The group of boys, consisting of boys aged 12-16 stared at the school walls blankly for years. Wondering why it was never renovated. Why it looked the same as it did more than 40 years ago. Did they not have the right to redecorate their school? They decided it was time to change the way the wall looked. With their graffiti and markers they wrote slogans they had learnt from children in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia. They demanded change.

With that they all laughed nervously at their bravery and returned home feeling somehow liberated; a feeling children only dreamed they had in Syria. Little did they know they had to pay for that sensation. When the sun went down and sleep paralyzed all sensations, heavy footsteps were heard near the old school walls. Every single boy who saw, drew or even supported the slogans on the wall was awoken violently that night. The boys were dragged out of their homes by large armed men wearing uniforms. Their parents screamed and shoved the armed men helplessly. They were paying the price for years of silence.

Unable to understand their crime the boys cried as they were put together in small pickups and jeeps. They were dragged to small humid cells and beaten by large men. A kick in the rib for contemplating change; a blow in the face for asking for change; and a crack in the spine for feeling liberated. They sat in their cells for weeks, beaten and humiliated on a daily basis. As a final warning, their nails were yanked out of their fingers to teach them to never draw on the old wall.

Whoever survived the torture was later returned home, swollen and crushed. The dead were lucky to have never lived life to see the fate of the Syrian children in the future.

Family members and friends of the young boys swarmed the streets of the town of Daraa demanding justice be brought to those who tortured and killed their children. No one listened to them. Friends of friends and passerby’s later joined the angry group, forming a small demonstration. No one listened to their demands. The demonstration grew as more people were familiar with the recent events. There was finally a response. Live bullets and tear gas forced the crowds to split up the demonstrations temporarily. The demonstrations grew larger as angry crowds demanded for nothing but change and were not receiving it. The response was once again bullets and tear gas, however this time the bullets hit flesh. As more blood was spilt, the crowds grew more furious and larger.

The word about the demonstrations reached other provinces like Homs, Douma, Idlib and Damascus suburbs. Touched by the bravery of the little boys in Daraa, more little boys followed their example and drew on old walls. Demonstrations grew larger, demands progressed. People no longer wanted change and reformations; they wanted the complete removal of the old. They wanted Bashar Al Assad and his government to resign. While his grip tightened on his throne, more blood was spilt in demonstrations and more people grew aware of the situation.

The question is, what happened to the children? Did the government learn from their mistakes? Did they stop child torture and imprisonment? On the contrary, after the boys in Daraa, Hamza alkhateeb fell victim to their torture. His genitals mutilated, his body bruised from blows, arms dented with bullet holes and burns from cigarettes, and bones crushed. Him and thousands of children in Syria are paying the price for desiring what the boys in Daraa desired.

This revolution was ignited by the children, carried out by the children, and will be extinguished by the children.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the bombing in the village of Ziyara in the central province of Hama was carried out by Jabhat al-Nusra, an Islamist group. Activists from the area reported that the operation was in coordination with other armed rebel groups.

The attack was one of the deadliest on pro-regime forces since the start of the revolt against President Bashar al-Assadin March last year.

The observatory also reported that more than 20 rebel fighters were killed by a fighter jet air-strike on the town of Harem in the northern province of Idlib. A rebel leader in the town was also seriously injured and is thought to be dead.

State-run TV SANA and the Britain-based Observatory said a car bomb attack had also killed 11 people and wounded dozens in the west Damascus district of Mazzeh.

The rebels have scored significant gains in recent weeks and now hold swathes of territory in the country’s north, but have struggled to gain ground in and around Damascus and in the commercial hub Aleppo amid heavy bombardment from government air power, according to AFP.

The escalating conflict has added importance to a meeting of the Syrian National Council in Qatar, where Washington is pushing for an overhaul of the opposition as U.S. officials have expressed disappointment with the SNC’s inability to create a consistent plan and its lack of agreement and cooperation with different internal groups.

Syrian opposition factions were at odds Monday in talks seeking to forge unity Washington says is needed to oust the Assad regime.

The Syrian National Council, the main exiled opposition coalition, based Turkey, disagreed with a U.S.-backed proposal to set up a larger umbrella group the BBC reported.

The new group, proposed by well-known exiled dissident Riad Seif, would include representation of rebel fighters, opposition military councils and minority groups.

“I have conveyed my strong message to the Syrian Government that they should immediately declare a unilateral ceasefire,” he told a news conference in Paris, after holding talks with French President François Hollande on the 19-month uprising against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his Government in which more than 31,000 people have already been killed according to activists and human rights groups.

