Media coverage of events in Syria.

[Magda Hassan]

http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news...ece#page-3
Are you ready to die?
The war photographer John Cantlie expected a warm Syrian welcome. Instead he met hate-filled LondonersJohn Cantlie Published: 5 August 2012
Members of Jihadist group Hamza Abdualmuttalib run during training near Aleppo
On the face of it, we didn't do anything wrong. We went to the same town we'd been to before, stayed in the same hotel, called the same fixer, took the same route. But when an assignment in a war zone goes wrong, it goes wrong fast. Within an hour of crossing the border into Syria we were in deep trouble.
I ended up running for my life, barefoot and handcuffed, while British jihadists young men with south London accents shot to kill. They were aiming their Kalashnikovs at a British journalist, Londoner against Londoner in a rocky landscape that looked like the Scottish Highlands. Bullets kicking up dirt as I ran. A bullet through my arm. Another grazing my ear. And not a Syrian in sight. This wasn't what I had expected.
We entered Syria just over two weeks ago: Thursday, July 19. The day before, three close aides to President Bashar al-Assad had been killed by a bomb in Damascus. We were heading for Aleppo, Syria's biggest city, where the struggle for the country would move next.
There were three of us, wearing backpacks after crossing from Turkey at night Mohamed, a young guide who used to be in the Syrian army, Jeroen Oerlemans, a Dutch photographer, and me. In the dark, I tripped over granite boulders, cursing under my breath as we stumbled up and down the steep rock screes. Less than two miles inside Syria, we came across a small camp of two rectangular tents 30ft long and about eight other square tents. We thought it was the Free Syrian Army. Mohamed said we were going to stop to drink tea.
When I was last in Syria in March, I had passed straight through one of these camps and nobody took any notice. This time, we said "Salaam alaikum" (peace be upon you) and I knew we were in trouble. They weren't smiling. Syrian people are engaging and hospitable, with friendly faces. They love western journalists. These guys were not Syrian.
They were small, wiry and dark-skinned. Most had beards and there was no salaam alaikum from them. Within 20 seconds one of the men, speaking English, faced Mohamed and said: "I'm going to kill this guy if he doesn't shut up." We were taken at gunpoint to one of the smaller tents and handcuffed.
Jeroen asked me if they were Shabiha, the Syrian militia paid to do the government's dirty work, including massacres. "Shabiha don't speak English," said a voice in perfect English. There were about 30 of them altogether; a dozen spoke English and about nine had London accents. Two of them were so Anglicised they couldn't speak Arabic.
A dozen spoke English and about nine had London accents. Two of them were so Anglicised they couldn't speak Arabic They were jihadists who were prepared to die in a holy war against Assad Islamic fundamentalists with a mission to convert bad Muslims to sharia: no smoking, no drinking, no fornication, prayer five times a day. For the moment, they and the Free Syrian Army have a common enemy. But after the fighting is over, they said, there will be a wider war, "because when they learn that sharia is spreading into Syria, then we will be at war with America".
The worst of them was a chunky man in his late twenties, possibly of south Asian origin, who had lived in England for more than a decade. He said he had worked in a supermarket. He sat in the tent, playing with his Kalashnikov, saying: "You are spies. You work for MI5, you work for MI6. Prepare for the afterlife. Are you ready to meet Allah?"
There was a kind, English-speaking doctor who became our friend.
A south Londoner we called Doc Junior helped him. He was young and impressionable aged 21 or 22. He'd come to ask if there was anything we wanted. Yes, we'd say, water and food. He'd go: okay. And then we wouldn't see him for the next six hours. The other British jihadists were even younger. It was clear they had never seen a Kalashnikov before. They were thrilled to be in Syria. All their talk was of how to take out a tank, how to advance across open ground and how to clear a building. The camp was like an adventure course for disenchanted 20-year-olds.
Then there were the three lifetime jihadists who ran the place, plus 10 or so Arabic-speaking young men who were just as excited as the English speakers to be part of a jihad. I saw one female jihadist and four or five professional fighters Chechen, Pakistani who hardly ever spoke. They seemed no threat to us. The biggest risk was from the British.
