School witch-hunt fuels UK Islamophobia
By Finian Cunningham | Press TV | June 10, 2014
An official British probe this week into alleged “Islamic extremism” in schools is replete with rumor, hearsay and sensationalist accusations.
But, as it turns out, the government report is based on scant factual evidence.
What this amounts to is a “witch-hunt” against British Muslims fuelled at the highest level of government.
This exercise in fear mongering not only denigrates Muslim communities; it recklessly adds to an already hostile climate of Islamophobia in British society, where ordinary citizens are being targeting by racism and hate crimes.
This week the British government’s regulatory body, Ofsted, released a report into more than 20 schools in the midlands city of Birmingham, where it has been alleged that there is a secret plot to infiltrate the education system with “Islamic extremism.”
Six of the schools investigated have been accused of promoting “intimidation” and “intolerance” of non-Muslims. The British government has now placed the schools on a watch-list, which will involve future no-warning snap inspections.
British Prime Minister David Cameron has vowed “a robust response to protect children” with “an extremism taskforce” that will from now on promote “British values” in schools.
The Birmingham establishments in question may now see their governors and staff sacked, and replaced by government-vetted personnel.
The local education trust that runs the facilities in Birmingham has flatly rejected the Ofsted report and the “baseless allegations.”
A senior member of Parkview Trust, which governs three of the schools investigated, said the government probe has found no evidence to support its claims. Trust chairman David Hughes said:
“This report has been conducted in a climate of suspicion… Ofsted inspectors came to our schools looking for extremism, looking for segregation, looking for proof that our children have religion forced upon them as part of an Islamic plot. The Ofsted reports find absolutely no evidence of this because this is categorically not what is happening at our schools.”
So, what is going on here? The whole affair into alleged extremism in the Birmingham schools, both secondary and primary, began some four years ago when an anonymous teacher supposedly wrote a letter to the British government claiming that there was a “Trojan Horse” plot operating in schools in majority Muslim communities across Birmingham.
That plot was said to involve the takeover of teaching staff at the schools and the infiltration of students with extremist ideology.
The letter has since been widely seen as a hoax. Even right-wing British newspapers, such as The Daily Mail, have acknowledged that the document and its accusations therein are fabrications.
Nevertheless, the allegations have taken on a life of their own and have gained credibility, largely due to incessant media vilification of the schools and Muslim communities in general.
Reprehensibly, senior British government ministers have heightened this climate of fear and the ensuing Islamophobia by giving these groundless claims of extremism credence.
Last week, the interior minister Theresa May and education minister Michael Gove engaged in a bizarre public row, accusing each other of “being soft on Islamic fundamentalism.” Then Conservative party leader David Cameron stepped in to the war of words – not to dismiss the damaging allegations against Muslim majority schools, but to merely discipline his ministers for their public bickering.
There is more than a suspicion that the Conservative ministers, May and Gove, are each exploiting the issue as a way of garnering personal publicity and to further their ambitions for taking over the party leadership from the hapless Cameron. For his part, Cameron seems to be reacting in a heavy-handed way to shore up his image as a “tough leader” instead of being seen as the lame duck premier that he is increasingly appearing to be.
With the release of the Ofsted report this week, Cameron has not challenged the dubious premise of the probe, but has instead promised a “robust response,” thus giving its claims a veneer of veracity.
Teachers, parents and community leaders in Birmingham have roundly condemned the “political agenda” of the government’s so-called probe into Islamic extremism.
Lee Donaghey, a principal at the now black-listed Parkview Academy, said the accusations were “absolutely untrue,” adding: “This is a normal state school, like thousands of others across Britain – 98 percent of our pupils just happen to be Muslims. British Muslims.”
As several local people also pointed out, the schools being targeted by the British government report have staff of different religious faiths, including Muslim and Christian. Some are agnostic.
One parent, Arshad Malik, said the conclusions of the Ofsted report claiming the existence of extremism were “completely alien” to him.
“The only thing extreme about our school is the excellence of student achievement in exams,” he added, saying that Park View had been turned around from an academically failed school into an award-winning one in recent years, thanks to the resilient efforts of the teaching staff.
What forms the basis of the British government probe is nothing but a litany of hearsay and unfounded rumor, which has been pursued with prejudice among the government school-regulators. That is a symptom of the worrying trend of increasing Islamophobia in British society at large, not the existence of “hard-line Islamic” influence in schools.
This very real and unconscionable Islamophobia is now being further whipped up at senior government level for self-serving political reasons that bear no relation to alleged problems.
Furthermore, what is even more deplorable is that the government fuelled anti-Muslim attitude in Britain is placing the lives of ordinary Muslims, including young students, at grave risk. Already, there is disturbing evidence of a soaring number of physical attacks, some of them lethal, on Muslim citizens across Britain. In the mindset of racist street thugs, all Muslims are dehumanized as “terrorists.”
What the British government is doing with its scaremongering reports of “extremist plots” at schools in Muslim communities is setting the stage for even more hate crimes.
Ironically, the one entity that can be most associated with so-called Islamic extremism is the British government itself, with its covert support for terrorists in Syria and Libya, as well as its long-held cozy relationship with the Wahhabi rulers of Saudi Arabia.
Tragically, Muslim communities across Britain are at risk of paying an even bigger price of human suffering for the reckless policies of the British government and its so-called “British values.”
The 9/11 Museum’s Biggest Oversight: No Mention of WTC Building 7
By Les Jamieson | sf911truth.org | June 6, 2014
I toured the recently opened 9/11 Museum last night. There is quite a bit to report. The size and scale of the building and many sections are actually impressive. One can see how the general public will be very taken by the entire presentation, and therefore, take what they see as truth.
However, if the original intent of the museum was to pay homage to those who perished, the exhibits are far off the mark. Instead, the creators have co-opted the tragedy to substantiate the official narrative. The museum just solidifies the shock & awe of the events of 9/11, and gives the public a visual and auditory experience that will be firmly etched in their memory far into the future.
There are exhibits on each of the towers. There are photos of their original construction. There were sections of steel columns, elevator parts, and parts of the foundation. There were displays of personal items of those who perished. There were many audio recordings with slide shows being projected of pictures of victims, survivors, and onlookers in a state of terror. There are film clips, and transcripts of conversations from that day. There is an ambulance and a fire truck, which show the damage from the debris. There are videos of the towers on fire. There are even photos of people jumping. Then there are even large videos of the demolition of each tower. But by the time people view these, they’ve been thoroughly distracted and emotionally overcome by the magnitude of the horror people experienced that day, so they cannot recognize the implications of the disintegration and free-fall of 110 stories of steel-framed structures.
There is a section on Osama Bin Laden, the alleged hijackers, Kaleed Sheikh Mohammed, and Al Qaeda. There were two film clips of hijackers passing through the airports. However, the one from Dulles has no time stamp and I think the only other one is actually taken from Portland, ME, not Logan Airport. Nevertheless, people viewing this display were shown exactly who the official narrative wants the blame to be attributed to.
To my surprise, there was even a small section on the public’s questioning of the events. This included photos of people calling for investigations, protestors claiming 9/11 was an inside job, and the cover of Popular Mechanics which supposedly debunked all those “conspiracy theories”. At least the museum planners can attempt to say they were thorough in addressing all of the “focus groups”. But this small section did nothing to go into the broad scope of alternative research based on science and journalistic analysis. If only they had a copy of “The New Pearl Harbor” by David Ray Griffin next to a copy of “Rebuilding America’s Defenses“.
Then, of course, there were quilts, photos, and artifacts that good hearted Americans created in tribute to those who suffered and died. There were photos and statements about how we all came together and rose above the tragedy because we’re resilient and won’t be defeated. After all, we have to keep up our “American exceptionalism”. The framers of the official account took an unspeakable tragedy and turned it into a cause for patriotism.
There was a digital presentation showing the flight paths. There where photos of Shanksville and the Pentagon. But by now you may be noticing there’s a glaring omission to this report. There is nothing on WTC7! I still can’t believe it when the museum covers so much of everything else.
