As Mubarak meets with Larjani in an effort to mediate between Iran and the Arabs, we see the continuing shift away from confrontation in the region. The Arab Cold War, exacerbated by the US invasion of Iraq and Bush’s attempt to turn “moderate” against “radical” Arab, is petering out. Saad Hariri’s trip to Damascus was one chapter in the reconciliation process that has seen Assad and King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia mend fences. Now Egypt is mending relations with the radicals even as it helps Israel and the US contain the Palestinians in Gaza by building a steel wall along its border.  Washington’s effort to build Saudi Arabia into a Middle East leader which could rally the region to take on Iran was short lived. Turkey has stepped into the breach to assume leadership  in what some pundits are labeling its “Neo-Ottoman” foreign policy. The collapse of Iraq has also catapulted Syria into a larger regional role. Not only is it the only transit route between North and South, but it also has a stable government in a region of instability. Syria’s improving relations with Turkey have also exalted its standing. As Erdoghan said this week,  he hopes that Turko-Syrian relations will become a model for cooperation to be copied throughout the region.

The Leveretts on new Middle East Cold War at the RFI

On Sunday, the Speaker of the Iranian majlis (parliament), Ali Larijani, met for two hours with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Cairo. Ostensibly, Larijani was in Egypt to attend a meeting of the Parliamentary Union of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, which includes Turkey, Kuwait, Niger, Azerbaijan, and Uganda in addition to Egypt and Iran. Larijani publicly described his meeting with Mubarak as “very good and constructive”, and official Egyptian and Iranian media reported that the two men discussed bilateral relations and regional issues of mutual concern. After meeting with Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit, Larijani declared Iran’s support for Palestinian unity and, following a meeting with Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman, noted that “relations between the two countries could be a great help for creation of peace and security in the region”.

Larijani’s meeting with Mubarak was unusual; among other reasons, Larijani is not a head of state or government. More broadly, Larijani’s high-level reception was striking because Egypt and the Islamic Republic have yet to restore diplomatic ties since Cairo cut them off in 1980 and Egyptian-Iranian relations were recently strained by the 2008-09 conflict in Gaza. The potential significance of Larijani’s visit was highlighted today when Mubarak—who, at this point in his career, travels abroad infrequently—set out on a previously unannounced tour of several Gulf Arab states. An unnamed Egyptian official told the Associated Press that the Iranian had presented a “new proposal” to improve relations with Arab states and that Mubarak was traveling to discuss it with his Gulf Arab allies.

Larijani’s discussions in Cairo and Mubarak’s swing through the Gulf need to be understood through at least two analytic “prisms”: the first is the increasingly polarized strategic environment in the Middle East, and the second is growing concern among America’s traditional Arab allies about the ability of the Obama Administration to “deliver” in dealing with key regional challenges. Broadly speaking, the Middle East today is deeply divided between two camps—a reality that some commentators, borrowing a phrase from the late Malcolm Kerr, describe as a new regional “Cold War”.

On one side of this divide are those states willing to work in various forms of strategic partnership with the United States, with an implied acceptance of American hegemony over the region. This camp includes Israel, those Arab states that have made peace with Israel (Egypt and Jordan), and other so-called moderate Arab states (e.g., Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Gulf Cooperation Council).

On the other side of this divide are those Middle Eastern states and non-state actors that are unwilling to legitimize American (and, some in this camp would say, Israeli) hegemony over the region. The Islamic Republic of Iran has emerged in recent years as the de facto leader of this camp, which also includes Syria and prominent non-state actors such as HAMAS and Hizballah. Notwithstanding its close security ties to the United States, Qatar has also aligned itself with the “resistance” camp on some issues in recent years. And, notwithstanding Turkey’s longstanding membership in NATO and ongoing European “vocation”, the rise of the Justice Development Party and declining military involvement in Turkish politics have prompted an intensification of Ankara’s diplomatic engagement in the Middle East, in ways that give additional strategic options to various actors in the “resistance” camp.

While the “pro-American” camp retains considerable resources and influence, the “resistance” camp has made impressive strategic gains since the turn of the millennium—in no small part, because of the George W. Bush Administration’s strategically counterproductive approach to the region. Against this backdrop, the “pro-American” camp clearly hoped that President Obama would re-legitimate America’s leadership role in the Middle East and deal effectively with the region’s most pressing strategic challenges—with the Palestinian issue and Iran at the top of that list. But, as we have met with senior diplomats and officials from the “pro-American” camp in recent weeks, we have been struck by the accelerating pace at which our interlocutors’ concern about the direction of the Obama Administration’s Middle East policies is mounting. They are becoming increasingly dubious that President Obama will “deliver” in the Middle East—on Palestine, on Iran, in Afghanistan, and on other important regional issues.

It is in this context that Larijani’s visit to Cairo and Mubarak’s subsequent departure for the Gulf take on special significance. As the Islamic Republic prepares for an intensification in its longstanding “Cold War” struggle with the United States and Israel—and a corresponding rise in the risks of eventual military attacks against Iranian interests—Tehran has a clear interest in trying to bolster regional “solidarity” with America’s traditional Arab allies. But America’s traditional Arab allies, such as Egypt, have an even more compelling interest in improving relations with Tehran, to reduce the odds of U.S. (or Israeli) military confrontation with Iran, minimize perceived Iranian threats to their interests, and mitigate the domestic and regional backlash that would ensue if these states were somehow implicated in a U.S. and/or Israeli military campaign against the Islamic Republic.

Syria 2009” –  excellent review DPA

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More assessment of the Hariri visit:

IDAF writes:in al- Akhbar – Interesting details of the Hariri-Asad meeting: Hariri spent 22 hours in Damascus and met privately with Asad for more than 8 hours during. The two guys should be friends by now!

Al-Diyar Newspaper: Asad to visit Beirut next month after Mo’allem

Also in al-Akhbar: Syria’s unprecedented welcome for Hariri is explained here as Syria’s need to fortify Hariri’s Sunni “Za’im” credentials in Lebanon (to counter growing Sunni radicalism in Lebanon):

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Firas Azmah writes:

For Hariri, the visit was necessary for two main reasons:

First, as Prime Minister of a national unity government with the support of the Lebanese Parliament, Hariri is no longer the leader of a Sunni political party, but the official representative of all Lebanese, half of whom do not share his heretofore-adversarial approach to Syria.

Secondly, and more importantly, under the Lebanese constitution, the Prime Minister is effectively the Chief Executive responsible for governing the country and delivering on the people’s agenda. After the Doha agreement and the arduous process of forming his own government, Hariri understood well that, Saudi sponsorship notwithstanding, he needs Damascus’ blessing and support to govern effectively in Beirut. Without such support, his premiership could turn into a grinding series of political battles over minutiae that will prevent him from achieving anything but stasis. The Siniora government of the last few years serves as a dim example.

To secure Damascus’ support, Hariri will have to commit to some core values that are key to Syria: Re-affirming Lebanon’s Arab identity, securing an unambiguous position vis-à-vis the conflict with Israel, supporting the resistance (i.e. Hezbollah) and committing to a distinguished relationship with Syria. From Syria’s perspective, all other issues may be negotiated.

On the Syrian side, after a period of critical evaluation of its pre-2005 management of the ‘Lebanese portfolio’, there seems to be a genuine interest, among the leadership in Damascus, in adopting a new, more institutional approach to managing the relationship with Lebanon, which could present an opportunity for Hariri.

Personally and politically, the visit represented a difficult climb-down for Saad Hariri. However, the visit could serve as the beginning of a personal reconciliation between Hariri and Assad, and consequently, of a political reconciliation between Syria and Lebanon’s Sunni community. Most importantly, harvested well, the visit could be a harbinger for a new type of a relationship between the two countries.

Regardless of how things play out, one thing was clear: After the acrimony of the last 5 years, in form and substance, Hariri’s visit to Damascus symbolized the return of Syria’s preeminence in Lebanon.

– “Who will vaccinate Al-Hariri against the Maronite “Megalomania”?” (Al-Akhbar Lebanon) mideastwire.com

– “Kouchner: the Assad-Hariri meeting normal…” (Al-Hayat)

“The visit represents a positive development after the formation of a new government in Lebanon. It is only normal that the Syrian president and the new Lebanese prime minister be able to talk with each other and I even expect the prime minister to make another visit to Syria. Anyway, the meeting was a very positive, personal and private one between both leaders. I may be one of the few politicians who do not forget the past events but I can tell you that the meeting is without any doubt a positive development and we will see how things will go later on. After all, this meeting will not resolve the problems in the Middle East or the Israeli Palestinian confrontation or the Hezbollah problem but it is always better for the different parties to talk to each other.”

“Asked if France wanted to play a mediating role between Israel and Syria, Kouchner said that the problem between both parties was Hezbollah and its missiles which are threatening Israel. In regard to Syrian pressures to stop the funding of Terje Roed-Larsen’s mission in regard to United Nations Resolution 1559, Kouchner said that he had never heard of that problem before and that he did not think it was even possible.” – Al-Hayat, United Kingdom

Syria-US Relations: The Difficult Lessons of 1991 and the Peace Process
By Ahmed Salkini, Embassy in Washington

The National UAE: Economic downturn hits Syrian Christmas
2009-12-23 02:49:08.12 GMT

DAMASCUS // An economic downturn and fears over increasing Islamic radicalism have dampened this years festive atmosphere for Syrian Christians.In the week running up to Christmas Day, merchants in Christian majority sections of Damascus complained …

Turkey to invest 3.5 bln USD in railway construction in 2010

Efforts were also under way to complete international rail lines from Syria’s Aleppo to Sanliurfa in southeast Turkey and from Georgia’s Tbilisi to Kars in northeast Turkey, Karaman
added.

Turkish PM Erdogan hails ties with Syria
December 23, 2009, Now Lebanon

During a speech in Damascus on Wednesday to Turkish and Syrian businessmen on Wednesday, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan hailed his country’s fast expanding relations with Syria as model for its ties with other Arab countries.

“We are living through historic times. We are going to overcome all the obstacles and form with Syria a model for cooperation to be copied elsewhere,” Erdogan added.

He also said Turkey was working on expanding its relations with other Arab states, including Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon. He said he hoped bilateral trade between Turkey and Syria would rise to $5 billion a year from $2 billion a year over the next three to four years. The improvement in relations between Turkey and Syria over the past

Dec. 23 (Xinhua) — Syria and Turkey on Wednesday signed 50 agreements and memorandum of understanding (MoU) and a work program for joint cooperation, as leaders of the two countries met and vowed to further enhance bilateral relations.

“The Syrian-Turkish relations have developed over the past few years, however we still have a long way to go,” Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said at a joint press conference with visiting Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“The fruits of our deep relations could be seen in all fields, which became a reality that anyone couldn’t ignore,” said Assad.

The agreements were signed at the end of the first meeting of the Turkey-Syria High Level Strategic Cooperation Council co-chaired by Erdogan and his Syrian counterpart Naji Otri, a mechanism launched during the Syrian president’s visit to Ankara in September.

After the visit, Syria and Turkey announced that the two countries have decided to cancel entry visa requirements of each other for their passport-holding citizens.

Erdogan said the first meeting of the High Level Strategic Cooperation Council is a historic day for relations between the two countries, adding that cooperation between Syria and Turkey made considerable progress in the fields of economy and trade.

He said canceling the entry visa requirements between the two countries and the Free Trade Zone agreement led to increasing trade exchange, adding “we will work to increase trade exchange incoming years to reach 5 billion U.S. dollars.”
The two leaders hailed that the “brotherly ties” between the two countries is an example to be followed.

Assad also reiterated his country’s readiness to participate in any peace talks if Israel shows real will to achieve just and comprehensive peace, saying that “Syria doesn’t need (French President) Nicolas Sarkozy to be the mediator of peace talks.”

The Turkish prime minister started his official visit to Syria on Tuesday evening, accompanied by a large ministerial delegation.

Hamas delegation heads to Syria for swap consult

A delegation of Hamas officials will head to Damascus Thursday to meet with the movement’s leaders in Damadcus around the latest Israeli response to ongoing negotiations for a prisoner swap deal.

An official in Hamas said the delegation would seek Damascus’ point of view on the offer, following meetings in Gaza as leaders discussed the information passed to them by a German mediator in the swap talks.

According to reports, the latest offer includes the release of all or most of the prisoners identified by Hamas, but demands that up to 100 of them, mostly Hamas and militant movement leaders, be deported from the West Bank to Gaza or other countries that do not border Israel.

Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahhar told Israel Radio that Hamas would need several days to collect an official response.

Zahhar said the German mediator left the Strip and returned to Europe, where he is awaiting Hamas’ response. Their answer will determine the mediators next move.

Slow Travel
A Syria Roadtrip… Seriously?
By Frederick Deknatel December 13, 2009

Renewed Lebanese drug trade hikes Mideast tensions – AP

BAALBEK, Lebanon – Lebanon’s drug-producing heartland is back in business with a resurgence of marijuana and poppy fields, challenging the country’s underpowered security forces and adding another dimension to Israel’s war with Hezbollah militants….

ISRAEL: Good neighbors make fences
by Batsheva Sobelman – (Blog) December 23, 2009 – 12:00am

While Egypt’s steel barricade draws both ire and fire from Gaza, it isn’t the only neighbor fencing in its property. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intends to build a fence along the country’s border with Egypt. The border sprawls about 143 miles through sand-land and mountainous terrain, and with the exception of the official crossing at Taba, it is wide open. It is largely a peaceful area, but in recent years it has become increasingly exploited by a wide range of factors that are evolving into a real threat.

Postwar Gaza: Scars frozen, Mideast at an impasse
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
by Karin Laub – December 23, 2009 – 12:00am

Gaza’s scars have been frozen in place since Israel waged war a year ago to subdue Hamas and stop rockets from hitting its towns. Entire neighborhoods still lie in rubble, and traumatized residents can’t rebuild their lives. A man who lost two daughters and his home can’t visit his surviving 4-year-old girl in a Belgian hospital because Gaza’s borders remain sealed. A 15-year-old struggles to walk on her artificial limbs, while dozens of other war amputees still await prostheses.

“It was nonsense to try to isolate Syria,” says the new French ambassador to Damascus, Eric Chevallier. “It was not feasible, and ended up being counterproductive.”

Q&A: Eric Chevallier, French Ambassador to Syria
By John Dagge in Syria Today

We believe that Syria is a key country in the region, not only for political reasons. Economically and geographically, Syria is very important as well. So my task is clear: to build upon this political dynamic in order to strengthen our political, economic, cultural and social relations. This will not necessarily be easy, but it is a clear goal.

Can you update our readers on Franco-Syrian business ties?

There are a number of key and very visible projects underway in Syria. One is the presence of Total [energy company], a very important French firm. A very interesting project is also being carried out by Lafarge [building materials group] which is constructing a cement factory in the north of the country. This project uses the most up-to-date technology and will boast the largest cement compressor in the world. There is also a very successful project with Bel [food group], which is also being carried out in cooperation with Syrian business partners. Most recently, a deal was finalised between the Port of Lattakia and a major French shipping company to modernise the port facility. We also have the new Franco-Syrian Entrepreneurs Club and AFD, the French development agency, which is rapidly establishing a presence here. The AFD office in Damascus was officially opened on October 24. These are all emblematic projects. But it is clear that we need to do more. France can do more with big projects, particularly in the fields of infrastructure, transport, energy and water. We are also keen to develop smaller initiatives. Put simply, although we have a number of emblematic projects underway, we think that the economic relationship does not match the excellent political dynamics and we need to work on this.

Kouchner: France has Often Been Disappointed in Syria

French Foreign Minister Brernard Kouchne hailed a visit to Syria by Prime Minister Saad Hariri, uncovering a similar trip by the Lebanese premier to Paris in the coming few days. Kouchner believed Lebanon has achieved “progress,” citing parliamentary elections, establishment of a national unity government and Hariri’s visit to Damascus.

Asked about Hariri’s outcome of his visit to Syria, Kouchner commented: “Parties better talk to each other rather than fight each other.”

He lauded Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s initiative toward Hariri, saying: “I hope I am not mistaken for we have often been disappointed in this country (Syria) in particular.”

Robert Worth in the NYTimes

the United States and the West have chosen to engage with Syria, not isolate it. And Saudi Arabia, which has long backed Mr. Hariri and competed with Syria for influence here, reconciled with the Syrians earlier this year, leaving them a freer hand to guide politics in Lebanon as they once did.

All this has been known for months, but it was still tremendously important for Mr. Hariri to actually cross the mountains — in his first visit since before his father’s killing — and pay his respects in Damascus.

“The image of Syrian soldiers retreating was a huge blow to them,” said Elias Muhanna, a political analyst and the author of the Lebanese blog Qifa Nabki. “So the image of Hariri coming over the mountains means they’ve come full circle. It demonstrates to all the power centers in Damascus that Bashar has restored Syria’s position of strength vis-à-vis Lebanon.”

The visit also has vivid historical echoes for many Lebanese. In 1977, the Druze leader Walid Jumblatt visited Damascus just weeks after his own father was killed in an attack that is believed to have been arranged by Syria. Like Mr. Hariri, he had little choice: he had to reconcile with Syria if he wanted to continue playing a political role.

“The stability of Lebanon always depends on its environment, and basically this environment is Syria,” Mr. Jumblatt said in an interview on Sunday. “For the sake of Lebanese stability, we have got to put aside personal animosity.”

It is difficult to say exactly what Mr. Hariri’s visit portends in terms of Lebanese-Syrian relations. By one measure, he has already achieved his most important goals: the Syrian Army is gone, and no one expects it to return. The two countries restored diplomatic relations this year. The international tribunal that was formed in 2005 under United Nations auspices to try the elder Hariri’s killers continues its work here and in the Netherlands, where it is based. It could still indict high-ranking Syrians, although most analysts say that seems less likely than it did four years ago.

But most agree that Syria will once again have a powerful, undisputed voice here on issues ranging from cabinet positions to the militant Shiite movement Hezbollah, which Syria supports. The influence is not likely to be as crude as it was during the 1990s, when Syrian officers strutted through Beirut and were accused of raking profits from Lebanese industries. To some here, that is improvement enough. To others, Mr. Hariri’s trip across the mountains was a tragic concession.

Dr. al-Taqi says Baghdad should look closer to home for the culprits. “There are forces in Iraq that want to see it turned into a weak federal state,” he said. “Syria has no interest in that. We don’t want another Lebanon on our border.” …

Commenting on the international red carpet that has been rolled out for Damascus, one Western diplomat said it was hoped that Syria also had learned a lesson. “We want Syria to stop playing with the bad guys and start playing with the good guys,” he said.

This isn’t the attitude of a lot of Syrians, however. Hearing of this remark, an influential Syrian businessman leaned over and said softly: “Playing with the good guys never got us anywhere.” Globe and Mail

Michael Totten at Commentary Mag Blog

I was invited to dinner at Hariri’s house earlier this year and had a long and frank discussion about politics with him and some colleagues. I can’t quote him because the meeting was off the record, but trust me: the man is no friend of the Syrian government or Hezbollah, and it’s not just because someone in that crowd killed his father……

No one has Hariri’s or Lebanon’s back, not anymore. He and his allies in the “March 14? coalition have sensed this for some time, which is why Druze leader Walid Jumblatt has grudgingly softened his opposition to Assad and Hezbollah lately. When Hariri went to Damascus, everyone in the country, aside from useless newswire reporters, understood it meant Syria has re-emerged as the strong horse in Lebanon.

Walid Jumblatt is another member of what David Schenker calls the Murdered Fathers Club….

It’s bad news for the Lebanese, the Americans, the French, the Saudis, and the Israelis. None of this was inevitable, but — in Lebanon, at least — it was predictable.

Sami Moubayed,”Hariri’s Syria visit sets Lebanon on track”

During the press conference, Hariri said that the “skies were blue” between Syria and Lebanon, promising a new phase of cooperation between the two countries that were once one an entity before being divided by European colonizers only 90 years ago, after World War I.

Hariri tried to put an end to the debate about his visit, saying that it should not be seen as one party scoring a point over the other, “otherwise, we will never move forward”. Many in the Lebanese press said he has made a grand concession by coming to Syria, given accusations in Beirut that the Syrians were responsible for the murder of his father, Rafik, in February 2005.

The Syrians, however, see things very differently. They are convinced that they had nothing to do with the Hariri murder, meaning it is only natural for Hariri to come to Syria since they had done nothing to make him upset in the first place. Every Lebanese prime minister since the 1940s, after all, has made the trip to Syria, even Hariri’s predecessor and protege, Fouad al-Siniora, who came during the lowest points in Syrian Lebanese relations, in 2005.

If Hariri wants to rule Lebanon – and succeed – he needs to have good relations with Syria. Syria after all, according to what he said shortly before heading to Damascus, was Lebanon’s “only neighbor”.

If this relationship was not mended, Hariri realized, his standing would always remain strained with Hezbollah and the Free Patriotic Movement of General Michel Aoun. And in order to rule, he cannot have the Shi’ites or the Maronites at odds with his cabinet. Simply put, a cabinet with no Hezbollah or its sister party, Amal, means one with no Shi’ites – meaning an unconstitutional one.

Hariri tried, with the help of particular strongmen in his March 14 Alliance, to confront the warriors of Hezbollah on the streets of Beirut in May 2008. His men were rounded up in a matter of hours, proving how poorly prepared they were for battle and how powerful Syria and its allies were on the streets of Beirut. This was in response to an attempt by the Hariri-dominated Siniora cabinet to dismantle Hezbollah’s telecommunications network at Beirut International Airport.

Before that, according to Hezbollah, members of his team urged Israel to carry on with its 2006 war on Lebanon, hoping that it would succeed at breaking, or at least weakening, Hezbollah. Hariri after all is an extension of Saudi influence in Lebanon, while Hezbollah is an extension of Iranian weight in Lebanese affairs.

During the heyday of Hariri’s father, an understanding had been reached between the two countries, whereby Rafik Hariri ruled Lebanon and was supported by Hezbollah, who in turn obtained greater decision-making powers along with their allies in the Lebanese state, and were allowed to keep their arms to fight the Israelis.

Now, after trying and failing to get rid of Hezbollah, Hariri has decided to court them – and their Syrian patrons – which partially explains why he landed in Damascus….

Not only did the Saudis encourage Hariri to go to Syria, but they are now preparing to welcome Nasrallah to Saudi Arabia for a groundbreaking visit for the Iran-backed Hezbollah leader.

On another front, Iran, too, is supportive of Hariri, now that he has promised to “protect and embrace” the arms of Hezbollah, meaning that the regional neighborhood is well placed at this stage, like no time since 2005, to help Saad Hariri succeed in his job as premier. He has Iran and Saudi Arabia behind him, and now the Syrians, and is already backed by big-hitters in the international community such as France and the US. Times could not be better for the 69th prime minister of Lebanon.

See Forward Magazine’s new on-line format – Beautiful – congrats to Sami and Haykal

S&P Raises Lebanon LT FC Sovereign Rtg To ‘B’;
2009-12-22

The following is a press release from Standard & Poor’s:

— We are raising the long- and short-term sovereign credit ratings on the Republic of Lebanon to ‘B/B’, from ‘B-/C’.

— The upgrade and positive outlook reflect our view that Lebanon’s public finances, and in particular the banking system, have proven resilient in the face of the political turmoil over the past three years, and that recent developments in Lebanon may provide a greater measure of political stability in the medium term.

Syria Politics Overview 2009: The Road to Damascus
By Fay Ferguson, December 2009, Syria Today

…… More show than go

Despite the initial flurry of activity, however, the second half of 2009 saw the string of US delegates dwindle. Moreover, the country is still waiting on the arrival of a US ambassador and no progress seems to have been made on lifting economic sanctions. In an interview with the French daily Le Figaro published last month, Assad chided Obama for not matching words with actions.

“What has happened so far is a new approach; dialogue has replaced commands which is good,” he said. “But things stopped there.”

Political analysts put the lack of concrete progress down to an unwillingness of both sides to be the first to make meaningful concessions before some of their policy demands are met.

“Syria doesn’t expect change to be fast, but it did expect to receive an ambassador by now,” Ayman Abdelnour, a media consultant to the EU for the Middle East-North Africa region, said. “In terms of substance, US policy hasn’t changed.”

While Syrian officials have reiterated that the country’s alliances with Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas are unbreakable, analysts claim ties could well be softened if Syria had something tangible to gain. Until the US lifts economic sanctions and exerts pressure on Israel to agree to the full return of the Golan Heights, they note that Damascus has little incentive to accommodate US interests in the region.

