00:00 – 00:23
Shots from car of driving across beautiful open plane with rebel fighters.
This is the approach to Mennagh Airbase, one of the last government-held military strongholds in the north of Syria’s Aleppo province.
The base has been besieged for 3 months by hundreds of opposition fighters from this region. Defectors who have managed to escape say that as many as 350 government soldiers are still trapped inside, and supplies are running out.
00:23 – 00:34
Shots of rebel fighters walking towards frontline through olive groves.
We’re with a small detachment of local men from Northern Storm Brigade, They they’re here to fight for God, their land and their families.
This is as close as we can get to the base without giving away our position in the open fields.
00:34 – 01:09
Soundbite Abu:
“We’re now about 400 meters from the airport. We try to strike every day, we try to break it down every day, but its vey hard because there are many heavy weapons in the airport, more than 40 tanks and maybe some chemical weapons. They warn us to wear masks because our commander is afraid they many shell us with chemical weapons here.”
01:09 – 01:32
Shots of the wreckage of a downed helicopter, ID card of one of the Crew.
Narrator:
It’s now almost impossible for the Government to resupply Mennagh with food fuel and ammunition. Rebel antiaircraft guns positioned around the base shot this helicopter down a few weeks ago as it came in low to try and drop off barrels of fuel. The rebels said Six incinerated bodies were pulled from the wreckage, among them was this man, Hassan Aldiab, his ID card apparently survived the blaze. (We don't have to include this but it is a humanizing detail)
01:32 - 01:39
Soundbite Najim’adeen:
“If you go inside the base you will see the army are desperate and bored sitting like this (head in hands) and have no clue what to do. They are full of hate for the situation they’re in.”
01:39 - 01:52
Shots of rebel fighters drinking tea outside their base.
This is Najim’adeen, the commander of this small unit. He was a fruit seller in Beirut before the war, but is now a self-proclaimed jihadist. He also claimed he went to fight the Americans in Iraq for a month after the invasion in 2003.
01:52 - 02:24
Soundbite Najim’adeen
“As Muslims, there is Jihad for the sake of God, to liberate the honor and the land. For Muslims, honor is precious, and land is even more so. That’s why you see so many civilians fighting. This is a civilian, that’s a civilian, I’m civilian.
I gave up everything and came here when jihad was announced and I’ve been battling against Bashar al-Assad for 2 years.”
02:24 - 02:35
Narrator:
Abu was a schoolteacher before the war. He said some government soldiers had pretended to defect to try and escape from the base, but their plan was short-lived.
02:35 - 03:17
Soundbite Abu:
(broken english)
“They were fighting us, but when they reached hopelessness, (to the point that) that they will die, they said, ‘we escape, we want to break away’.
So they (we) killed them. Because they didn't break away for the revolution, for these people, they did it just to survive.”
“We have connected with some soldiers in the airport now who can’t break away, and when they get the chance, we will forgive them. But the other soldiers … there is no way.”
03:17 - 03:41
Shots of damaged houses, craters and cluster bombs in nearby village.
You don't have to look far to find some of the reason for the anger consuming these people. This is the nearby town of Marra’naz, more than 6000 people once lived here but the streets are now abandoned, littered with unexploded cluster bombs and these enormous bomb-craters. US officials (observers?) have said that this deliberate targeting of civilian areas is part of a policy of collective punishment, designed to destroy communities that are thought to have spawned the uprising.
03:41 - 04:01
Soundbite Abu:
“We lost one person, he was a commander here in our detachment around the airport. And now we will go to the cemetery and you will see him.”
04:01 - 04:30
Shots of the body being carried by a crowd of men.
Narrator:
Their commander, Abdul Haadi Saalu, was married 3 months ago. Today it’s his funeral, he was shot by a sniper. This graveyard in Azaz was specially built for the town’s war dead and it’s filling up.
Such a large gathering of opposition men would make a tempting target for government bombers, but the funeral goes ahead. The grief provides fertile ground for those calling for Islamic rule in Syria.
04:31 - 04:52
Soundbite: Islamist preacher at funeral
‘I wonder, when will the past return? Because I long for that time. We promise God that we will fulfill the prophecy brought to us by the Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him, and reestablish the (Islamic) Caliphate. With the help of God, the one who never closes his eyes and never sleeps.
Shots of men singing quietly over the grave
05:13 – 05:50
Soundbite, Najim’adeen, sitting at home with his daughter on his lap:
Before we used to be very sad when someone was martyred, but now it has become normal. We started with 15 men, then we became 33. We built a camp in the mountains, we don't want to take you there now. We endured the cold weather and rain. Now we have 1500 or 2000 fighters and we have our own brigade on the frontline, now we are the Hurricanes of the North.
05:50 - 06:00
Shots of Najim’adeen smoking, his son holding an AK47 rifle.