To add further weight to this proposition, just think how the truth about WTC7 actually changes the meaning of everything in the museum! Just think how the entire official narrative caves in on itself. It boggles the mind…
The alternative flyer by Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth is an essential educational tool. The cover looks similar to the official pamphlet, except it says “9/11 Reality: Welcome to the other story about 9/11.” This is the Visitor Guide For Truth Seekers. With the thousands of people visiting the 9/11 Memorial and 9/11 Museum daily, distributing these flyers is a huge opportunity to open the eyes of the public. This is our chance to counter the deliberate distortion of history. I urge us all to meet the challenge.
(sf911truth editor’s note: The headline above was in response to a June 5, 2014 article in Newsweek called “The 9/11 Museum’s Biggest Oversight: The World Trade Center’s Neighborhood“, written by Alexander Nazaryan, which laments the museum’s oversight of including any mention of the historical arabic roots of the part of New York City where the museum now resides. However, we think the oversight of mentioning WTC Building 7, a 47-story tall building that suddenly collapses at free fall speed on 9/11, even though it wasn’t hit by a plane, is the more egregious example of the museum omitting evidence, especially evidence that could lead to people questioning the official narrative.)
Fukushima Is Still a Disaster
By Harvey Wasserman | CounterPunch | June 4, 2014
The corporate media silence on Fukushima has been deafening even though the melted-down nuclear power plant’s seaborne radiation is now washing up on American beaches.
Ever more radioactive water continues to pour into the Pacific.
At least three extremely volatile fuel assemblies are stuck high in the air at Unit 4. Three years after the March 11, 2011, disaster, nobody knows exactly where the melted cores from Units 1, 2 and 3 might be.
Amid a dicey cleanup infiltrated by organized crime, still more massive radiation releases are a real possibility at any time.
Radioactive groundwater washing through the complex is enough of a problem that Fukushima Daiichi owner Tepco has just won approval for a highly controversial ice wall to be constructed around the crippled reactor site. No wall of this scale and type has ever been built, and this one might not be ready for two years. Widespread skepticism has erupted surrounding its potential impact on the stability of the site and on the huge amounts of energy necessary to sustain it. Critics also doubt it would effectively guard the site from flooding and worry it could cause even more damage should power fail.
Meanwhile, children nearby are dying. The rate of thyroid cancers among some 250,000 area young people is more than 40 times normal. According to health expert Joe Mangano, more than 46 percent have precancerous nodules and cysts on their thyroids. This is “just the beginning” of a tragic epidemic, he warns.
There is, however, some good news—exactly the kind the nuclear power industry does not want broadcast.
When the earthquake and consequent tsunami struck Fukushima, there were 54 commercial reactors licensed to operate in Japan, more than 12 percent of the global total.
As of today, not one has reopened. The six at Fukushima Daiichi will never operate again. Some 30 older reactors around Japan can’t meet current safety standards (a reality that could apply to 60 or more reactors that continue to operate here in the U.S.).
As part of his desperate push to reopen these reactors, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has shuffled the country’s regulatory agencies, and removed at least one major industry critic, replacing him with a key industry supporter.
But last month a Japanese court denied a corporate demand to restart two newer reactors at the Ooi power plant in Fukui prefecture. The judges decided that uncertainty about when, where and how hard the inevitable next earthquake will hit makes it impossible to guarantee the safety of any reactor in Japan.
In other words, no reactor can reopen in Japan without endangering the nation, which the court could not condone.
Such legal defeats are extremely rare for Japan’s nuclear industry, and this one is likely to be overturned. But it dealt a stunning blow to Abe’s pro-nuke agenda.
In Fukushima’s wake, the Japanese public has become far more anti-nuclear. Deep-seated anger has spread over shoddy treatment and small compensation packages given downwind victims. In particular, concern has spread about small children being forced to move back into heavily contaminated areas around the plant.
Under Japanese law, local governments must approve any restart. Anti-nuclear candidates have been dividing the vote in recent elections, but the movement may be unifying and could eventually overwhelm the Abe administration.
A new comic book satirizing the Fukushima cleanup has become a nationwide best-seller. The country has also been rocked by revelations that some 700 workers fled the Fukushima Daiichi site at the peak of the accident. Just a handful of personnel were left to deal with the crisis, including the plant manager, who soon thereafter died of cancer.
In the meantime, Abe’s infamous, intensely repressive state secrets act has seriously constrained the flow of technical information. At least one nuclear opponent is being prosecuted for sending a critical tweet to an industry supporter. A professor jailed for criticizing the government’s handling of nuclear waste has come to the U.S. to speak.
The American corporate media have been dead silent or, alternatively, dismissive about the radiation now washing up on our shores, and about the extremely dangerous job of bringing intensely radioactive fuel rods down from their damaged pools.
Fukushima’s General Electric reactors feature spent fuel pools perched roughly 100 feet in the air. When the tsunami hit, thousands of rods were suspended over Units 1, 2, 3 and 4.
According to nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen, the bring-down of the assemblies in Unit 4 may have hit a serious snag. Gundersen says that beginning in November 2013, Tokyo Electric Power removed about half of the suspended rods there. But at least three assemblies may be stuck. The more difficult half of the pile remains. And the pools at three other units remain problematic. An accident at any one of them could result in significant radiation releases, which have already far exceeded those from Chernobyl and from the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
At least 300 tons of heavily contaminated Fukushima water still pour daily into the Pacific. Hundreds more tons are backed up on site, with Tepco apologists advocating they be dumped directly into the ocean without decontamination.
Despite billions of dollars in public aid, Tepco is still the principal owner of Fukushima. The “cleanup” has become a major profit center. Tepco boasted a strong return in 2013. Its fellow utilities are desperate to reopen other reactors that netted them huge annual cash flow.
Little of this has made its way into the American corporate media.
New studies from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission have underscored significant seismic threats to American commercial nuclear sites. Among those of particular concern are two reactors at Indian Point just north of New York City, which sit near the highly volatile Ramapo Fault, and two at Diablo Canyon, between Los Angeles and San Francisco, directly upwind of California’s Central Valley.
The U.S. industry has also suffered a huge blow at New Mexico’s Waste Isolation Pilot Project. Primarily a military dump, this showcase radioactive waste facility was meant to prove that the industry could handle its trash. No expense was spared in setting it up in the salt caverns of the desert southwest, officially deemed the perfect spot to dump the 70,000 tons of high-level fuel rods now backed up at American reactor sites.
But an explosion and highly significant radiation release at the pilot project last month has contaminated local residents and cast a deep cloud over any future plans to dispose of American reactor waste. The constant industry complaint that the barriers are “political” is absurd.
While the American reactor industry continues to suck billions of dollars from the public treasury, its allies in the corporate media seem increasingly hesitant to cover the news of post-Fukushima Japan.
In reality, those gutted reactors are still extremely dangerous. An angry public, whose children are suffering, has thus far managed to keep all other nukes shut in Japan. If they keep them down permanently, it will be a huge blow to the global nuke industry—one you almost certainly won’t see reported in the American corporate media.
Elections in Syria: The People Say No to Foreign Intervention
By Ajamu Baraka | Black Agenda Report | June 4, 2014
Defying threats of violence, tens of thousands of ordinary Syrians went to the polls to cast a vote that was more about Syrian dignity and self-determination than any of the candidates on the ballot. After three years of unimaginable atrocities fomented by a demented and dying U.S. empire, with the assistance of the royalist monarchies of the Middle East and the gangster states of NATO, the Syrian people demonstrated, by their participation, that they had not surrendered their national sovereignty to the geo-strategic interests of the U.S. and its colonial allies in Europe and Israel.
The dominant narrative on Syria, carefully cultivated by Western state propagandists and dutifully disseminated by their auxiliaries in the corporate media, is that the conflict in Syria is a courageous fight on the part of the majority of the Syrian people against the brutal dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad. As the story goes, the al-Assad “regime,” (it is never referred to as a government), can only maintain its power through the use of force. By attacking “its own citizens,” the regime, representing the minority Alawite community, can only maintain its dominance over the rest of the country through sheer terror.
However, events in Syria, with the election being a dramatic example, continue to reveal fissures in that story.
