Sorry Nimrod; pot-addled hillbilly beats RT to the story by three years

RT, known in some circles as Putin's propaganda network, has a timely feature on the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on view at the moment.

Seems that Rami Abdulrahmen is still running his one-man show out of his apartment in Coventry. Never before in the history of media has a one-man show garnered so much mainstream attention. Rami has been the go-to guy for info on the Syrian civil war ever since it started.

That a one-man operation should get such a massive following among the mainstream press is a curiosity indeed. In fact, it may even be more of a curiosity now than it was over three years ago, when the think tank here at Falling Downs brought you the exact same story!

UN reveals startling new Syria death toll

After almost two years of having no idea what the death toll in the Syrian civil war might be, the UN has waded in with an estimate that seriously ups the ante.

Till now the most accessible estimates have been from the London based "Syrian Observatory for Human Rights," a one man show run by Rami Abdul Rahman, a guy who assembles the numbers while working in his wife's dress shop.

It's safe to say that most observers of the Observatory were somewhat skeptical of Mr. Rahman's statistics. For one thing, he is an avowed opponent of the Assad regime and therefore had ample motive for inflating his figures.

Secondly, because the nature of his in-country network could not be independently verified, it was assumed in many quarters that it amounted to little more than wishful thinking. The consensus was, until yesterday, that the death toll publicized by the Observatory was to a greater or lesser extent exaggerated.

So here comes the UN, and bumps Abdul Rahman's numbers by a healthy 30%!

What is the UN up to? Does this signal a more activist role for the UN? Note that this information comes directly from the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay. Would her office be foregrounding this issue if there wasn't pressure from certain security council members to raise the profile of the Syrian conflict as a prelude to more explicit  involvement?

Look for anti-Assad resolutions coming from the UN soon.

Meet the Syrian Human Rights Observatory

From left to right: Rami Abdulrahmen, reporter; Rami Abdulrahmen, editor; Rami Abdulrahmen, producer; Rami Abdulrahmen, researcher; Rami Abdulrahmen, fact checker

Yup, it’s a one man show, that Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Never before in the history of journalism has a one man show got this much face time on major media.

Apparently Rami hasn’t been to Syria in at least ten years. He has no network and no fact-checkers. He just passes on stuff that somebody may or may not have made up. He has no way of knowing. We have no way of knowing either. Maybe he just makes stuff up himself.

But Rami’s Syrian Observatory for Human Rights gets major face-time on Fox, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, BBC and al Jazeera.