It is undeniably true that Assad responded to the protests against his regime violently. People were killed, but hardly massacred. And public buildings including the Ba'athist Party Headquarters where burned down, so 'peaceful is stretching it a bit.
This seems like a fair assessment...
Page 12
// unarmed but destructive demonstrations in Dera’a prompted the assad regime to respond with violence. The incarceration of several youths in Dera’a triggered demonstrations on friday, March 18, 2011 that escalated until the following Monday, when security forces fired live ammunition against a mob that had succeeded in burning down the Ba’ath Party headquarters and other public buildings. The regime responded decisively, driving straight to the heart of the protest movement, the omari Mosque. the mechanized unit that seized this landmark has been frequently identi ed as Bashar al-assad’s brother Maher’s elite 4th armored Division, which opened re on unarmed demonstrators and killed as many as fteen protestors in the two-day assault. //
http://www.understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/Struggle_For_Syria.pdf