“Syria has discovered that the president of the United States does not control all aspects of the country’s foreign policy,” Joshua Landis, a prominent Syria expert, said. “Congress is a roadblock in the path to lifting economic sanctions on Syria. Without either the return of the Golan or the lifting of sanctions, Syria has little interest in making important concessions to the US.”

During Israel’s two-month war on Gaza launched in December 2008, Syria openly and forcefully rallied behind Hamas and condemned the attacks as clear war crimes. Assad’s popularity in the region soared as a frustrated Arab public became increasingly disillusioned with the silence of leaders in Riyadh and Cairo.

“Despite Obama’s outreach, the mood in the region is for resistance and Syria’s position is now very strong,” Abdelnour said. “Each month resistance groups are holding their meetings in Damascus. US policy isn’t popular in the region, so why would Syria change tactics and join Washington? Syria is now in a position to enforce its views, one that has been strengthening since Israel’s war against Hezbollah in 2006.”

Prospects for peace

In terms of the Syrian-Israeli peace process, 2009 again resulted in deadlock. Local observers have all but given up hope that the Israeli government headed by Benjamin Netanyahu is seriously interested in peace, or that the Obama administration is willing to apply the kind of pressure needed to bring it about.

“Syria is serious about a just and comprehensive peace – Israel is definitely not,” Jihad Makdissi, spokesman for the Syrian embassy in London, said. “Arab countries made a historical collective offer to Israel in the form of the Arab Peace Initiative in 2002 and Israel reciprocated by killing 1,300 Palestinians in Gaza. Peace does not seem to be imminent.”

The approach to negotiations remains in a familiar deadlock. Syria insists on certain ground rules which will form the basis for negotiations: that they must be based on UN Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338 and take up where they stopped at the Madrid Peace Conference, adopting the ‘land for peace’ formula. For Syria, these are not preconditions, but internationally recognised commitments undertaken by both sides. Netanyahu and the US reject this approach and demand that negotiations start from square one, without any commitment that Israel withdraw from occupied Syrian territory.

“The positions of the two sides are diametrically opposed which probably precludes the possibility of a peace agreement between Syria and Israel while Netanyahu is in power,” Elias Samo, a professor of international relations at the University of Aleppo, said.

Syria-Saudi rapprochement

While simultaneously engaging in dialogue with the US and upholding the right to resistance, Syria also entered a period of rapprochement with Saudi Arabia. The reconciliation comes after years of strained relations between the two countries over Syria’s alliance with Iran and support for Lebanon’s Hezbollah faction, two of Saudi Arabia’s biggest ideological threats in the region. Laying these tensions to rest necessitated a flurry of diplomatic activity and led to the appointment of ambassadors in both countries. In March, Assad met with King Abdullah in Riyadh and in October the Saudi King visited Damascus for the first time as head of state.

Saudi Arabia’s switch from a policy of isolation to one of engagement with Syria is a sign, say analysts, that Riyadh recogises Damascus can influence numerous regional arenas.

“Syria has many cards to play; Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas and other resistance groups,” Samo said. “US-backed countries in the region have discovered that Syria cannot be overlooked, marginalised or discounted. It is an important player in all Middle Eastern issues.”

The potential for Syria to exert its influence was underlined, says Abdelnour, when Damascus officially supported Saudi Arabia’s right to defend itself against security threats posed by the Shi’ite rebellion in northern Yemen, an uprising many have claimed is backed by Tehran.

“At the moment Saudi Arabia needs Syria’s support in dealing with the crisis in Yemen,” Abdelnour said. “The Shi’ite uprising is a security threat on Saudi Arabia’s border, so Riyadh hopes Syria will use its influence on Iran to calm the situation down.”

Highlighting a new climate of understanding between the two countries, Makdissi emphasised Damascus’s commitment to preserving Saudi Arabia’s security.

“We always shared the same political objectives, but we sometimes differed on how to achieve them because we read events differently,” he said. “Syria has played an important role in preserving the security of the Gulf countries at the time of crisis and it will continue to do the same. Saudi-Syrian relations remain the cornerstone of Arab solidarity.”

Syria’s rapprochement with Saudi Arabia has given rise to much speculation that a warmer political climate will take hold in the region. Yet significant differences of opinion remain in Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine. Syria’s ongoing spat with Baghdad regarding Iraqi Ba’athist groups based in the country, which resulted in both capitals recalling their ambassadors in August, is an example of how quickly thaws can freeze back over.

“We should not hold our breath for Arab unity to break out any time soon,” Landis said. “Arabs will remain deeply divided, especially over countries with weak governments such as Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen where much is at stake. Saudi Arabia will have to give Syria’s interests greater concern before relations will make much further progress.”

The rise and rise of Turkey

While mending bridges in the Gulf, Syria also shored up support to the north of its borders. Damascus’s alliance with Turkey went from strength to strength in 2009…..

Majalla has just published a special edition on Bashar Assad with 3 or 4 interesting articles in English (Thanks Steve)

Alex Explains why Syrian occupation of Lebanon was not the same as Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands. In response to Shai who had written: “There are plenty on my side, who are exact copies. They too would say: “…and stop giving us moral-lessons about Occupation after its own “little history” in some neighboring country…” Alex writes:

Shai, I will use the example you wrote here to let Ausamaa and Norman (and practically every Syrian I can think of) know that I agree with your call for Syrians to have meaningful discussions with Israelis.

Why?

Because, we need to do a good job in presenting Syria’s point of view. Only Syrians will be motivated enough to do it right. We can’t hire a PR firm to represent us, we can’t expect the Israeli peace activists to be able to respond on our behalf (it will discredit them in Israel if they over did it)

Back to the “little history” of Syrian “occupation” of Lebanon … Here is how it is very different from Israel’s occupation

1) Syria was invited by the President of Lebanon, got Arab and international backing before entering the long term challenge of stopping Lebanon’s bloody civil war. The Syrian army was part of the Arab league’s Lebanon rescue army.

Israel … invaded its neighbors.

2) Syria did not annex Lebanon even though it was doable.

Israel annexed the Golan and planted crazy Israeli settlers all over the occupied territories.

3) Syria did not “occupy” any other neighbor … Israel at different points occupied territories from every single neighbor (Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and .. Palestine).

For Israel, occupation of others’ lands is a pattern of behavior. (although these days it is not as easy as before)

4) Syria was never ever mentioned specifically in any UNSC resolution for its occupation of another country .. even 1559 does not name Syria by name.

Israel is the target of tens of UN resolutions (SC and GA) … no other country on earth comes a close second to Israel in this regard.

5) Syria respected 1559 and withdrew immediately from Lebanon. Israel does not give a damn about international law (excpet when it can use it against Hizbollah or Iran)

Engaging Syria
James Denselow
guardian, Sunday 20 December 2009
Change in Syria is unlikely to come quickly. But in the meantime, we shouldn’t keep it out in the cold

Critics of Syria have in the past compared the tale of the Assad dynasty to that of the Corleone family in The Godfather. In a National Geographic article this month that infuriated the Syrians to the extent that their Washington ambassador issued a point-by-point rebuttal, Bashar is cast as Michael Corleone. Like Al Pachino’s character, Bashar was called back from abroad to take over the family business following the sudden death of his brother Basil in a car crash (aka Santino Corleone, killed in a car ambush).

Michael Corleone promised to change things and make the family legit, much like Bashar who was “neither stained with blood nor corrupted by radicalism or incompetence” and promised change to Syria as the “Damascus Spring” arrived with his inheriting the presidency in 2000.

Like Corleone, however, Bashar has failed so far to fundamentally change the authoritarian character of the Syrian state. The Damascus Spring was followed by a Damascus Winter, as the bitter winds of regime change swept the region during the Bush years. Yet Syria survived and ever since the Baker-Hamilton report recommended engaging with Syria, the west has been desperately trying to make Damascus an offer it cannot refuse – abandon Hezbollah, Hamas and Iran and come in from the cold.

However, much like attempting to restart a marriage after years of acrimonious divorce, engagement is proving stilted. One of the conclusions in the series of briefing papers produced by the International Crisis Group (ICG) this month suggested that if Syria can endure the isolation brought upon it by the Bush-years, the regime will ask why it should change at all.

Ian Black asked in October whether Syria sees itself as “in the cold” and in need of “the west” considering that its relations with Iran, Turkey and powerful proxy groups are so strong, and that relations with Saudi Arabia have just been patched up.

Recent events were a display of this emboldened Syria. Back in 2005 the country that former CIA-man Flynt Leverett described as “a comparatively small, internally conflicted, economically underperforming, and resource-poor Arab state” was forced to make a humiliated withdrawal of its military from Lebanon.

Four years and a multitude of assassinated prominent Lebanese figures later, over the weekend a line of Lebanese politicians from all the various sect “families” made their way to Damascus to pay their respects to President Bashar al-Assad over the death of his brother Majd Assad. Traditional allies such as Hezbollah and house speaker Nabbil Berri will be followed by the Druze leader Walid Jumblatt and Sunni prime minister Saad Hariri. Figures who may have thought of themselves as once on Syria’s hit list are now paying their dues to the Damascene court.

Some argue that this more secure regime may be more likely to enact significant change. This theory suggests that with a solid base the Ba’ath party could give more priority to political and ideological ideas than to pure power politics. However Alan George has written dismissing such an idea, describing the Ba’athist system of governance as “so demoralised and corrupt that power is wielded for no purpose but power itself”.

So what hope is there for change in Syria? Lebanese president Michel Suleiman had to delay his visit to Damascus due to meetings with President Obama in advance of Lebanon taking up its place as a temporary member of the UN Security Council. Obama, frustrated with his outreach to Iran and unable to effectively pursue an Israeli-Palestinian peace process, may be tempted to see what Suleiman thinks of the prospect of improved US-Syrian relations.

According to the ICG report Obama “turned an old page without settling on a new one”. There is still no US ambassador in Damascus, an insult that will mean Syria will be unlikely to make any real concessions. In addition the Americans have stayed quiet whilst in Iraq Maliki has launched into a series of tirades against Damascus, accusing the Syrian government of being linked to recent large scale bombings, this despite the American military recognising improved security along the Iraqi-Syrian border.

As the ICG reports remind us the instability rife across the Middle East makes any abrupt change in Syria unlikely. Obama should send an ambassador to fully engage US diplomatic channels in order to better assess whether there is any hope of Syria opening up, rather than press for significant change at this time. A “slowly slowly” approach is by no means a visionary one but it may be the best option on the table at this time.

Haaretz exclusive: Olmert’s plan for peace with the Palestinians
By Aluf Benn, Haaretz

Click here to view the map detailing Olmert’s peace plan

Former prime minister Ehud Olmert proposed giving the Palestinians land from communities bordering the Gaza Strip and from the Judean Desert nature reserve in exchange for settlement blocs in the West Bank…..

Olmert also proposed giving land to a future Palestinian state in the Beit She’an Valley near Kibbutz Tirat Tzvi; in the Judean Hills near Nataf and Mevo Betar; and in the area of Lachish and of the Yatir Forest. Together, the areas would have involved the transfer of 327 square kilometers of territory from within the Green Line.

Olmert presented his map to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in September of last year. Abbas did not respond, and negotiations ended. In an interview with Haaretz on Tuesday, Abbas said Olmert had presented several drafts of his map…..

Olmert wanted to annex 6.3 percent of the West Bank to Israel, areas that are home to 75 percent of the Jewish population of the territories. ….Olmert proposed the transfer of territory to the Palestinians equivalent to 5.8 percent of the area of the West Bank as well as a safe-passage route from Hebron to the Gaza Strip via a highway that would remain part of the sovereign territory of Israel but where there would be no Israeli presence…..

World Finance Syria Economic Reform Awards 2009
2009-12-22

LONDON, December 22 /PRNewswire/ — It has been a productive and exciting year for Syria. The country has in the past faced difficulties due to its weak
administrative structure, together with US sanctions, which have had an affect on investment and development opportunities. This is changing. The challenges the country faces include shifting from an oil-exporting economy towards a net oil importer; managing the transition from a socialist planned economy towards a liberalised social market economy; and enhancing human development through targeted interventions which ensure a more equitable distribution of wealth and equal economic opportunities for wealth creation across all segments of Syrian society. Several companies are meeting these challenges head on and it is World Finance’s pleasure to recognise those forwarding the agenda. This year World Finance held the Syria Economic Reform Awards. Congratulations to those who made the grade.

