| 2012 al-Midan bombing | |
|---|---|
| Part of the 2011–2012 Syrian uprising | |
| Location | Al-Midan, Damascus, Syria |
| Coordinates | 33°29′00″N36°17′00″E / 33.4833°N 36.2833°E |
| Date | 6 January 2012 10:55 (UTC+3) |
Attack type | Suicide bombing |
| Deaths | 26 [1] (including 11 police officers) [2] |
| Injured | 63 |
| Perpetrator | Al-Nusra Front |
On 6 January 2012, a bomb exploded in the Al-Midan district of Damascus, Syria. According to the Syrian government, a suicide bomber attacked buses carrying riot police shortly before an anti-government protest was to begin. It said that 26 people were killed and over 60 were injured. Most of the victims were civilians, though the Syrian government showed footage of what it claimed to be the funeral of 11 police officers killed in the attack. [3]
It was the second such bombing since an uprising against the government began in early 2011. [4] Two weeks earlier, a double car bombing in Damascus had killed 44 people. The government blamed that attack and the 6 January attack on al Qaeda. [5] However, the Syrian opposition accused the government of staging the attacks to justify its crackdown on the uprising. Later, the newly formed Al-Nusra Front to Protect the Levant claimed responsibility in a video.
 | This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (January 2012) |
The attack occurred as Arab League monitors were in the country to see if Syria was abiding by Arab League demands that were said to have sought an end to the violence. [6] Two weeks earlier, a double car bombing in Damascus had killed 44 people. The government blamed that attack on Islamist militants.
Most of the initial information about the attack comes from the Syrian government and state media. It reported that, at about 10:55, [7] a suicide bomber detonated an explosive belt beside three buses carrying riot police. [8] [9] A police officer said that he had seen a man carrying a black bag walk toward a bus and then detonate the explosives. [10] The buses were parked outside a police station that was near a primary school and a mosque. The bomb detonated at a traffic light under a concrete flyover, shattering windows and destroying several police cars. [8] According to Syrian state media, it was estimated that the bomb was 10 kilograms of high explosive. [7]
Syrian state news agency SANA reported that 26 were killed (including 15 who could not be identified) and 63 were hurt. [7] [11] It also said that most of the victims were civilians but that there were security personnel among the dead. [9] [12] Remains, allegedly those of the bomber, were left at the scene for several hours before being taken away for DNA tests. [8] These and other body parts were repeatedly displayed for journalists who were driven to the scene by the Ministry of Information. [8] State-owned television showed a damaged bus with blood and police helmets on the seats. Interior Minister Mohammed Shaar said that the bomber "detonated himself with the aim of killing the largest number of people."
Hundreds of government loyalists later arrived at the scene, some of whom were waving flags and chanting in support of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. [8] According to The New York Times, people living in the neighborhood reported that about an hour after the bombing, security forces and armed loyalists went on "a rampage, shooting randomly and beating and arresting people in the streets". [11]
Despite the bombing, anti-government protests went ahead in Damascus and elsewhere. The anti-government Local Co-ordinating Committees said 14 protesters were killed in the suburbs of Damascus later that day. [10] It also reported that nine protesters had been killed in Hama, eight were killed in Homs, three were killed in Idlib and one was killed in Deraa. [10] SANA also reported that an oil pipeline between Hama and Idlib had been blown up by a "terrorist group." [10]
The Interior Minister described the modus operandi and "intention to cause mass casualties" as having the "fingerprints of al-Qaida." [9] Syria's interior ministry said the government would "strike back with an iron fist" to what it called "terrorist escalation". [10]
Opposition groups accused the government of staging the attack to "sully the opposition’s image" [11] and validate its own argument that it is "fighting blind violence rather than a pro-democracy movement." [13] The Free Syrian Army (FSA), the main anti-government paramilitary group, denied involvement and condemned the attack. FSA spokesman Major Maher al-Naimi said: "This is planned and systematic state terrorism by the security forces of the President Bashar al-Assad". [13] The Syrian National Council issued a statement reading: "Today's bombings, in the area that has experienced the largest of the anti-regime demonstrations, clearly bear the regime's fingerprints". [10] The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood also blamed the government. [11]
On 7 January, opposition activists accused the government of making fake television footage of the aftermath. The activists pointed to three clips "mistakenly" aired by Syrian state TV. One shows what seems to be an injured man on the ground standing up just before the end of the clip. Another shows a man with a microphone (allegedly a reporter for Syrian state TV) placing "bags of vegetables" in the street to give the impression that some of the victims were civilians shopping in the nearby market. The third video shows a person putting police shields in one of the damaged vans. [14]
The same day as the bombing, Syrian opposition leader Ammar Qurabi claimed that the government was planning another bombing in Aleppo "to terrorize the people". He said he had learned of the plot from Syrian security officials. [15]
At the end of February a group called the al-Nusra Front claimed responsibility for the attack and placed a 45-minute video on the Internet showing its preparation. [16]
Terrorism in Syria has a long history dating from the state-terrorism deployed by the Ba'athist government since its seizure of power through a violent coup in 1963. The Ba'athist government have since deployed various types of state terrorism; such as ethnic cleansing, forced deportations, massacres, summary executions, mass rapes and other forms of violence to maintain its totalitarian rule in Syria. The most extensive use of state terrorism in the 20th century was during 1970s and 1980s, when Islamic uprisings across Syria where crushed through bloody campaigns of intense repression, culminating in the 1982 Hama massacre which killed around 40,000 civilians.
