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  • Kasab Vs. #Kessab, And Propaganda On Syria's Coast

    KASAB VS. #KESSAB, AND PROPAGANDA ON SYRIA'S COAST

    The Daily Star, lebanon
    April 5 2014

    April 05, 2014 12:06 AMBy Marlin Dick

    BEIRUT: A social media campaign to prevent a "genocide of Armenians!"

    in the scenic Syrian mountain resort town of Kasab exploded recently,
    in the latest example of how 21st century communications technology
    can spread as much disinformation as it does information.

    The Armenian diaspora community was shaken late last month when the
    town of Kasab and surrounding areas fell quickly out of the regime's
    control, as part of the "Al-Anfal" coastal campaign launched by rebels
    and jihadists.

    The cast of characters in the campaign is a long one - on one side
    are Syrian regular army troops and several paramilitary groups
    and militias, believed to include the National Defense Forces,
    Lebanon's Hezbollah, and the Liberation of Iskanderon group, headed
    by a Turkish-born Alawite from the neighboring province across the
    border, called Hatay by Turkey.

    On the other side is a loose coalition of groups: the Al-Qaeda
    affiliate the Nusra Front, several conservative Islamist militias,
    and in a supporting role, the mainstream Free Syrian Army.

    For the Armenians of Kasab and Armenians elsewhere, all these
    distinctions are largely insignificant. The regime and its supporters,
    besides labeling every insurgent a "terrorist," have emphasized that
    Turkey is actively aiding the rebels' military efforts, in order to
    stir up old fears and endemic hostility to Syria's neighbor, whose
    Ottoman Empire predecessor massacred 1.5 millions beginning in 1915.

    American-Armenian organizations and activists raised the alarm about
    a new genocide being imminent in Kasab as the town quickly fell to
    the rebels.

    Celebrities such as Kim Kardashian joined in, guaranteeing
    the #SaveKessab campaign instant global reach, thanks to the
    Armenian-American from southern California who commands 20 million
    Twitter followers.

    The message of "Kasab being targeted" was also relayed by the U.S.

    government and Congress, people with Armenian-American constituents,
    although the mayor of Kasab, along with an MP from the Republic of
    Armenia who visited Syria, have both said that no Armenians were
    killed when the town fell.

    Much of the wider social media campaign's visual content - and
    particularly a selection of still photographs - highlight how tenuous
    Internet-driven claims can be.

    Horrific to look at, the photos suffer from the fact that not a single
    one is connected to events in Kasab in late March 2014.

    Ironically, most of the victims pictured in the gruesome beheadings,
    executions and atrocities are Muslims, being killed by ultraextremist
    Muslims, in Syria and elsewhere.

    But the public, facing the wave of such photos and other accusations
    being circulated, might come away with various impressions -
    "Kasab residents butchered," "destruction of churches," and "ethnic
    cleansing."

    The #saveKessab and other propaganda campaigns generated a quick
    pushback, on various fronts.

    A fighter from Ansar al-Sham, the most moderate of the Islamist
    militias in the coast offensive, released a video statement denying
    that any harm had come to the Armenians of Kasab.

    He cited the behavior of the seventh century Caliph Omar, who did
    not harm the Christians of Jerusalem when he seized the city.

    Multiple items of video footage from Kasab also emerged, produced both
    by media activists and pro-opposition television stations, at churches
    where the fighters had posted guards, to make sure nothing was looted.

    Two of the four large groups leading the campaign are Ansar al-Sham
    and Ahrar al-Sham, both members in the Islamic Front, an alliance of
    seven large, conservative Islamist militias.

    The Front put out its own statement on the coast offensive, criticizing
    the disinformation campaign swirling around the insurgents' behavior
    toward civilians.

    Much of this Arabic-language material, however, doesn't reach the
    audience that is hearing about a "new genocide."

    But a string of counterclaims in English-language websites, thoroughly
    debunking the claims of atrocities, has also emerged.

    An anti-regime media activist who covered some of the battles raging
    in northern Latakia, including Kasab, told The Daily Star he knew
    of only one "violation," when an overzealous rebel fighter removed
    a cross from one of the churches in Kasab.

    He described the fighter as part of a minority of non-Syrians from
    the Nusra Front who took advantage of the chaos in Kasab during the
    first few days of the takeover. Since then, the rebel groups have
    sought to enforce order, by organizing patrols and issuing directives
    that the town's shops and other establishments should not be touched.

    "The fighting groups have made it clear that the person who took down
    the cross should be punished for his act," he said.

    Meanwhile, a small number of mainly elderly Armenians remain in Kasab,
    the activist said.

    "They are basically people who didn't want to leave, or felt they had
    nowhere safe to go, so they stayed," the activist said. "They were
    afraid at first, but the fighters told them that they would be safe.

    But they don't want to be photographed, and are remaining out of
    the spotlight."

    The activist said they and other civilians in the Kasab region ran
    the risk of injury or death by remaining in the area.

    He said there were individual cases of local families, among them
    Alawites, asking the rebels to transport them to safe areas.

    The activist said that while the overwhelming majority of Kasab
    residents took refuge in Latakia, a small number who delayed their
    exit were finally escorted by the rebels to Turkey, with their consent.

    The biggest irony is perhaps that as the commotion over Kasab and
    Armenians has raged, another community - the Turkmen - are the ones
    actually experiencing violence because of their identity, amid palpable
    anti- Turkey and anti-Turkish hysteria.

    Residents of a string of villages near Kasab have also experienced
    displacement, and many of their residents are Turkmens, and the
    community has already been experienced two gruesome murders. Shortly
    after Kasab fell to the rebels, the bodies of a teenager and a
    young man were found dumped in a public park in the Turkmen-majority
    neighborhood of Ali Jamal in Latakia.

    And no global Internet campaign has arisen to cry out against ethnic
    violence against Turkmen in northwestern Syria.

    Kasab is a victim of geography, not ethnicity - it's the closest town
    to a border crossing, it's the central town in an area with dozens
    of surrounding small villages, it's near a militarily important
    observation post, and it's close to the village of Samra, where the
    dramatic end to Syrian territory comes - a steep drop onto a cove,
    hemmed in to the south by a jutting cliff, while on the right to the
    north is Turkish territory. Before the war, if one walked or swam
    a few hundred meters in that direction, Turkish border guards would
    politely fire warning shots to encourage a retreat.

    Kasab's Armenians have recently been subjected to media interviews
    more than oppression, but the effect of the old-fashioned rumor mill
    is being multiplied by sensationalist Internet campaigns, stoking the
    tension. How many people also hear and believe the debunking efforts
    is another matter, and difficult to measure.

    One of the worst photos in the "save Kasab" bunch was of the bloody
    corpse of a young woman stretched out on a bed, with a cross shoved
    down her throat.

    It was also used last year in a misinformation blip about a Christian
    girl supposedly murdered in Aleppo, and quickly debunked back then,
    by people who gleefully pointed out it that it was actually a publicity
    still from a 2005 Canadian horror flick.

    About the only certainty is that the Armenians of Kasab are now
    experiencing the war directly, just like their fellow community members
    in various cities - Aleppo, Damascus, Homs, Hassakeh, Qamishli and
    elsewhere - and like millions of other displaced Syrians.

    http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2014/Apr-05/252401-kasab-vs-kessab-and-propaganda-on-syrias-coast.ashx#axzz2xxG6kaDe




    From: A. Papazian
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