Best Telecoms Company
Syriatel Mobile Telecom

Best Financial Brokerage Firm
Bemo Saudi Fransi Finance

Best Tourism Development Company
The Wahoud Group

Best Construction & Property Development Company
Fouad Takla Co.

Best Gas Industry Contracting Company
Lead Contracting & Trading

Best SME Business Promotion Group
Syrian Enterprise & Business Centre

Best Pharmaceuticals Company
National Company for Pharmaceutical Industry (NCPI)

Best Conventional Private Bank
Bank Syria & Overseas

Best Money Exchange Company
Al Fuad Exchange

Best Oilfield Services Company
The Nasco Group

Best Economic Development Company
Khwanda Group

Best Engineering & Utilities Equipment Supplier
Hamscho International Group

Best Plastic Industrial Products Manufacturer
Al-Matin Group

Best Shipping Company
Al-Sham Shipping

Major Foreign Investor
Shell Syria Petroleum Development BV

Best Private Airline
Cham Wings Airline

Best Food Processing Company
National Sugar Company

Best Freight Services Provider
Shamout Group of Companies

Best Importer of Construction & Building Materials
Zein Brothers

Best Container Terminal Manager
Tartous International Container Terminal

Best Luxury Hotel Property
The Four Seasons, Damascus

Best Conventional Private Insurance Company
Syrian-Kuwaiti Insurance Company

Award for Pioneering Key Economic Projects in Support of Syria
MAS Economic Group

Visionary leadership and contribution to the Syrian economy
Mr Haytham Joud, Souria Holding

Lifetime Achievement Award for Promoting Syrian Commerce
Ratab Shallah

Andrew White, Sa’d Business School, Oxford University speaks to Forward about plans to prepare Syria’s promising business leaders through an untraditional academic program. Forward: Why are you here in Damascus?

White: As a representative of the Sa’d Business School at the University of Oxford we are here to set up an executive development program targeted to whom we refer to as `high potential leaders’ here in Syria. We are looking at people between the ages of 25 – 35 who are already demonstrating the characteristics and delivery profile of leaders that come from the public, private and NGO sectors. The program is about helping them prepare for a leadership role in Syria and to understand the country’s future economic development. The program is open to Syrians only and we will be taking on 40 participants in the first program.

Forward: Why is Oxford University interested in Syria?

White: Our school has a very strong level of association with Syria; our program is named after Syrian businessman, Wafic Sa’d. Also if you look at us as a university, we have interests in multiple regions around the world and in the case of Syria, there is much potential.

Forward: Where does Syria’s business potential lie?

White: Syria is coming out of a long period of closed economic practices and is moving towards an open market economy so there are clearly major growth areas in banking and finance, industries which are really opening up to external capital and competition and which will play a major role in bringing in some market discipline and holding companies accountable to shareholders.

Syria is enjoying something of a renaissance.
Patrick Martin, Globe and Mail

The country’s art scene is flourishing, Damascus café life is blooming, shopping malls have cropped up and the moribund economy has awakened from a deep, state-imposed sleep.

“Syria is open for business,” says Mohammad Daaboul, chairman and CEO of the Daaboul Industrial Group and president of the Association of Syrian-Canadian Businessmen…..

Everyone is talking about the Saad Hariri speech to the Lebanese parliament – see it here on YouTube. Very funny. He is not very literate in Arabic.

Ambassador Joseph Adam Ereli may be the next US representative in Damascus according to As-Safir. The list of officials who have been mentioned in the press as possible ambassadors grows ever longer. We will wait and see….

Ambassador Adam Ereli presenting a set of books to Isa Cultural Center Director Mr. Khaldoon Abahsain and National Library Director Dr. Mansoor Sarhan

Ereli on YouTube talking about his London job overseeing the Office of Regional Media Outreach. (At 4 minutes he talks about Arab-Israeli conflict)

Here is  a press conference Ereli gave about Syria in 2005 in response to President Assad’s Damascus University speech.

Ambassador Adam J. Ereli arrived in Baghdad 31 May 2008 to serve as the Public Affairs Counselor at the United States Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq from 2008 to 2009.

Quote:

From 2007 to 2008 he has served as Ambassador to Bahrain. He will return to the post when his tour in Iraq is completed in 2009.

Prior to his appointment as Ambassador to Bahrain, Ereli was Senior Advisor to the Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy for Overseas Communications, based in London. There he oversaw regional communications hubs in Brussels and Dubai, and the Arab Media Outreach Center in London.

J. Adam Ereli, according to his U.S. Department of State biography, “became Deputy Spokesman of the Department of State in August 2003. In this capacity, he oversees the Office of Press Relations, Office of Regional Media Outreach, the Foreign Press Centers and the Press Office at USAID. Previously, Mr. Ereli served as Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Doha, Qatar, from 2000 to 2003.

“He joined the Foreign Service in 1989 and has served abroad as a Junior Officer in Cairo, Egypt, Program Officer in Damascus, Syria, Cultural Affairs Officer in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and Public Affairs Officer in Sanaa, Yemen. In Washington, Mr. Ereli served as Director of the Office of Press and Public Affairs in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs and as Director of the Office of Press Relations in the Bureau of Public Affairs. Mr. Ereli’s awards include a Meritorious Honor Award, a Meritorious Step Increase, and three Superior Honor Awards.

“Mr. Ereli earned a B.A. in History from Yale University in 1982 and an M.A. in International Relations from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in 1989. Before entering the Foreign Service, he worked as a journalist and human rights activist in Paris, France. He speaks French and Arabic. He is married to Marina Pastuhov Ereli.” [1]

The Angry Arab on Ereli – funny, even if mean….

Why the Road to Peace May Run Through Damascus
Mohamad Bazzi, Adjunct Senior Fellow for Middle Eastern Studies
December 18, 2009
The National

Is peace possible between Syria and Israel? That question has taken on new urgency after the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered to negotiate with the Syrian president Bashar Assad “anytime, anywhere”–and Mr Assad rebuffed the approach.

He is correct in assuming that a meeting with Mr Netanyahu at the moment would be nothing more than a photo-op. But that should not discourage the administration of the US president Barack Obama from pushing for renewed Syrian-Israeli negotiations…..

See Friday Lunch Club on Saad Hariri’s visit to Damascus…

“… The visit by Hariri was “very difficult on the personal level” and involves “great sacrifice,” said Hariri loyalist and former lawmaker Mustafa Alloush. “But as prime minister of Lebanon, it is quite normal to have such a visit. … It is necessary and there is a need to settle all aspects of the relationship,” Alloush told The Associated Press. He said the visit did not mean Lebanon had dropped its belief that Syria was responsible for the killing of Rafik Hariri, who also served as prime minister. “But this matter is up to the international tribunal now; it is no longer a personal issue,” Alloush said.

See more photos of the visit at YaLubnan

Abu Wael – Muhammad Nasiif – oversees the Lebanon portfolio

?? ???????? ?? ????? ????? ????? ???? ?????? ????????? ???????? ??????????? ????? ???? ?????? ?? ?????? ???????? ???? ??????? ???????? ???? ?????? ? ??? ???????? ??? ??? ?? ??????? ?? ????? ??? ????? ???????? ??? ????? ?????? ? ???? ??? ????? ??? ???? ??? ? ????? ???? ?????? ????????? ?? ???? ?????? ?? ?????? ????? ?? ????????? ?????? ???? ?????? ?????? ???? ????? (??? ????) ???? ???? ?????? ??? ?? ??? ????? ??? ??? ?????? ??????? ?? ????? ?????? ?????? ?????? ???? ????? ???? ????? ????? ??? ???? ?????? ???? ??????.

The Enduring Iran-Syria-Hezbollah Axis
Michael Rubin  | AEI Online December 2009)

The Obama administration would like to move Syria into the camp of more moderate Arab states, but there is scant evidence that Syria is willing to give up its support for terrorist organizations. Like Iran, it remains a destabilizing and dangerous force in the region.

Key points in this Outlook:

• The Lebanese and Israeli border is calmer today than during the 2006 war, but the potential for regional conflict is great.
• Both the Syrian and Iranian governments have used Hezbollah to conduct proxy warfare against Israel.
• The Obama administration has tried to move Syria from a rejectionist state into the more moderate Arab camp, but there is no evidence that the engagement policy has worked.

Successful U.S. and Israeli interdiction efforts of Iranian arms at high sea, while embarrassing to Iran, have made Syria’s role as a route for weapons delivery more important. The last decade has witnessed several high-profile interceptions of weapons:

• On January 29, 2001, the Israeli Navy seized two containers of weapons, reportedly offloaded in watertight containers by the Calypso, a Lebanese arms-smuggling ship.
• On May 7, 2001, the Israeli Navy seized the Santorini while it was on its fourth arms-smuggling mission. This ship carried 107mm rockets, mortars, rocket-propelled grenades, antiaircraft missiles, and antitank weaponry.
• On January 3, 2002, the Israeli Navy intercepted the Karine-A, a Gaza-bound freighter, while it was on the Red Sea. Onboard, naval commandos found fifty tons of sophisticated Iranian weaponry.[33]
• On May 20, 2003, the Israeli Navy intercepted the Abu Hassan, a fishing vessel carrying weapons, explosives, and detonators.[34]
• On January 19-20, 2009, the U.S. Navy intercepted the Monchegorsk, an Iranian freighter carrying military supplies to Syria in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1559.[35]

|  U.S.-Israeli Arms Cooperation Quietly Growing
By Nathan Guttman
December 16, 2009, issue of December 25, 2009.

Washington — Leaders in Washington and Jerusalem  have publicly locked horns over the issue of West Bank settlements. And Israeli public opinion has largely viewed America’s new administration as unfriendly. But behind the scenes, strategic security relations between the two countries are flourishing.
Israeli soldiers train near the coastal city of Ashdod in October, part of the largest missile defense dry run ever held. Some 1,400 American soldiers were also involved.
Israeli officials have been singing the praises of President Obama for his willingness to address their defense concerns and for actions taken by his administration to bolster Israel’s qualitative military edge — an edge eroded, according to Israel, during the final year of the George W. Bush presidency.

Among the new initiatives taken by the administration, the Forward has learned, are adjustments in a massive arms deal the Bush administration made with Arab Gulf states in response to Israeli concerns. There have also been upgrades in U.S.-Israeli military cooperation on missile defense. And a deal is expected next year that will see one of the United States’ most advanced fighter jets go to Israel with some of America’s most sensitive new technology.

Amid the cacophony of U.S.-Israel clashes on the diplomatic front, public attention given to this intensified strategic cooperation has been scant. But in a rare public comment in October, Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren praised the Obama administration’s response to complaints about lost ground during the close of the Bush years as “warm and immediate.”

“We came to the Obama administration and said, ‘Listen, we have a problem here,’” Oren, told a gathering of the National Jewish Democratic Council. “The administration’s reaction was immediate: we are going to address this issue, we are going to make sure that we maintain your QME [qualitative military edge].”…..

Israel: EU official’s ‘occupation’ remark casts pall on ties
By Akiva Eldar, Haaretz Correspondent, 18/12/2009

Government officials in Jerusalem harshly criticized the new European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Catherine Ashton, for her scathing remarks about the “Israeli occupation” in her maiden speech.

Ashton on Tuesday leveled scathing criticism at Israeli policy in her first speech as the European Union’s first high representative for foreign affairs and security policy.

The government officials in Jerusalem said they were surprised, dissatisfied and concerned that such a senior figure had expressed criticism before visiting Israel and learning the facts.

They said the remarks cast a pall over relations with the European Union, and that they were particularly angry that she had not welcomed the settlement construction freeze, as had her European colleagues.

The British stateswoman, who has also served as the Commissioner for Trade in the European Commission, said that in the EU’s view, “East Jerusalem is occupied territory, together with the West Bank.”

Ashton demanded that Israel immediately lift its blockade on the Gaza Strip, and reiterated that the union opposes the existence of the West Bank separation fence, as it opposes evictions of Palestinians from their homes in East Jerusalem.

The stateswoman, whose full title is Baroness Ashton of Upholland, also only defined Israel’s partial freeze of West Bank settlement construction as a “first step,” as opposed to the warmer description of the move by EU foreign ministers, who last week took “positive note” of it.

