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ISIS Conquest of Palmyra Expands Militants’ Hold in Syria Frantic Message as Palmyra Fell: ‘We’re Finished’
(about 9 hours later)
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Islamic State militants on Thursday solidified their rout of Syrian government forces in the historic desert city of Palmyra, moving to the outskirts to seize its airport and the notorious Tadmur Prison, according to residents and statements from the group. BEIRUT, Lebanon — The Syrian Army soldier had long served in Palmyra, but he was on leave when he heard that Islamic State militants had attacked a village northeast of the desert city, killing dozens of his comrades. He sent frantic text messages, trying to reach them. No one answered.
It was the first time that the Islamic State militants had seized an entire city from Syrian government forces; it won control of its first major city, Raqqa, from Syrian insurgents and the Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front after the two became rivals. He shared his anguish last week in a series of texts, as he slowly pieced together bits of the story from survivors of the massacre. Soldiers told him they ran out of ammunition. One officer radioed to headquarters: “We’re finished.” Worst of all, the soldier said, was the photograph he was shown of the decapitated body of a friend of his, the 19-year-old daughter of a Syrian general.
The rout on Wednesday in Palmyra, whose spectacular ancient ruins are a symbol of the country’s heritage embraced by supporters and opponents of President Bashar al-Assad alike, came just five days after the militants seized the much larger city of Ramadi, in western Iraq. Within a matter of days this week, the Islamic State, also called ISIS or ISIL, seized with apparent ease the cities of Ramadi in Iraq and Palmyra in Syria, in both cases seemingly coming out of nowhere to rout government forces. On Thursday, the militants were digging in, consolidating their grip and executing people with ties to the old order.
The Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, declared on Thursday that it was in control of the town after soldiers “ran away” and “left behind hundreds of dead and injured,” according to a statement released through Islamic State social media channels. Yet a closer look at the two battles shows ISIS following a longer-term strategy, in both cases biding its time, taking territory mainly from other insurgent groups. Then, after years of war, attrition and corruption have left the government forces demoralized and, particularly in Syria, hollowed out, it attacks, overrunning them.
Antigovernment activists who also oppose the Islamic State circulated grisly images of the dead, including of decapitated bodies of young men lying on what looked like a street in the center of Palmyra, saying they were members of the Shueitat tribe, hundreds of whom were massacred last year for resisting the group. Palmyra was a place where tensions had long simmered, a mainly Sunni tribal city where a local rebellion was put down early in the war, and where relations between residents and security forces were complex. A young officer serving there from the Alawite heartland had confessed a year earlier that he felt no connection to the population, and feared residents would kill him the first chance they had.
The defeat is likely to increase pressure on Mr. Assad, whose forces have suffered setbacks in the northern province of Idlib in recent months and have increasingly struggled to fill their ranks after four years of war against an insurgency that began with political protest and morphed into a war with several fronts. Ramadi, the capital of Anbar Province, Iraq’s Sunni heartland, was also divided in its loyalties.
Although Mr. Assad still has many supporters who find him preferable to extremist groups like the Islamic State, there is increasing resentment that the state is failing to provide security. Those problems were on display in Palmyra before and during Wednesday’s rout. Residents were caught between the latest ISIS onslaught and what sometimes seemed like a haphazard government response. The scenes of chaos that unfolded belied Syrian state news media’s claim that government forces had withdrawn only after taking families to safety.
The Islamic State militants now control about half of Syria’s territory. Nearly all of that is desert, although the militants have seized critical roads, oil and gas fields, and many sites where valuable antiquities can be excavated, now chief among them Palmyra. Residents — supporters and opponents of President Bashar al-Assad — described officers fleeing, leaving civilians and lowly conscript soldiers to fend for themselves. One business owner said he watched pro-government militiamen run helter-skelter into orchards, not sure where to retreat. “Treason,” he called it.
Other reports from the area were hard to confirm because Internet and phone lines were disrupted. But reports from residents, activists and Islamic State supporters suggested that the group was moving to seize more of the oil and gas fields around Palmyra, a hub in a network of roads near the geographical center of the country. Residents videotaped airstrikes coming close to the town’s medieval citadel, and wondered why the militants had not been bombed earlier — by the government or, for that matter, by the United States-led coalition waging a parallel air war against them — while traversing miles of open desert roads.
There were conflicting reports about Tadmur Prison — Syria’s equivalent of Abu Ghraib in Iraq, where dissidents were long held and tortured. The spectacle of opening its doors could be a propaganda coup for Islamic State militants, but residents said that the most high-profile political prisoners — Islamists and senior army defectors — had been moved in recent days to another prison closer to Damascus, a possible sign the government knew defeat was coming. But most of all, they said, they had lost any sense that the government could provide safety even to its loyalists. On Thursday, after the militants had taken over the city and begun executing people they deemed close to the government, many residents were cowering in their houses and basements, terrified of ISIS in the streets and of government shelling and airstrikes from the sky.