First, it became clear that substantial numbers of non-Alawite people and communities support the government. And even those elements of Syrian society that were not enthusiastic supporters of the government grew to understand that the legitimate indigenous opposition had been displaced by powerful non-Syrian forces from the U.S. and the Gulf States who provided material, political and diplomatic support to an opposition that not only had tenuous ties to the country but seemed only committed to waging war. This convinced many that the only politically consistent option was to support the government, as an expression of support for Syria’s sovereignty and its’ national project.
As a result, not only did popular support for the government hold over the last three years of carnage, it expanded to include those in the opposition who were against the destruction of the country and the slimy Syrian ex-pats who traveled from one European capital to another begging for the U.S. and NATO to do what it did in Libya – destroy the infrastructure of the country through the use of NATO air power and flood the country with weapons.
But the most graphic undermining of the dominant Western narrative has been the participation of tens of thousands of ordinary Syrians who have braved threats and violence to participate in the election process.
Western corporate news outlets, especially in the U.S., were unable to explain the huge turnout of Syrian refugees voting in Lebanon preceding the election on Tuesday, so they just decided not to cover it. Images of Syrians displaced by war yet backing al Assad for president did not support the carefully crafted story that the only people fleeting war were those who had been terrorized to do so by the government.
Instead, the U.S. press raised the question of the “legitimacy” of elections taking place in a country involved in a “civil war,” a position consistent with their narrative of the war being one between the Syrian people and the government as opposed to what it has turned out to be – a war largely being fought by foreign forces, with the indigenous opposition forces allied with the feckless Syrian National Coalition; isolated, out-gunned and militarily irrelevant.
And while the U.S. press uncritically propagated the position of the U.S. state, which wrote off the election as illegitimate and a farce, the media seemed not to notice the contradictory position of the U.S. writing off the election in Syria because of conflict but giving enthusiastic support to the election in Ukraine in the midst of a conflict and contested legitimacy. The Western media could explore a few obvious questions if it was really independent, such as: what makes the election in Ukraine legitimate when half of the country boycotts the vote and the national army violently attacks its own citizens in Eastern Ukraine who refused to recognize the legitimacy of the coup-makers in Kiev?
Other questions might be: if they deem it appropriate to support an election in Ukraine, why would the Obama Administration violently oppose elections in Syria, especially if, as it claims, the majority of the people oppose the current government? Wouldn’t the illegitimacy of the government in Syria be confirmed by the low turnout, even in areas where there was a modicum of security? If Syrian authorities organized opportunities for displaced Syrians in various countries around the world to vote and very few participated, wouldn’t that verify the Administration’s position that the al Assad government lacks popular support?
Yet in various European capitals and other countries like Turkey, United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Egypt, efforts were made to block the opportunity for displaced Syrians to vote in their election – why? Were the authorities afraid that the narrative of non-support for al Assad might be challenged if there was a proliferation of images like the ones that came out of Lebanon showing thousands of Syrians marching to the polls holding signs of Bashar al Assad?
It will be interesting to see how the authorities and their spokespeople in the corporate media spin the voting process in Syria.
The U.S. position is a position of continued war in Syria
Secretary of State John Kerry declared that Syria’s presidential election was a “farce,” and that the U.S. and its partners are prepared to quickly redouble efforts to support opposition forces in the county. The meaning of this position is that it does not matter what kind of public display of support is given to al Assad or anyone who might emerge as the head of state in Syria, the U.S. objective is more death, more war and more chaos.
This is the essence of the “new” global strategy unveiled by President Obama during his foreign policy speech at West Point last week. The U.S. declaration that it will “change the dynamics on the ground in Syria” came out of a meeting of the so-called “Friends of Syria,” a motley collection of 11 Western colonial nations and their Arab creations. The Obama Administration intends to work through these kinds of regional formations and alliances to advance its strategic objectives with as minimal a cost to the U.S. as possible. Of course, the interests and desires of the states or peoples involved are of secondary concern. The desire on the part of the majority of the people to end the conflict in Syria is not even considered. As part of the effort to secure public support in the U.S. for destabilizing and then attacking Syria it was posited that by deposing the al Assad government a real democracy can be introduced. That is why policymakers pretended to back so-called moderate elements that support democracy. But over the last year or so, even that proposal has been eliminated. Democracy in Syria is as much a threat to U.S. imperialist interests as it is in Ukraine – and increasingly even in the U.S.
Policymakers in Washington and London have already made the shift to supporting what are being called “moderate” Islamists forces grouped around the Islamic Front (IF) with al Nusrah, al Qaeda’s official Syrian affiliate, operating in the background. The problem for the Syrian people is that these moderates the west is supporting are Salafi-Wahhabi fundamentalists who reject representative democracy and support the imposition of sharia law in Syria. So while the U.S. and their allies characterize the election in Syria a farce, their solution is to back forces who would eliminate even the pretext of democratic participation. This is the progress that is being imposed on the secular, pluralist society of Syria by the Western “liberators.”
It is not about al Assad, it is about the people of Syria and imperialism:
Questions of democratic legitimacy have never determined U.S. relationships with any state where the U.S. had strategic and economic interests. If a commitment to democracy and democratic governance was the determining factor for U.S. support, the Obama Administration would not be in alliance with the dictatorship of the royalists in the Gulf states, it would have condemned the coups in Honduras and Egypt, not given diplomatic or economic support to the coup in Ukraine, and would not be supporting right-wing elements in Venezuela attempting to destabilize the democratically-elected government in that country.
There was a time when this position would have been clear to the peace and anti-war, anti-imperialist progressive and left movements in the U.S. and the West. But over the last two decades, with the ideological infiltration of the left by liberalism, social democracy and the rightist tendencies of “anti-authoritarian” anarchism, the resulting political confusion has seen a consistent alignment of the left with the imperial project of the U.S. – from the attacks on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia through to attacks on nationalist projects throughout the global South, from Libya to Syria. Since the last gasp of anti-imperialism solidarity represented by the massive marches in opposition to the illegal attack on Iraq in 2003, the peace, anti-war and anti-imperialist movements have been in relative disarray.
This disarray and ineffectiveness is taking place right at the historical moment when in order to maintain its global hegemony, the colonial/capitalist West has decided to revert to what it does best – spread death and destruction. For those of us who understand our responsibility situated, as we are, at the center of this monstrosity called the U.S., we have to strip away the veneer of humanitarianism that hides the ugly inner logic of domination and we have to “struggle” – a term now passé for the hip post-modern nihilist left.
When a people, like the people of Syria, demonstrate their commitment to the integrity of their own national experience in opposition to the efforts of the imperialist states that we reside in, the only principled position we can take is to stand in solidarity with those people, no matter how we see the internal contradictions of that nation/state. The people of Syria have said no to foreign intervention. Those of us in the imperialist West, can we do anything less?
Ajamu Baraka, a long-time human rights activist and organizer, is an editor and contributing columnist for Black Agenda Report. Baraka can be reached at info.abaraka@gmail.com and http://www.AjamuBaraka.com
Media Distortions on the Syrian Elections
By Rick Sterling | CounterPunch | June 3, 2014
US Secretary of State Kerry has pronounced the Syrian election to be a “farce”. As if on cue, National Public Radio, Associated Press, ABC and other western media have presented stories which support that claim. A closer look reveals the media has been exaggerating, distorting and lying about the Syrian elections.
Following are a few examples from the past few days.
Example 1. “Thousands Flee before Syrian Elections” by Bassem Mroue, AP
On Saturday May 31 Associated Press distributed a story claiming that thousands of Syrian civilians have “fled government-held Syrian cities”. In my local newspaper there is an accompanying photo showing youth on a truck, photographed from behind. The impression to the casual viewer will be that these are some of the people fleeing. But the reality is the opposite: the photo shows youth enthusiastically encouraging voting in the election and flashing peace signs. Far from “fleeing”, they are driving around town expressing their enthusiasm for the election.
Where is the evidence to back up the AP claim? It’s all “according to opposition activists”. That’s it, no other evidence.
Contrary to the claim of this AP story, many people are flooding INTO Syria to vote in the election. There are Syrians flying from all over the globe to return home to vote. There are dozens of Syrian Americans from southern California flying there to vote.
