“The Shibiha [security force] went from house to house, arresting every man from the age of 15 to 75,” a student called Khaled, from a village near Tartous, told me. They also forced the women and children to scour their homes for money and valuables. “The Shibiha then took us to the main square, made us lie face down, and stamped all over us.”
Khaled was released, but many of his neighbours were taken to prison. Some returned “silent and ashamed”, with stories of torture and sexual abuse, their bodies “black and blue”.
Later, a doctor working at a military hospital in Damascus agreed to meet me on condition that we locked all the windows and doors to prevent anybody from listening in. He wanted to talk about a massacre in Daraa, near the border with Jordan, where human rights groups say some of the worst atrocities have been committed.
“After one particularly bloody Friday, a military truck brought 80 dead civilians to the hospital,” he said. “The military wanted to keep the bodies in the morgue and return them one by one, village by village, over the course of a few weeks to prevent a potentially massive demonstration if all bodies were returned on the same day.”
The doctor spoke of soldiers in Daraa who had defected. “I was working in the emergency room late one night and some soldiers were brought in with gunshot wounds to the back,” he whispered. “They were crying out: 'The Shibiha shot us when we refused to fire on protesters.’”
The doctor and I staggered our exits from the building. On my walk home, I felt the glare of eyes on my back and looking around, men in groups of three were everywhere. That evening, I received calls on my mobile, only to hear nothing but a quiet hum on the other end. It was time to leave. Assad’s tactics had worked on me — I was a paranoid wreck. I burnt my notes and made a dash for the Lebanese border.
