Syria

Boston Globe:

Syria deploying security forces ahead of protests
Gatherings to be a test of reaction to Assad reforms
By Anthony Shadid

BEIRUT — Syria deployed police officers, soldiers, and military vehicles yesterday in two of the country’s three largest cities in advance of nationwide protests planned today that will test the popular reception of reforms decreed by President Bashar Assad as well as the momentum that organizers have sought to bring to a five-week uprising.

Residents described a mobilization in the capital, Damascus, and, in more pronounced fashion, in the restive city of Homs, where a government crackdown this week dispersed one of the largest gatherings since demonstrations began last month. For days, organizers have looked to today as a potential show of strength for a movement that has yet to build the critical mass reached in Egypt and Tunisia.

“Together toward freedom,’’ read a Facebook page that has served as a pulpit of the uprising, the words posed over symbols of Christianity and Islam. “One heart, one hand, one goal.’’

The aim of both sides is the same: to prove they have the upper hand in the biggest challenge yet to the 40-year rule of the Assad family. While organizers were reluctant to call today a decisive moment, they acknowledged that it would signal their degree of support in a country that remained divided, with the government still claiming bastions of support among minorities, loyalists of the Ba’ath Party, and wealthier segments of the population.

“People are still hesitant,’’ said Wissam Tarif, the executive director of Insan, a human rights group. But he added, “If it’s not this Friday, it will be the coming Friday.’’

Residents of Damascus said police officers were seen heading from a headquarters on the outskirts in Zabadani toward the capital, where military security officers had reportedly turned out in greater numbers.

The security presence was more pronounced in Homs, residents said, as scores of military vehicles loaded with soldiers and equipment were seen on the highway from Damascus. Police officers in plain clothes had gathered at the New Clock Square, where thousands of protesters had tried to stage an Egyptian-style sit-in Monday night.

Cellphones were hard to reach, and some landlines had been cut.

In Homs, an organizer, Abu Kamel al-Dimashki, said the city was “like a ghost town and we are still mourning our martyrs, so everything is closed.’’ He said, “Things are a little scary.’’

The government has maintained that the uprising is led by militant Islamists, and organizers acknowledge that organized religious forces like the banned Muslim Brotherhood have forcefully taken part. The government has also accused foreign countries of supporting the protests. And, indeed, some of the largest have occurred in cities near Syria’s borders: Daraa, a poor town near Jordan, and Homs, an industrial center near conservative northern Lebanon.

But so far, the government has sought to hew to a policy of crackdown with compromise. Yesterday, Assad signed decrees that repealed harsh the emergency laws in place since 1963, abolished draconian security courts, and granted citizens the right to protest peacefully, though they still need government permission to gather.