Example 2. “How Fair can a Vote be in a War Zone?” , Frederick Pleitgen, CNN
This CNN story reports that opposition and Western countries “say it’s impossible to hold a vote when rebels are holding much of the north and east of the country. And they say the election won’t be free or fair, that it will be rigged and Assad declared the winner.” The CNN story fails to include such relevant information as:
a) Elections have recently been held in Afghanistan, Iraq and Ukraine where there are also conflicts and areas beyond the government control. The response of the US was not to dismiss the election but to congratulate the government and people!
b) The US held its 1864 election in the midst of the US Civil War.
As to the final claim about election rigging, that is simple propaganda without evidence. Perhaps CNN does not refer to polling or surveys because credible polls , including those contracted by Doha Qatar and NATO, have consistently shown Assad having wide support.
Example 3. ”Syria Election: Experts Weigh In” Voice of America , Cecily Hilleary, June 2, 2014
In this VOA report the “experts” have clearly been selected with bias. Only one of the eight is not vehemently anti-Assad. The “experts” proceed to voice all sorts of nonsense. For example Zaher Sahloul says the Syrian government is “targeting the healthcare system”. For a reality check interested readers can view the video of rebels blowing up of the Kindi Hospital in Aleppo. To the cries of Alahu Akhbar we see the truck slowly drive up the road and then blow up the new hospital which was to be a model for Syria. Sahloul continues as follows: “Syrians who are lucky enough to stay alive or be spared from displacement will have no choice but to vote and vote frequently for the ’exceptional’ leader”. This is untrue. There is no requirement to vote, nor is there any way to determine how a person votes if they do. It’s a secret ballot. Sahloul’s claim is part of the stream of false rumors and claims, assertions without evidence.
Example 4. “Five Things to Know about Tuesday’s Election in Syria“, ABC News, by Zeina Karam AP
According to this article “The election is an indication the civil war is likely to last a long time.” On the contrary, if the election confirms that the Syrian government has significant popular support, it will further undermine the credibility of the armed opposition and lead to ENDING the armed conflict. That, of course, is what they are worried about.
Another claim in this article is that “The so-called internal Syrian opposition groups … are also boycotting.” This is not true. The non-violent opposition parties and groups are actively participating in the election.
The article further claims that “About 2.5 million Syrian refugees are scattered across neighboring countries. Most of them have been either excluded or are boycotting the balloting.” This is not true. Those refugees who crossed the border into Lebanon or Jordan with passports stamped had their voting day last Wednesday May 28. The turnout of Syrians in exile was huge, greatly exceeding the expectations.
Those refugees who fled across the border over the past few years and only have their national ID card, were expected to vote at polling stations on the Syrian side of the border on election day June 3.
However in the wake of the massive turnout last Wednesday, the US allied Lebanese “Future Movement” has in the last 48 hours enacted a new law which will PREVENT Syrian refugees from voting on Tuesday! The law will not allow the refugees to return to their camp if they cross over into Syria to vote. It’s the Lebanese government, not the Syrian government, which is excluding the vote of Syrian refugees.
In summary, Syrian citizens abroad are not being allowed to vote in countries like USA and Canada where the Syrian Embassies have been shut down. They are not being allowed to vote in European countries such as Germany, Belgium and France where the host countries have prohibited voting. And now the refugees in Lebanon are not being allowed to cross into Syria to vote. The claims of the article are untrue. It’s the western powers and their allies who are preventing Syrians from voting.
WHAT IS AT STAKE
John Kerry and those seeking regime change in Damascus know the significance of the Syrian elections. That’s why Kerry has been so crude and forceful in his denunciation. The media, as in the past, has fallen into line and failed to report objectively.
The Syrian people, both those in the country and those abroad, also know the meaning of the election. That’s why they went in massive numbers in Beirut. That’s why Syrians have traveled from many countries around the globe, going to vote in their homeland. And that’s why it will be interesting to see how many boycott the election in Syria vs. how many vote. One thing is clear: We won’t find out from the mainstream media or their followers.
Rick Sterling is a founding member of Syria Solidarity Movement. He was in Damascus, Latakia and Homs in April with the International Peace Pilgrimage. He can be emailed at rsterling1@gmail.com
Left Forum Conference Ignores US-NATO Genocide
By Jay Janson | Dissident Voice | June 3, 2014
The Left Forum’s tenth annual conference was held this year at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, part of the City University of New York. Left Forum describes itself as “convening “the largest annual conference of a broad spectrum of left and progressive intellectuals, activists, academics, organizations and the interested public.”
The rather enigmatic theme for Left Forum 2014 was “Reform and/or Revolution: Imagining a World of Transformative Justice,” but one heard no mention of justice for the victims of sixty-nine years of US-NATO genocide presently ongoing in a dozen Muslim nations in the Middle-East and Africa as being a reason for either “reform” or “revolution.” The entire focus of the three day event, save in a a very small number of the three-hundred-and-eighty panel/workshops, was on “reform and/or revolution” to benefit Americans in America.
For this writer, the actual theme of Left Forum 2014 seems to have been: Martin Luther King was Wrong!: Americans CAN make a better America WHILE still continuing to kill the poor overseas in spite of the cost in human and financial resources that SHALL NOT stop Americans from making progress on social and justice issues at home.
Martin Luther King Jr. said:
I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. So, I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such. “I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly … for the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence. … Somehow this madness must cease. We must stop now. … I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. I speak … for the poor of America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home, and … in sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportion relative to the rest of the population.
A few years ago there was a shining moment in that struggle. It seemed as if there was a real promise of hope for the poor — both black and white — through the poverty program. There were experiments, hopes, new beginnings. Then … I watched this program broken and eviscerated, as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war.
Martin Luther King cried out, “For the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence I cannot be silent!”
But Cornel West, now of New York Theological Seminary, the keynote speaker at Left Forum 2014’s Opening Plenary, and Harry Belafonte and Angela Davis, who spoke at its Feature Event, were silent on the sixty-seven years of US-NATO genocide overseas, the ongoing US-NATO slaughter of Muslims in a dozen nations in the Middle East and Africa and the covert violence around the world for “unjust predatory investments” that Rev. King condemned. Amazingly, their cries and exhortations were to fight for justice for Americans at home. Left Forum 2014 was a truly an ‘America First’ proposition.
All three most beloved African American celebrities of the Left railed against the injustices suffered by African Americans, Native Turtle Islanders, Latin Americans, and non-heterosexuals (including one supposes those returning from military duty in one or the more of the nations under military occupation or attack, and from US military bases in more than a hundred and fifty nations.)
The shouting was mainly about getting a better deal for Americans in America, Americans who King had held responsible for atrocity wars and covert genocide on three continents since 1945. Yours truly was uncomfortably aware that he sat in a college gymnasium filled with knowledgeable people, who, by virtue of their anti-government stance and protests, felt themselves innocent of the massive atrocities that King held himself responsible for, along with his fellow Americans.
Perhaps the most galling pill to swallow was the presence on stage of progressive media Democracy Now director Amy Goodman, long committed to false reporting to destroy the government and the population that supports it in Syria, having had a dedication to the destruction of beautiful, democratic and prosperous Libya and third world hero Muammar Gaddafi, and to dutiful backing of the Orange, Green and now Ukrainian “revolutions” sponsored by CNN and arranged by CIA and its many foreign branches.
I was gratified to find that quite a few panel facilitators and speakers at the three day conference were very knowledgeable and outspoken about the perfidy and treachery of Amy Goodman — and just as angry about her role in contributing to the death and maiming of so many innocent citizens by disseminating false propaganda in support of US-NATO bombings and funding of terror.
In fact, the panels I sought out were run and attended by dedicated scholars well aware of the traitorous nature of so many of those who pride themselves in being leftists and progressives critical, or even damning, of their government without realizing that not working firstly to stop the carnage of US-NATO deadly military operations and CIA’s equally deadly covert activities makes Leftists and Progressives more responsible for the genocide continuing than anyone else. For as the segment of society most informed about the horror of American actions overseas, yet refraining from referring to them as prosecutable crimes against humanity, not calling for their prosecution, and not seeking justice for America’s victims, makes such intellectuals, professors, historians and journalists accessories after the fact, even in some cases before the fact, for backhandedly protecting criminals in hindering the arrest and bringing to justice of all fellow Americans responsible. … Full article
Seymour Hersh: liar and pro-fascist propagandist?