Diplomatic relations between Syria and the United States are currently non-existent; they were suspended in 2012 after the onset of the Syrian Civil War. Priority issues between the two states include the Arab–Israeli conflict, the Golan Heights annexation, Iraq War, alleged state-sponsorship of terrorism, occupation of Lebanon, etc.
The 2008 Damascus car bombing was a car bombing that occurred on 27 September 2008 in the Syrian capital of Damascus. The explosion left 17 people dead and 14 injured. A car, laden with 200 kilograms of explosives detonated in the Sidi Kadad suburb of the capital, at approximately 8:45am. The blast occurred roughly 100 metres from a security installation on the road to Damascus International Airport at an intersection leading to the Sayyidah Zaynab Mosque, popular with Shia pilgrims from Iran and Lebanon. Security forces cordoned off the area.
Bombings occurred in Tripoli, Lebanon on August 13 and September 29, 2008. Both attacks targeted military buses.
The following is a timeline of the Syrian Civil War from May to August 2011, including the escalation of violence in many Syrian cities.
The following is a timeline of the Syrian uprising from September to December 2011. This period saw the uprising take on many of the characteristics of a civil war, according to several outside observers, including the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, as armed elements became better organized and began carrying out successful attacks in retaliation for the ongoing crackdown by the Syrian government on demonstrators and defectors.
The Rif Dimashq clashes were a series of unrests and armed clashes in and around Damascus, the capital of Syria, from November 2011 until a stalemate in March 2012. The violence was part of the wider early insurgency phase of the Syrian civil war. Large pro-government and anti-government protests took place in the suburbs and center of Damascus, with the situation escalating when members of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) started attacking military targets in November.
On 23 December 2011, two seemingly coordinated bombings occurred in the Syrian capital of Damascus. The alleged suicide car bombs exploded outside Syrian military intelligence agency buildings, killing 44 people and injuring 166. According to Syrian state media, most of the dead were civilians. The attacks took place during the Syrian uprising. The Syrian government blamed Islamist militants, while the Syrian opposition accused the government of staging the attacks to justify its crackdown on the uprising.
The following is a timeline of the Syrian Civil War from January to April 2012, during which time the spate of protests that began in January 2011 lasted into another calendar year. An Arab League monitoring mission ended in failure as Syrian troops and anti-government militants continued to do battle across the country and the Syrian government prevented foreign observers from touring active battlefields, including besieged opposition strongholds. A United Nations-backed ceasefire brokered by special envoy Kofi Annan met a similar fate, with unarmed UN peacekeepers' movements tightly controlled by the government and fighting.
The 1986 Damascus bombings were a series of terrorist attacks perpetrated in Damascus, Syria in 1986. They were the deadliest acts of terrorism against civilians since the quelling of the Islamist uprising in Syria in 1982. The bombings appeared to be aimed at destabilizing the Syrian government under Hafez al-Assad with links being between the suspected perpetrators and Iraq.
On 10 February 2012, two large bombs exploded at Syrian security forces buildings in Aleppo. According to the Syrian government and state media, the blasts were caused by two suicide car bombs. It reported that 28 people were killed and 235 wounded. The bombings took place during the Syrian civil war and the government blamed armed opposition groups.
The March 2012 Damascus bombings were two large car bombs that exploded in front of the air intelligence and criminal security headquarters in the Syrian capital of Damascus. At least 27 people were reported killed and over a 140 injured in the fourth major bombing since the beginning of the uprising and the second in the city. As in previous cases, the opposition blamed the government for orchestrating attacks, while the government placed the blame on terrorists and foreign groups.
The following is a timeline of the Syrian Civil War from May to August 2012. The majority of death tolls reported for each day comes from the Local Coordination Committees, an opposition activist group based in Syria, and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, another opposition group based in London.
The 10 May 2012 Damascus bombings were carried out using a pair of car bombs allegedly detonated by suicide bombers outside a military intelligence complex in Damascus, Syria. Combined, the perpetrators detonated more than 1,000 kilograms (2,200 lb) of explosives, tearing the facade off a 10-story building. With 55 people confirmed dead and almost 400 others injured, the attack was the deadliest bombing to date in the Syrian Civil War, though later outpaced by other events.
The Battle of Damascus, also known as Operation Damascus Volcano, started on 15 July 2012 during the Syrian civil war. It is unclear who started the battle. Thousands of rebels infiltrated Damascus from the surrounding countryside. Following this, according to some reports, the opposition forces launched an operation to capture the capital, while according to other reports, the military learned of the large-scale rebel operation beforehand and made a preemptive strike. Some reports even suggested the rebels launched the operation prematurely due to their plans being discovered by the security forces.
The 18 July 2012 Damascus bombing of the National Security headquarters in Rawda Square, Damascus, killed and injured a number of top military and security officials of the Syrian government. Among the dead were the Syrian Defense Minister and Deputy Defense Minister. The incident occurred during the Syrian Civil War, and is considered to be one of the most notorious events to affect the conflict. Syrian state-controlled television reported that it was a suicide attack while the opposition claims it was a remotely detonated bomb.
The following is a timeline of the Syrian Civil War from January to July 2014. Information about aggregated casualty counts is found at Casualties of the Syrian Civil War.
| Historic and other landmarks | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Madrasas and takiyyas | |||||||
| Mosques | |||||||
| Churches |
| ||||||
| Historic gates | |||||||
| Souqs and caravanserais | |||||||
| Culture and education |
| ||||||
| Entertainment | |||||||
| Streets and squares | |||||||
| Nature | |||||||
| Sport |
| ||||||
| Municipal districts | |||||||
| Timeline (List of rulers) |
| ||||||
