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Blinded to Syria

By Patrick Lawrence | Consortium News | December 15, 2024

Decades after deploying mass violence and rendering citizens grotesquely ignorant of the world, U.S.-led powers appear willing to risk world war, while reinventing a terrorist to lead what was a secular nation until last week.

I do not know anyone who was not shocked by the lightning speed with which Damascus fell to expensively armed jihadist militias last weekend.

I know very few people who do not understand that another domino has just fallen in the “seven-front war” Benjamin Netanyahu has boasted this year of waging across West Asia. I know very few people who do not recognize that terrorist Israel is well on the way to establishing itself as a dictatorial hegemon across the region.

I know very few people who do not understand that the longstanding project of the Zionist neoconservatives, who have more or less controlled U.S. foreign policy for decades, i.e., “remaking the Middle East,” is the design behind all that has occurred since the Israelis launched their attack on Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023.

I do not know anyone who has achieved the age of reason who does not recognize the U.S. hand in the stunning sweep through Syria of Hay`at Tahrir al–Sham, long-recognized as a terrorist organization. All one needs to grasp this is a little history.

But I know of no corporate or state-funded medium on either side of the Atlantic — the major dailies, the broadcast networks, NPR, PBS, the BBC — where you can read or hear about any of this.

Blinding Us

Mainstream media are doing exactly what they did as the U.S.–led “regime change” operation in Syria began in early 2012 at the latest and probably in the final months of 2011: They are making sure the events now unfolding in Syria are not quite illegible but nearly.

It is again a question of knowing the history. In the case of Hay`at Tahrir al–Sham and the other jihadists who knocked over the Assad regime as if it were made of Lego blocks, it is another exercise in dressing up a monster in a suit and tie.

The corporate press and broadcasters are now resolutely recasting the murderous fanatics who have seized control of Syria as legitimate “rebels.” Rebels, rebels, rebels: This is the approved terminology.

I see they have left off describing these Sunni zealots as the “moderate rebels” of yesteryear, that phrase having been hopelessly discredited last time around, but the drift is the same: These are civilized people out there trying to do the right thing.

My favorite in this line appeared in The Daily Telegraph several days before the Assad government collapsed: “How Syria’s ‘diversity-friendly’ jihadists plan on building a state.” I had to read this one twice, too.

Nowhere but nowhere in the West’s mass media can you find even a mention of the U.S.–Turkish-and-probably–Israeli support that made possible the swift sweep of Hay`at Tahrir al–Sham and its ever-bickering allies from its seat in the Idlib governorate through Hama and other cities to the center of Damascus.

This is, like the earlier years of the Western-backed terrorist attacks on the Assad regime, and like the proxy war in Ukraine, and like the Saudis’ U.S.–supported war against Yemen, and like the Israeli genocide against the Palestinians of Gaza, and like the Israelis’ attacks in Lebanon, sponsored military aggression we are not permitted to see without considerable effort to transcend official representations of reality.

Understanding Who the Americans Are

What happened, what is happening, what will happen: I do not know anyone who is not asking these questions, too.

We must go back and back and back further to understand what has just occurred in Syria and to understand why, and finally to understand who Americans are and who they have been for all the decades since the 1945 victories.

It is logical to begin this pencil-sketch of the past with the famous coups of the 1950s. These occurred in Iran, where the C.I.A., working with MI6, deposed Mohammed Mossadegh as Iran’s prime minister in August 1953, and in Guatemala, where an agency operation forced Jacobo Árbenz from the presidency a year later.

It is striking today to consider a few of the features of these operations. Stimulating various social and economic antagonisms to foment public unrest and an appearance of political disorder was key in both cases. Both coups removed popularly elected leaders and installed repressive puppets.

There was violence in both cases, but by later standards these operations were something close to surgical. Mossadegh withdrew to his farm in the Iranian countryside; Árbenz, a Swiss pharmacist by background, spent his last years wandering dejectedly through Europe.

An appearance of propriety was important back then. Most Americans were unaware that the C.I.A. had engineered the events in Tehran and Guatemala City. And in the Iranian case, something to note: Removing Iran’s first elected prime minister set in motion a wave of blowback that continues to break over U.S.–Iranian relations; in Guatemala it led to a civil war that endured for 36 years.

The C.I.A. considered the coup in Iran a useful model – Guatemala its next application. But in 1965 the agency began to do things very differently when it organized the coup that brought down Sukarno, independent Indonesia’s charismatic founding father and its first president.

The Jakarta Model

Vincent Blevins, a seasoned foreign correspondent, got this down better than anyone in The Jakarta Method: Washington’s Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program that Shaped Our World (Public Affairs, 2020). With the Cold War approaching its worst years, the Indonesian coup was the first, as Blevins’s subtitle indicates, to submerge an entire nation in prolonged violence.

There are various figures for the number of deaths that resulted as the agency installed the dictatorial, bottomlessly corrupt Suharto in the presidential palace in 1967. Blevins puts it at a million or more. Along with the deaths, the nation’s previously lively political culture was extinguished until Suharto fell 32 years later.

The Jakarta Method was subsequently applied in various other circumstances, notably but not only in the 1973 coup that deposed Salvador Allende in Chile and installed Augusto Pinochet, a vicious dictator in the Suharto mold. Nine years later Zbigniew Brzezinski put a modified version to use in Afghanistan.

Blind to US Support for Jihadism

As Jimmy Carter’s relentlessly anti–Soviet national security adviser, Brzezinski persuaded Carter to back the mujahideen then fighting the Moscow-backed regime in Kabul. The result was the well-armed, well-financed force named al–Qaeda, led by Osama bin Laden.

And so we come, via the campaigns of mass violence in Iraq and Libya and the proxy war in Ukraine, to the Syrian operation. People who rely on mainstream media still have a hard time accepting that the U.S. and its trans–Atlantic allies backed al–Qaeda’s Syrian forces, the Islamic State, and their heinous offshoots in their war against the Assad regime.

There are no grounds whatsoever for this disbelief. The U.S. operation in Syria is a straight readout of Brzezinski’s Afghanistan strategy. Sharmine Narwani, the tenacious Beirut-based correspondent and the founding editor of The Cradle, reported the American op first-hand as it unfolded. She recounted what she saw in an impressively detailed interview I published in 2019. It is here and here in two parts.

It Wasn’t Over

By 2018–19, it was obvious that the C.I.A.’s Syrian operation, in my judgment its largest since the Cold War’s end, had failed after several years of Russia’s bombing campaign against the Islamic State. Everyone making this judgment, myself included, forgot to add four essential words: It had failed for the time being.

Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham was founded at the start of the covert U.S. intervention, in 2011–12. Its name translates as Organization for the Liberation of the Levant.

Liberating the Levant is a very good idea, but HTS does not mean this the way anyone opposed to the Western powers’ long and violent domination of West Asia would mean it. HTS shared with the Islamic State an ambition to establish a caliphate ruled by radical interpretations of Islamic law.