Interventions Watch | June 3, 2014
On 19th December 2013, the London Review of Books published an article by Seymour Hersh, entitled ‘The Red Line and the Rat Line’, which challenged the Obama administration’s claims that only the Assad regime could have been responsible for the chemical weapon attacks in Ghouta on August 21st 2013.
The article attracted a lot of criticism and attempted ‘debunkings’, some of which I blogged about here.
The latest attempted ‘debunking’ comes from Muhammad Idrees Ahmad, an author and journalist, and has been published in the L.A. Review of Books.
It’s being widely circulated among those who have long been critical of Hersh’s claims in regards to Ghouta, with – for example – Peter Bouckaert of Human Rights Watch tweeting:
Thank u @im_PULSE 4 revealing Sy Hersh’s lies re Ghouta CW attack–we stand by @hrw findings of Assad resp. http://www.hrw.org/reports/2013/09/10/attacks-ghouta …
I agree: Sy Hersh’s @LRB writing on Ghouta chemical weapons attack = distortions of a propagandist, not journalism. http://lareviewofbooks.org/essay/dangerous-method-syria-sy-hersh-art-mass-crime-revisionism# …
Not only is Hersh being accused of being wrong, then, but he’s being accused of being both a liar and a propagandist – a couple of very serious, and potentially libellous, accusations.
For Bouckaert to justify making such serious allegations against Hersh, Ahmad’s article would have to demonstrate conclusively that Hersh is both a liar and a propagandist. And in my opinion, it fails to do so.
Let’s just deal with some of the claims made against Hersh:
1. Claims of Responsibility
Ahmad writes that:
Hersh claims that the Assad regime was innocent of the August 21 massacre, that indeed the attack was carried out by the Islamist rebel group Jabhat al-Nusra, as part of what Hersh’s source describes as “a covert action planned by [Turkish Prime Minister Recep] Erdoğan’s people to push Obama over the red line.”
This is Ahmad’s first error, and one that is commonly made among those seeking to ‘debunk’ Hersh.
Hersh is not in fact saying that the regime was innocent, and that the rebels were to blame, and has clarified this on a number of occasions.
In an interview with Mint Press News in April 2014, he said that:
No one is saying they know what happened . . . We don’t know.
In an interview with Democracy Now! in December 2013, he said that:
I certainly don’t know who did what, but there’s no question my government does not.
And in an interview with Almayadeen in April 2014, he said that (starts at 21:54):
I am not saying I know that one particular unit . . . we know nothing about who did what. Was there an Al Nusrah wing that did it? Was it done by a rogue unit of the Syrian army? Maybe, who knows? I’m not ruling out . . . I’m just saying what the President was told by the Joint Chiefs: the Sarin that we found was not military grade.
So Ahmad starts off by attributing an opinion to Hersh that he’s never actually held, and that he has openly denied holding on at least three separate occasions. Ahmad continues to repeat the error throughout the rest of the article.
Hersh is instead saying that there are people within the U.S. Intelligence community who suspect rebel culpability; who believe certain rebel groups have the capability to manufacture Sarin; and that this therefore directly contradicts the Obama administration’s initial claims that only Assad and Assad alone could have been responsible.
2. U.N Reports
In his article, Hersh relays claims that Sarin samples collected on the ground in Ghouta by a Russian agent were later tested by British defence scientists at Porton Down. These scientists apparently concluded that ‘the gas used didn’t match the batches known to exist in the Syrian army’s chemical weapons arsenal’, and so a message was relayed to the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff ‘that the case against Syria wouldn’t hold up’.
In response, Ahmad quotes a U.N. report from February 2014. Here is what Ahmad says exactly:
Samples were also recovered from the site by the UN. Hersh makes no mention of these. Whatever discoveries Porton Down might have made, they were superseded by what the UN inspectors extracted and studied first hand. The UN’s remit did not include assigning responsibility, but its judgment leaves little room for doubt. The perpetrators, it concludes, “had access to the chemical weapons stockpile of the Syrian military, as well as the expertise and equipment necessary to manipulate safely large amount of chemical agents.”
And here is what that U.N. report says in full:
The evidence available concerning the nature, quality and quantity of the agents used on 21 August indicated that the perpetrators likely had access to the chemical weapons stockpile of the Syrian military, as well as the expertise and equipment necessary to manipulate safely large amount of chemical agents.
http://www.globalr2p.org/media/files/a-hrc-25-65_en.pdf – p.19 (emphasis mine)
As you can see, Ahmad leaves the words ‘indicated’ and ‘likely’ out of the quote, perhaps because they’re qualifiers and do in fact suggest a degree of doubt.
That reading is strengthened by what the report says three paragraphs later. Namely, and in regards to allegations of chemical weapon usage in Syria in general, that:
In no incident was the commission’s evidentiary threshold met with regard to the perpetrator.
Again, if the U.N. are themselves saying that the evidentiary threshold has not been met in regards to the perpetrator, then quite a significant degree of doubt *is* suggested.
Ahmad then moves onto the alleged chemical weapon attack in Khan al-Assal in March 2013. Hersh quotes an anonymous source from the U.N. as saying that:
Investigators interviewed the people who were there, including the doctors who treated the victims. It was clear that the rebels used the gas. It did not come out in public because no one wanted to know
Ahmad again responds by quoting the U.N. report from February, which says:
Concerning the incident in Khan Al-Assal on 19 March, the chemical agents used in that attack bore the same unique hallmarks as those used in Al-Ghouta.
He then accuses Hersh of not having read the report.
But the report doesn’t pin the blame on the regime, does it? It just says the chemical agents allegedly used had the same hallmarks as those used in Ghouta – an attack for which, like all the others, no ‘evidentiary threshold was met with regard to the perpetrator’.
Further to this, a previous and more indepth U.N. report, released in December 2013, had said of the Khan al-Assal attacks that there is:
credible information that corroborates the allegations that chemical weapons were used in Khan Al Asal on 19 March 2013 against soldiers and civilians
https://unoda-web.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/report.pdf – p.19 (emphasis mine)
A reasonable question to ask here might be ‘Why would the Syrian regime gas its own soldiers?’.
And for what it’s worth, Hersh’s anonymous U.N. source is not the only person from that organisation who has pointed the finger of suspicion at rebel groups, in regards to chemical weapon attacks carried out in the early part of 2013.
Carla Del Ponte, one of the overseers of the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Syria, was reported as saying in May 2013 that:
According to their report of last week, which I have seen, there are strong, concrete suspicions but not yet incontrovertible proof of the use of sarin gas, from the way the victims were treated . . . I was a little bit stupefied by the first indications we got . . . they were about the use of nerve gas by the opposition.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-22424188
Ahmad is entitled to his interpretation of the February 2014 report, and I would agree that it does, to an extent, look damning for the regime.
But he has clearly stripped all of the qualifiers out of the report he is quoting, which do indeed leave room for doubt. He then – at least in regards to the Khan al-Assal attack – ignores previous U.N. reports, and quotes from named and senior U.N. officials, which, in turn, look damning for the rebels.
Ahmad then quotes Hersh as saying, in regards to the U.N. team who investigated the Ghouta attack, that:
[Their] access to the attack sites, which came five days after the gassing, had been controlled by rebel forces
This quote actually comes from Hersh’s first LRB article on the chemical weapon attacks in Ghouta, ‘Whose Sarin?’, which was published in December 2013.
In Ahmad’s reading, this is Hersh ‘suggesting that the UN may have been constrained by the presence of the rebels’, while neglecting to mention that, in Ahmad’s words, ‘the visit “came five days after the gassing” because the regime refused access to the sites and instead subjected them to unrelenting artillery fire‘.
Ahmad, on the basis of this, accuses Hersh of employing ‘the distortion of a propagandist’.
Another way of looking at Hersh’s sentence is that it is simply true.
The U.N. investigative teams access to the affected areas had indeed been controlled by rebel forces, as the report itself says. Here is the relevant passage:
A leader of the local opposition forces who was deemed prominent in the area to be visited by the Mission, was identified and requested to take ‘custody’ of the Mission. The point of contact within the opposition was used to ensure the security and movement of the Mission, to facilitate the access to the most critical cases/witnesses to be interviewed and sampled by the Mission and to control patients and crowd in order for the Mission to focus on its main activities’.
