Violence sweeps away the coast of Syria, sowing chaos: “We have to get out of here”

Friday, the shots started at dawn in the city of Al-Haffa on the Mediterranean coast of Syria.

At the beginning, Wala, a 29-year-old resident of the city, jumped from her bed at the corner of the room in her apartment on the first floor, flattening while the rat-tat of gunshots sounded in front of the window of her room.

When the bustle has become stronger, she said, she slipped to the window and took off the curtain. Outside, dozens of people fled on the road, many in pajamas, while four men in Green Forest uniforms continued them. Then the men in uniform opened fire. In a few seconds, four of the people on the run crumple on the ground.

“I couldn’t believe what I saw. I was terrified, terrified, “said Wala, who asked to be identified by his first name only for fear of reprisals.

The attack on his city was one of the troubles that rocked the Syrian coast in the past four days and have killed more than 1,000 people, said the Syrian war surveillance group for human rights on Sunday. It was the bloodiest violence since the rebels ousted the longtime dictator, Bashar al-Assad, in early December, then sought to assert their reign on a country fractured by almost 14 years of civil war.

Violence broke out on Thursday when armed men faithful to Mr. Al-Assad set an ambush to the government’s security forces in the province of Latakie, where Al-Haffa is located. The ambush sparked days of clashes between the loyalists of Assad and the government forces.