[…] may have been an Iraqi Sunni group targetting Shiites or a home-grown Syrian group. We don?t know. More Here. Note: Joshua Landis teaches modern Middle Eastern history and politics and writes on Syria and its […]

Mostly certainly had to be planned by neocon al qaida. Probably someone that Cheney hand picked.

Most probably is that Bashir el-Assad murdered yesterday one of his top Muhabarat (intelligence units) officers in order to protect himself and his regime.
He murdered Razi Cana’an his long-commander in Lebanon who threatened to testimony on the Rafik Hariri’s murder, and his top security commander Suleiman, two months ago in Tartus whom his testimony before the UN commission on the Syrian nuke revealed Assad nuclear policy.

Assad is protecting himself from his closer commanders who risk his regime.

I have been traveling the last two days. This news is most disturbing. I’m wondering on what grounds the Saudi and Egyptian regimes base their failure to even condemn this terrorist attack?

Averroes,

It is simple , they are happy.it is ashamed ,

AVERROES

President Mubarak sent a message of condolences to President Assad.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-09/28/content_10126499.htm

But the Saudis did not feel comfortable sending a letter to President Assad.

That was almost predictable … but … They did not even express their sympathy with the families of the victims.

I would imagine that some advisers are now putting pressure on the Saudi King to convince him to say something.

We’ll see by tomorrow.

There is nothing in the Saudi press of sympathy from the Saudi family.

Alex,

Thanks for the news link on the Egyptians. I’m relieved to see it, although they were late in speaking out.

Norman, it is truly a shame on the part of the Saudis not to even express sympathy for the families of the victims. It tells you how much they have personalized their conflict with Bashar.

To all ,

Look at this ,

Signs of trouble seen before Syria bombing
Syria has strained ties to some Sunni Arab countries because of its support for Shiite groups. Troops along Lebanese border may be intended to stop an attack from militants, analysts say.
By Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
September 29, 2008
BEIRUT — When Syria deployed thousands of soldiers along its frontier with northern Lebanon this month, some here feared that the Syrians were preparing to retake a country their military had dominated until it was pushed out in 2005.

But now, after a bombing Saturday that was the deadliest in Syria since 1986, analysts are wondering whether the troops were defensive, meant to stop an imminent attack from Lebanon-based Sunni Muslim militants inspired by Al Qaeda and sometimes trained in Iraq.

“The handwriting has been on the wall for a while,” Sami Moubayed, a political analyst in Damascus, the Syrian capital, said Sunday. “There have been signs of trouble coming in from Iraq or Lebanon.”

The car bombing killed 17 people and injured 14 in a crowded residential neighborhood on the outskirts of Damascus. The area is near an intelligence office and along the route to an important Shiite Muslim shrine.

It came as Syria performs delicate balancing acts in navigating the region’s sectarian and political fault lines.

The Syrians have held peace talks with Israel while strengthening ties to Iran, the Jewish state’s greatest enemy. They are trying to improve relations with the West and maintain what some describe as heavy influence in Lebanon, contrary to the demands of the United States and France.

Recently, Syria’s Shiite-dominated allies in Lebanon won several political victories, angering Sunni militants who consider the secular government of Syrian President Bashar Assad an enemy.

Northern Lebanon has long been a bastion for Sunni radicals, some of them veterans of the Iraq insurgency. Fatah al Islam, a group with Al Qaeda ties, fought the Lebanese army last year in a months-long battle that left hundreds dead.

On Aug. 12, just hours before newly selected Lebanese President Michel Suleiman paid a landmark visit to Damascus, a roadside bomb struck a bus in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli, killing at least 12 people, 10 of them soldiers of the Lebanese army, which is widely perceived as sympathetic to Syria. Dozens have died in clashes between Sunnis and Lebanon’s Alawite sect, which also has strong ties to Syria.

Lebanese scholar Ahmad Moussalli said he told several Syrian officials over lunch in Damascus three weeks ago to expect an attack on their soil. Saturday’s bombing, he said, was unsurprising.

“This constitutes payback against Syria because it is anti-Islamist and is against the spread of such Islamism in the north of Lebanon,” said Moussalli, a professor of political science and Islamic studies at the American University of Beirut.

Syria suffers strained ties to some Sunni Arab countries over its support for the Shiite political and military organizations Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Palestinian territories, as well as its strategic alliance with Shiite-dominated Iran.

Although diplomats all over the world, including U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the U.S. State Department, condemned the bombing, Saudi Arabia, Damascus’ biggest Arab rival, remained silent. The Saudi government strongly supports Lebanon’s Sunni community and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah movement, which is violently opposed to Hamas.

Syrian officials and pundits throughout the Middle East have publicly suggested that groups in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia or Israel could have been behind the blast. But authorities investigating the explosion have been mum.

“You can always round up the usual suspects,” Moubayed said. “It’s too early to blame any particular group or organization.”