In May 2018 the State Department added HTS to its list of foreign terrorist organizations, FTOs in the parlance of the apparatchiks. It is a direct descendent of Jabhat al–Nusra, which was the worst of the worst among al–Qaeda’s shape-shifting affiliates operating in Syria.

By the time HTS made the list, Jabhat al–Nusra was already on it. They both remain on it as we speak.

HTS was founded by Abu Mohammad al–Jolani, a nom de guerre now all over the news: He has long led HTS and appears now to have plans to make himself Syria’s next president. When he spoke at a celebrated mosque in Damascus last week, he shed the public alias in favor of his real name, Ahmed al–Shara.

Jolani’s background is not to be missed. He was once an Islamic State commander who went on to found Jabhat al–Nusra and, after a violent split, HTS.

As the HTS leader, he was implicated in numerous cases of torture, violence, sexual abuse, arbitrary arrests, disappearances, and so on. Reflecting his singular malignity, the State Department had declared Jolani a “specially designated global terrorist” as far back as 2013.

That designation still stood in 2021. Then something odd, and in hindsight very revealing, occurred.

Rehabilitating Jolani

In April of that year PBS broadcast the first interview with Jolani ever to appear in any Western medium. It was conducted by Martin Smith, a longtime broadcast correspondent with a good reputation.

And there on camera was the specially designated terrorist in a blue blazer and a buttoned-down shirt, telling Smith he planned to build a “salvation government” in Syria.

Smith was not shy, to his credit, in his review of Jolani’s horrific record. But he gave his interview subject ample airtime to make his that-was-then-this-is-now argument.

There was no talk of a caliphate, despite how HTS still named itself. It was about sound local governance. Yes, this would be according to Sharia law, but it would be a kind-and-gentle Sharia law.

The Martin Smith interview, it is now evident, was highly significant for its timing and its implications for U.S. policy. It is almost certain that it signaled an already-in-train revival of the Syrian operation; certainly it marked the start of the preposterous reinvention of Jolani that is now ubiquitous in Western media.

It is a long way from those first postwar coups — large in ambition and implications but small in scale as they look to us now. Since the Jakarta Method was devised in the mid–1960s, mass murder programs have shaped our world just as Vincent Blevins insightfully put it.

Committed to Mass Violence

The questions noted at the start of this commentary remain those we must ask: What happened, what is happening, what will happen. Clarity on these matters arrives by degrees — not by way of official accounts or the corporate press, but in independent media. For now, two conclusions.

One, the U.S. and its trans–Atlantic allies are now thoroughly committed to mass violence. This means it is difficult to avoid concluding that the Western powers and Israel will turn to Iran once Syria as a functioning polity has been thoroughly disabled.

What has prompted the U.S. and Israel to exercise caution to date has been the risk of what would without doubt be a cataclysmic conflict that could tip into another world war.

With a six-decade history of mass violence behind them, these powers now appear willing to take this risk. There is little ground left to continue questioning this.

Two, we now witness the reinvention of a viciously intolerant terrorist given to waging holy wars as an acceptable presence at the head of what was a secular nation until earlier this month.

We must read this as the outcome — the successful outcome — of an eight-decade campaign to render the citizens of the Western powers grotesquely ignorant of the world in which they live.

The New York Times and other major dailies continue to lie by omission about U.S. support for Jolani and the organization he leads, even as both are officially designated terrorists. But something worth considering here: These media ran interesting photographs with their initial stories on the militias’ sudden offensive, showing rocket launchers and armored personnel carriers of obvious Western manufacture. Here is one such picture and here is another.

I see these pictures and the accompanying stories as mirrors. They show us exactly who we are, what we have become — and also the extent to which we are encouraged not to see either.

There are no true surprises in what we witness now in Syria. It is an old story. We have been blinded to it, along with many other things to which we have been blinded. Most fundamentally we have been rendered blind to ourselves.

Patrick Lawrence, a correspondent abroad for many years, chiefly for the International Herald Tribune, is a columnist, essayist, lecturer and author, most recently of Journalists and Their Shadows.

December 17, 2024 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

‘Israel’s’ support for Syrian opposition exposed

By Kit Klarenberg | Al Mayadeen | December 14, 2024

In the wake of ultra-extremist militants of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham seizing Damascus, Zionist entity premier Benjamin Netanyahu gave a smug address from the Golan Heights, Syrian territory illegally occupied ever since 1967. Along the way, he took personal credit for the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s government and the Syrian Arab Army’s defeat, while pledging that the ground on which he stood would be part of “Israel “for eternity”. Ever since, Israeli occupation forces have pushed ever deeper into Golan, unimpeded and unopposed.

Tel Aviv’s criminal seizure of yet further territory from its neighbors was an absolutely inevitable upshot of Syria’s collapse. However, some Western journalists and politicians have expressed dismay – in many cases, the same figures were cheering al-Assad’s fall just 24 hours prior. Consternation has also widely abounded over the foreign-dominated and controlled opposition groups that overran Damascus, effusively praising the Zionist entity’s assistance in their offensive against the SAA.

Speaking to Israeli TV on December 2, one rebel fighter thanked Tel Aviv for striking Hezbollah and other Resistance groups, stating the opposition was “very satisfied” with the support. They added, “We love Israel and we were never its enemies… [Tel Aviv] isn’t hostile to those who are not hostile toward it. We don’t hate you, we love you very much.”

‘Striking deeper’

While never acknowledged in the mainstream, the Zionist entity’s sinister alliance with extremist opposition groups arrayed against Damascus has long laid in plain sight. A September 2018 investigation by the US empire house journal Foreign Policy spelled out in detail “Israel’s secret program to back Syrian rebels.” It documented how, since 2013, Tel Aviv “armed and funded at least 12 rebel groups” in the country. The ostensible purpose was to “prevent Iran-backed fighters and militants of the Islamic State from taking up positions near the Israeli border.”

The entity’s “military transfers” to anti-Assad opposition groups were vast. They “included assault rifles, machine guns, mortar launchers, and transport vehicles.” The material was funneled via the illegally occupied Golan Heights. “Israel” even “provided salaries to rebel fighters… and supplied additional money the groups used to buy arms on the Syrian black market.” Initially, arms transferred were “mostly US-manufactured,” but these were later “switched” to “non-American weapons… apparently to conceal the source of the assistance.”

Every step of the way, “Israel’s” backing of the Syrian opposition ratcheted. Foreign Policy attributes this ever-aggressive stance to Tel Aviv’s failed “appeals” to the US and Russia “to secure a deal that would ensure that Iranian-backed militias would be kept away from southern Syria.” This prompted the entity to “[begin] striking deeper inside Syrian territory, targeting not just individual weapons shipments from Iran to Hezbollah but also Iranian bases across the country.”

In providing this largesse, Tel Aviv “relied on relationships it developed with individual commanders” of extremist militias, sending “assistance directly to them.” Representatives of these factions “would communicate with Israeli officials by phone and occasionally meet them face to face” in the Golan Heights. “When commanders switched groups and locations, Israeli assistance followed them” – and the entity’s chosen proxies frequently served as distributors of Zionist-supplied weaponry “to other groups,” giving them “outsized influence” in the dirty war.

