang - TV (Casey Kasem), 1967
Just in time for Opening Day.
Just yesterday responding to childhood friend on FB who went to see Bonnie Raitt Wednesday night...the time I got to meet BR backstage and who was right behind us in line but Martha. We ambled a moment after our moment to listen and watch that historic meeting (happy tears on both sides). As for Opening Day, I'm afraid for the Tigers there's nowhere to run. k
Ah the memories...
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