Hit-and-run attacks by Syria troops on rise

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights,an opposition group in Britain that maintains a network of contacts in Syria,said the latest raid on Wednesday morning in Kafar Soussa with tanks backed by infantry soldiers left at least 12 people dead.

Activists there described it as another hit-and-run assault. Similar attacks have been reported in several areas ringing the capital in recent weeks,as troops and shelling intensify then fade,as the government kills and leaves. This week,activists reported finding 40 bodies in one suburb; last week,60 others appeared in a landfill,many of them believed to be civilians.

Analysts said the effort in which the government invades but does not hold an area underscore the challenge that Assad faces as he tries to defeat an insurgency that often slips away only to resurface. It is an effort that experts describe as the opposite of the winning hearts and minds model,based instead on the Arabic saying rule is based on awe.

Terror is the basic approach, said Paul Salem,director of the Carnegie Centre for the Middle East. From the beginning of the uprising the logic was hit and hit hard,punish and scare,and that would be the way to do it.

But he added,Its a crazy logic,and it has not served them well. While the approach worked when the Syrian government suppressed a revolt in Hama in the 1980s,he said,the current effort to intimidate the country into calm is increasingly showing signs of failure.

The Opposition throughout Syria has not broken; it has scattered and regrouped. In many areas,from north to south,the government has claimed that its mission has been accomplished,only to have the rebels resurface.

Meanwhile,The UN said Wednesday that Iran was delivering weapons to Syria,in an apparent violation of UN sanctions banning arms exports by Tehran.