Foreign Policy records, “As a result of Israel’s humanitarian and military assistance, many residents of southern Syria came to perceive it as an ally.” An anonymous opposition fighter told the outlet, “Israel is the only one with interests in the region and a little bit of humanity and [provides] assistance to civilians.” However, “As troops loyal to Assad, aided by Russian and Iranian forces, reasserted control over more and more areas of Syria,” Tel Aviv cut a secret deal with Moscow, to the opposition’s detriment.

Under its auspices, SAA forces returned to “areas adjacent to the Golan Heights” while Russia promised “to keep Iran-backed militias 80 kilometers” from the area “and not to start hindering Israeli strikes on Iranian targets across Syria.” Despite this, Tel Aviv didn’t desert its murderous surrogates. As government forces closed in, “rebels reached out to their Israeli contacts and asked for asylum.” They and “their immediate family members” were duly permitted to flee to “Israel”, Jordan, and Turkey, with Tel Aviv’s assistance and protection.

With eerie foresight, Foreign Policy concluded that “Israel’s” policy of backing the rebels would contribute to significant and enduring unresolved security problems not only in Damascus but throughout West Asia more widely:

“[This] raises questions about the balance of power in Syria as the civil war there finally winds down. With the Iranian forces that helped Assad defeat the rebels showing no inclination to withdraw from Syria, the potential for the country to become a flash point between Israel and Iran looms large. Without deft diplomacy, confrontations in Syria, protests in Gaza, and tensions over the Iran nuclear deal could plunge the Middle East into chaos.”

‘Military capabilities’

Foreign Policy was at pains to portray “Israel’s” assistance to the Syrian opposition as being predominantly informed by a desire to crush ISIS. For example, the outlet claimed Tel Aviv “provided fire support to rebel factions” fighting an Islamic State affiliate near the Yarmouk River. This purportedly extended to drone strikes targeting ISIS commanders “and precision-missile strikes against the group’s personnel, fortifications, and vehicles during battles with the rebels.” Meanwhile, the Zionist entity “did not extend similar fire support for rebel assaults on regime forces.”

Yet, such an exculpatory narrative is at glaring odds with multiple public admissions by Israeli officials. For example, in April 2017, former entity Security Minister Moshe Ya’alon revealed that “recently”, ISIS had “apologized” after “[opening] fire” on Tel Aviv’s forces in the Golan Heights. This contrition was expressed by the terror group despite the IOF responding to this broadside by bombarding Islamic State fighters with airstrikes and tank fire, killing four of them.

One might reasonably ponder why, despite these casualties, ISIS felt the need to say sorry. An obvious explanation is the hyper-militant faction did not wish to offend Tel Aviv, lest the entity’s long-running operation to provide medical assistance to insurgents wounded in the Syrian dirty war in field hospitals dotted across Golan be terminated. From 2012 onward, UN peacekeeping forces consistently testified to witnessing injured Al Qaeda, al-Nusra, and ISIS fighters being treated by Israeli military doctors across the region.

Along the way, documentary filmmakers even captured video evidence of this practice. Once tended to, these belligerents were sent straight back into battle by their Zionist protectors to fight Hezbollah and the Syrian Arab Army. These astonishing scenes went largely unremarked upon in the Western media although in May 2016, ex-Mossad chief Efraim Halevy proudly boasted that Tel Aviv was committed to a strategy of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” in its crusade to neutralize Assad:

“It’s always useful to deal with your enemies in a humane way. When you have people who are wounded, considerations of whether to take them in are not simply whether it’s politically useful… I didn’t say there was no tactical [consideration]. I don’t think there’s going to be blowback… Al Qaeda to the best of my recollection hasn’t specifically targeted Israel… As Hezbollah fighters are concerned, we have a different account.”

Fast forward to today, and ever since al-Assad’s fall, “Israel” has relentlessly blitzed SAA sites in Syria. Entity officials boast the “historic” campaign has “destroyed most of the former [Assad] regime’s strategic military capabilities,” decimating up to 80% of the fallen government’s “strategic weapons stockpiles.” Markedly, there has been no attempt whatsoever by HTS to deter or respond to this bombardment, despite Damascus now being completely defenseless against future incursions from its adversaries. Group spokespeople have moreover actively refused to denounce the attacks.

Nonetheless, longtime Syrian “revolution” activists have expressed shock at “Israel’s” onslaught against the “newly liberated” country and further illegal “annexation” of its territory, demanding Tel Aviv cease its inexorable assaults forthwith. One wonders whether such public reactions are truly borne of ignorance and naivety about “Israel’s” rapacious expansionism. The reality may be that the opposition knew all along precisely what would be unleashed following al-Assad’s ouster and still welcome it. After all, they were coordinating directly with the Zionist entity at every step of their struggle.

December 15, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , , | Leave a comment

How ex-Daesh and al-Qaeda leader al-Jolani became West’s blue-eyed boy in Syria

By Alireza Akbari | Press TV | December 15, 2024

Only a day after West-backed militant groups led by Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) took control of Damascus, ending Bashar al-Assad’s long reign, HTS leader Abu Muhammad al-Jolani stood triumphantly on a hill overlooking the Syrian capital.

Wearing army fatigues, Ahmed al-Sharaa, popularly known as Jolani, looked on as plumes of smoke billowed into the sky—a grim spectacle of destruction wrought by Israeli bombings following the ouster of Assad’s democratically-elected government in Damascus.

The haunting scene evoked an eerie parallel to Emperor Nero, who infamously watched Rome burn while playing his lyre—portraying an image of power and apathy.

As the Israeli regime grabbed more Syrian land beyond the occupied Golan Heights and launched unprecedented airstrikes on Damascus, HTS militants gleefully roamed the streets, celebrating the “conquest,” and unleashed a brutal campaign of throat-slitting and terrorizing minorities.

The tumultuous events that eventually led to the overthrow of the Assad government began on November 27, when videos surfaced of militant groups in Aleppo making rapid advances.

These groups swiftly and dramatically escalated their advances, capturing strategic military bases in Idlib and Hama before marching toward the capital Damascus.

On December 8, they delivered a televised address from Damascus, declaring the end of Assad’s 24-year reign—a seismic shift in the region’s power dynamics with all eyes on Jolani as the leader.

Who is al-Jolani?

Abu Muhammad al-Jolani was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in 1982 to a Syrian family originally from the occupied Golan Heights of Syria, which has been under Israeli occupation for years.

His family returned to Syria in 1989, settling in Damascus’s affluent Mezzeh district. Jolani pursued media studies in Damascus before relocating to Iraq in 2003, just prior to the US invasion.

In Iraq, he joined the al-Qaeda terrorist group and became a key figure in the group.

He was captured by American forces in 2006 and spent five years imprisoned at Camp Bucca before being released in 2011. After that, he moved back to Syria and gained prominence as a militant leader.

Jolani’s journey through the ranks of Takfiri terrorist groups was spectacular as he became a close aide to top al-Qaeda leaders including Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri.