In her address to MEPs in Strasbourg, Ashton, who was only recently appointed to the new position, said she had spoken with Israelis, Palestinians and the U.S. Secretary of State about the role the Quartet of international mediators, and that of its special envoy to the region, Tony Blair.

Ashton said she had told Blair personally that, “The Quartet [a special group set up by the U.S., EU, UN and Russia] must demonstrate that it is worth the money, that it is capable of being reinvigorated.”

Following her comments, a number of MEPs from the Liberal side of the house called for punitive measures against Israel, including the suspension of the EU’s Association Agreement. Irish centre-left member Proinsias De Rossa, who visited the West Bank last week, called Israel’s treatment of Palestinians a form of “apartheid.”

This time it was neither the “infamous” Swedish president who pulled the EU toward an anti-Israel resolution, nor a “daydreaming judge” in Britain who issued an arrest warrant against an Israeli foreign minister. Criticism of Israel has become the language of choice in European discourse.

When the Israeli government offers new benefits to settlers, and peace talks with the Palestinians are deadlocked, even the superpower’s long arm is helpless. Even former U.S. ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk, a devout Jew who serves as an external advisor to U.S. President Barack Obama, does not hide his chagrin with the settlements policy.

Indyk has recently told Haaretz in an interview that statements by figures like Minister without Portfolio Benny Begin, according to which settlement construction will continue despite the moratorium, are damaging to Israel’s interests. He said these comments, as well as the decision to pump funds into isolated settlements, strengthen the impression that the declaration of the freeze is not worth the paper it is written on. He warned that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will pay a political price for the move, without gaining the benefits which it was intended to grant Israel in the international arena.

Domaine Bargylus is Syria's first private vineyard and is producing high-quality wine with European techniques.

‘Very old world’ wine makes a comeback in Lebanon and Syria
By Olivia Sterns, for CNN, December 18, 2009

Domaine Bargylus is Syria’s first private vineyard and is producing high-quality wine with European techniques.

London, England (CNN) — The fertile plains of Lebanon and Syria have been producing wine for thousands of years. Only recently, though, has the tradition come back in vogue.

Today, a new crop of boutique vineyards is sprouting up and older vineyards are earning increasing critical acclaim. Meanwhile, both local and international demand for their wine is steadily growing.

…. in Syria, the first private vineyard has just been opened by the Saade brothers, who already operate a successful estate in Lebanon — Chateau Marsyas…..

Enough of blaming the Goldstone Report!
By Rami G. Khouri
Daily Star staff
Wednesday, December 16, 2009

A brief news item in the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) a few days ago made depressing reading. It was entitled: “State Department blames Goldstone for stalled peace talks.” “Wow!” I thought to myself, has it really come down to this? The United States and Israel, who do not hesitate to toot their horn about their democratic credentials, now blame the stalled Arab-Israeli peace process on Judge Richard Goldstone, the main author of a report on potential war crimes during the Gaza war that was issued last September by the United Nations Human Rights Council inquiry commission?
It is hard to think of a more distorted and backward brand of political morality than this American-Israeli view of the Goldstone report, which most of the world sees as a historic breakthrough in the elusive quest to apply international norms of accountability to avoid the savagery that has come to define Arab-Israeli warfare.

Syrian president meets Iraqi SIIC leader
Dec. 18, 2009

DAMASCUS, Syria, Dec. 18 (UPI) — Security and political progress in Iraq are included in the foreign policy interests of the government in Damascus, the Syrian president told Iraqi leaders.

Syrian President Bashar Assad met with Ammar al-Hakim, the leader of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council in Damascus, the official Syrian Arab News Agency reports.

Assad during his meetings with the Shiite leader relayed his support for political stability and national security in Iraq.

Syrian relations with Iraq were strained following a deadly August attack in Baghdad. Iraqi leaders lashed out at Damascus
, saying supporters of the Iraqi Baath Party played a role in the attacks from their bases in Syria.

Damascus denied the link, and the Iraqi branch of al-Qaida claimed responsibility for the August bombings and a string of similar attacks.

U.S. military officials, however, said several members of the former Iraqi regime could be in Syria, including former Iraqi commander Izzat al-Douri, who took over as head of the Iraqi Baath Party following the 2006 execution of Saddam Hussein.

The SANA report noted Hakim expressed his appreciation for Syria’s support for Iraq as it emerges from years of war.

Ammar al-Hakim emerged as the SIIC chief following the death of his father and former leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim in August.

A pro-Jewish movement within Israel’s Likud Party says a referendum bill making its way through the Knesset would effectively end the Oslo accords and prevent the Israeli government from giving away important territory to the Arabs in any so-called “peace agreement.”

As previously reported, Israel’s Parliament recently gave preliminary approval by a 68 to 22 vote on a piece of legislation that would require a national referendum on any peace deal that cedes land in Jerusalem or the Golan Heights. If it passes two more readings, the law could constrain the ability of any future Israeli government to turn covenant land over as part of a peace deal as the Palestinians seek east Jerusalem as the capital of a future state, while Syria has demanded the return of the Golan Heights as part of any peace agreement with Israel.

<div><a href=”http://www.latimes.com/features/image/la-ig-diary13-2009dec13,0,2328239.story”><img class=”alignleft” src=”http://www.latimes.com/media/thumbnails/storylink/2009-12/51091297-15090310.jpg” alt=”” width=”187″ height=”105″ /></a></div>
<div><a href=”http://www.latimes.com/features/image/la-ig-diary13-2009dec13,0,2328239.story”>Queen Rania champions Palestinian designer Rami Kashouat</a>: “Rania’s style is elegantly conservative. She can wear something open, but she can’t wear something strapless. And she loves my draping — the thing they beat me up for on ‘Project Runway’ takes me to the queen of Jordan!”</div>
<div><span style=”font-size: x-small;”><span style=”font-size: 10pt;”>Who started the recent rapprochement between the two countries? …. Who extended their hand of friendship first?

Queen Rania champions Palestinian designer Rami Kashouat: “Rania’s style is elegantly conservative. She can wear something open, but she can’t wear something strapless. And she loves my draping — the thing they beat me up for on ‘Project Runway’ takes me to the queen of Jordan!”

On the recent Israeli Legislation Requiring a Referendum before Occupied land can be returned to Palestinians or Syrians

Rob Muchnick, U.S. spokesman for Manhigut Yehudit, the Jewish Leadership Movement, believes that this is a great piece of legislation “that will kill any chances of a deal with any Arabs who Barack Obama says are moderate [and] who the Israel government says [are] moderate, even though we know they’re just terrorist thugs wearing suits. So if it destroys that chance, then no matter how much Obama screams or how much the Israeli left wants to give it away, it pretty much would wipe out the Oslo agreement and get us back on the right course. And that’s what’s so great about it,” he contends.

Brian Whitaker extracts the most important part of Peter Harlings ICG report for our edification in his “When is a dictator not a dictator,” Guardian article copied below. This is the Syria I know. All Syria watchers scratch their heads, wondering why the president does this or that and, more importantly, why he doesn’t do X or Y. It often seems such a confused mess, but their is an explanation, which Harling captures well and Whitaker summarizes for us. Because Syria has no political parties, various factions are allowed to struggle and compete over policy formulation. The problem is that Syria has a “policy” in only the very broadest terms.  Powerful individuals are able to undermine and sabotage the initiatives of their competitors at every turn. The president only interviens infrequently and very rarely not decisively, allowing the losing personality to plot a return and stay in the game. Of course much of this depends on the personal style of the President, but it is a system of sorts. It was established by Hafiz al-Assad and has been copied and in some senses upgraded by the Bashar, but not substantially altered.

For example in the Foreign Policy community, there are only a handful of people who can come up with an initiative on their own. Remember, there are no think tanks, policy centers or institutional bodies for policy development. Individuals drive the process and launch initiatives, but they must do so with caution. As soon as they push a policy forward the others will take a position, some will try to undermine it so as not to be left out or allow their competitors a success. Rarely does the president intervene. It makes for very slow and grinding policy advances. Often the policies are filled with contradictions and are not justified with or accompanied by position papers that explain how they fit into the larger world view or values of Syria. Everything is very ad hoc and often left incomplete. In the economic sphere, this method of policy development is particularly damaging. Damage control drives the policy process.

When is a dictator not a dictator?

Bashar al-Assad leads an authoritarian regime, but the workings of power in a country such as Syria are surprisingly complex

By Brian Whitaker in the Guardian
Friday 18 December 2009

Decision-making in authoritarian regimes can be a lot more complicated than it looks. The idea that dictators simply dictate is often wide of the mark: they may not care much about public opinion but they do have to juggle with conflicting demands inside their own power base, and sometimes they can’t even be sure their instructions will be implemented.

Syria is one country where the inner workings of the regime can seem baffling. A diplomat in Damascus once told me that although Bashar al-Assad’s position as president seems secure, nobody knows how much power he really has.

A report published by the International Crisis Group (ICG) earlier this week – mainly about Syrian foreign policy – sheds some light on this intriguing puzzle. In Syria, it says:

Many decisions witness a contest between various lines of thought that coexist within the regime, each reflecting a slightly different worldview, diverging private interests or personal rivalries. Some decisions ultimately reflect a balance between diverse institutional power centres; others, a more decisive victory by a particular one … Further confusion arises from the fact that officials occasionally take initiatives or make pronouncements that are inconsistent with the authorised line – in an attempt to influence it; as a means of drawing attention to themselves; in order to express frustration; or, quite simply, out of ignorance.

In theory at least, the president’s decision is final but much of the time he sits back, waiting to see which way the wind will blow. One Syrian official told the ICG:

Overall objectives are set by the president with input from those around him. Then, it’s up to others to suggest how to achieve them. For instance, if the minister of foreign affairs makes an interesting proposal, the president will give him some leeway – but only up to a point, because he still has to contend with other tendencies. Moreover, the leadership tends to maintain multiple, parallel channels on any given issue. But, in the end, the president always remains in a position to arbitrate and distribute roles. The balancing and real decision-making takes place at the top. No one else is even fully in the picture.

Even the most loyal official, familiar with the workings of the system, can find this confusing. But then there are others who think they know what the policy is – and try to subvert it. In an opaque, compartmentalised and heavily bureaucratised system such as Syria’s it’s by no means certain that decisions, once made, will stick. “Follow-through often is lacking, as the process creates considerable room for either active or passive obstructionism,” the ICG says. “Policies frequently are adjusted or rectified, even after apparently final decisions are made.”

One recent example was Syria’s association agreement with the EU, which both parties spent years negotiating. Then, just as it was about to be signed, Syria unexpectedly put it on hold – possibly because of objections from local business interests.

This chopping and changing happens at a national level too. A Damascus lawyer told the ICG: “There are several centres of power. Much-needed legislation can be enacted and then, within a few months, is amended and amended again. The reason is that the legislation interferes with the interests of people influential enough to step in and have their way”.

Clearly, Syria is not a one-man dictatorship and a senior official quoted in the report sees this as a positive development, a “sign of a dynamic debate”. Dynamic it may be, but it’s still a closed debate, conducted mainly in private, by those in the loop. The rest of the country is excluded.

On the domestic front, this opacity is likely to slow down the pace of reforms or limit their extent. In order to succeed, such reforms will need buy-in from the public as well as the regime’s insiders and the only way to achieve that is through open debate that helps ordinary Syrians to understand the rationale behind them.

Internationally, the opacity makes Syria one of the most difficult countries for negotiators to deal with. Martin Indyk, an assistant secretary of state during the Clinton administration, told a congressional committee last year:

Just about every leader that has attempted to deal with President Bashar al-Assad has come away frustrated. The list includes Colin Powell, Tony Blair, Nicolas Sarkozy, Hosni Mubarak and Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah. The cause of their frustration is the disconnect between Assad’s reasonableness in personal meetings and his regime’s inability or unwillingness to follow through on understandings reached there. It is unclear whether this is because of a lack of will or a lack of ability to control the levers of power.

This was echoed by a foreign official who has worked closely with the regime and is quoted in the ICG report as saying:

In dealing with Syria we always need to ask ourselves, ‘Are they reluctant to do this or simply can’t they do it?’ … We should not take any promise as a given, if only because many are beyond their capacity. This is a systemic problem. Syria is an authoritarian system of a particular kind, in which the ruler isn’t necessarily obeyed. Besides, the system is largely inefficient. People step on each other’s toes; institutions lack capacity; and things are disorganised.