In a report cited by Israeli media, London’s pro-Saudi newspaper Asharq al Awsat said the bombing took place near a building identified as the Palestine branch of Syria’s military intelligence. It cited unnamed sources saying that one victim, perhaps the target, was a high-ranking intelligence officer.

But a Syrian opposition group, the U.S.-based Reform Party of Syria, discounted that possibility, saying that no high-ranking officials ever spent time at that intelligence office.

The privately owned Syrian newspaper Al Watan cited witnesses at the site, including a traffic policeman injured in the blast, who said they saw two charred bodies in the black sedan that held the car bomb minutes after the explosion. Imad Habib, the policeman, said he found the car “totally burnt and in it were two burnt persons and another two outside it. They were all dead.”

Another witness said the car blew up after crashing into a truck parked along a sidewalk.

The official Syrian government-run Al Thawra newspaper published an editorial calling for tighter restrictions on foreign visitors entering the country. Syria now lets citizens of other Arab countries enter without visas.

“We need to be very careful in whom we let in,” the piece said. “We should ask, ‘Why is he here and what does he want?’ ”

[email protected]

To all,

Signs of trouble seen before Syria bombing
Syria has strained ties to some Sunni Arab countries because of its support for Shiite groups. Troops along Lebanese border may be intended to stop an attack from militants, analysts say.
By Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
September 29, 2008
BEIRUT — When Syria deployed thousands of soldiers along its frontier with northern Lebanon this month, some here feared that the Syrians were preparing to retake a country their military had dominated until it was pushed out in 2005.

But now, after a bombing Saturday that was the deadliest in Syria since 1986, analysts are wondering whether the troops were defensive, meant to stop an imminent attack from Lebanon-based Sunni Muslim militants inspired by Al Qaeda and sometimes trained in Iraq.

“The handwriting has been on the wall for a while,” Sami Moubayed, a political analyst in Damascus, the Syrian capital, said Sunday. “There have been signs of trouble coming in from Iraq or Lebanon.”

The car bombing killed 17 people and injured 14 in a crowded residential neighborhood on the outskirts of Damascus. The area is near an intelligence office and along the route to an important Shiite Muslim shrine.

It came as Syria performs delicate balancing acts in navigating the region’s sectarian and political fault lines.

The Syrians have held peace talks with Israel while strengthening ties to Iran, the Jewish state’s greatest enemy. They are trying to improve relations with the West and maintain what some describe as heavy influence in Lebanon, contrary to the demands of the United States and France.

Recently, Syria’s Shiite-dominated allies in Lebanon won several political victories, angering Sunni militants who consider the secular government of Syrian President Bashar Assad an enemy.

Northern Lebanon has long been a bastion for Sunni radicals, some of them veterans of the Iraq insurgency. Fatah al Islam, a group with Al Qaeda ties, fought the Lebanese army last year in a months-long battle that left hundreds dead.

On Aug. 12, just hours before newly selected Lebanese President Michel Suleiman paid a landmark visit to Damascus, a roadside bomb struck a bus in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli, killing at least 12 people, 10 of them soldiers of the Lebanese army, which is widely perceived as sympathetic to Syria. Dozens have died in clashes between Sunnis and Lebanon’s Alawite sect, which also has strong ties to Syria.

Lebanese scholar Ahmad Moussalli said he told several Syrian officials over lunch in Damascus three weeks ago to expect an attack on their soil. Saturday’s bombing, he said, was unsurprising.

“This constitutes payback against Syria because it is anti-Islamist and is against the spread of such Islamism in the north of Lebanon,” said Moussalli, a professor of political science and Islamic studies at the American University of Beirut.

Syria suffers strained ties to some Sunni Arab countries over its support for the Shiite political and military organizations Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Palestinian territories, as well as its strategic alliance with Shiite-dominated Iran.

Although diplomats all over the world, including U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the U.S. State Department, condemned the bombing, Saudi Arabia, Damascus’ biggest Arab rival, remained silent. The Saudi government strongly supports Lebanon’s Sunni community and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah movement, which is violently opposed to Hamas.

Syrian officials and pundits throughout the Middle East have publicly suggested that groups in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia or Israel could have been behind the blast. But authorities investigating the explosion have been mum.

“You can always round up the usual suspects,” Moubayed said. “It’s too early to blame any particular group or organization.”

In a report cited by Israeli media, London’s pro-Saudi newspaper Asharq al Awsat said the bombing took place near a building identified as the Palestine branch of Syria’s military intelligence. It cited unnamed sources saying that one victim, perhaps the target, was a high-ranking intelligence officer.

But a Syrian opposition group, the U.S.-based Reform Party of Syria, discounted that possibility, saying that no high-ranking officials ever spent time at that intelligence office.

