Syrian Troops Reportedly Enter Restive City
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Troops backed by tanks stormed a city on Syria’s Mediterranean coast on Saturday that has proved one of the most restive in the seven-week uprising, besieging neighborhoods and cutting electricity and phone lines, opposition groups said.
The military’s move against Baniyas, a predominantly Sunni Muslim city that witnessed some of the largest protests in nationwide demonstrations a day earlier, was another signal that the Syrian government was determined to crush by force dissent that has posed a sweeping challenge to President Bashar al-Assad’s 11-year rule. It comes nearly two weeks after the military stormed Dara’a, a poor town near the Jordanian border where protests galvanized demonstrations across the country. Gunboats were spotted off the coast.