‘We are one body'

Near Damascus

‘Remember: what we do, we do for God,’ said the rebel commander to the huddle of his men at the foot of the mountain. They divided up their ammunition. They had so little — one clip’s worth was shared between two Kalashnikovs. They set off, a line of men stretching into the dark, breathing heavily on the steep slope: another night’s gruelling walk to bring them closer to Damascus.

The Free Syrian Army’s failed offensive in the capital had been the week before. Fighters poured in, only to run out of bullets. The city did not rise up to help them. Government forces hit back with tanks, artillery and jets; but time and again the regime has tried to crush the uprising using ever greater violence, only to cause a bigger reaction. And now the rebels are preparing a counter-offensive. Groups are coming in from the countryside, we were told; new weapons arriving from Turkey. Ramadan would be decisive. Ramadan would see the end of the regime.

Will it really? Zabadani, on our smugglers’ route from the Lebanese border to Damascus, was a good place to consider what the new Syria might look like. It was one of the first towns to go over to the rebels and it also has a sizeable Christian minority: 5,000, among some 30,000 Sunni Muslims.

Father Anton al Houri was a bank manager before becoming head of the Orthodox community in Zabadani. He is 80, grey-bearded, dignified, and though he was planted firmly in an ornate chair, he managed to do a good impression of sitting on the fence.