After his release from Camp Bucca in 2011, where he forged connections with future Daesh leaders, Jolani emerged as a key figure in the global Takfiri terrorist movement.

He initially served as a Daesh commander in Iraq’s Nineveh and Mosul provinces before being handpicked by Daesh chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2012 to establish a Syrian affiliate at the outset of the West-backed militancy against the Assad government in the Arab country.

Jolani founded the Nusra Front as Daesh’s Syrian offshoot, leveraging the chaos to advance his agenda. However, a power struggle with al-Baghdadi over control of the group led to a split in 2013.

Jolani severed ties with Daesh and fortified his influence in Syria’s Idlib governorate, aligning the Nusra Front with al-Qaeda to retain the loyalty of hardline elements within his ranks.

While the split signaled a shift in allegiance, according to experts, it was less about ideology and more a personal rift. Jolani continued to espouse the Salafi ideology but sought to differentiate himself through a political veneer, setting him apart from figures like al-Zarqawi and al-Baghdadi.

Terror designation

The US State Department designated Jolani as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist in May 2013. By 2017, he was among the most wanted terrorists globally, with a $10 million bounty by the US government for information leading to his capture.

In an audio statement on September 28, 2014, Jolani declared his intent to fight the United States and its allies, urging his forces to reject Western assistance in their battle against Daesh.

Yet, just two years later, in July 2016, Jolani broke his pledge of allegiance to al-Qaeda leader al-Zawahiri, aiming to rebrand his militant organization and broaden its alliances.

This strategic pivot marked a shift in Jolani’s focus—from global ambitions to governance in Syria.

Following the establishment of the HTS militant group in 2017, the group took control of large swathes of Idlib, where they established a rudimentary governing structure.

HTS began collecting taxes and issuing identity cards to locals. However, these efforts were marred by authoritarian practices, including the suppression of dissent and the arrest of political opponents.

Despite Jolani’s public commitment to protecting minorities, his group adopted high-handed measures against religious and ethnic minorities, especially those who spoke about discrimination.

While HTS made rapid strides in consolidating power in the region bordering Turkey, its track record of human rights abuses in Idlib continued to be an area of concern.

The group has been known for systematically silencing dissent, targeting rivals, and using disproportionate force against those who opposed his authoritarian practices.

Concerns have also grown over the presence of foreign mercenaries in HTS, particularly those in its elite Red Brigades, which include members from Central Asia, Chechnya, and France.

Bigger political aspirations

Despite his Takfiri-militant roots, Jolani’s bigger political aspirations kept him in the news for years, as he continued to harbor ambitions of capturing Damascus from his hideouts in Idlib, financially and militarily backed by the United States, the Israeli regime and some regional countries.

Now, with HTS and its allies controlling significant territory in Syria, questions loom over how they will govern the country. Around 100,000 Syrians have already gathered on the border to enter Lebanon, according to reports, desperate to leave their home country.

Fears persist about the treatment of minorities, dissidents, and women under their rule, as many Syrians and the international community remain wary of Jolani’s true intentions.

Despite growing concerns over HTS rule, fueled by viral videos showing the group’s violent tactics, both the UK and the US are reportedly reconsidering its designation as a terrorist organization.

The British government is actively weighing the removal of HTS from its list of designated terrorist groups, particularly in light of the group’s pivotal role in the fall of the Assad government.

UK government minister Pat McFadden has suggested that such a move could be “relatively swift,” given the rapidly changing dynamics in Syria.

Similarly, US officials are debating the merits of removing the $10 million bounty on Jolani.

After years of lobbying for delisting, HTS appears to have gained traction with Western powers, particularly following its instrumental role in Assad’s ousting, a goal it shared with Western powers.

For years, the US and its Western allies had tried to dislodge the Assad government, using transnational mercenary forces as well as terrorist groups without much luck.

al-Jolani finally accomplished what his Western backers couldn’t for years despite massive efforts.

In his first detailed interview on Saturday, he emphasized engagement with Western nations and confirmed that the channels of communication with Western embassies, including talks with the British government to restore its diplomatic representation in Damascus, are underway.

He once again asserted that his regime has no intention of engaging in a conflict with the Israeli regime, despite Benjamin Netanyahu decimating the Arab country’s military muscle in a few days.

December 15, 2024 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

Israel Gives Biden His Marching Orders

Syrian land will be annexed into “Greater” Israel

By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • December 13, 2024

My former CIA colleague Larry Johnson has a real ability to clarify the significance of the constantly growing deep dark hole that Joe “Mumbles” Biden, he of failing mental capacity, has hurled the American people into. Larry wrote on December 12th that “There is still plenty of time before Donald Trump is inaugurated for Joe Biden’s team of cretins to start World War III. I think the biggest risk is that Israel may be emboldened to attack Iran and try to destroy sites, and may be encouraged to do so by the Biden lackeys. In short, American interference, at the behest of Netanyahu’s Israel, has left the Middle East in ruins, with over a million dead and open wars raging in Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine, and with Iran on the brink of a nuclear arsenal, being pushed against its own inclinations to this eventuality. The collapse of the Assad regime has prompted a punishing military response from Israel, which has launched airstrikes at military targets across Syria and deployed ground troops both into and beyond a demilitarized buffer zone for the first time in 50 years.”

Given the destruction and partitioning of Syria, it has become impossible to consider United States foreign policy without some acceptance that it is driven and, in a sense, directed by Israel and Israel’s formidable domestic lobby in the US. “The Lobby,” as it is commonly referred to, controls both Congress and the White House on key issues and manages the media narrative in such a fashion as to make Israel the permanent victim, never the aggressor. Even though Israel is now marching in triumph across what remains of Syria and has indicated that it will be sticking around as an occupier, the move is being described as “temporary” and “defensive” by White House spokesmen. The Lobby’s success rests on the corruption that lots of money can buy, obvious to nearly everyone in politics, but a forbidden topic, sometimes referred to as an antisemitic “trope,” i.e. “Jews and money.” Israel’s role in managing the Joe Bidens and Donald Trumps is largely exercised in the broader Middle East but it also includes passionately supporting Volodymyr Zelensky’s Ukraine, a process derived in part from Jewish mythologizing and obtaining revenge for the alleged “pogroms” carried out in imperial Russia. Subsequent Jewish dominance of the Soviet intelligence and security services, which saw the killing of millions of Christians in Russia, Ukraine and Eastern Europe, are carefully excluded from the narrative.

In the latest bit of “mowing the grass” by the Israeli military, the country’s new Defense Minister Israel Katz told the press that the Israel Air Force (IAF) had carried out more than 480 strikes across Syria during the two days after the initial invasion, deliberately destroying most of Syria’s strategic weapon stockpiles. Meanwhile, the Israeli navy totally destroyed the Syrian fleet based at Latakia overnight. Katz hailed the operation as “a great success.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on the day before, had called the rapid defeat of Bashar al-Assad’s regime as “a new and dramatic chapter… The collapse of the Syrian regime is a direct result of the severe blows with which we have struck Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran… we are changing the face of the Middle East.”

