As negotiations to avert a U.S. strike against Syria ramped up last week, so, too, did the action on the ground. Warplanes dropped bombs over far-flung Syrian towns that hadn't seen airstrikes in weeks, government forces went on the attack in the hotly contested suburbs of Damascus, rebels launched an offensive in the south and a historic Christian town changed hands at least four times.
At the close of a week hailed in Moscow and Washington as a triumph of diplomacy over war, more than 1,000 people died in the fighting in Syria, the latest casualties in a conflict that has killed more than 100,000 people and can be expected to claim many more.
Indeed, some analysts fear that the deal struck in Geneva between Russia and the U.S. over a mechanism to dismantle Syria's chemical weapons arsenal may actually prolong a war being fought over issues far more profound than the parameters of a specific weapons program.