It is difficult to distinguish one gruesome day from the next in Syria until the devastation of a town is so great that it earns itself a place on the conflict's increasingly bloody timeline: the assault in February on Homs's Baba Amr district, the Houla massacre in May, and now Daraya.
The small town on the southwestern edge of the capital Damascus was shelled for several days last week before President Bashar Assad's forces stormed in on August 25th, carrying out house-to-house raids and executing men on the spot. At least 200 bodies were found on Saturday, often in basements of houses; more than 350 were killed over the past week. Video footage and photographs from local activists show bloodied corpses laid out in the yard of a mosque, before being lowered into mass graves.
The massacre is part of an intensified offensive by the regime to reassert control in Damascus and beyond. Having failed to stamp out the rebels despite resorting to ever more shelling and aerial bombing, Mr Assad appears to be targeting his efforts more specifically on areas held by or harbouring rebels in an attempt to turn the local populations against the fighters. That may work in some areas of Aleppo, the country's commercial capital, where although many locals hate the regime there is less support for the opposition fighters. But in smaller towns like Daraya, residents reached by Skype on Sunday put the blame squarely on the regime.
Rebel fighters here apparently withdrew from the town to avoid the regime's wrath, although some may have simply melted back into the civilian population. But any such efforts were futile: the regime sees all young men as a threat, as the fact that the majority of the dead were young men shows. The UN accuses both sides of war crimes, but says that those committed by the government far outweigh those of the rebels. Increasingly, ordinary Syrians are bearing the brunt of the violence. Saturday was the bloodiest day yet, adding to a death toll of 4,000 so far in August.
In Daraya, Syrians are mourning not just the devastation in one town but the increasingly dark fate of the uprising. For months the place was a beacon of non-violent resistance. As other parts picked up arms, protesters in Daraya offered roses and water to the soldiers stationed in their hometown. To no avail. Ghiyath Matar, a young activist committed to non-violent protest, was arrested and tortured to death; others were shot on the spot. Daraya embodies the sad trajectory of Syria's uprising, in which the regime's violence has transformed hopeful protests into a destructive civil war. It will be just one of many places to pay dearly.
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