And even when the president speaks, it’s difficult to know whether he’s telling people what he really thinks or what he thinks they want to hear. A Turkish official interviewed by the ICG said: “Bashar has two lines of speech, one for the region and one for the west. He doesn’t say the same thing on BBC and al-Jazeera. It’s double-talk. Here [in the Middle East] it is acceptable. His interlocutors must understand this is not unusual in the region. Americans might think it devious. He sees it as being polite”.

Peter Harling

Peter Harling has made an important contribution to our understanding of how Syria works and why it follows the foreign policy that it does in this two part report for the ICG.

I have copied Sami Moubayed’s assessment of Syria’s foreign policy at the bottom of this post because it provides a useful counter-point to Harling’s analysis. Sami is not perplexed by Syria’s “mountain of apparent contradictions.” For him, Syria has had a very good year and is on the right track. Rather than concern for Syria’s contradictions, he is concerned about America’s contradiction in supporting Israel’s continued conquest and settlement Syrian land – even though Washington says it stands for international law and has many interests in the Middle East that would be well served by taking a more even handed approach to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Read, “When Will It Be Our Time?” in today’s New York Times By MUSTAFA BARGHOUTHI for an expression of how perplexing this contradiction appears to Arabs.

Reshuffling the Cards? (I): Syria’s Evolving Strategy
Here it is: Reshuffling the Cards? (II): Syria’s New Hand
MENA Report N°92
14 December 2009

This executive summary and recommendations is also available in Arabic.

Reshuffling the Cards? (I): Syria’s Evolving Strategy
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Syria’s foreign policy sits atop a mountain of apparent contradictions that have long bedevilled outsiders. Its self-proclaimed goal is peace with Israel, yet it has allied itself with partners vowed to Israel’s destruction. It takes pride in being a bastion of secularism even as it makes common cause with Islamist movements. It simultaneously has backed Iraqi Sunni insurgents and a Lebanese Shiite armed group. The U.S. has wavered between different approaches in unsuccessful attempts to persuade Damascus to clarify its stance, from a peace process focus in the 1990s to isolation and pressure under George W. Bush in the following decade. Barack Obama, having turned an old page without settling on a new one, seems intent on engagement on bilateral issues, albeit more cautious than ambitious. It might work, but not in the way it has been proceeding. Syria might amend its policies, but only if it is first reassured about the costs – in terms of domestic stability and regional standing. That will entail working with Damascus to demonstrate the broader payoffs of a necessarily unfamiliar, and risky, journey.

At the heart of the problem is a profound mismatch of expectations. The West wants to know whether Syria is ready to fundamentally alter its policies – loosen or cut ties to Iran, Hamas and Hizbollah; sign a peace deal with Israel – as a means of stabilising the region. Syria, before contemplating any fundamental strategic shift, wants to know where the region and its most volatile conflicts are headed, whether the West will do its part to stabilise them and whether its own interests will be secured.

From Syria’s vantage point, there is good reason to cling to the status quo. For almost four decades, it has served Damascus well. Despite a turbulent and often hostile neighbourhood, the regime has proved resilient. It has used ties to various groups and states to amass political and material assets, acquiring a regional role disproportionate to its actual size or resources. One does not readily forsake such allies or walk away from such a track record.

But satisfaction with the past does not necessarily mean complacency about the future. On virtually all fronts, Syria can see peril. Its economy is wobbly. The country lacks significant natural resources or human capital, most conspicuously a qualified workforce and entrepreneurial business class. Its infrastructure is obsolete. And unlike years past, when the Soviet Union and then Saudi Arabia offered support, Iran or Iraq provided cheap fuel and Lebanon was prey to its plunder, Syria no longer can count on a foreign rent. All this, coming amid an increasingly competitive global market and financial crisis, calls for structural reforms that the regime almost certainly cannot undertake without Western help and a more pacified regional environment.

In terms of societal dynamics, regime policies are fanning Islamist sympathies that, over time, could jeopardise its secular foundation. Cuts in subsidies and the collapse of the welfare system, as well as high unemployment and inflation rates, have chipped away at the regime’s ideological pillars. Its pan-Arab rhetoric gradually has been replaced by a “resistance” discourse that has more in common with Islamist movements than the Baathism of yore. Clashes between government forces and Islamist militants are not uncommon, their frequency ebbing when the regime more clearly espouses regional Islamist causes – which further harms its secular outlook. The posture of the past few years – close ties to Iran, Hamas and Hizbollah, promotion of resistance against Israel and support for what was a Salafi-oriented Iraqi insurgency – encouraged trends that threaten longer-term social cohesion.

Recent gains in the region could prove short-lived. However vindicated leaders felt by events in Iraq (where they opposed the U.S. war), Lebanon (where the Western-backed coalition was unable to bring Damascus to its knees, and Hizbollah stood its ground against Israel) or Palestine (where its Islamist allies have gained influence), they remain preoccupied by lingering conflicts and persistent fault lines. The spread of sectarianism, uncertainty on its eastern and western borders, stalemate in the Arab-Israeli peace process and threat of confrontation over Iran’s nuclear program cloud the horizon. The potential for domestic spillover of regional tensions haunts the regime and helps explain why, in addition to economic and social fears, it might be searching for a different way forward.

Syria’s ambivalence – its reliance on existing alliances and longing to break out of the current mould – is perhaps best embodied in its Iranian-Turkish balancing act. Syrian doubters argue that the regime will not cut its ties to Iran. They are right. Tehran remains a valued and indispensable partner, especially in a context of regional uncertainty. The long relationship provides military assets and security cooperation, as well as diplomatic leverage in dealing with Western and Arab countries.

But that is only half the picture. Budding ties with Ankara show a different side. For Damascus, they are an opportunity for economic stimulus through increased tourism, investment and the possibility of a more integrated region in which it could be central. More, they are of huge strategic value as a gateway to Europe and a means of bolstering regime legitimacy in the eyes of its own and the Arab world’s Sunni population.

Besides, not all is tranquil on the Iranian front. The relationship became increasingly unequal as Tehran’s fortunes soared. Excessive proximity harms Syria’s posture in Arab eyes and cannot mask deep disagreements. Syria warily watches Iran’s growing reach, from Iraq (which Syria believes must remain part of the Arab sphere and where it objects to Iran’s backing of sectarian Shiite parties) to Yemen (where Syria has sided with Riyadh in what appears as a proxy war against Tehran). As long as Syria’s environment remains unsettled, in short, it will maintain strong ties to Iran; at the same time, it will seek to complement that relationship with others (Turkey, France, and now Saudi Arabia) to broaden its strategic portfolio and to signal a possibly different future.

President Obama’s effort to re-engage was always going to be a painstaking and arduous task of overcoming a legacy of mutual mistrust. Syrian doubters have their counterparts in Damascus, who are convinced Washington never will truly accept that the Arab nation can play a central regional role. The administration’s slow and cautious moves are not necessarily a bad thing. There is need for patience and realism. The region is too unstable for Damascus to move abruptly; relaxation of U.S. sanctions is tied to Syrian policies toward Hamas and Hizbollah that are hostage to a breakthrough with Israel for which conditions do not seem ripe. Neither side is ready for a leap, and both have domestic and foreign skeptics with whom to contend.

But the pace is less worrying than the direction. The temptation in Washington seems to be to test Syrian goodwill – will it do more to harm the Iraqi insurgency, help President Abbas in Palestine or stabilise Lebanon? On its own, that almost certainly will not succeed. The U.S. is not the only one looking for evidence. So too is Syria – for proof that the risks it takes will be offset by the gains it makes. The region’s volatility drives it to caution and to hedge its bets pending greater clarity on where the region is heading and, in particular, what Washington will do.

A wiser approach would be for the U.S. and Syria to explore together whether some common ground could be found on regional issues. This could test both sides’ intentions, promote their interests and start shaping the Middle East in ways that can reassure Damascus about the future. On Iraq, it may not truly exercise positive influence until genuine progress is made toward internal reconciliation. The U.S. could push in that direction, test Syria’s moves and, with the Iraq government, offer the prospect of stronger economic relations with its neighbour. Syria claims it can press Hamas to moderate views but only if there is real appetite in the U.S. for an end to the Palestinian divide. Both could agree to try to immunise Lebanon from regional conflicts and push it to focus on long-overdue issues of governance. Given the current outlooks and suspicions in Damascus and Washington, these are all long shots. But, with little else in the Middle East looking up, it is a gamble well worth taking.

This is the first of two reports on Syria’s evolving foreign policy. The second, to be published shortly, will take a closer look at specific changes in Damascus’s regional approach and the prospects for U.S.-Syrian relations.

RECOMMENDATIONS

To the U.S. Administration and Syrian Government:

1.  Devise a process of mutual engagement revolving around concrete, realistic goals, notably:

a) containing Iranian assertiveness in new arenas such as Iraq or Yemen (rather than aiming to drive a wedge between Damascus and Tehran);

b) working toward national reconciliation in Iraq, by combining U.S. leverage with the Iraqi government and Syrian access to the insurgency and former regime elements;

c) encouraging the Lebanese government to refocus on issues of domestic governance and containing the risks of a new Hizbollah-Israel conflagration; and

d) combining Syrian efforts to restrain Hamas and reunify Gaza and the West Bank with U.S. adoption of a more welcoming approach to intra-Palestinian reconciliation.

To the U.S. Administration:

2.  Establish an effective line of communication by:

a) sending an ambassador to Damascus, part of whose mission should be to build a direct link with President Bashar al-Assad; and

b) identifying a senior official to engage in a strategic dialogue aimed at exchanging visions for the region and determining a blueprint for future bilateral relations.

3.  Recalibrate U.S. efforts on the peace process by:

a) displaying interest in both the Palestinian and Syrian tracks;

b) working at improving Israeli-Turkish relations as a step toward resuming Israeli-Syrian negotiations under joint U.S.-Turkish sponsorship; and

c) making clear that, consistent with past Israeli-Syrian negotiations, any final agreement should entail full Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights, firm security arrangements and the establishment of normal, peaceful bilateral relations.

4.  Restart bilateral security talks related to Iraq, beginning with border issues, either immediately or, at the latest, after parliamentary elections in Iraq.

5.  Soften implementation of sanctions against Syria by streamlining licensing procedures and loosening restrictions on humanitarian or public safety grounds.

To the Government of Syria:

6.  Facilitate access for U.S. diplomats to relevant officials upon arrival of a new ambassador.

7.  Utilise existing security cooperation mechanisms with countries such as the UK and France to demonstrate tangible results, pending direct talks with the U.S.

8.  Articulate proactively its vision for the region in talks with U.S. officials.

9.  Consolidate improved Syrian-Lebanese ties by demarcating the border and providing any available information on Lebanese “disappeared”.

10.  Clarify what immediate, positive contributions Syria could make in Iraq, Palestine and Lebanon and what it would expect from the U.S. in turn.

Reshuffling the Cards? (II): Syria’s New Hand
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Syria typically, and at times justifiably, brings to mind stagnation and immobility. Yet, over recent years, change has been afoot. In 2008, it agreed to Turkish-mediated talks with Israel. It built ties with the Iraqi government after long depicting it as the offspring of an illegitimate occupation. It began to normalise relations with Lebanon, after years of resisting its claim to sovereignty. It accelerated economic reforms. These steps fall short of being revolutionary; some were imposed rather than chosen and reflected opportunism rather than forward thinking. Still, by Syrian standards, they are quite remarkable, especially in contrast to recent fervent militancy.

In a companion report with identical policy recommendations published on 14 December 2009, Crisis Group analysed the factors behind Damascus’s strategic evolution. Here, it explores in detail the mechanism, extent and limitations of these adjustments as well as challenges faced by the Obama administration if it wishes to exploit and solidify them. Only so much can be done in advance of genuine progress in Israeli-Syrian negotiations. For reasons Israeli, Syrian and American, that could be some time in the making. In the interim, Washington and Damascus should move beyond their tactical interaction by heightening the level of their engagement, broadening its agenda and quickly focusing on joint steps on Iraq.

There was nothing preordained or inevitable in Syria’s moves. Each reflected a cautious, deliberative process in which the regime carefully assessed the impact of one step before taking the next. Each involved at times starkly diverging views about how best to defend national interests. All pointed toward a more powerful, assertive President Bashar al-Assad, who must nonetheless contend with competing power centres and divergent outlooks, while suggesting the growing weight of a generation of insiders he has methodically put in place. Occasionally, there was backsliding, indicating the shift from greater militancy to more pronounced pragmatism is susceptible to negative changes in the regional landscape or to blowback from Syria’s allies and so is anything but irreversible.