“Of course their reaction was that, what would happen if they do it, because the opposition forces might continue. That is exactly what I have discussed, and I am in the process of discussing with the key Member States of the Security Council and the countries in the region,” he added, stressing that Joint UN-Arab League Special Representative Lakhdar Brahimi will continue to discuss this matter with regional leaders, including Mr. Assad.

Mr. Ban expressed concern over the “extremely dangerous” impact of the crisis, which has seen an escalation of the conflict on the Syrian-Turkish border and a flood of hundreds of thousands of refugees pouring into neighbouring countries.

In a related development, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) announced today that it is expanding its operation within Syria and in countries affected by the crisis to cope with the growing needs of children and families as winter approaches, such as providing heating, children’s clothes and prefabricated classrooms. Next month it plans to support a vaccination campaign to protect up to 1 million children against measles and other diseases.

Around 1 million children are affected by the conflict inside Syria, and more than 100,000 Syrian children have been displaced to Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and Iraq. UNICEF is urgently scaling up its emergency response to reach hundreds of thousands of children with child protection, water, sanitation and hygiene, health and nutrition, and education initiatives. But a lack of funds is inhibiting what can be achieved. UNICEF has appealed for $91 million for its operations.

Meanwhile, Syrian opposition fighters have taken control of Maarat al-Numan, a strategic town in Idlib province on the highway linking Damascus with the commercial hub of Aleppo, activists say.

“Regular forces pulled back from all of their checkpoints around Maarat al-Numan, except for one at the entrance of the town,” Rami Abdel Rahman, a UK-based activist who gets information from a network of sources on the ground in Syria, said on Tuesday, according to Al Jazeera.

“This is a strategic location on the route from Damascus to Aleppo. All the regime reinforcements headed to Aleppo must pass through Maarat al-Numan.”

Elsewhere in the country, soldiers moved into the central city of Homs and Reuters news agency reported that rebel suicide bombers struck at an Air Force Intelligence compound in Damascus used as an interrogation centre – the latest attack to bring the conflict close to Assad’s power base.

A helicopter strike on Sunday on the town of Kafr Aweid in the Syrian province of Idlib killed at least 11 civilians, five of them children and one woman, said the Observatory.

Amateur video posted on the Observatory facebook page showed horrifying images of the children’s corpses as mourners shouted 
“Allahu akbar! (God is greatest)”.

Government troops also pounded the rebel-held Shaar district of Aleppo, killing 11 people, a rights group said on Sunday.

The Free Syrian Army, meanwhile, was able to control an artillery battalion in al-Zahraa region in Aleppo overnight, following intensive clashes with government forces, Al Arabiya reported citing the Syrian Media Center.

In Damascus, fighting erupted at dawn in the northeast suburb of Harasta, while the army also shelled the southern suburb of Al-Hajar al-Aswad from several directions, according to Al Jazeera.

Explosions also rocked the northeast suburb of Douma, while the rebel Assali and Qadam districts in south Damascus were also bombarded.

The violence came a day after UN and Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi met President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus.

Meanwhile, SANA state news agency said more than 5 million students would return to the country’s 22,000 schools. President Bashar al-Assad has downplayed the violence and the killing of civilians everyday since the beginning of the uprising insisting that everything is under control.

Yesterday, the top commander of Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guard has said that the elite unit has high-level advisers in Lebanon and Syria but remains undecided on whether to send military reinforcements to help save Assad’s regime.

More than 26,000 people have been killed since the uprising against Assad’s rule erupted in March last year, according to activists while the UN puts the toll at 20,000.

The death toll of civilians killed today has risen to 28, the same source reports, with 14 people killed in Hama most of which were killed in random gunfire by the Syrian  forces.

The Local Co-ordination Committees (LCC), confirmed that it had received reports of several “suspicious explosions” earlier in the morning in Damascus “in or near several government buildings, including the official state media and television office; a security centre in Rukneddine; and the Central Bank building in Sabaa Bahrat Square”,  AlJazeera reported citing the opposition group.

On the other hand, Syria’s state-run news agency reported that monday’s explosions  killed at least eight people amongst them civilians and security forces, blaming “armed gangs” for the attacks.

Meanwhile, The Norwegian General Robert Mood head of the UN mission to Syria charged with overseeing the shaky U.N.-backed ceasefire in Syria, arrived in Damascus on Sunday in the country promising it would “rapidly” reach its planned strength of 300 monitors.

The head of the UN observer mission to Syria has warned that even 1,000 unarmed observers could not end the violence in the country on their own. General Robert Mood urged all sides to halt fighting and said peace must be a joint effort.

30 observers will follow General Mood in the coming days, increasing the size of the mission. The UN has approved up to 300.