tempt to end the protests. Tens of people were killed or wounded over the weekend and tanks have entered two suburbs of the city of Homs, Rastan, and Talbiseh. The heavy-handed repression by police and military officials may lead demonstrators to consider a recourse to arms. The government is cracking down

hort period that the air strikes have taken place, =hey've predictably generated the usual reports of "collateral =amage," including 17 civilians in Talbiseh at the very outset on =eptember 30. =p class="MsoNormal">The Russian moves, if only because they=represent something fundamentally different in a c

en furiously buying smuggled weapons since the crisis began. Last week for the first time, anti-regime activists reported that people in Rastan and Talbiseh were meeting tanks with rocket-propelled grenades. Some of the conflicting reports from Jisr al-Shaghour, the besieged town near the northwestern b