Barack Obama’s election had little if anything to do with the evolution. The changes were initiated while the Bush administration was in office, when many Syrians were wagering on John McCain’s victory and for reasons almost entirely independent of the U.S. Still, the triumph of a man who had promised to make engagement a foreign policy leitmotif gave rise to hope that the bilateral relationship would more rapidly to a sounder footing and that the two sides might find ways to work together on regional policies.

So far, that has not been the case. Each side has its own explanation. Syria is convinced it has taken the first steps – in Iraq and Lebanon in particular – and that the onus is on Washington to do its part. Damascus expected the administration to reverse at least parts of the Bush-era legacy, reestablish normal diplomatic relations by sending an ambassador, show greater flexibility on sanctions, push for a resumption of Israeli-Syrian talks and, more broadly, propose a partnership on regional issues where Syria claimed it was willing to cooperate. It says that without a minimal common vision, it is not about to simply do America’s bidding. It feels it is being asked to prove its worth, not treated as a worthy partner.

The U.S. sees a traditional Syrian pattern repeating itself – halting some hostile action and expecting recompense while continuing to engage in unfriendly activity (such as allowing some insurgents to slip into Iraq or arming Hizbollah) and counting on a blind eye. Besides, the young administration believes it has more pressing matters, must contend with a sceptical Congress and even more sceptical regional allies (notably in Lebanon and Iraq) and fears that renewing the Israeli-Syrian track at a time when the Palestinian track is at a halt risks jeopardising any chance of breathing life into the latter.

As a result, each side has tended to see significant value in its own goodwill gestures, while essentially dismissing the other’s. The U.S. has indeed engaged, repeatedly dispatching officials to Damascus. But it has stopped well short of initiating a thorough strategic dialogue with Syria in which views of the region’s future are exchanged. Nor, on the issue of arguably greatest immediate concern, Iraq, has it implemented a bottom-up approach designed to build trust and produce tangible results. Instead, it cancelled security talks on that subject as soon as that country’s prime minister – alleging Syrian complicity in a tragic series of bomb attacks – chose to oppose them. Syria, for the most part, has done what it does best: sit and wait. It has refrained from putting forward its own approach to successful engagement, let alone a vision for the region that might gain U.S. buy-in.

It always was unrealistic to expect that the mere call for or initiation of engagement would overcome years of mistrust, divergent conceptions for the region and conflicting alliances. Right now, a productive process is needed, not immediate, dramatic results. But there is not even that.

It is still early. President Obama has not personally invested himself in the Syrian file, the Israeli-Syrian track could revive, both the U.S. and Syria continue to profess their shared desire for a new page and, in terms of atmospherics at least, the improvement in bilateral relations is notable. But they are not where they should be and little has been done with the opportunities that have arisen.

There also are potential clouds on the horizon. The international tribunal on the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri could develop in ways that that will significantly complicate management of the Syrian file; so too could the investigation by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) into Syria’s alleged nuclear program. Violence in Iraq also could produce a further downturn in U.S.-Syrian relations in the absence of a joint security framework. The situation at the Israeli-Lebanese border remains tense. The roots of the 2008 Gaza war are still unaddressed. A confrontation around Iran’s nuclear program could move the region in unpredictable and dangerous ways.

The most realistic measure of success is not whether the U.S. and Syria achieve a quick breakthrough. At best, that will take time and will have to await changes in the region and real progress toward Israeli-Syrian peace. The test, rather, is whether they can move the relationship far enough so that it might resist crises that, almost inevitably and always unexpectedly, will arise.

Hariri visit seals a good year for Syria
By Sami Moubayed in Asia Times
Dec 15 2009

DAMASCUS – Talk of a visit by Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri to Syria has been in the air since his March 14 Coalition emerged victorious in the June parliamentary elections. Shortly after President Michel Suleiman asked Hariri to create the new cabinet, speculation mounted on whether he would make the Damascus visit, as customarily done by every Lebanese prime minister since the 1940s.

The Syrians declared from day one that Hariri would always be welcome in Syria, letting bygones be bygones, and scores of Lebanese politicians, eager to mend relations with Damascus, began sending positive signals, hoping that the doors to the Syrian capital would be opened to them as well, seeing that it was political suicide to be at odds with Damascus now that George W Bush had left the White House.

Hariri’s ally, Walid Jumblatt (a former ally of the Syrians), went to great lengths to do that and is expected to make an on-air live apology this week, through the Doha-based channel al-Jazeera. Politicians like Jumblatt and Hariri had wrongly bet on the Bush administration during the years 2005-2008, thinking that the days of Syrian government were numbered.

They unleashed a war of words against Syria and its Hezbollah allies, calling for the full implementation of United Nations Security Council resolution 1559, which calls for the disarming of Hezbollah. In 2006, they were unimpressed by the Hezbollah victory – realizing that it only strengthened Syria’s influence in Lebanon. Then came the mini-civil war of May 2008, when Hezbollah managed to round up all of March 14’s armed stalwarts in a matter of hours, proving that it had the upper hand on the streets of Beirut.

That action was taken after the March 14 cabinet of then-prime minister Fouad al-Siniora tried to dismantle Hezbollah’s telecommunications network at Beirut International Airport. The Hezbollah chief, Hassan Nasrallah, came out with a thundering statement, threatening to “cut the hand” of whoever tried to meddle with the “arms of the resistance”.

The Hariri team reasoned that Hezbollah was there to stay since it was so deep-rooted in Lebanese society, especially in south Lebanon and the suburbs of Beirut. Writing it off militarily had clearly failed, and relying on Israel to do the job had also proved futile. Betting on the UN or the US was also no good – the only way forward, Hariri reasoned, was to mend broken fences with Hezbollah and Syria.

Earlier in 2009, Hariri met with Nasrallah – a cordial meeting that buried the hatchet between the two men. After emerging victorious last June, Hariri created a cabinet of national unity that answered all of Hezbollah’s demands. It gave the Ministry of Telecommunications to a Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) candidate, Charbel Nahhas, which was a long-standing demand by both Hezbollah and FPM leader Michel Aoun.

Hariri also agreed to name Aoun’s son-in-law, Gibran Bassil, as a minister. Then in a final gesture, Hariri pushed for a cabinet policy statement that promised to protect and embrace the arms of Hezbollah. Hariri had no other choice – he could only rule by consensus, and that consensus could not be made unless he includes the Shi’ites, who are overwhelmingly supportive of Hezbollah, in any cabinet formation.

This antagonized Hariri’s relations with some of his Christian allies, like the Phalange Party of ex-president Amin Gemayel and the Lebanese Forces of Samir Gagega, a warlord. Hariri reasoned that Hezbollah’s support was more crucial for him at this stage than that of Christian statesmen who represented – at best – only half of the Lebanese Christian community. The breakthrough came on the heels of a royal visit by Hariri’s patron, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, to Damascus where he, too, turned a new page with the Syrians after relations had soured in 2005-2006. The Syrians and Saudis realized that what united them over Lebanon and other regional issues, such as Iraq, was greater than what had divided them since 2005 – mainly the issue of Hezbollah.

Now comes Hariri’s visit to Syria, expected this December. It closes a troubled chapter of Syrian-Lebanese relations that was imposed on both countries by the Bush administration. That chapter began to turn when Syria and Saudi Arabia reconciled at an Arab summit over Gaza, which took place in Kuwait last January, symbolically on Bush’s last day at the White House.

The Bush team – eager to punish Syria for confronting them in the 2003 occupation of Iraq – tried to isolate Syria, blaming it for the insurgency in Iraq and the murder of Rafik Hariri in 2005. It too reasoned, however, that it could not obtain any breakthroughs in the Middle East without the cooperation of Syria. The Syrians were needed after all, to moderate the actions of Hamas in Palestine, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and, more importantly, the behavior of the Iranian government.

It all boiled down to one thing: if the Americans wanted peace and tranquility in the Arab world, they had to deal with either Syria or Iran. Dealing with both was too difficult for the Bush team and continuing to deal with neither was clearly not working. The Americans reasoned, towards the end of the Bush era, that dealing with Syria was less difficult, given that Syria had proven to be a credible negotiating partner and did not have a history of anti-Americanism.

Then came President Barack Obama, who showed from day one that he was very different from Bush in dealing with the Middle East. Obama began sending official delegations to Syria to find common ground on Iraq, listening to Syrian grievances while expressing their own, seeing the many ways forward for both countries. Obama began to do away with some of the sanctions imposed by the US in 2004, and in the summer of 2009 announced that he was going to send an ambassador to Damascus to fill a post that has been vacant since 2005.

Obama’s priorities, however, were very different from those of Syria. He was clearly more interested in Iraq, Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan than in the Middle East peace process. In as much as he would have loved to hammer out a peace treaty between the Palestinians and Israelis, a troublesome US Congress and a hardline Israeli government prevented him from achieving any of that.

The Syrians, however, wanted two things from Obama: jumpstarting serious talks on the occupied Golan Heights and improving bilateral relations between the US and Damascus. Neither the Syrians nor the Americans had Lebanon on their priority list – although both continued to regard the Lebanese file as “important”.

Hariri and Jumblatt were among the first to realize how different the balance of power had become in the Middle East in the post-Bush era. The US needed Syria in Iraq and the Syrians needed the US to get back the Golan. A new relationship of cooperation had flourished and if Lebanon did not blow with the prevailing wind, now coming from Damascus, it would sink into oblivion in the new Middle East.

Rather than beat Hezbollah and Syria, they decided to join them, restoring a status quo that had existed during the 1990s between Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, the US and Lebanon. This means that the Saudis’ proxy in the region, Hariri, would co-rule Lebanon with Iran’s proxy, Hezbollah.

Lebanon would no longer be used as a launching pad for anti-Syrian propaganda, and the Syrians would be assured that no anti-Syrian cabinet would reign in Beirut, now that its allies were strongly represented in the Hariri cabinet. More importantly, the Hariri visit proves that all talk marketed by the US and March 14, which blamed Syria for the murder of Rafik Hariri in 2005, had now vanished.

Simply put, had the Syrians killed him, then evidence would have emerged to incriminate Syria. The fact that nothing has emerged from the international tribunal that began last March is testimony to Syria’s innocence, so is the honeymoon between Syria and France, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and the US.

These are good days for Syria. Regional solutions have seemingly been tailor-made to fit the liking of the statesmen in Damascus. A new US ambassador will likely land in Syria before the end of this year, and the Americans are still promising engagement and more results on the peace process.

The anti-Syrian craze in Beirut has been silenced – probably for good – and relations could not be better between Damascus and Paris on one front, and Damascus and both Ankara and Doha on another. Syria is playing a pivotal role in the reconciliation process between Hamas and Fatah, and is using its considerable influence to hammer out solutions between Hezbollah and March 14 in Lebanon.

From where the Syrians see things: only one breakthrough is still needed – enough US pressure on Israel to cease settlement expansion and return to the peace talks with the Arabs, for the sake of restoring occupied land to both Syria and Lebanon. The year 2009 could not have been better for Damascus.

Sami Moubayed is editor-in-chief of Forward Magazine in Syria.

Not only is there talk of Hizbullah chief  Nasrallah visiting Saudi Arabia after Hariri visits Damascus, but everyone is wooing Turkey. Mubarak is headed to Ankara for the second time this year. Amr Mousa, the Arab League head, was just there. Middle Eastern reconciliation is breaking out all over the place, as regional states seem to be tearing pages from Turkey’s “Zero Crescents, Zero Axises, and Zero problems with neighbors” foreign policy handbook. Turkey has designed the perfect anti-Bush foreign policy. Shiites are embracing Sunnis; moderates are making doe eyes at extremists, and the Lebanese are just getting along!! What is wrong with the Middle East? Will Iraqis soon be having pajama parties in parliament?

Syria’s future can draw on its past
BY SAMI KHIYAMI (Syrian Ambassador in London)
Le Monde Diplomatique, 24 NOVEMBER,

… The paralysis among Arab states during the Bush era, and the continuing dissension among Arab ranks, have prompted Syria to widen its regional outreach, strengthening its ties with the major regional players, Turkey and Iran. Syria has started to contemplate the possibility of creating a new regional understanding which would have a major economic and political impact on all the parties involved, and which would ultimately transform the Middle East into a recognised player in world politics….

