US backs idea of temporary ceasefire in Syria

 A car bomb in southern Damascus killed six people on Wednesday, state television said, as international mediator Lakhdar Brahimi pushed for a temporary ceasefire in Syria.
   
"The terrorist explosion caused by the car bomb in Daf al-Shok caused the martyrdom of six citizens and 20 wounded," television said.

This as opposition activists and Syrian state media traded blame on Wednesday for the killing of at least 25 people, including women and children, in the town of Douma near Damascus.   

"There was a horrible massacre in Douma last," opposition  media office in Douma said in a statement. "More than 20 civilians have been slaughtered by (pro-government militia) shabiha who were at a checkpoint and then stormed into a residential building nearby."   

Syrian state television said 25 people had been killed by "terrorist members of the so-called 'Liwa al-Islam.'" State media labels all opposition members as "terrorists."

Earlier, Syria's Foreign Ministry said the country's military leaders were studying a proposal by international mediator Lakhdar Brahimi for a ceasefire to mark the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha, and would announce their decision on Thursday.   

"The proposal to halt military operations during the blessed Eid al-Adha holiday is still being studied by the leadership of the army and the armed forces," the ministry said in a statement released after Brahimi announced in Cairo that Syria had agreed the truce. "The final position on this issue will be announced tomorrow."

In this regard, International mediator Lakhdar Brahimi said on Wednesday the Syrian President has agreed to the Eid al-Adha ceasefire, a decision Damascus would announce on Thursday.

"After the visit I made to Damascus, there is agreement from the Syrian government for a ceasefire during the Eid," Brahimi told a news conference at the Cairo-based Arab League

The holiday starts on Thursday and lasts three or four days. Brahimi, a mediator appointed by the United Nations and League, did not specify the precise time period.

The Islamist group al-Nusra Front rejected a truce in Syria proposed by peace envoy Brahimi for this week's Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha.

This as reports emerged on Syrian rebels having acquired portable surface-to-air missiles including U.S.-made Stingers, the Interfax news agency quoted Russia's senior general as saying on Wednesday.

Like Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Russia has laid most of the blame for continuing violence on armed government foes it says are aided by encouragement and arms from abroad.

Russia's military has learned "that militants fighting Syrian government forces have portable missile launchers of various states, including American-made Stingers," Interfax quoted general staff chief Nikolai Makarov as saying.

The Obama administration is cautiously welcoming the possibility of a temporary ceasefire in Syria, saying it hopes calm might lead to political transition.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says she supports U.N. peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi's initiative and wants a transition process ending the Assad family's four-decade dictatorship.

On the ground:

Activists say Syrian warplanes have struck a village near a strategic rebel-held town in the country's north, killing five members of an extended family.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says government aircraft hit Mar Shureen village on Wednesday morning.

The Observatory director, Rami Abdul-Rahman, says the dead include a father and his two sons, as well as a two other relatives, a woman and a young man.

This as hundreds of Syrian refugees have poured into a makeshift refugee camp overlooking the Turkish border, fleeing a week of what they say are the most intense army bombardments since the uprising began 19 months ago.

In the past two days, 700 tents have been erected in a sprawling olive grove on a hill just inside Syria and all of them have already been claimed.

Dozens of stranded families struggle into the camp to find no shelter, but are afraid to return home to the horror of the constant shelling.

REUTER/AP/LBCI

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