Two parts to an interview done with Sean Stone on Watching the Hawks in October, 2016.
-Putting a Human Face to Suffering in Syria w/ Eva Bartlett, Oct 18, 2016, Watching the Hawks (shared on their Facebook page)
-A Different Perspective on Syria w/ Eva Bartlett, Oct 20, 2016, Watching the Hawks (shared on their Facebook page)
*photo: Resilience of Syrians, Old City of Homs, December 2015.
As many readers will know, I have visited Syria four times, between April 2014 and December 2015—independently on a journalist’s visa and as part of two peace delegations. When in Syria as a writer, I visited key places—including liberated Homs and Ma’loula, terror-bombed regions of Homs, and the Yarmouk district, which has been focus of slick propaganda by anti-Syria corporate media and so-called human rights groups—and have conducted numerous interviews, with Syrian political and religious leaders, as well as Syrian civilians.
I have taken many photographs and videos, collected numerous personal testimonies, undertaken my own research and investigations, visited hospitals and refugee centres, and—in every area that I visited—have conversed with Syrians about what they feel is the cause of the problems in Syria, the solution, and on their insistence for Syria’s sovereignty, and on their support for the Syrian Arab Army and their president.
In the months since my last trip, I have been transcribing interviews and testimonies and writing articles based on them, writing about my personal impressions based on my visits to Syria, and challenging the latest corporate media lies and propaganda campaigns.
I will be returning to Syria, as soon as possible, and for that I must ask for financial assistance to make this trip possible. [see: Syrian Voices Book Project on GoFundMe ]
Why am I compelled to go to Syria?
In order to write a book that prioritizes Syrian voices from Syria: truths from some of the most highly-misrepresented, lied about or plainly ignored areas of Syria.
To do justice to the full spectrum of the stories of Syrians as told by them, it is essential that I visit areas I not previously been to, areas that have been liberated since I was last there and areas that are enduring especially egregious suffering—such as in Aleppo under terrorist bombs.
,
© Eva Bartlett
Mar 7, 2016, SOTT.net (in Spanish; in German; re-published at: Off Guardian, Dissident Voice, Strategic Culture, Global Research) (cited in: “Western Reporter in Syria Finds U.S.-Backed Fighters Are Jihadists”, Washington’s Blog; “Contrary to West’s Humpty-Dumpty Allusion Syria is ‘Coming Together Again'”, Sputnik News)
-Eva Bartlett
In April 2014 I first visited Syria, going to Homs and Latakia, in addition to Damascus. On each of my three subsequent trips to Syria, speaking moderate colloquial Arabic (or with a translator when necessary), I have been able to interact one-on-one with Syrians there, whether in markets, taxis, on the streets or in areas I visited.
In Latakia, many of the the over 1 million Internally Displaced Persons from Idlib, Aleppo and surrounding areas who are being housed and supported by the Syrian government spoke of the same heinous kidnappings, beheadings, and other crimes that most media currently only associate with Da’esh (ISIS), but which were perpetrated (with Turkish support) by the so-called FSA and other terrorist factions.
A man from Harem, near the Turkish border, spoke of being kidnapped by FSA terrorists and of the decapitations of Harem residents, with their heads sent home in boxes.
“The terrorists attacked us, terrorists from Turkey, from Chechnya, and from Arab and other foreign countries. They had tanks and guns, like an army, just like an army. For 73 days we were surrounded in the citadel of Harem. They hit us with all kinds of weapons. We had women and children with us. They showed no mercy. When they caught any of us, they slaughtered him, and then send his head back to us. They killed over 100 people, and kidnapped around 150… children, civilians, soldiers. Until now, we don’t know what’s happened to them,” he said.
CONTINUE READING
2.3 km Syrian flag, al-Mezzeh Highway, Damascus, SANA, June 15, 2011.
Feb 21, 2016, Porkins Policy Radio
For this episode we are joined by activist and freelance journalist Eva Bartlett for an in-depth discussion of the war in Syria. Fresh from her fourth trip to the embattled nation, Eva lends us her perspective of what it’s actually like on the ground. Eva recounts the many places she has visited, and the current living conditions of the Syrian people. Eva and I discuss the numerous terrorist groups and gangs operating within Syria, and the disappearance of groups such as the FSA and other “moderate rebel” groups. Eva also offers us an alternative narrative about the Maddaya starvation story that gripped news headlines and then vanished. We discuss the propaganda involved in this story and its similarity to the skewed reporting of the terrorist siege of Yarmouk.
POST CONTINUES
An interview I did with Brendan Stone yesterday on his program, Unusual Sources. Their introduction:
“Guest: Eva Bartlett, Canadian journalist, who has visited Syria 4 times in the past three years.
