BEIRUT
(AP) — A renowned political cartoonist whose drawings expressed
Syrians' frustrated hopes for change was grabbed after he left his
studio early Thursday and beaten by masked gunmen who broke his hands
and dumped him on a road outside Damascus.
One
of Syria's most famous artists, Ali Ferzat, 60, (pictured here), earned international
recognition and the respect of many Arabs with stinging caricatures that
infuriated dictators including Iraq's Saddam Hussein, Libya's Moammar
Gadhafi and, particularly in recent months, Syria's autocratic Assad
family.
He lay badly bruised in a hospital bed Thursday evening
with his hands swathed in bandages, a stark reminder that no Syrian
remains immune to a brutal crackdown on a five-month anti-government
uprising.
Ferzat remembers the gunmen telling him that "this is just a warning," as they beat him, a relative told The Associated Press.
"We
will break your hands so that you'll stop drawing," the masked men
said, according to the relative, who spoke anonymously for fear of
retaliation.
Before inheriting Syria's presidency from his father
in 2000, Bashar Assad, a British-trained eye doctor, used to visit
Ferzat's exhibitions and offer encouraging words, the artist has said.
When
the new president opened Syria to reforms, Ferzat was allowed to
publish the country's first private newspaper in decades, a satirical
weekly called The Lamplighter.
The
paper was an instant hit, with copies of each issue selling out a few
hours after hitting the stands. It was soon shut down, however, as Assad
began cracking down on dissent and jailing critics after the brief,
heady period known as the Damascus Spring quickly lost steam.
Ferzat
became a vehement critic of the regime, particularly after the military
launched a brutal crackdown on the country's protest movement.
Human
rights groups said Assad's forces have killed more than 2,000 people
since the uprising against his autocratic rule erupted in mid-March,
touched off by the wave of revolutions sweeping the Arab world.
An
endearing figure with a bushy gray beard, Ferzat drew cartoons about
the uprising and posted the illustrations on his private website,
providing comic relief to many Syrians who were unable to follow his
work in local newspapers because of a ban on his drawings.
His
illustrations grew bolder in recent months, with some of his cartoons
directly criticizing Assad, even through caricatures of the president
are forbidden in Syria.
This
week, he published a cartoon showing Assad with a packed suitcase,
frantically hitching a ride with a fleeing Gadhafi. Another drawing
showed dictators walking a long red carpet that leads them, in the end,
to a dustbin.
The response was swift.
Ferzat,
who usually works late into the night, left his studio at 4 a.m.
Thursday, but a jeep with tinted windows quickly cut him off, according
to the relative. Four masked gunmen then dragged him out of his car,
bundled him into the jeep and drove him to the airport road just outside
Damascus, beating him and making threats all the while.
The men then singed the artist's beard, put a bag over his head and dumped him on the side of the road.
The Facebook page of the U.S. Embassy in Damascus described it as a "government-sponsored, targeted, brutal attack."
The Obama administration, which has called for Assad to step down, said the cartoonist's beating was deplorable.
"They
broke his hands in the most disgusting and deplorable way to send a
message," said U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland. "It's
not only Ali Ferzat that we're worried about. The regime has also locked
up a number of other prominent dissidents to send a message."
Assad's
crackdown has not spared other Syrian intellectuals and artists who
dared to voice criticism. A group of intellectuals and artists,
including Syrian actress May Skaff, were rounded up and jailed for a
week last month after holding a protest in Damascus.
Damascus-based activist and film producer Shadi Abu Fakher went missing on July 23 and has not been heard of since.
Ferzat,
however, is the most famous victim of the repression to date. He had
been encouraging other Syrian artists to side with the protesters, even
publishing on his website a "List of Shame" that included names of those
who were on the side of the regime.
"We
were a group of reformers in the country, and suddenly, the doors of
hell opened on us. It was a huge disappointment," Ferzat told the AP
earlier this month in a phone interview.
The
timing of the attack strongly suggests Ferzat's attackers knew his
unusual working hours and had been tracking him. Ferzat said his day
starts at 5 p.m.
In the
telephone interview, he said he was full of hope that the Syrian
revolution would bring about the change fervently desired by so many
Syrians.
"There are two things in this life that cannot be crushed — the will of God and the will of the people," he said.
Asked if he fears arrest because of his drawings, he said: "I have killed the policeman in my head."
After news of Ferzat's attack broke Thursday, online social networking sites exploded with angry postings.
"Assad's Syria is the burial ground of talent," read a posting on Twitter.
"Ali
Ferzat, your innovation will stand in the face of their cowardice and
hate," wrote Suheir Atassi, a prominent Syrian pro-democracy activist.
Soon
after the attack, his website where he published his cartoons and
satirical commentary was taken down. "This account has been suspended,"
reads a message on the website, http://www.ali-ferzat.com/.
___
Associated Press writer Matthew Lee contributed to this report from Washington.
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