ON THE first full day we didn't really move. We had no way of getting a message out, all our gear had been taken and nobody knew where we were. We had tried discreetly turning on our phones, but as soon as they were switched on they played the Nokia theme and they, too, were confiscated. Jeroen and I were kept handcuffed under armed guard. They put Mohamed in a stress position, handcuffed behind his back, because they disliked his constant questions.
The next day, we were marched to one of the bigger tents and handcuffed to two other prisoners. They were Syrians who had been held for two weeks and had obviously been beaten. The jihadists believed they were government spies. "These guys are going to be executed," our captors said. "You guys are going to be all right, as long as your story checks out." Then we were blindfolded.
This had happened so suddenly. One moment we were stumbling across a landscape like Scotland and the next we were handcuffed to a guy who was going to be executed.
That morning there were single shots outside the tent. Were people being executed? We had no idea. I wondered how it would feel. You are led out. You kneel. How does it feel when the bullet enters your brain? Is it just a flash? Does it hurt?
We couldn't see, but we could hear. "Yeah, they're spies, MI6." And we kept receiving sermons from the Koran. When you die you will be taken to paradise by a green bird. You will see Allah and his thrones, in a house made of gold and silver. Your family will meet you up there. You will have 72 wives.
The speaker was the supermarket man. We called him the Preacher. He would come and talk for an hour and a half about death and how wonderful it was, before adding that there were 100 flaws in the Bible and our destination was the pits of hell, which would burn 800 times hotter than the sun for eternity.
They weren't all bad. The doctor got us detached from the two Syrians, although we were still handcuffed and blindfolded, and he gave us intelligence: "John, they found an army business card in your wallet." I'd just come back from Afghanistan, and it was the card of an army major who works with journalists. "And they found pictures of you with soldiers on your computer." Our captors thought their suspicions were confirmed. I knew this wasn't going to get better.
We could see a bit by nudging up our blindfolds when they weren't looking. When Mohamed looked at a large rip at the back of the tent, about 3ft wide, and said in his broken English, "Go" not meaning go now, but at night I knew he was right.
This could be our only chance. We were cuffed, but not to each other. We had eaten only a few olives but were not yet weak. We had not been beaten. If you are going to attempt an escape, you do it sooner rather than later. At least, that's what I thought.
The war in Syria is making life hell but western journalists are usually welcomed (Fast Features) The tents were on top of a plateau strewn with rocks and boulders. Just to the north it dropped into a dry valley. We'd need to run to the edge of the plateau before we were out of sight.
About 7pm, as it was starting to get dark, the camp was quiet; perhaps they were at prayer. As I was nearest to the rip, I went first. I stepped out of the back of the tent, still cuffed, pulled off my blindfold and ran. I passed four tents, hoping there was nobody in them. The plateau went uphill and the temperature was 35C. It was 300 yards to the edge where we could drop out of sight. All it would take to stop us was for one person to look up.
Twenty yards from the edge I heard the first shouts, and then the first shots came over. Jeroen was right behind me as we dropped out of sight. We were jumping from boulder to boulder, balancing unsteadily because of the handcuffs. There were thorns, thistles, cacti you don't feel anything when you are running for your life. At the bottom of the slope was a dry river bed.
When I looked up to my left, I saw a scene from a western. They were above us on the ridge line. There were eight of them, firing single shots, aiming to kill. Now we were running through a hail of bullets, sometimes stopping behind a big rock to get our breath. We were both incredibly calm. I didn't feel fear, as I didn't think the bullets would hit. I don't know why. Then Jeroen, just ahead of me, gave a short cry: "Aaghh!" And he went down. I processed what to do in an instant. He's a big guy; I can't carry him. One of us had to get out and raise the alarm. Jeroen shouted: "Go, John, go!"