Mainstream media reporting and NGO social-media posts about starvation in the Syrian village of Madaya are designed to elicit an emotional response and build support for military intervention in Syria. Reality on the ground there, and elsewhere in Syria is ignored.
Agitation about Madaya is propaganda in its purest form – telling part of the truth in order to obscure a larger picture. Falsehoods were definitely spread about Madaya, and citizens in the West need to start asking questions about the stories and reporting surrounding Madaya and other Syrian villages. That is, if we are serious about breaking the cycle of war propaganda justifying intervention in Iraq, Libya, Syria, and elsewhere.”
Listen HERE
-Eva Bartlett, Global Research
On December 28, 2015, the United Nation’s OCHA made its first express Twitter mention of two northern Syrian villages, al-Foua and Kafarya (also transliterated as Kafraya).
The belated December mention is in spite of the fact that the two villages of around 30,000 people have been locked under siege by terrorist factions Jebhat al-Nusra (al Qaeda in Syria), Jaysh al-Fattah (the so-called “Army of Conquest”), and Ahrar al-Sham (Liberation of the Levant Movement), among other terrorist factions, since March 2015. The siege has meant that the isolated villages have had limited to no access to food and medical supplies since then. Additionally, terrorists have been daily firing rockets, mortars and hell cannons at the villages, killing and maiming residents, destroying homes and infrastructure.
In October, 2015, the ICRC reported that al-Foua and Kafarya were among several areas to receive humanitarian assistance.
OCHA’s tweets around that time made no specific mention of al-Foua and Kafarya, instead simple tweeting: “UN and partners deliver critical relief supplies to besieged areas of Syria.”
The tweet-linked UN report, however, does mention at least mention the two villages by name, although it does not at all mention the terrorists’ bombings of the villages, nor the immensely dire situation there.
This in spite of the fact that the UN did acknowledge, back in March 2015, that al-Foua and Kafarya had just been besieged. Yacoub el-Hillo, the UN Resident Coordinator for Syria, himself in a March 30, 2015 statement, declared:
I am gravely concerned by the ongoing fighting taking place in Idleb governorate and its possible impact on hundreds of thousands of civilians.
Hillo apparently did not sustain his concern.
CONTINUE READING
“I live in Tayr Filsey, not Madaya, and I am fine.” –Marianna Mazeh; ‘Starving Syria child’ revealed as south Lebanon girl (article below)
-Eva Bartlett, Dissident Voice
This is a brief post with the intent of merely alerting people to the latest campaign to demonize the Syrian government and army, and also at the same time to depict the terrorists inhabiting Madaya as somehow noble or in the right… as somehow not the human shielding terrorists that they in fact are. Madaya is the new Yarmouk. [See this post regarding the lies and propanda that were put forth in the exact same manipulative manner on Yarmouk previously. I will be writing an update on Yarmouk, which I visited in December 2015 soon.]
**UPDATE: see RT journalist on the ground now in Madaya updates on Twitter: Murad Gazdiev https://twitter.com/MuradoRT
(Jan 11, 2015)
-“More on #madaya: #syria military sent 42 tons of food there on 27 november. All of it was seized by Islamist rebels; the are reselling aid”
-” #madaya civilians say rebels charged 100,000 SP ($250) for kilogram of rice”
-“Many #madaya civilians weeping for joy at finally leaving this place. Say #ISIS in town, fight together with rebels”
-“Fleeing #madaya civilians blame rebels for cruelty, theft..”
-“About two dozen journalists here. Can’t see any Western press. Strange, given how worried they were about #madaya”
See also his RT report, which includes: “Just passed by first aid trucks bound for #madaya. Water&flour. Judging by lack of markings, this is #syria govt aid …Another fully loadef #syria govt food aid truck going in to #madaya. Looks like rice or flour. …”
Jan 11 updates include:
Madaya Basics:
*image from Fars News
-village in hills NW of Damascus, near the Lebanese border
-occupied for many months by approximately 600 terrorists (60% Ahrar al-Sham, 30% Jebhat al-Nusra, and 10% “FSA”) hold the village (according to a recent Hezbollah statement)
-residents number approximately 23,000, not the 40,000 being reported in MSM and social media (the same trick of inflating the numbers was used in the propaganda campaign on Yarmouk last year) (according to the Hezbollah statement)
-on Oct 18, 2015, the Red Cross delivered supplies to Madaya. ICRC statement here: (ICRC cannot confirm info being published re Madaya. ICRC was, however, able to bring medical and food supplies to Madaya, Zabadani, Foua and Kafarya in mid-October, 2015. ICRC concerned also very much about Foua and Kafarya, “where the people are telling us the same thing: they are lacking food, they have not been eating proper meals for months, they lack medicine…”)
CONTINUE READING