When informed of the initial invasion of al-Assad’s Syria by Israeli, Turkish, insurgent and US forces, Donald Trump said that the conflict was none of our business and it would be best to keep out of it. Hopefully that will be the policy after January 20th’s inauguration, but one recalls that Trump’s record of pandering to Israel is almost as bad as Biden’s, and he was the one who decided (admittedly under pressure from the Pentagon) to continue in 2017 the military occupation of a third of Syria that included its oil resources and its best agricultural land. Add in the crippling US and European sanctions on Damascus and one might argue that since that time Syrians have been poor and starving, causing refugee flows and hostility towards the al-Assad government that contributed to the success of the recent uprising.

To be sure, many Syrians are celebrating the fall of an admittedly repressive, authoritarian, and corrupt Bashar al-Assad government. But other Syrians, particularly from hitherto protected minority groups like Christians, Alawites and Shiites, are now living in fear of or fleeing from the violent sectarian insurgents that have taken the place of President al-Assad. Christian Churches have already been looted and desecrated and warned not to hold Christmas services, not to sponsor Christmas parades, and not to display the image of St. Nicholas.

To be sure, fearing what is to come is legitimate as the “rebel” leader of the al-Qaeda derived Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) Terror group, Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, who now goes by his given name Ahmed al-Shara, is a founder of al-Qaeda in Syria, al-Nusra, and a former deputy to ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The US State Department has listed him as a terrorist as well as HTS as a terrorist group, and has placed a $10 million bounty on al-Jolani’s head, which presumably will soon be removed by Joe Biden. There is plenty of blood on al-Jolani’s hands and little in the way of evidence that he will not opt to slaughter those who he sees as his enemies, much of the killing being guided by the extreme religious groups that make up his followers. Indeed, there are already reports of group killings, including numerous soldiers in the Syrian Arab Army who surrendered rather that fight the insurgents.

Al-Jolani now claims that his extremism was just a “phase” and he has several times confirmed that he wants good relations with Israel, clearly a condition imposed by the US to allow him to remain in power. He has even suggested that Israeli air support enabled his warriors to move quickly from their bases in the north to Damascus. But al-Jolani has never actually apologized for or disowned the atrocities committed on his watch in 2011-3 when he was actively killing fellow Syrians. This includes August 2013 massacres in some of the Alawite areas of Latakia, which included “the systematic killing of entire families,” an international investigation later determined. One observer also reported that the insurgents were devoted to “sectarian mass murder” This is the legacy of the new “inclusive” government in Syria. According to one other ominous report, it appears that Sharia law has already been announced by the newly installed justice minister, Shadi Alwaisi.

So, what is in it for the United States? Nothing but a curt thank you from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who clearly connived with Joe Biden’s Special Envoy Amos Hochstein, an Israeli by birth, to set the ball rolling towards Syria through adroit use of an attack on southern Lebanon to disarm Hezbollah followed by a phony ceasefire in Lebanon that gave Netanyahu a free hand and empowered Israel to invade and overthrow its neighbor Syria, parts of which will undoubtedly be annexed to help create Eretz or “Greater” Israel. It was and is all part of a plan by the US and Israel to reshape the Middle East to benefit the Jewish state and you can bet that Iran is the next target. And a delusional Joe Biden took credit for it all in his usual haphazard way, claiming after the regime change that Assad’s “main allies” — Iran, Hezbollah, and Russia — “are far weaker today than they were when I took office.” Their inability to save Assad was “a direct result of the blows that Ukraine, Israel have delivered upon their own self-defense, with unflagging support of the United States.”

Sure Joe, what bullshit. At the end of the day, to bring down Syria the US spent billions of dollars arming an insurgency that they knew was dominated by al-Qaeda in a government replacement scheme that benefited only Israel and Turkey and which targeted a country that in no way threatened the United States. It sure makes sense to me and I hope you will be comforted by it when you are hauled off to prison after you leave office and are prosecuted for exceeding your constitutional authority by involving the United States in two unnecessary wars. Some might call it treason!

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.

December 14, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

West shamelessly whitewashes barbarism in Syria

Strategic Culture Foundation | December 13, 2024

One week after the dramatic collapse of the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad, it is too early to give a precise prognostication of how the Arab country and the wider region will emerge politically.

But already, there are grim signs of the nation surging in bloody conflict and barbarism. Predictably, the West is covering up its guilt for creating another epic horror, with its news media shamelessly propagandizing and denying the reality of Syria’s new rulers as terrorist factions.

Syria is facing a fate similar to Libya in 2011. The North African country was turned into a killing field by a NATO regime-change aggression under the cynical guise of “liberation.” NATO-backed jihadists brutally murdered Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, and the former oil-rich country has been wrecked as a failed state, riven by warlordism ever since without a functioning national government.

Syria’s former president Assad escaped to Moscow and has been granted asylum by his Russian ally. Apart from that difference, Syria’s future looks ominously like Libya’s. Cruelly, that is rather fitting. The overthrow of Libya in 2011 was used by the United States and its Western allies to mount the regime-change war on Syria that also began in 2011, as recounted in our SCF editorial last week.

Thirteen years on, the takeover of Damascus by the terror group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is unleashing murderous reprisals, internecine warlordism, and sectarian hatred. The U.S. and its Western allies are strenuously covering up the huge imperial crime that has befallen Syria, as with Libya before.

In an audacious denial of reality, Washington and its European partners are talking up a “new beginning” for Syria. It’s a charade of optimism aimed at lulling the world into acceptance of heinous Western criminality.

This outpouring of Western optimism is while the Western-backed Israeli regime immediately launched a blitzkrieg on its northern neighbor, viewing the chaotic events in Syria as an opportunity to annex more land. The Israeli military extended its illegal occupation of the Golan Heights and carried out a massive bombing campaign across Syria.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken made a hurried tour of the region this week, no doubt to ensure an orderly carving up of Syrian territory and resources between Washington and its allies Turkey and Israel – all of whom have worked for years to pursue regime change in Damascus.

While Washington is urging the formation of a non-sectarian government in Syria that “respects religious minorities and women’s rights” – the cringemaking rhetoric of public relations – the reality on the ground told a different story.

The black flags of Wahhabi Islamism supported by HTS and its other al Qaeda-type associates were hoisted in Damascus and other cities. There are palpable fears among Syrian Shia and Alawite Muslims, as well as Christians, that they will be subjected to a reign of terror, as was seen during the years of U.S.-led proxy war from 2011 onwards with beheadings of infidels and apostates, among other atrocities.

Credible videos have shown HTS supporters executing unarmed captives and shouting obscenities about their victims’ perceived religious affiliation. There have been appalling scenes of barbarism where corpses are dragged through streets tied to trucks. Mothers holding the bodies of their slaughtered sons have been abused by jostling crowds in deranged bloodlust.

In an incredible wave of psyops, Western news media organizations have been whitewashing the events in Syria as a kind of “liberation from the tyranny of Assad rule.”

There have been multiple reports of crowds celebrating in the streets of Damascus and Aleppo, tearing down symbols of Bashar al-Assad and his father Hafez. However, the Western media have omitted or downplayed any reports that might indicate a descent into barbarism and sectarian killings.