Hersh’s article also quoted the part of the U.N. report which says that:
‘During the time spent at these locations, individuals arrived carrying other suspected munitions indicating that such potential evidence is being moved and possibly manipulated’.
The report, then, is clear: the teams access to the affected areas was controlled by the opposition, and the team also had concerns about the potential moving and/or manipulation of evidence.
Hersh doesn’t misrepresent or distort the report in any way.
The most Ahmad can pin on Hersh is that he didn’t outline why there was a five day delay in getting to the affected areas, but frankly, it’s weak tea indeed, and in no way justifies the description of ‘distortion’ and ‘propaganda’.
3. Technical claims
Ahmad takes issue with Hersh’s use, in an interview with Democracy Now!, of the phrase ‘kitchen sarin’, writing that:
one would also have to accept Hersh’s related claim that sarin can be produced in a kitchen. Bashar al-Assad shares this view, but chemical weapons experts understandably disagree. Sarin is a deadly substance; its production is a substantial technical, financial, and logistical undertaking. It is not the kind of thing one can conceal in a house; nor is it something one can load into homemade rockets using kitchen gloves.
But it’s clear from the full quote that Hersh is not saying that he thinks sarin can be ‘produced in a kitchen’. Here is the full quote:
And so, the Brits came to us with samples of sarin, and they were very clear there was a real problem with these samples, because they did not reflect what the Brits know and we know, the Russians knew, everybody knew, is inside the Syrian arsenal. They have—professionals armies have additives to sarin that make it more persistent, easier to use. The amateur stuff, they call it kitchen sarin, sort of a cold phrase.
The phrase ‘kitchen sarin’, then, is being used as a slang term to distinguish professionally manufactured sarin from ‘the amateur stuff’. I very much doubt it was intended to be taken literally, or that Hersh seriously believes sarin can be knocked up on a stove with a few pots and pans.
There is then an overview of the debate regarding the launch points of the rockets used in the Ghouta attacks, and about who is in possession of such rockets.
This basically pits Ted Postol, a well regarded defence technology expert at MIT, and Richard Lloyd, a former UN weapons inspector, against Eliot Higgins, a British blogger renowned as an expert on the munitions used in the Syrian conflict.
Postol and Lloyd are the main sources for Hersh’s technical claims, and Ahmad himself concedes that ‘They have produced valuable analyses on the payloads and ranges of the rockets used on August 21′, and that ‘There is little reason to doubt their expertise in this area’.
I’m not going to attempt to analyse the competing claims and counter-claims in this regard, because i’m not qualified to do so.
But Hersh relying on the expertise of Postol and Lloyd in making some of his claims in regards to the technical aspects of the attack doesn’t strike me as being particularly outrageous. They may be right, they may be wrong, but they are competent and credible sources.
However, Ahmad then accuses Ted Postol of a ‘determination to validate’ Seymour Hersh’s work, and in doing this, ignoring ‘all evidence that undermines them’. He quotes Emile Durkheim as calling this the ‘ideological method’, defined as ‘the use of “notions to govern the collation of facts, rather than deriving notions from them”.
But Postol himself has said that when he first started investigating the attacks, he was sure that no-one but the regime could have been responsible. To quote Postel himself:
My view when I started this process was that it couldn’t be anything but the Syrian government behind the attack. But now I’m not sure of anything.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/01/15/214656/new-analysis-of-rocket-used-in.html
If anything then, Postol’s trajectory has been the exact opposite of the one Ahmad attributes to him. When he started his investigations, he was sure that the regime was culpable, and that Hersh was wrong. But the facts he uncovered in the course of that investigation lead him to doubt and then discard his initial hunches.
That doesn’t stop Ahmad essentially dismissing some of his work as ideologically motivated.
Ahmad then accuses Hersh of a similar ideological motivation, saying that:
He ignores or obfuscates established facts that contradict his theory: the fact that the delivery system used in the attacks is peculiar to the regime, or that the UN has established that the sarin could only have come from government stockpiles
But you could argue that it is Ahmad who is obfuscating here.
The UN has never categorically reported ‘that the sarin could only have come from government stockpiles’, saying only that the perpetrators ‘likely’ had access to government stockpiles, but that the evidentiary threshold in regards to the perpetrators hasn’t been met.
Postol and Lloyd are both of the opinion that the ‘delivery system used’ could have been manufactured by a rebel group, and needn’t be peculiar to the regime.
Ahmad himself also ignores other evidence – such as Carla Del Ponte’s claims, or that regime soldiers appear to have been targeted in some cases – that points to rebel culpability for at least some of the chemical weapon attacks in Syria.
Ahmad finishes by wondering whether Hersh is just ‘credulous’, or whether ‘something less benign is at play’.
He basically accuses Hersh of wanting to see Assad retain his chemical arsenal, based on this paragraph from ‘Whose Sarin?’:
While the Syrian regime continues the process of eliminating its chemical arsenal, the irony is that, after Assad’s stockpile of precursor agents is destroyed, al-Nusra and its Islamist allies could end up as the only faction inside Syria with access to the ingredients that can create sarin, a strategic weapon that would be unlike any other in the war zone’.
Ahmad calls this ‘a dog-whistle case for Assad keeping his arsenal’, and expresses astonishment that LRB would publish it.
But I don’t see it as anything of the sort. Ahmad’s reading of Hersh here is, at best, tenuous and uncharitable, and at worst an outright smear that is the polar opposite of Hersh’s stated beliefs.
In his December 2013 interview with Democracy Now!, for example, Hersh said in regards to Obama’s acceptance of the Russian brokered disarmament deal:
He (Obama) decides overnight to go to Congress, and then he accepts a very rational deal—and I’m glad he did—that the Russians put forward, with the Syrians, to dispose of the chemical arsenal or the chemicals that are in Syria.
http://www.democracynow.org/2013/12/9/seymour_hersh_obama_cherry_picked_intelligence
So Hersh thinks the deal was ‘very rational’, and he is ‘glad’ Obama accepted it. Some ‘dog whistle’.
In summary, then, these are the most obvious and immediate errors and misrepresentations I found in Ahmad’s article:
1. That Hersh thinks the rebels were to blame for the attacks in Ghouta. This is flatly false, as Hersh’s own words show, and is not the point he’s making at all. Ahmad gets the basic premise of Hersh’s argument – which is that doubt over culpability exists where the Obama administration insists there is none – completely wrong.
2. That Hersh misrepresents, obfuscates or ignores U.N. reports to make his case. Again, this isn’t true, and if anything it’s Ahmad who has selectively quoted some U.N. reports, while totally ignoring others/senior U.N. officials, to make it look like they’re categorically blaming the regime.
3. That Hersh is wrong in regards to the technical claims, and that his sources are ideologically motivated.
All I can say is that it’s clear the technical debate is still raging, and that Hersh has some very credible sources on his side – one of whom, despite Ahmad’s insinuations, actually started his investigations convinced that the regime was to blame, and that Hersh was wrong.
It should also be noted that Ahmad’s own main source, Brown Moses, is far from infallible, and is less qualified and less experienced than both Postol and Lloyd.
4. That Hersh might not just be well meaning if wrong, and instead has another agenda, such as wanting Assad to keep his chemical weapon stockpile. This is based on the most uncharitable reading of Hersh’s work possible, is extremely tenuous, and is directly contradicted by Hersh’s own words.
Ahmad finishes by saying:
By now even the most dogmatic among Hersh’s publishers must have realized that they were hoaxed. Their ideological proclivities and eagerness for clicks made the deception easier. They got played — they relayed what is in effect pro-fascist propaganda.
And while this may ultimately turn out to be true, he doesn’t come anywhere near close to demonstrating it to be the case.
Nor is there any convincing evidence presented of Hersh being a liar or a propagandist, as opposed to just conveying claims from his sources that are potentially dishonest or mistaken.
But for those who are desperate to see Hersh discredited if not destroyed, I suppose it’ll have to do until the next attempt.