I did. It felt like 300 bullets one went past my ear so close that I felt the shockwave. They were landing just to the right, just to the left, just above, just below. My feet, naked on thistles and hot granite, were cut to pieces. Adrenaline will take you only so far. I was slowing down, and still the bullets were coming.
That was when I felt a stab of heat going up my finger, and saw the blood sprayed on my T-shirt and trousers. I'd been hit. When I turned round, I saw the Preacher just 60 yards behind. I put my manacled hands up in surrender.
Furious, he was firing shots into the ground all around me. I'd already been shot once; I knew how it felt, which is not too bad. I was expecting the bullet through my chest. It never came.
Jeroen had been shot through the hip. The bullet had missed his bowels, his main arteries and his pelvis. It had passed straight out. But it looked bad for him. I cradled his head and said the Lord's Prayer, with Jeroen whispering along, while the Preacher looked for Mohamed. "What a shame, man, we didn't get away," Jeroen was saying.
Doc Junior hit me with the butt of his Kalashnikov. And then as is the custom in Islam asked for my forgiveness The English-speaking kids arrived. "You're going to f****** die, Christian kaffir, you're going to hell. Serves you right."
They hit Jeroen across the head as he lay on the ground in his own blood. Doc Junior, who had been so eager to please earlier, hit me with the butt of his Kalashnikov, kicked me in the face, put his foot in my face and urinated above me. And then as is the custom in Islam asked for my forgiveness. I forgave him.
A pale south Londoner with stubble went to smash Jeroen's head with a rock, but was restrained by Doc Junior. Jeroen was shouting at him: "Is this your religion? Is this what your religion does?" Later Paleface, too, begged forgiveness. "I like you man," he told Jeroen. "It's this one" pointing to me "I don't like."
The only kindness came from jihadists who spoke no English. A quiet Arabic man took off his shirt to try to make a tourniquet and a Chechen helped Jeroen to walk back to the camp. The English speakers were vindictive. They gathered around their quarry, happy with themselves, hyped up.
Back at the camp, they punched and kicked me in the face and neck as I was now earmarked as the ringleader. But where was Mohamed? Either he was dead or he had escaped. We hoped for the latter.
We were in a bad way. We'd lost blood. We'd been beaten. There was skin hanging off the soles of our feet. And it was only day two.
DAY three was miserable. The doctor stabilised Jeroen with a drip and antibiotics, but he was saying we were in deep trouble. The plan had been to ransom us. This was no longer certain. The Preacher was blunter: "You have signed your own destruction. You will be executed because of this. I'm so disappointed in you."
The fourth day was even worse. By lifting the edge of my blindfold I watched as at about 11am they came into the tent with a trestle table and placed a cloth around it with a black Islamic flag. It was the sort of table you see in online videos of executions. It is where judgment is passed.
They put their feet on the back of my head to tighten my blindfold. And then we heard the worst noise we will hear in our lives: the sharpening of knives for a beheading.
I knew Jeroen was next to me. Like me, he is 41 but we're different characters. I have an active imagination. As we heard them sharpening their knives, it kicked in. How does it feel when they wrench your neck back and the knife goes in? Can you feel the blood going down your windpipe as you gurgle? How long are you conscious? It's ridiculous to wonder, but I can't help it.
Jeroen, by contrast, is a former kickboxer. He's big and muscular; he didn't think stupid thoughts like me. He was constantly thinking about his three children, wondering if he would see them grow up.
They took the other prisoners out. The Syrians hadn't been shot but were they now to be beheaded? We heard what sounded like a ceremony, then silence for five minutes. And then we heard "Allahu akbar" (God is great) followed by conversation. We said a prayer for the Syrians. I'm not a religious man, but we prayed that they were not beheaded.
John Cantlie at home with his girlfriend Charlotte Stockting (Dwayne Senior) They weren't. Under sharia, if you repent and promise to be a good Muslim, you can be cleansed and start again. The Syrians had repented.
Doc Junior asked if I was interested in converting. By now, Jeroen and I would have said anything. My attitude was "Yeah, of course". Doc Junior talked it through. "You have to believe in your heart 100% in Allah." I find the peace, gentleness and hospitality of Islam immensely appealing. But these were jihadists. No deal.
