Thread: US woman trapped in Syria's Ghouta wants action from Trump

US woman trapped in Syria's Ghouta wants action from Trump

By bassem mroue, associated press
BEIRUT — Mar 12, 2018, 1:32 PM ET

An American woman living in the besieged suburbs of the Syrian capital on Monday called on President Donald Trump to put more pressure on Russia to "stop bombing us" amid an air and ground assault by government forces that has killed more than 1,000 people over the past three weeks.

Deana Lynn, from Detroit, Michigan, and her family are among nearly 400,000 people who are trapped in eastern Ghouta, surviving on limited amounts of food and spending most of their time squeezed into underground shelters. Lynn moved to eastern Ghouta with her Syrian husband in 2000, to be close to his elderly parents.

The mother of eight — seven daughters and one son — has been working as an English-language teacher in a town in eastern Ghouta that she prefers not to disclose for safety reasons. But since Feb. 18, when government forces began their latest assault, Lynn and her family have been mostly staying in the basement, rarely emerging for fear they might be struck by shelling or airstrikes.

"It's been horrifying, especially (that) I have small children and grandchildren," the 44-year-old woman told The Associated Press via the WhatsApp messaging service.

Lynn met her husband in the 1990s while she was studying English literature at the University of Michigan and he was on a visit to the United States. Five of their eight children were born in the U.S., while their four grandchildren were all born in Syria.

"We've been taking shelter in basements. We go up and downstairs," she said. "We go upstairs to eat, to cook. We have to go upstairs to use the bathroom."

The Ghouta region was among the first to rise up against President Bashar Assad after protests erupted in March 2011, and it fell into the hands of opposition fighters in 2012. The following year, the army and allied militias surrounded eastern Ghouta from all sides. The enclave has been under an ever-tightening siege since then.

Over the past three weeks, government forces backed by Russian warplanes launched an all-out offensive, capturing more than half of eastern Ghouta from rebels.

"Right now we're eating whatever is available," Lynn said. "We're trying to make it last longer by making soup, so we put a small amount of rice or wheat in." She said her family is fortunate to still have some food stored up.

"Other people are not so lucky. They couldn't store food because they didn't have enough money, so really they're hungry. They're trying to just live," she said. She said a kilogram (2.2 pounds) of rice or wheat is about $8 and that the price could go up at any time.

She sent a photograph from the basement showing two of her grandchildren sitting on her lap. She has also posted videos on YouTube to tell the world about the suffering in Ghouta. In one of the videos, she is seen standing in an apartment near an open window, when the sound of a warplane is heard right before a shell slams down outside.

"The children are horrified when they hear the intense bombing, especially when they are close to our homes. They cry or they scream. Grown women, they cry and scream," she said.

She said that sometimes the shelling starts unexpectedly.

"We would be upstairs cooking or using the bathroom and we have to run downstairs, and we hope a bomb doesn't fall," she said.

"I am just a schoolteacher here. I am just a regular person living a daily life. My message to the United States, to President Trump, I wish he could put pressure on the Russian government to stop sending their warplanes here and bombing us."

Lynn said Assad's forces and Russian warplanes "are purposely hitting civilian targets, they're hitting medical centers, they're hitting basements which are shelters for a lot of people." Russia, which has been waging an air campaign in support of Assad's forces since 2015, denies targeting civilians.

Lynn said the family remained in eastern Ghouta after the Arab Spring uprising began because they hoped things would change. Later, as the civil war escalated, they stayed because they feared losing their home and property. "We didn't want to leave this place that my children were raised in," she said.

She said residents of eastern Ghouta hope the U.N. Security Council will implement the cease-fire it adopted last month, and that families won't be forced to leave as part of a surrender deal, as they have in many other parts of Syria.

"This is their home and this is their property. They shouldn't be forced to leave or evacuate their homes," she said.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/...trump-53689723

Trump isn't going to do that, lady. Ghouta is the last ISIS stronghold, Russia and Syria are handling that. You should have married an American and lived a nice life in Michigan. When news of the effort to overthrow your government over there broke out, you should have high-tailed it out of there.

Maybe all their Syrian MEN should have stayed to fight and it would be over instead of fleeing like cowards!

Sick of all the damn wars in the Middle East!!!

Send them all back!

Originally Posted by Judy

Trump isn't going to do that, lady. Ghouta is the last ISIS stronghold, Russia and Syria are handling that. You should have married an American and lived a nice life in Michigan. When news of the effort to overthrow your government over there broke out, you should have high-tailed it out of there.

