Holidays in Syria ?

Confirmation of what I was saying in previous posts, that the protests in Syria did not really get going until late-March 2011,  come from an old newspaper I happened to come across: as late as 5 March, The Independent (which I bought for its article on David Bowie in Berlin) Traveller supplement had this:

Muslim tradition recalls that the Prophet Mohammed, arriving in the hills overlooking Damascus [... ,] refused to go on. Paradise was unique, he reasoned [...]
the walking here  [...] is as good as anywhere in the Middle East.

Etc.