“They want to start a religious war; we want to extinguish it” – Mufti of Syria
By Eva Bartlett | Crescent International | June 1, 2014
Leading figures in Syria such as the Mufti of Syria who lost his own son to a terrorist attack, want to extinguish the fires of hatred. The overwhelming majority of Syrians agree, isolating the foreign-backed mercenaries inside and outside Syria.
Most news accounts of Syria paint a desolate, sectarian picture of the country where people in areas secured by the Syrian army are miserable and where people, above all, want to see President Bashar al-Asad gone. During my visit, I found the exact opposite. In particular, I found widespread, and usually ardent, support for the president.
I entered Syria as part of an international Peace Delegation, comprising more than 40 people who believe in a political, Syrian-led solution for Syria. In the course of one week, we visited Latakia, Homs, and areas of Damascus, sat with the top religious leaders and numerous grassroots leaders. We heard testimonies from survivors of massacres — Haram, Kasab, Maaloula — and met with various internally-displaced from Yarmouk.
After the week had passed, I stayed on independently, moving freely on my own throughout Damascus, engaging with various strata of Damascene life.
The streets of the three cities I saw were far busier and more alive than I had expected possible and, aside from the mortars fired daily by armed insurgents on Damascus and environs, I felt safe and welcomed. All over, I saw groups of mixed faiths comfortably chatting, sharing meals and shisha, and proudly answering “I am Syrian” to my taboo question, “Are you Muslim, Druze, Christian…?”
Damascus, unsurprisingly, has upscale shops and historic markets, but also newsstands with papers found in any North American city, including those which have propagandized so heavily against Syria’s government and for the need for Western intervention.
Yarmouk has now, strangely, all but disappeared from mainstream reporting. Is it because the story is old, or because the actions of these armed insurgents controlling vast areas of Yarmouk have been so documented that it is difficult to any longer purvey the standard line: that the government is assaulting its own people? Still suffering under the presence of largely foreign militants, with a heavy presence of Jabhat al-Nusrah, Islamic State in Iraq and Sham (ISIS), and other al-Qaeda affiliated groups there since December 2012, numerous attempts at cease-fire have been foiled. The Palestinians and Syrians (yes, there are Syrians in Yarmouk) continue to need food, medicine, hospitals, and the exit of the armed groups.
At the edge of the camp, where Yarmouk and Palestine streets converge, I could see some of the massive damage: shells of cars, houses and a hospital with walls studded with machine gun bullets and mortars. But venturing beyond the concrete barriers would have been inviting sniper bullets to the head. “For two kilometres in that direction, it’s completely open. If you walk another five meters, you’ll be in the snipers’ scope,” security told me, himself not going any farther.
Abu Kifah Ghazzi, a PFLP spokesman, outlined events of the past two years relating to Yarmouk, noting that there are Palestinians from Yarmouk alongside the Syrian army fighting against the militias and for Yarmouk. I ask about food aid and starving residents. “The civilians are suffering terribly, but the armed gangs have ample food,” he said, adding, “Food aid has entered Yarmouk, but the militias often took it.”
In the most recent attack on aid distribution, on May 13, one person was killed and another injured when a centre for humanitarian aid distribution was targeted, the Daily Star reported. We also visited two different schools now housing displaced Palestinians and Syrians from Yarmouk. Their words were the same. “The terrorists took over the camp, took over our houses, and stole our food. We want the camp back. Tell your governments to tell those terrorists to leave Yarmouk.”
The growing trend of Syrian fighters laying down their arms in exchange for amnesty from the government was most notable in Homs, now secured by the Syrian army. This “Musalahah” (Reconciliation) movement, dubbed the “third way,” looks toward a political solution for Syria.
Amnesty and the laying down of arms doesn’t apply to the over 5,000 foreign fighters, nor have they shown any intention to stop shelling, kidnappings, beheadings and the countless other atrocities largely void from many Western reports on Syria.
As of April 2014, “1416 fighters have laid down their weapons. At first, the fighters were afraid that they would go to jail, but now, every day people are asking for reconciliation. Yesterday 10, the day before 29, I feel that peace is close,” said a priest in Homs. The highest numbers of those laying down weapons are from Homs, a city which was often dubbed in the media as the “heart of the revolution.” It seems these “rebels” realize that the ideology they thought they were fighting for is not shared by their armed takfiri brothers.
The mortars being fired at Damascus by militants in the Jobar district east of Damascus (and until recently the Mliha, now secured by the Syrian army) are not guided, yet they are designed to create maximum damage. One day I got a lesson on mortars from two men in the National Defense Forces (NDF). Most mortars the armed groups are using are homemade. Some have just enough explosives to make them fly, with as many pieces of metal, nails, sharp bits stuffed inside, to cause wider injury when exploded.
Online videos document the insurgents making these crude but deadly shells, and the firing of them toward Damascus. While the Old City has been particularly hard-hit, the mortars also reach central and western areas of Damascus. On April 15, insurgents in Jobar shelled the Manar elementary school, killing one child and injuring at least 60 more. They shelled a kindergarten the same day, injuring three more children. On April 29, four mortars hit Shaghour district, killing 12 students and wounding at least 50.
Deputy-Foreign Minister Faisal al-Miqdad had said earlier this year (January 2014), “In the past 4 months, terrorists fired 12,000 shells,” not including the mortars in other areas of Syria. A friend, a member of Syria’s rugby team, was one day at a match in Beirut, another day in the hospital, injured by shrapnel from these mortar attacks. At the time of his injury, he had been assisting civilians injured in a prior attack in the area.
Staying in Bab Sharqi, the East Gate area of the Old City, I got a more personal lesson on mortars, some as close as 50 metres from where I stayed, a residential area. On another occasion, outside the walls of the Old City, from the direction of insurgent-held Jobar, sniper bullets flew within a few feet of me. So while the city has a secure and strangely normal feel to it, the attacks of these militants are constant.
Driving to Homs, the roads were secured by military checkpoints, cars were searched for explosives and weapons. Evidence of the past three years of fighting is everywhere. In Homs City, I saw the site of a double car bombing just the week prior, which killed 25 civilians. Houses and businesses torn apart, families of martyrs told of the bombings, mid-afternoon, timed one after another, to ensure hitting any rescuers. These people were some of the most ardent supporters of President al-Asad and the Syrian army, again saying al-Asad is the only means of unifying Syria, and the army is protecting them. Having endured years of car-bombings and mercenary snipings, they would know best.
In Latakia, northwest of Damascus and closer to the Turkish border, to some of the current hot spots like Aleppo, I was surprised by the sense of normalcy: people picnicking, busy seaside streets as the Sun set. Lilly Martin, an American 22 years in Syria, mentioned that yes, Latakia is in general safe, but that they are assaulted from afar, from the Turkish border, by long-range missiles.
As Latakia is largely unscathed, it is host to refugees from areas being assaulted by militant groups, including the displaced from the village of Kasab, attacked March 21 by mercenaries originating from, and with the support of Turkey. The mercenaries continue to hold Kasab, and reports cite the desecration of churches there.
In Latakia, Homs, Damascus, and on the roadside, posters of President al-Asad are everywhere… the President in a suit, to the President in army fatigues and sunglasses. The support voiced by the various civilians I met in all three cities is not exclusive to minorities or ‘Alawites or Ba‘th party members. In fact, within Syria, there are a number of registered opposition parties who, while seeking change in the country, support President al-Asad.
At a joint meeting with the peace delegation, I met members of six different leftist opposition parties who do not support foreign intervention, but instead support the reconciliation movement. They resoundingly agreed that this “conflict” was a Syrian issue, to be dealt with by Syrians in Syria, that the foreign mercenaries had to go, and that elections were imperative. Despite their differing sentiments three years ago, they said they would now vote for Bashar al-Asad this June.
“In Syria we have real opposition parties, demanding reforms for the Syrian people. We are the real opposition, rooted in the streets of Syria,” said Shaykh Nawaf ‘Abd al-‘Aziz Trad al-Milhim, head of the People’s Party. Berwin Ibrahim, chair of the National Youth Party for Justice and Development said, “We don’t agree with the regime on many things, but we insist that our homeland comes first. We have corruption in the government. But that is like any government. The conspiracy, terrorism, and interference from Western countries have united supporters of the government and the opposition,” she said.