The privately owned Syrian newspaper Al Watan cited witnesses at the site, including a traffic policeman injured in the blast, who said they saw two charred bodies in the black sedan that held the car bomb minutes after the explosion. Imad Habib, the policeman, said he found the car “totally burnt and in it were two burnt persons and another two outside it. They were all dead.”

Another witness said the car blew up after crashing into a truck parked along a sidewalk.

The official Syrian government-run Al Thawra newspaper published an editorial calling for tighter restrictions on foreign visitors entering the country. Syria now lets citizens of other Arab countries enter without visas.

“We need to be very careful in whom we let in,” the piece said. “We should ask, ‘Why is he here and what does he want?’ “

I just read a comment by Zenobia that I can not leave unanswered:

“A small point first: I don’t believe in the original sin kind of reasoning , and that you can blame the son for the sins of the father. Therefore, until the son orchestrates the murder of thousands of people, we cannot hold him responsible for the sin of brutality of the elder father Assad.”

I think we can. Here are a few questions for you:

1) Do you not agree that Hama was a major turning point in Syria’s history?

2) Do you agree that any Syrian president should make sure we do not suffer the same incident again?

3) Did Bashar condemn what happened in Hama?

4) Did he persecute those responsible?

5) Did he offer compensation for the families?

6) Did we create a system of checks and balances that will prevent such a massacre in the future?

7) Did anything change in the structure of the regime that will prevent this event? Apart from the fear that is now in the heart of every Syrian and will take another generation to be erased?

8 ) Did Bashar return any of the wealth that was harvested from the Syrian people by force?

9) Can Bashar himself prevent such an event in case the regime decides to defend itself against Syrians seeking freedom?

10) Do you not see that some otherwise moral and smart people, including commentators in this blog, consider Hama a good thing (lesser of 2 evils). And that such logic is obviously more widespread withing regime operators. So it could happen again.

Nafdik, thanks for your thoughts.

well, what I said is a very narrow statement about assigning blame really, not a judgement about all the other issues you raise, that I agree are important.

number 1, I don’t know enough to know how this event should be perceived or judged relative to Syrian History, which is very long indeed. I don’t know if that was a turning point. Maybe in the twentieth century. Hardly in the larger scope of history. In the larger scope, it is blip.

number 2: yes, the president should make sure this is not repeated , of course.

I think the answers to three through eight are probably all NO. And whether it would be ideal that the current president did do all these things, I think it is not realistic to think that he will. The Syrian way is to avoid bringing up a nasty subject, and to sweep it under the collective rug. Also, there would be a cultural barrier to his condemning the actions of his own father, this is the problem with family succession, it makes it hard to be critical of the past leader and the past policies and mistakes or crimes.

Number 9: I would say he does now have the power to prevent such an event from repeating itself. I think this president has continuously accumulated more political capital and respect such that he could (assuming that we judge him to be someone who would not support such actions) stop it from happening outside of his control.

number 10: I don’t know what is in the hearts of all the commentators on this blog, but I give them the benefit of the doubt that in general they are not in favor of violence and brutality and suppression by the government. I do think they rationalize , perhaps too much, that there is a large swath of gray between the black and white, and that the MB was guilty of significant violence as well, to the point that it brought this event upon itself. I don’t personally think there is a justification for violence and killing. But as usual, the story is more complex than simply good guys – bad guys, guilty and not guilty. Maybe everybody is guilty as usual.

Zenobia,

I am really surprised by your statement:

“The MB brought this event upon itself”, as if it was an organization who suffered and not humans who could have been our friends, brothers and children.

Of the 10000-30000 dead:

How many were MB?

How many were MB who supported the terrorist acts?

How many were MB who participated in the terrorist acts?

How many were MB sympathizers (do they deserve to die)?

How many were innocent bystanders?

How many were children?

How can we relativise such an event?

Nafdik, I am not saying that. I am repeating what I have heard others say. I really didn’t say anything of this, as I am not qualified to offer an opinion. I am repeating what some have said. And I usually find that there IS more gray in most situations than simply a black and white story.
However, you have your opinion that fits one side. Ok, I see that.
My original comment had nothing to do with figuring out this historical truth or my own opinion at this point about it. Regardless, Bashar Assad was about 15 years old or something at that time of this tragedy, so he can’t realistically be blamed for it, or for any brutality of his father’s. Thats all I said. And you can’t attach to a son, the father’s sins. I certainly wouldn’t want anyone to associate me with my father’s sins.
Because he is now president, it is a more pertinent issue, as Bashar has to speak to the historical issues to some degree, but there is a point where history recedes, and the mentality of an earlier era recedes, and the question is: is he allowing a new mentality and a new expectation for society to emerge. And does he himself, assure his people that he is delivering the opportunity for a better system and a different kind of rule eventually. People are of course, still disagreeing about what is happening, i believe.

[…] such as the September 26thexplosion in central Damascus which killed 17.  SyriaComment had a poston possible motives for the attack.  Yesterday, Jordan’s Mohamed Abu Rumman, whose articles […]