The Lebanese news channel MTV reported that 27 Lebanese citizens had been freed, prompting immediate speculation that they were among the Lebanese who have been missing for decades in Syria. Some inmates in Tadmur Prison have been there since a Muslim Brotherhood uprising in 1982 was crushed, and dissidents, including secular leftists, were rounded up en masse. Some found it ominous that Syrian state news media had incorrectly declared that most civilians had been evacuated, perhaps signaling an excuse to increase airstrikes.
The report about the prison could not immediately be confirmed independently. “I can foresee the regime bombarding the town massively, especially after the huge loss among its soldiers.” said Khaled al-Homsi, a member of the committee that organized anti-government protests in Palmyra in 2011, before anyone imagined full-blown civil war, let alone a group like ISIS.
As Syrians woke up to the news that the Islamic State militants were in control of Palmyra, state news media focused instead on reports of victories in the Qalamoun Mountains, near the Lebanese border. Government forces there are receiving significant help on the battlefield from the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah. “The civilians are terrified,” he said. “The only bakery is controlled by ISIS. The army is bombing randomly.”
There were no updates from the government on the situation in Palmyra. State television had broadcast patriotic music and nature scenes the night before, with state news media later reporting that “popular defense groups” had withdrawn “after securing the evacuation of most of the families.” Mr. Homsi, 32, a former hotel worker who uses a nom de guerre for safety, said he was nervous that ISIS fighters would seek revenge against him and other activists who oppose them and the government.
Residents offered a different account, however, reporting that soldiers and pro-government militiamen were fleeing the town, leaving many civilians unable to evacuate. “I’m happy that Palmyra was liberated from the regime but not happy it fell under Daesh control,” he said. “In my view, as an activist, it s not a liberation.”
There have been fears locally and internationally that the Islamic State militants will harm the priceless antiquities of Palmyra. The militants have destroyed, damaged and looted other Unesco World Heritage sites in their rampage across Iraq and Syria, condemning them as idolatrous even as they loot and sell movable items to finance their activities. In a rare wartime visit to Palmyra a year ago, New York Times reporters met a range of people, who have kept in touch. In recent days, they provided a play-by-play view of the chaos, emotion and uncertainty there as ISIS rolled in.
While local activists said the militants were in control of the ancient site on Thursday, there was no sign they had caused damage to it. Experts said the militants might first turn their attention to the profits they could reap from Palmyra’s vast stores of unexcavated antiquities. Khalil al-Hariri, an archaeologist who keeps his hair dyed shoe-polish black, fled his house on the northern edge of the city, which had become the front line, while his colleagues scurried to cart away ancient artifacts from the museum. On Palmyra’s few shopping streets, metal gates rolled down, shuttering businesses like the Zenobia Café, named for a legendary queen of ancient Palmyra. Omar, a fellow activist of Mr. Homsi’s, began hiding and erasing computer files that he though ISIS would find incriminating. Mr. Homsi said he had nothing to hide. Poking fun at ISIS’ ban on smoking, he said, “I’ll hide my cigarettes.”
The group often reserves its spectacular propaganda displays, such as smashing antiquities, for when it wants to divert attention from battlefield setbacks, which was certainly not the case on Thursday. Ahmed, who owns an antiquities shop near the museum, said on Wednesday that his family had packed their bags to leave town. But, he said, “The government is not allowing us.”
Expecting to head to Palmyra with reinforcements, the soldier, who is 27 and comes from a Sunni family, sent a final photograph — maybe his last, he warned. But the road were blocked. A cousin serving in Palmyra told him: “Stay where you are. God loves you.” The soldier asked not to be further identified out of fears for the safety of he and his family.
After ISIS took control, Mr. Hariri, the archaeologist, reached again by phone, said that he had left with about four people. Nevertheless, he said, “most of the civilians are still there.” He paused. “What can I say? The situation is really bad.”
Another business owner spluttered in anger, “This is the army’s fault.” He had been out of town when the assault came, but was unable to get his parents out.
He said his parents had reported ISIS issuing a call from the minarets for people to hand over any soldiers or government workers. Yet, at the same time, ISIS fighters were fanning out through the city to offer services. “They are even handing out bread, god forbid,” he said.
By Thursday night, several dozen people had been publicly executed, residents said.
For Mr. Homsi, the day’s events had presented him with a new power to revolt against. “We will face and confront the destruction of the town’s history and heritage,” he said. “The revolution was and will remain my life. We won’t accept oppression from anyone.
As for the soldier, he had lived through bloody battles, but none had shaken him like the deaths of his comrades. (Thirty-five soldiers were buried in the provincial capital of Homs on Thursday alone, a resident who lives near the hospital there said.)
“I wish I were not a soldier, but a civilian living normal life, married with children,” the confessed on Wednesday. His situation, he said, reminded him of a line from the beloved damascene poet Nizar Qabbani:
“Love me.. away from the lands of oppression and repression, away from our city which has had its fill of death.”
Then he headed off to try once more to reach the front. He has not texted since.