One of the opposition who had formally called for al-Asad to step down, Mohammad Abu Qasem, Secretary General of the Solidarity Party, said, “What’s happening in Syria is international terrorism, with many countries interfering in Syria. Since the elections were announced, the insurgents started working harder in Kasab and in Aleppo.”
Feminist activist, Suheir Sarmini, Deputy Secretary General of the Syrian National Youth Party, said, “President Obama and Congress have armed these gangs to kill our children, our people. Tell Obama and Congress to stop killing the Syrian people and not to interfere in Syrian sovereignty.”
In contrast to accusations that no “real” opposition could exist within Syria, Mazen al-Akhrass, a member of Syria’s NDF and a political analyst, pointed out that two very vocal (and far more critical than those I met) opposition members remain in Syria, unscathed. “Louay Hussein and Hassan ‘Abd al-‘Azeem are very well known and extremely against the regime, and they ask for more than ‘reforms.’ Yet they have been living in Damascus — the ‘stronghold of the regime’ — during the events, and their lives weren’t threatened. They are not in jail, and at this point they seem to have settled for partial reforms as a step toward full regime change.”
We met with Syria’s Grand Mufti, Dr. Ahmad Badr al-Din Hassoun. He spoke of the need for reconciliation and forgiveness amongst Syrians. He is notable for walking the talk: Shaykh Hassoun’s 21-year-old son Sarya was assassinated in October 2011, on the same day that it was announced he’d be engaged. During the funeral, while sobbing, the Mufti called for forgiveness and reconciliation, even for those who murdered his son. “All of the churches and masjids that have been destroyed, we can rebuild. But who will bring back our children? Who will bring back my son Sarya? When we have violation against any child, it is a violation against God.”
He mentioned that in March he had been granted a prestigious Italian peace prize, by The Ducci Foundation, for his non-sectarian preaching of interfaith peace. But the Mufti never got to Rome. “I was granted a visa for only ten days. They were afraid I’d stay longer. But Europeans are among those killing our people. … I reject this [kind of] ‘democracy.’ We in Syria are not Sunni or Shi‘i or ‘Alawi nor Muslim nor Christian. We are human beings and must be respected. They want to start a religious war. We are going to extinguish this fire.”
On a personal note, I would echo the Mufti’s call, and those of so many others I met in Syria. Come to Syria, see for yourselves. Very quickly you can get a taste of the senseless mortars, and the horrific testimonies of those assaulted by foreign mercenaries and takfiri ideologists. But also of the strength and resistance that is the Syrian people, who don’t intend any time soon to fall to occupation, and who will vote for President al-Asad in June.
Why are They Afraid of the Syrian Elections?
By Rick Sterling | CounterPunch | May 30, 2014
The Presidential Election in Syria takes place next Tuesday, June 3. With a revised 2012 Constitution, Syria is no longer a one party state and there are multiple candidates for office. Running against Bashar al Asad are former communist and legislator Maher al Hajjar and business person Hassan al Nouri.
The election has been vehemently opposed by the so called “Friends of Syria” (NATO members Turkey, Germany, France, UK, Italy, USA, plus the Gulf monarchies UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia plus Jordan and Egypt). Since 2011 the “Friends” have met periodically to coordinate funding, arming and training the rebels plus trying to promote and consolidate a credible outside political leadership. According to the pro opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights the result of this externally supported uprising has been over 62,000 dead Syrian soldiers and militia, plus another 80,836 dead civilians. Many of the civilians were killed by rebels. Just looking at the number of dead Syrian soldiers and security forces, can you imagine what would happen if 10% of that number (6,000 soldiers and security) were killed in the USA?
Given the extent of the violence, the well publicized fanaticism of the most active rebels and evident difficulty to manage the political operatives who were supposed to be anointed “leaders”, one might wonder why the USA and others persist in trying to force regime change in Syria.
But instead of viewing the multi-candidate election in Syria as a step forward, they are viewing it as a mortal threat. “Assad’s staged elections are a farce,” Kerry said after the so-called Friends of Syria meeting in London on Thursday May 15. “They’re an insult. They are a fraud on democracy, on the Syrian people and on the world,” he added.
France, Germany, Belgium and the Gulf States have all prohibited voting in the Syrian election. Syrian Embassies in the US and Canada have been forced to close, removing the chance for Syrians living in these countries to vote.
Why are Kerry and the “Friends” so upset and fearful of Syrian elections? If they are such a farce, then much of the public will not participate in them. If the vote is seen by the public as meaningless, then voter turnout will be very low such as in Egypt this week.
As to the issue of holding an election during a time of conflict, this was done right here in the USA. The 1864 election which re-elected Abraham Lincoln was held during the midst of the extremely bloody US civil war.
Another group afraid of the Syrian elections is the Syrian American Council (SAC). This well funded lobby group claims to represent Syrian Americans. They have launched a twitter and Facebook campaign decrying the ‘Blood Election’. They have professional marketing and public relations, paid staff and support from neo-con and Zionist interventionists in Congress. Still, their real support across the country seems thin. Last August and September 2013, they were promoting a US attack on Syria. They were not concerned with the massive bloodshed that would have resulted from that. Ironically they are decrying blood now when Syria holds a peaceful election.
In sharp contrast with SAC, alternative organizations such as Arab Americans for Syria (AA4Syria) and Syrian American Forum (SAF) are speaking with growing strength against our US tax dollars being used to destroy their homeland. As a measure of the depth of feelings, over 25 members of AA4Syria are flying to Beirut then traveling by land to Syria to vote in next Tuesday’s election. The same thing is happening in other countries which have prevented Syrians from casting a vote. Syrians who live in the Gulf are traveling all the way to Syria to vote as a sign of their commitment.
The reason is that many Syrians, both inside and outside the country, see voting in this election as a sign of support for their homeland at this difficult time.
Voting by Syrians living abroad has already begun, with voting yesterday, May 28, in Lebanon, Jordan and a few other countries. The turnout in Beirut was massive, with tens of thousands of people marching, chanting and singing through the avenue and along the highway to the Syrian Embassy compound east of the city center. Look at the video and judge for yourself whether these people are being “forced” to vote or cheer for Bashar al Asad.
The voting in Beirut has been extended due to the huge turnout. This is in ironic contrast with Egypt where the government is desperately extending the voting hours and days, trying to boost the voting turnout.
If recent history is a guide, there may be some kind of spectacular media event or atrocity in the coming days. The Syrian opposition and their handlers have executed PR stunts at critical times. If it happens here, the purpose will be to distract from the strong Syrian participation in the election and to attempt to renew the branding of Assad as “brutal dictator”.
But the branding is wearing thin, those who are most affected by the crisis know the truth and even those who have been influenced by the immense propaganda may be starting to wonder: Was it ever a genuine “Syrian revolution”? What kind of “revolution” is financed by corrupt monarchies and former colonial powers? Is the “brutal dictator” really as bad as they say? The scenes of thousands of Syrians waving his poster, chanting his name and youth expressing love for him are not what they wish us to see.
Next week we can look at the videos, photos and stories from Syria. Hopefully there will be some reasonably unbiased reports. John Kerry and other “Friends of Syria” did not want it to happen, and there may still be violence and bumps on the journey, but the election in Syria is going ahead. Let’s see what Kerry and company are afraid of.
Rick Sterling is a founding member of Syrian Solidarity Movement. In April he was in Damascus, Latakia and Homs with the International Peace Pilgrimage.
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On ‘conflict’, ‘peace’ and ‘genocide’: Time for new language on Palestine
By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | June 12, 2021
On 25 May, famous US actor Mark Ruffalo tweeted an apology for suggesting that Israel is committing “genocide” in Gaza.
“I have reflected and wanted to apologise for posts during the recent Israel/Hamas fighting that suggested Israel is committing ‘genocide’,” Ruffalo wrote, adding: “It’s not accurate, it’s inflammatory, disrespectful and is being used to justify anti-Semitism, here and abroad. Now is the time to avoid hyperbole.”
But were Ruffalo’s earlier assessments, indeed, “not accurate, inflammatory and disrespectful”? And does equating Israel’s war on besieged, impoverished Gaza with genocide fit into the classification of “hyperbole”? … continue
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