Guardian, Nour Ali in Damascus, Monday 18 July 2011
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| Syrians at a rally backing President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus. Celebrities have split for and against the regime. Photograph: Youssef Badawi/EPA |
The Syrian TV star Mohammed al-Rashi has joined Syria's anti-regime demonstrators just days after a group of intellectuals and artists protested in Damascus.
In a video
posted online the actor is seen attending a number of funerals in the Damascus
neighbourhood of Qaboun, where at least 15 people were shot dead on Friday, the
highest number of deaths reported in a single day in the capital since the
revolt began four months ago.
Rashi joins
a list of stars including the actor Fares al-Heloo who have spoken out against
the regime.
On
Wednesday 30 of about 200 actors, writers and intellectuals who protested in the
Midan neighbourhood of the capital were arrested, including the leading actor
May Skaf, film directors Nabil Maleh and Mohammed Malas and writer Rima
Fleihan. All have since been released.
But as
those fighting to topple President Bashar al-Assad and those supporting him
seek the backing of the rich and famous, many of Syria's celebrities have shown
loyalty to the regime.
The singer
George Wassouf performed before thousands of people at a pro-regime concert in
the central Omawiyeen Square on Sunday evening.
Wassouf,
one of Syria's most famous singers who hails from a town in the governorate of
Homs, is among a number of stars who have drawn fierce criticism for supporting
a regime that continues to crack down brutally on protesters. The concert,
described as a show of loyalty to the homeland, started with a minute of
silence for the dead.
Others have
hedged their bets. The actor Muna Wassif, the mother of the democracy activist
Ammar Abdulhamid, who runs a blog on Syria's revolution, called in May for an
end to the killing and the lifting of sieges on villages but stopped short of
calling for the regime to go.
In May a
group of international filmmakers signed an online petition denouncing the
killing of protesters for making "demands of basic rights and
liberties".
Nour Ali is
the pseudonym of a journalist in Damascus
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