If there was a prize for propaganda, the British state-owned BBC might have won it with this article headlined: “From Syrian jihadist leader to rebel politician. How Abu Mohammed al-Jolani reinvented himself.”

The truth is it is the Western media, like the BBC and CNN, that have “reinvented” al-Jolani.

The years of al-Jolani carrying out mass killings as a commander in Al Qaeda, Islamic State, Al Nusra as well as HTS have suddenly been shoved down the memory hole, and he is now presented as a statesman supposedly leading Syria to a brighter future.

His belated words about respecting religious minorities and pluralism are reported with cloying gullibility by the Western media. Washington and other Western governments are moving to recognize the new Syrian regime by delisting HTS as a terrorist group and indulging al-Jolani’s rhetoric about reconciliation and tolerance as somehow plausible.

Of course, Washington is euphoric about its apparent success in Syria. Damascus has long been a target for regime change, going back to the Eisenhower administration more than 70 years ago when the Arab state was perceived as being too independent.

More recently, as former U.S. Senator Richard Black explained in this 2016 article, Syria became a renewed target for Washington’s regime change in 2007 when then-President GW Bush’s administration decided Bashar al-Assad had to go. To achieve that illegal result, the U.S. and its regional allies deployed murderous proxies, one of which was Hayat Tahrir al-Sham – the new ruler in Damascus.

The covert proxy war continued under Obama, Trump, and Biden. Russia and Iran’s intervention to defend their Syrian ally managed to impede the regime-change objective, but, in the end, they did not succeed for various reasons, as adduced in a SCF commentary this week.

For over a decade, the Western media have systematically and blatantly lied about Syria to cover up for the U.S.-led imperial aggression against that country. They lied about Assad’s alleged despotism when, in reality, Syrians enjoyed religious and social freedoms. They lied about Assad using chemical weapons when it was the Western-backed jihadist terrorists who used them in false-flag provocations, as Seymour Hersh reported.

The overthrow of Assad appears to be a great victory for the Western imperialist agenda and a blow to Russia and Iran. Washington and its allies are in a celebratory mood over the spoils of victory.

But the signs of bloody disintegration are impossible to conceal even for the lying Western media. In the short term, the Western powers and their propaganda media are trying to present the new rulers of Syria as somehow reformed and benign. This is while Israel annexes territory and U.S. and Turkish-backed factions begin fighting over strongholds.

Syria’s descent into untold mayhem has begun, and in the usual Orwellian fashion, the Western culprits are trying to sell the infernal outcome as a liberation. This is typical of the whitewashing deception that comes as a matter of routine following every imperial regime-change operation. It never ends well.

The people of Syria and the region are facing more turmoil, chaos, conflict, and suffering. The criminal Western imperialist axis is emboldened, but lies are never a sound foundation for the future.

December 14, 2024 Posted by | Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , , , | 1 Comment

HTS officials order Palestinian resistance factions to disarm, close bases in Syria: Report

The Cradle | December 13, 2024

Representatives from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the new ruling extremist organization in Damascus, informed the representatives of the Palestinian factions in Syria they would no longer be allowed to possess any weapons, training camps, or military headquarters, Ibrahim Amin of Al-Akhbar reported on 13 December.

Amin further reports that the factions must dissolve their military formations as soon as possible in exchange for political and charitable work under the roof of the new Syrian state.

Palestinian factions, including Fatah, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC), the Saiqa, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) Martyr Ali Aswad Brigad, have had a presence in Syria as guests of the government for decades.

A source in the PFLP-GC revealed to Erem News that the factions were informed of the decision in meeting headed by Ahmed al-Sharaa, also known as Abu Muhammad al-Julani, in the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in the capital, Damascus.

Palestinians came to Syria as refugees during the 1948 Nakba. That year, pre-state Zionist militias ethnically cleansed some 750,000 Palestinians from the land that became the state of Israel, making them refugees in neighboring countries.

Many Palestinian refugees settled in Syria in the Yarmouk Camp on the southern outskirts of Damascus. The camp became the capital of the Palestinian diaspora.

The Palestinian factions formed armed resistance groups and provided manpower for the Palestinian Liberation Army (PLA), which served as an auxiliary to the Syrian Army.

Amin notes that the practical result of these steps taken by HTS, led by former Al-Qaeda leader Abu Mohammad al-Julani, who now goes by his real name Ahmad al-Sharaa, is that the Palestinians are prohibited from using Syria as a headquarters or passage for any activity against Israel.

In 2012, the predecessor to HTS, the Nusra Front, invaded and occupied Yarmouk, seeking to use it as the gateway to conquer Damascus. The camp was largely destroyed over the following years in the course of the fighting. ISIS also occupied the camp and fought against the Syrian army and Palestinian factions there.

Amin says that although the new Syrian government does not talk about establishing relations with Israel, its representatives talk about taking practical steps to prevent any existing or potential resistance against Israel from Syrian territory.

He writes that Israel may seek to force the Lebanese government to take similar actions against Palestinian factions in the refugee camps in Lebanon.

December 13, 2024 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Al-Qaeda Rides Again… in Syria

By Daniel McAdams | Ron Paul Institute | December 11, 2024

As Christians around the world prepare to celebrate Christmas, a hell has been unleashed inside Syria with the seizure of the country by the re-named “al-Qaeda in Syria” now called Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). Its leader is a former deputy commander of ISIS, Abu Mohammed al-Julani.

While neocons and the mainstream media in the US and Europe celebrate the overthrow of the Assad government – a priority since the Obama Administration – as with previous US “liberations” in Libya and Iraq the outcome is proving to be anything but liberating. Christian churches are being ransacked and believers abused.

Sharia law has been announced by the new justice minister, Shadi Alwaisi.

Public executions of those who oppose the rule of al-Julani – who still has a $10 million bounty on his head from the US State Department even as he is funded by the CIA – have begun across the country. (Extremely graphic link here).

Just today, Christian Churches in Syria were warned not to hold Christmas services, not to hold Christmas parades, and not to even display the image of St. Nicholas! This is what the mainstream media told us was the new “inclusive” government in Syria.

December 12, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Wars for Israel | , , , | 5 Comments

Biden claims credit for toppling Syria’s Assad

RT | December 9, 2024

Outgoing US President Joe Biden has claimed credit for the fall of Damascus to a coalition of armed groups, including jihadists from Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham (HTS). Washington had weakened the supporters of former Syrian President Bashar Assad, the American leader has said.

The result of the lightning offensive of anti-government militants in the past two weeks was a “fundamental act of justice” and a “moment of historic opportunity for the long-suffering citizens of Syria,” Biden said in a video address from the White House on Sunday.

“For years, the main backers of Assad have been Iran, [the Lebanese-based militant movement] Hezbollah, and Russia. But over the last week, their support collapsed, all three of them. Because all three of them are far weaker today than they were when I took office,” Biden said.