What a horrible thing to say.

We already know Asaad has no qualms about murdering his civilian population because he's been doing it for a long time. We also know Russia has no problem supporting him in doing so. Carpet bombing innocents is not the way to wage war against ISIS. Doing this only creates more enemies. You don't murder someones innocent mother, father, brother, or sister and not create an enemy set on revenge. You have to go in and individually take ISIS out with ground troops. The bombing should be used only on ISIS camps and strongholds outside heavy civilian populated areas. What Syria and Russia are doing is not counter-terrorism, it's barbarism. Surprised you would defend it.

Look at her clothes, Beezer. They aren't part of a good revolution, they're part of the crazy Muslim revolution. Assad's Syrians are westernized, modernized, they celebrate Christmas, decorate all their stores with Christmas lights and have Christmas trees in their squares. We've been lied to about Assad. Russia is also modernized and Christian. The US must leave all of this mess in Syria to Russia and Assad and stay the hell out of it.

Originally Posted by MW

What a horrible thing to say.

We already know Asaad has no qualms about murdering his civilian population because he's been doing it for a long time. We also know Russia has no problem supporting him in doing so. Carpet bombing innocents is not the way to wage war against ISIS. Doing this only creates more enemies. You don't murder someones innocent mother, father, brother, or sister and not create an enemy set on revenge. You have to go in and individually take ISIS out with ground troops. The bombing should be used only on ISIS camps and strongholds outside heavy civilian populated areas. What Syria and Russia are doing is not counter-terrorism, it's barbarism. Surprised you would defend it.

So you support the crazy Muslims who started this stinking revolution that's killed hundreds of thousands of people and created millions in refugees? Really?

Wow.

Russia and Syria will put an end to this nonsense. And no, it may not be pretty all the time, war usually isn't from what I've heard. That's why it's best not to start one you can't finish.

Originally Posted by Judy

Look at her clothes, Beezer. They aren't part of a good revolution, they're part of the crazy Muslim revolution. Assad's Syrians are westernized, modernized, they celebrate Christmas, decorate all their stores with Christmas lights and have Christmas trees in their squares. We've been lied to about Assad. Russia is also modernized and Christian. The US must leave all of this mess in Syria to Russia and Assad and stay the hell out of it.

Sort of like we did during the Holocaust for so long, huh?

Putin’s modern Air Force choosing devastating dumb bombs over precision strikes


A Russian bomber drops bombs on a target in this image made from video provided by the Russian Defense Ministry. (Associated Press) more >

By Rowan Scarborough - The Washington Times - Sunday, February 21, 2016

Russian President Vladimir Putin has thrust a much-modernized air force into the civil war in Syria, but the U.S. military says his bombers still drop mostly gravity “dumb” bombs as the West accuses Moscowof indiscriminately killing rebels and civilians alike around strategic cities such as Aleppo.

“This is not the Soviet air force in Afghanistan or the Russian air force in Georgia, but a very modernized force capable of precision attacks upon selected targets using both conventional and nuclear weapons,” said Jacob W. Kipp, a Russian military analyst, referring to spotty performance in past conflicts.

But in the age of precision bombing, even as Mr. Putin sends to Syria new, maneuverable Sukhoi-class jet fighters, Russia is running an air campaign of a past era — dropping tons of iron bombs.

Russian media contend that gravity bombs, guided by computerized systems, can be just an accurate as those directed by a GPS system, a laser or TV optics.

The U.S. military and human rights groups scoff at the assertion. They point to the rubble of northwestern Syria after Russian and Syrian bombers pass. Amnesty International charges that Mr. Putin is violating international treaties that ban purposeful bombings of civilians and says he may be

“They’re using mostly dumb bombs, guided only by gravity and fins,” Army Col. Steven Warren, the top military spokesman in Baghdad, told The Washington Times.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/feb/21/russia-dropping-dumb-bombs-in-syria-indiscriminate/

You're comparing Jews to ISIS?!!

We didn't enter WWII over the Jews, we entered WWII over Pearl Harbor.

Originally Posted by Judy

You're comparing Jews to ISIS?!!

We didn't enter WWII over the Jews, we entered WWII over Pearl Harbor.

No, what I'm saying is Putin and Asaad are indiscriminatly killing large numbers of innocent civilians. So if not for Pearl Harbor you're saying we should have allowed the Holocaust to continue?