From days four to seven, one day rolled into the next. The open wounds on our feet stank of rotten meat. The bandage on my arm was cutting into the flesh and there were flies swarming over our wounds. We knew that this is what a hostage looks like. Bloody bandages on both feet, bandages on the arms. Blindfolded. Handcuffed. Just lying there, not allowed to move in sweltering heat. Our balance had gone because our feet were so screwed up. We had to be held upright to shuffle out of the tent for a call of nature.
On about day five, more British jihadists arrived. Delighted to find captives, they asserted themselves. They put us in the stress position and told us not to make unnecessary movements. We had been handcuffed in front; they manacled our hands behind our backs, forcing us to lie on our sides or our stomachs. By then, the kind doctor had left, taking some of the better jihadists with him. They said they had not come to Syria to take western journalists hostage.
Word came down that we were going to be moved and then ransomed. We never saw the jihadists' leader, who was said to be Saudi, but we were told he was desperate for money as wars are expensive. I was enormously encouraged. If we were going to be ransomed, people were going to be informed, which meant they would know we were in trouble.
I don't care if this takes five months, I told Jeroen. If I know the process has started, I can grit it out. Of course there were doubts. Who was going to pay a ransom? We're freelances. Jeroen was particularly uncomfortable. "We've done nothing wrong," he was saying. "Who's going to pay our ransom?" He was right, but it was the only thing I could draw comfort from.
THE final day was a Thursday. We were told we were going to be moved. This made sense. If we were worth $1m each, we were assets. You don't keep valuable prizes on a compromised site.
Suddenly people came into the tent. There was shouting. A man pulled us up. "How long have you been here?" he asked in fractured English. He was screaming and swearing and claiming that we were free. We had heard this before. Early on, there had been plenty of rhetoric about how we would soon be free. To us, it was just more screaming.
This is not the way of the Syrian people. This is our revolution. We don't want these people coming here in our name The newcomers put half-decent sandals on our feet and looped our arms over their shoulders. As they walked us away, they were shooting into the air.
They put us in the back of a car, still blindfolded, and told us to rip off our bandages to take off anything that made us conspicuous. It was the worst getaway car in the world: it wouldn't start. Eventually the engine came to life and we pulled away, flat out down a little mountain road, with more gunfire out of the window.
Told to take off our blindfolds, Jeroen and I looked at each other. Is this real? Or are we just being taken somewhere else to be shot?
It was real. We had been rescued by four members of the Free Syrian Army.
Two or three miles down the road, we stopped at an olive grove and another car came along. Its driver spoke no English but was well dressed and obviously middle class. Like all the Syrians I have met, he was kind and gracious.
At his house, he gave us watermelon and introduced an English-speaking friend. "I'm so sorry about what's happened to you," the friend said. "We've been looking for you for three days. We were waiting for the right time to get you out."
"We know about these foreigners. There are about 40 of them. We didn't know they would do something like this. They're trying to control the border crossing at Bab al-Hawa so they can bring in more of their fighters. This is not the way of the Syrian people. This is our revolution. We don't want these people coming here in our name."
We had two people to thank. Mohamed had escaped while we were being shot at. When we ran, he had waited. When the shooting started, our captors' backs were turned and he had dashed off in another direction and reached the border. So even though our escape attempt failed, it allowed him to get away and to raise the alarm.
And a Syrian smuggler who had been in the tent with the jihadists on the first night had not liked what he had seen. He also raised the alarm and was one of the four men who helped rescue us. He cried with happiness once they'd set us free. My arm has now been operated on and I should regain the use of my left hand in time. Jeroen is also recovering.
To put things in perspective, our captivity lasted only a week and we survived. How many Syrians died in those seven days? Jeroen has a modest little boat in Amsterdam; we promised each other that if we got out, we would fill it with beer and go chugging up the canals with our girlfriends. I am sure that will happen; but what awaits Syria?