Washington has been pushing for the ouster of Assad since 2011, when mass protests spiraled into a devastating civil war, in which foreign-armed Islamists emerged as dominant players among anti-government forces. HTS, one of the groups that took over Damascus on Sunday, was formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, a Syrian Al-Qaeda affiliate. The war was exacerbated further in 2014 when the terrorist group Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) rose as a regional threat amid the collapse of security in Syria.

In his speech, Biden highlighted the sanctions on Syria, as well as the US military presence in the country and its support for Kurdish militias in the northeast, which denied Damascus access to fertile lands and oil fields under their control. The US has also supported Israel in its military campaigns in Gaza and Lebanon and its direct confrontation with Iran, Biden added.

“Our approach has shifted the balance of power in the Middle East,” Biden said, mirroring similar remarks by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“Through this combination of support of our partners, sanctions, diplomacy, and targeted military force where necessary, we now see new opportunities opening up for the people of Syria and for the entire region.”

The US president claimed that Washington was clear-eyed about HTS and its “grim record of terrorism and human right abuses.” Washington will “assess not just their words, but their actions,” he stated. Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said on Sunday that HTS’ history of terrorism and atrocities is a concern for the US.

Abu Mohammed al-Julani, the current leader of HTS, has had a $10 million bounty posted on his head by the US since 2013. According to the US government, the fighters he led were responsible for kidnappings and massacres of civilians.

December 9, 2024 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Syria falls to rebels who are “a tool of NATO, Israel and Turkey” with US role included

By Uriel Araujo | December 9, 2024

After combating terrorism and rebel groups for over twelve years, the former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad fled the capital of Damascus with his family on December 7, shortly before it fell to the rebels. The victorious insurgents are the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) organization along with an umbrella group called the Syrian National Army.

Craig Murray (former British ambassador to Uzbekistan), in a panel about “the end of pluralism in the Middle East”, described the “Syrian rebels” as “a tool of NATO, Israel and Turkey”. This is a complex description for a complex situation indeed. Of the three, many analysts are focusing on the Israeli and Turkish angle—not so much on the American angle, though.

To recap, since the 2011 armed rebellion, Syria has counted on military aid from its allies Iran and Russia. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard, as well as the (Tehran-backed) Lebanese Hezbollah have in fact been the main anti-terrorist actors in the Levant, by deterring the expansion of terrorist group ISIS (Daesh) and thereby making the region safer for Christians and other minorities. Islamic Wahhabi/Salafi extremists were, after all, beheading some of them while kidnapping others and selling women as slaves.

The fact is that the rebels who have won in Syria now are not of a very different persuasion, and it is no wonder many are now concerned. Archbishop Ieronymos of Athens for one has urged the Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs to aid the Christian population in Syria. He wrote: “The advance of extremist armed groups and the capture of Aleppo threaten… the interfaith composition of the region’s population… there is now a looming danger of the complete eradication… of Greek Orthodoxy and Christianity from the wider region.”

Such concerns are well founded. One should bear in mind that (Saudi-born) Abu Mohammed al-Julani, the very leader of Turkish-backed HTS, the group who has captured Aleppo (Syria’s second largest city), joined Al-Qaeda in Iraq in 2003, later establishing its split branch in Syria, the so-called al-Nusra Front. This group, under al-Julani, cooperated with the infamous Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, leader of Al-Qaeda’s split offshoot called “Islamic State in Iraq”, later known as ISIL (ISIS) or Daesh.

Al-Julani’s own later split from al-Qaeda and creation of the aforementioned HTS has been described as merely a “bid” to “stress his group’s national, as opposed to transnational, ambitions.” In other words, the group is just another re-branded offshoot of ISIS/Al-Qaeda. And those are the people who have now conquered Syria.

One might disapprove of Assad’s ruling but such a development can hardly be described by most as anything other than a disaster. Turkey (who aids the rebels) and Israel, as already mentioned, do benefit from this outcome, however, for their own reasons—and much is already being talked about that. But not so many analysts are highlighting the American role in all of it.

For example, the US-backed Syrian Free Army (a coalition which has taken control of Hom’s Palmyra district) announced that they are “open to friendship with everyone in the region – including Israel. We don’t have enemies other than the Assad regime, Hezbollah and Iran. What Israel did against Hezbollah in Lebanon helped us a great deal” – while claiming they are not allied with Turkey. The group, being increasingly dependent on Turkey, is a close ally of the United States, and was even hosted at the American military base at al-Tanf. Turkey, despite its differences with Washington is of course also, let us not forget, a NATO member.

The future of Syria and the concerned parties is far from clear now, there being lots of room for infighting among the different rebel factions. Turkey, which has long occupied northern Syria, has taken advantage of the ceasefire in Lebanon to give the rebels the green-light for launching an offensive (with Iran weakened in Syria and Hezbollah cornered in Lebanon). However Turkish-American differences pertaining to the Kurdish question are to remain a focal point for tensions.

HTS is indeed Turkish-backed but, as mentioned, its roots can be traced to Al-Qaeda, ISIS, and other such groups empowered by Washington’s policy. One should not forget the fact that there are still around 900 US troops in Syria (mostly in the northeast, near Turkish strongholds) which witnessed the rebel victory. This has led some analysts to comment that “whether the Pentagon wants to admit it or not”, these troops are “likely involved in the broader conflict unfolding there right now.”

Moreover, there is nothing new about the West praising and empowering brutal terrorism and radicals when such is deemed geopolitically convenient: if former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton under President Barack Obama had achieved her stated goals, Syria would be in a similar situation to Libya since 2011 – in Libya, coincidence or not, arms provided by the US to rebels there also “ended up” in ISIS hands, according to Amnesty reports.

Back to the Levant region, it is a well-established fact that Washington played a key role in the empowerment of ISIS (or Daesh) both in Syria and Iraq (as well as other brutal radicals), with the Pentagon and the CIA arming mostly foreign Islamic militias that ended up even fighting among themselves. This is consistent with American foreign policy elsewhere too. The infamous Clinton emails also show how the US was aware of their allies Qatar and Saudi Arabia supporting Daesh terror.

The White House National Security Council (NSC) spokesperson Sean Savett said in a recent statement that Washington “has nothing to do with this offensive.” Considering all of the above, one can certainly be justified in taking such statements with a grain of salt. For Washington, further destabilizing Syria might also serve the role of “countering” Russia in the region. The US has consistently aided, funded, armed and trained Fundamentalist rebels who operate in the Levant for over a decade and there is no reason to assume anything is different now with the newest developments.

Finally, still on the topic of the Christian minority, US foreign policy—for a variety of reasons—has actually often involved dividing or destabilizing Eastern Christian (both Orthodox and Miaphysitist) populations or sometimes even aiding or turning a blind eye to the ethnic-religious cleansing of such groups or of Christians in general in the Levant region, for that matter.

This is of course quite ironic for a country such as the US who often hails itself as “one nation under God” or as a “Christian nation”– this being the Republican party line at least. Trump for one has posted that “Syria is a mess, but is not our friend”.

Uriel Araujo, PhD is an anthropology researcher with a focus on international and ethnic conflicts.

