Out of the Shadow of Fear

Seierstad is the author of The Bookseller of Kabul and, most recently, The Angel of Grozny: Life Inside Chechnya.

A rare inside look at Syria, a land where the regime rules with a murderous impunity. Asne Seierstad chronicles an anxious revolt, running on fumes, in this week?s Newsweek.

He walks barefoot through the streets. The air is fresh with night, the sky at its darkest. He stretches his legs and inhales the scent of spring.

Some cars drive by, lighting up the sidewalk as they pass. Sand and gravel cover the soles of his swollen feet. His stomach pains are intense. His neck hurts. ?This was just a holiday,? they told him. ?Next time, it?s business.?

Article - Seierstad Syria Muzaffar Salman / AP Photo

He arrives at a metal door in Yarmouk, on the outskirts of Damascus, and presses the doorbell. A confused face appears in the door hatch, then bursts out: ?So, they got you a new haircut!?

Abid is jostled into the apartment. The ones who were asleep come shuffling. The laughter, it seems, won?t stop. Abid is out of jail.

The engineering student is one of thousands who have been detained and imprisoned since the revolt in Syria started in March. People have been plucked away from schools and mosques, from public squares and streets. The authorities are quick to arrive on the sites of the protests. Men in civilian clothes, called the ?ghosts,? are watching.

Surveillance dominates every aspect of life. The secret police?the Mukhabarat?is divided into an intricate system of departments and subdepartments; no part of society is left unexamined. A network of agents spans Syria. Some have tenure; others work part time. Who could be a better observer than the greengrocer by the mosque or the hospital night watchman? Who can better keep tabs on a family than the schoolteacher who asks what Daddy says about the man on the posters?

The man on the posters has pale, close-set eyes, is well groomed, and has a curiously long neck. On one variant he wears sunglasses and a uniform. On others, he looks like a banker. An ophthalmologist, he was reeled in at his father?s death to replace him as Syria?s dictator. His name is Bashar al-Assad. His deposition is the goal of the nascent upheaval.

One Friday Abid found the resolve to join a demonstration after prayers. He hardly saw they were surrounded before he felt a stinging pain on his neck. The electric shocks chased through his body. He fell, lost consciousness. When he awoke, several others were lying around him.

White vans and scores of men in plain clothes pop up from nowhere. They tear posters out of the girls? hands, throw the women to the ground. ?Whores,? the men shout. ?Cows!?

The Mukhabarat had appeared, in plain clothes, from nowhere. Now they dragged him, and a hundred others, to waiting white vans. The demonstrators were taken to the outskirts of Damascus.

?We sat in rows in a riad, a courtyard, surrounded by high walls. Our hands were tied behind our backs, and we were forced to kneel. I counted the prayer calls from the mosque to keep track of time. Our legs became numb. When told to stand up after the last call from the mosque, none of us could. I buckled over, was beaten, forced to stand, and fell again. At night, we were stuffed into a cell. We stood upright, 12 men, on a few square meters. Next morning we were taken out to the riad again. After three days we were tender, and the interrogations could start.?