Quote:
Originally Posted by spence
It's also possible that this entire civil war is a Miley Cyrus PR stunt.
Hey, nobody has dis-proven it.
-spence
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the "rebels"
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...09-08-05-37-13
AMMAN, Jordan (AP) -- Rebels including al-Qaida-linked fighters gained control of a Christian village northeast of the capital Damascus.
The rebel advance into the area this week was spearheaded by Jabhat al-Nusra, or the Nusra Front, exacerbating fears among Syrians and religious minorities about the role played by Islamic extremists within the rebel ranks.
A Maaloula resident said the rebels, many of them sporting beards and shouting God is great, attacked Christian homes and churches shortly after moving into the village overnight.
"They shot and killed people. I heard gunshots and then I saw three bodies lying in the middle of a street in the old quarters of the village," said the resident, reached by telephone from neighboring Jordan. "So many people fled the village for safety."
Now, Maaloula "is a ghost town. Where is President Obama to see what befallen on us?" asked the man.
He said one of the churches, called Demyanos, had been torched and that gunmen stormed into two other churches and robbed them.
Most of the gunmen are foreigners, he said, adding that he heard different dialects, mainly of Tunisians, Libyans, Moroccans and Chechens.
Another resident, a Christian man, said he saw militants forcing some Christian residents to convert to Islam. "I saw the militants grabbing five villagers Wednesday and threatening them (saying): `Either you convert to Islam, or you will be beheaded,'" he said.
A Christian woman who spoke to the AP on Thursday also said there were reports that militants threatened villagers with death if they did not convert.
Obama will intensify his efforts to sell a skeptical Congress and a war-weary American public on a military strike against Syria.