December 9, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , , , | 2 Comments

HTS extremists take control of Homs, no clashes reported as Syrian army withdraws

The Cradle | December 8, 2024

Extremist armed groups battling under the banner of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) took control of the strategic city of Homs in central Syria on 7 December, after the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) “repositioned its forces” outside the city with no clashes reported.

“The SAA, paramilitary forces, and allies of the Syrian government withdrew from the city of Homs … No clashes were recorded in or around the city before orders were given out to soldiers to withdraw,” Al Mayadeen’s correspondent in Homs reported late on Saturday.

According to local sources, fighters from the Turkish-backed HTS and Syrian National Army (SNA) have taken control of “every neighborhood in the city.”

HTS, a UN-designated terrorist organization, launched a shock invasion of the Aleppo countryside on 27 November. Their numbers were reportedly bolstered by extremist groups from Central Asia that entered Syria via Turkiye. Ukrainian special forces have also been providing support to the armed groups.

Over the past 10 days, HTS and SNA fighters – most of them former members of Al-Qaeda and ISIS – have taken control of the cities of Aleppo, Hama, and Homs.

As the offensive gains speed, the SAA has repeatedly chosen to redeploy troops outside battle zones, largely avoiding clashes.

Homs is strategically positioned at a crucial crossroads between Damascus and Syria’s coastal provinces, Latakia and Tartus – the government’s stronghold and home to a vital Russian naval base.

Al Mayadeen reports that, after leaving Homs, the SAA has also withdrawn “from the mountains of Latakia towards the city on the Syrian coast.” The Syrian army also withdrew from the eastern Deir Ezzor governorate earlier this week under an “agreement” with the US-sponsored Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

With Damascus now in sight of the extremists, the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) has ordered reinforcements to the Hermel area, which borders Syria and is located around 40 km away from Homs.

“The seeds of the regime’s defeat have always been within it… the Iranians attempted to revive the regime, buying it time, and later the Russians also tried to prop it up. But the truth remains: this regime is dead,” HTS leader Abu Mohammad al-Julani, a former Al-Qaeda warlord and deputy of the notorious ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, told CNN earlier this week.

Since the start of the offensive, western media launched a blitz to promote Julani and HTS as “diversity-friendly” moderates that will protect Syria’s religious minorities.

During the US-led war on Syria that began in 2011, the Nusra Front (HTS’ former name) and ISIS carried out large numbers of massacres of Christians, Shiites, Alawites, Yezidis, and even Sunnis who were supportive of the governments of Iraq and Syria.

“We called for an immediate end to hostile activities … and for this purpose called for the dialogue between the government and legitimate opposition,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Saturday from Doha after meeting his Turkish and Iranian counterparts.

Moscow has been providing aerial support for Damascus since the start of the offensive, killing hundreds of HTS and SNA-allied extremists.

December 8, 2024 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , | Leave a comment

Israeli jets strike Syria’s Palmyra from US-controlled airspace

The Cradle | November 20, 2024

Israeli jets bombarded the outskirts of the central Syrian city of Palmyra with violent airstrikes on 20 November, launched from within the airspace of Washington’s Al-Tanf military base in eastern Syria.

“Israeli warplanes launched a number of missiles from the airspace of the [US] base in the Al-Tanf area on the Syrian–Iraqi–Jordanian border, in the far southeastern countryside of Homs, targeting the vicinity of the city of Palmyra,” Sputnik’s correspondent reported, citing exclusive information.

The correspondent added that casualties were reported and that many ambulances were transporting the wounded to Tadmur National Hospital.

Nine members of the Syrian army’s auxiliary forces were wounded. Firefighting teams managed to contain the blaze that resulted from the Israeli attack. Images circulating on social media show large clouds of smoke in the area.

The US Al-Tanf base is surrounded by what is referred to as the 55-kilometer area.

According to numerous reports in the last couple of years, including Syrian and Russian officials, ISIS and other extremist groups receive training inside the Al-Tanf base, and are given logistical support to carry out hit-and-run attacks against Syrian military forces in the country’s desert region.

Earlier this month, Syrian troops foiled an ISIS ambush that originated from the 55-kilometer area in the vicinity of the US military base.

According to Israel, it has recently stepped up its violent and illegal campaign of airstrikes against Syria, particularly Syrian–Lebanese border crossings, in order to cut off the flow of weapons to Hezbollah in Lebanon, where it is waging a brutal and deadly campaign.

The Al-Tanf base lies approximately 218 kilometers from where Israel struck in Palmyra on Wednesday. In May 2015, ISIS launched a massive offensive against the Syrian government and captured the ancient city.

Moscow and Damascus announced the full liberation of Palmyra in March 2017.

November 20, 2024 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

Ukraine in league with Al-Qaeda – Syria

RT | November 12, 2024

Ukrainian agents have been working with Al-Qaeda in Syria, offering them drone warfare training and some of their US-supplied weapons in exchange for manpower, the government in Damascus has told RT.

The terrorist group Jabhat al-Nusra, since rebranded as Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham (HTS) has been reduced to parts of Idlib province in the northwest of the country, thanks in part to Russia helping the Syrian government defeat various rebel militants, including Islamic State (formerly ISIS).

RT’s Roman Kosarev has visited Syria and saw “undeniable evidence” that Kiev has made an alliance with HTS.

“We have real confirmation of the Ukrainian instructors’ presence in Syria,” a Russian soldier, identified only by the callsign ‘Gilza’, told RT. He said Kiev’s operatives have been teaching HTS militants how to fly suicide drones, as well as supplying them with such weapons.

Video footage filmed on a ship showed a US-made Switchblade 600 drone being delivered to the Syrian militants in crates labeled as humanitarian aid. Another video showed a man, wearing a black T-shirt with a Ukrainian trident symbol, chatting with a militant somewhere in Idlib.

Mohammed Hamra, a former government official who had to flee Idlib, has his own sources about what’s going on in the province. He told RT that around 250 Ukrainian instructors have been training HTS militants to kill Syrians and Russians.

Syrian intelligence has confirmed the presence of “several” Ukrainian operatives in Idlib. One of the Syrian officials, who sought anonymity, told Kosarev that Kiev’s instructors have been preparing HTS militants for attacks on government-controlled territory, in particular the Russian base at Khmeimim.

Kiev has delivered drones and even drugs – stimulants to keep militants alert – to HTS through Turkish territory, the Syrian said. In return for advice and technology, Kiev has asked HTS to release Chechen militants from their ranks so they could fight in Ukraine.

Moscow has “reliable information” that Islamic State militants and “similar groups” have been fighting in Ukraine under the guise of Chechen and Crimean Tatar units, according to Alexander Bortnikov, head of the Russian security service FSB.

Russia has accused Ukraine of “openly supporting terrorist groups in Africa,” pointing to an incident in Mali earlier this year involving Touareg militants. Ukraine’s HUR military intelligence agency has boasted about providing the Touaregs with information and drone warfare techniques to help them kill government soldiers and Russian security contractors.

November 13, 2024 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Militarism | , , , , | Leave a comment

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