It's been all over the news: "Journalist Marie Colvin died trying to get her shoes, her paper reports" (CNN), "Marie Colvin's killing piles pressure on Assad as civilian death toll rises" (Guardian), "American war reporter Marie Colvin killed in Syria" (Fox News), and "Journalists Marie Colvin, Remi Ochlik killed in Syria, activists and French official say" (MSNBC). While this is a tragedy, this post will focus more on the indiscriminate shelling, specifically in the city of Homs by the Syrian Army.
This video (courtesy of youtube) is probably thebest video that gives an example of the type of shelling that is occurring in the rebel-held, Syrian city of Homs; which, from the reports, is occurring daily, especially in the Baba Amr district of the city.
In reaction to the video, I was shocked to see how different my mental image was from reality: In my mind I picture a nearly destroyed city, say about the size of La Crosse being flattened via indirect fire from mortars, rockets, and artillery. However, I was quite surprised in seeing a glimpse at how large the city is, given that a majority of buildings still standing albeit it has been under constant shelling. I'm also quite appalled at the actions of the Syrian military and their backing from President Assad, which are slaughtering countless numbers of civilians. A video on Huffington Post that describes Marie Colvin's time there references the shelling; but also the fact that if one to be lucky enough to be spared that cause of death, they would most likely be sniped by a Syrian army sniper team as they are positioned throughout the city and shoot anyone on the streets.
It's quite sickening to think about how Russian and China could be so blatantly ignorant on such human rights violations, by not wanting to impede on Syria's sovereignty in order to end the violent,murderous actions by the Syrian government.
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