Aleppo, A Casualty

A world heritage site is slowly being destroyed.  One of the most ancient, steadily occupied cities in the world, it is being besieged and bombed, and the site, dating back to 2400 B.C., is being turned to rubble in a good many areas, with its old gates now destroyed and its Al Madina souk gone up in flames along with many symbols of its ancient heritage.

The most populous city in Syria, its northern portion is now controlled by the Free Syrian Army battling the Alawite regime of President Bashar al Assad's military, and in the process laying waste to many part of the ancient Old City of Aleppo.  The city, in ancient times, was under Roman, then Byzantine, Seljuks, Manluks, and Ottoman control.

The throne hall of the citadel restored during the Mamluk period

 

From 1920 it was part of the Arab Kingdom of Syria; from 1960 forward it became part of the Syrian Arab Republic.  And now control of the Shia Alawite minority is slipping away as the majority Sunni Syrian population is asserting their control through a revolution that has so far seen the deaths of some 30,000 Syrians.

Neighbouring Turkey, which has given haven to Syrian refugees fleeing the carnage, has also hosted the opposition, allowing FSA bases to be set up on Turkish soil.  Turkish President Erdogan has railed against his one-time colleague Bashar al-Assad as a tyrant to be removed.  The city once controlled by the Ottoman Empire, now part of Syria, is losing its archaeological treasures.

More latterly, the more modern facade of the Riga Palace Hotel has been bombed, the work of several suicide bombers, with most of those killed secrity forces members.  "This area was where the regime housed many of its officers, and the hotels were full of its soldiers", explained one resident, an opposition activist.

The square, which was destroyed, close to Bab Jenine where the chamber of commerce was also heavily damaged connects the historic Old City to the south-east municipal park where regime-occupied new city homes of the wealthy are located.  Some residents living nearby claim to have seen jets before the bombs, suggesting government involvement.

An "inside job", according to theorists who insist that it would have been too difficult for he Free Syrian Army to have cars filled with explosives make their way through the government checkpoints on roads leading to the now-destroyed square.  The bodies of the suicide bombers were dressed in army uniforms.

A video posted online claiming to be from Jabhat al-Nusra, a jihadist group held to have al-Qaeda ties has claimed responsibility.  The true culprits of this latest bombing in the pre-Biblical-era city?  Middle East intrigues are unlike those that occur anywhere else on Earth.  The Syrian regime points to terrorists aiding the rebels and that should they gain the upper hand Syria will become a radicalized Islamist state.

How much of a concern that would present to Turkey, itself an Islamist state under the Freedom & Justice Party of Erdogan can be imagined, almost.  The new Islamism in Egypt, reflecting what is occurring elsewhere in the Arab and Muslim world wherever, as in Tunisia, the Arab Spring became an almost-universal revolt against dictatorships has resulted in a perhaps more serious form of tyranny.