Nasrallah Visits Saudi Arabia after Hariri Visits Syria
Naharnet

The visitors of former president Emile Lahoud, who visited Damascus lately, said that a closed meeting gathered Lahoud to Syrian President Bashar Assad, for 45 minutes, in which they discussed Lebanese and regional situations.

The Central News Agency quoted Lahoud’s visitors as saying that the media circulated reports, about Hizbullah Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah visiting Saudi Arabia, were correct and confirmed, and that his visit will occur after that of Prime Minister Saad Hariri to Damascus.

Lahoud’s visitors stressed that the atmospheres between Saudi Arabia and Syria are going fine, especially that “they are based on good intentions between the two countries.”

Feltman: U.S. has Normal Relations with Syria, Disagrees with Damascus on Hizbullah, Iran
By Naharnet
Dec 15, 2009 – 5:48:58 AM

U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman said Washington has “normal” relations with Syria.
“The long time spent to form the new Lebanese Cabinet may have left a positive impact on the Lebanese because it may mean that the Lebanese are beginning to understand each other,” Feltman said in remarks published Tuesday by pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat.

“This is what I observed through my reading of the policy statement, which means that time has come for the Lebanese to rally behind an internal, national agenda,” he added. His remarks were translated into English by Naharnet.

Feltman said he hoped the Lebanese would start a new phase by attending to domestic affairs and “stop thinking about what Americans or the Saudis or the Syrians or any external element believe, but think of what Lebanese need.”

He described America’s relationship with Syria as “more normal than before and on more than one level.”

“Several dialogue channels are now open, meaning that today dialogue is multi-sided,” Feltman said, adding that the two countries continue to exchange formal visits.

“This is a positive and useful aspect. The important thing today is that that we are talking with each other, and not at each other. And that’s better for us and for Syria, as well as for the Lebanese,” he believed.

He pointed to the “deep differences” with the Syrians in views regarding Hizbullah and Iran.

MI chief: Syria is not natural member of ‘radical axis’
By Anshel Pfeffer, 16/12/2009, Turkishpress.com

Syria is a potential peace partner for Israel because it is a secular country that is not completely entrenched in the “radical axis” of Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas, despite increased cooperation among all four entities, Military Intelligence chief Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin said Tuesday.

“Syria is a secular country and, unlike Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas, it does not rule out the chance of reaching a peace agreement with Israel,” he said in an address to the annual conference of the Institute for National Security Studies.

Syrian President Bashar Assad, he said, “is not naturally entrenched in the radical axis.”
Therefore, “a peace agreement, if achieved, has the potential [to effect] a positive change in Israel’s strategic environment.”

“Removing Syria from the circle of hostility, severing the link that, both geographically and in other ways, connects the radical axis, and ending Syrian support for terror would reduce the potential threat against the State of Israel,” Yadlin said.

His speech surveyed the strategic challenges facing Israel in the coming decade, with particular emphasis on Syria’s place in the radical axis comprising Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah…….

But on the positive side, he said, southern Israel has been calm since Operation Cast Lead and the north has been quiet since the Second Lebanon War, thus refuting fears that the country has lost its deterrence capability.

Why non-state actors thrive
Editorial By The Daily Star
Wednesday, December 16, 2009

President Michel Sleiman’s trip to Washington is provoking unease in certain circles, which usually get jumpy when there are signs that the Lebanese state might actually become stronger. At the White House, Sleiman’s actual requests for military aid and assistance were quite modest, but any step in this direction sends alarm bells ringing.

Israeli officials and supporters of Israel in the US have never missed an opportunity to weaken the Lebanese state. It’s a long story, dating back decades. The Israelis have dealt with right-wing elements in Lebanon, in a policy of divide and rule. They’ve even dealt with Hizbullah, through German mediators, as the Lebanese state stands by and watches.

In 2000, the Israelis withdrew from the majority of Lebanese territory occupied since 1978. While an overt peace deal between the Israeli and Lebanese states wasn’t in the cards, our state wasn’t the beneficiary of this move. Instead, it was saddled with reclaiming the formerly occupied territories – strewn with land mines, naturally – and receiving no reparations for the decades of destruction.

Whether before or after 2000, Israeli air strikes, shelling and other aggression have forced the Lebanese state to pay the price in the form of shattered lives, and infrastructure. These Israeli actions are the opposite of “state-building,” since they generate the reasons why non-state actors thrive.

Sleiman’s host, President Barack Obama, must evaluate this history of Israeli-American dealings and decide what should be done to truly build strong states here. In his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, Obama talked about this region’s importance, as a source of instability. He should ask why non-state actors exist in the first place: Hamas and Hizbullah represent the reaction to unresolved issues, such as a fair and durable regional peace.

It’s not a time for treading water, since maintaining the current course of affairs – putting Israel’s security first and everyone else’s grievances last – will lead to further deterioration of the state system in the Middle East. Perhaps the Israelis want such a scenario, but at what cost? We’ve seen the danger to everyone, including the US, from the chaos in Iraq, and Afghanistan.

The White House must free itself of its sordid dealings with its ally Israel and realize that the usual platitudes and expressions of mild support for a country like Lebanon won’t get the job done.

Only then will we have a chance to prosper, and more importantly become an example of democratic growth and the inclusion of non-state actors, rather than seeing them run the show.

Warmer Relations With Turkey Kindle Hopes in Syria
2009-12-15 (New York Times) By ROBERT F. WORTH

ALEPPO, Syria — Ever since Syria and Turkey lifted their visa restrictions in September, Turkish visitors have poured into this picturesque northern city. Hawkers in Aleppo’s ancient souk now call out to shoppers in Turkish, and cross-border commerce has soared. The two countries have embarked on a very public honeymoon, with their leaders talking about each other like long-lost friends…..

Arab-Turkish Forum approved future work plan in all fields
Published: 12/15/2009

DAMASCUS – Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem, Turkish counterpart Ahmet Davutoglu and the Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa underlined during a joint press conference Tuesday that the 2nd Ministerial Meeting of the Arab-Turkish Forum came out with a future work plan to boost bilateral cooperation among the Arab countries and Turkey.

They added that this forum clearly expresses the two sides desire to enhance relations and push them forwards to a strategic level.

Turk Leader To Pay Key Visit to Syria
BY BURAK EGE BEKDIL and UMIT ENGINSOY, 15 Dec 2009

ANKARA – Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan will pay an official visit to Syria on Dec. 22-23 at the invitation of President Bashar al-Assad at a time when Turkey’s ties with Israel have hit rock bottom.

A statement from the Turkish Foreign Ministry said Erdogan would participate in the first meeting of prime ministers of the Turkey-Syria High Level Strategic Cooperation in Damascus.

Officials said Turkish and Syrian authorities will sign a series of agreements, protocols and memorandums of understanding during Erdogan’s visit. These agreements are expected to include military and defense industry cooperation accords. Erdogan’s visit comes shortly after Turkey and neighboring Syria agreed to hold their first major joint military exercises.

Egypt Forces Copts to Hide as Muslims Hit Swiss Minaret Ban
2009-12-14 22:03:59.799 GMT

Dec. 15 (Bloomberg) — On a side street in the far northeast Cairo suburb of Ain Shams, the door of a five-story former underwear factory is padlocked.

This is, or was supposed to be, the St. Mary and Anba Abraam Coptic Christian Church. Police closed it Nov. 24, 2008, when Muslims rioted against its consecration. Since then local Copts have had to commute to distant churches or worship in hiding at each other’s homes.

While Muslim leaders criticized the Nov. 29 vote in Switzerland that banned construction of minarets, they don’t support Christians who want to build churches in some Islamic countries. Restrictions in Egypt have exacerbated sectarian violence and discrimination, say Copts, a 2,000-year-old denomination that comprises about 10 percent of the population.

The day after the Swiss vote, Ali Gomaa, one of Egypt’s top Muslim clerics, called the decision “an attempt to insult the feelings of the Muslim community in and outside of Switzerland.”

Copts quickly said that neither Gomaa nor any other Islamic leader mentioned the Christian situation in Egypt.

“Without the merest attempt to put our house in order, are we in any position to taunt others to put theirs?” Youssef Sidhom, editor-in-chief of the Cairo-based Egyptian Coptic weekly newspaper El-Watani, said in a telephone interview. “They should be ashamed.”

The contrast between criticism of the Swiss and silence about local parallels isn’t limited to Egypt. Censure of Switzerland, where about 5 percent of the population is Muslim, was widespread in Islamic countries where Christians face restrictions on practicing their faith.

‘Xenophobic, Prejudiced’

“The decision of the Swiss people stood to be interpreted as xenophobic, prejudiced, discriminative and against the universal human-rights values,” said the Organization of the Islamic Conference in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, which represents 57 Muslim-majority nations.

Members include Saudi Arabia, where non-Muslims are arrested for worshipping privately; Maldives, the Indian Ocean atoll where citizenship is reserved for Muslims; Libya, which limits churches to one per denomination in cities; and Iran, where conversion from Islam is punished by death, according to a 2009 U.S. State Department report on religious freedom.

“The Copts are a minority. Why do they need more churches?” Ain Shams café owner Harbi Muhammed Ali said in an interview. “There are other churches around. If you have one car, do you need two?”….

Poverty fuels child labour among Iraqi refugees in Syria

Aseel Ali*, aged 16, and her mother – both refugees from Iraq – earn just enough (US$174 per month between them) in a Damascus handicraft workshop to pay their rent and buy food.

“Syrian women the smartest” SANA … The reason is a diet rich in olive oil and walnuts. Food for thought.

To the Arab world, Obama’s Nobel leaves something to be desired
The president appears to be following a well-worn and feckless American diplomatic path that discounts the Palestinian point of view.
By Scott MacLeod

16/12/2009

MI chief: Syria is not natural member of ‘radical axis’

By Anshel Pfeffer

Tags: Israel News

Syria is a potential peace partner for Israel because it is a secular country that is not completely entrenched in the “radical axis” of Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas, despite increased cooperation among all four entities, Military Intelligence chief Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin said Tuesday. “Syria is a secular country and, unlike Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas, it does not rule out the chance of reaching a peace agreement with Israel,” he said in an address to the annual conference of the Institute for National Security Studies. Syrian President Bashar Assad, he said, “is not naturally entrenched in the radical axis.” Advertisement Therefore, “a peace agreement, if achieved, has the potential [to effect] a positive change in Israel’s strategic environment.” “Removing Syria from the circle of hostility, severing the link that, both geographically and in other ways, connects the radical axis, and ending Syrian support for terror would reduce the potential threat against the State of Israel,” Yadlin said. His speech surveyed the strategic challenges facing Israel in the coming decade, with particular emphasis on Syria’s place in the radical axis comprising Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah. Cooperation among members of this axis, he said, has now reached “a level we’ve never seen before.” For instance, Syria and Iran have conducted joint weapons tests with representatives of Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad in attendance. The division of labor, Yadlin said, is that “ideology, financing, technology, doctrine and training [come] from Iran, production is preferably [done] in Syria, and the products reach every member of the axis.” Smuggling networks bringing weapons from Iran and Syria to Hamas and Hezbollah have “abandoned all restraint,” he said. As a result, the Israel Defense Forces’ working assumption is that any weapons system possessed by Syria or Iran is likely to find its way to Hamas or Hezbollah. He said members of the radical axis even cooperated in gathering intelligence and analyzing the Second Lebanon War in 2006 and Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip a year ago. Nevertheless, Yadlin said, despite the fact that “the more time passes, the greater Syria’s negative role becomes and the more entrenched Assad becomes in the radical axis,” this is not where he naturally belongs. With regard to the Iranian nuclear threat, Yadlin warned, “the technological clock has almost run out. In 2008, the Iranians fully mastered uranium enrichment technology, and in 2009, the Natanz facility produced a quantity of material that would suffice for a first bomb.” Nevertheless, he said, this uranium has not yet reached the 93-percent enrichment level needed for a bomb. Yadlin said he did not think Iran actually wanted to make a bomb right now. Rather, what it wants is to become a “threshold state” – one with the capability of producing a bomb quickly when it deems the time right. “The moment Iran succeeds in definitely establishing its status and image as a threshold state,” he added, this “will enable its allies to do things they currently dare not do.” But on the positive side, he said, southern Israel has been calm since Operation Cast Lead and the north has been quiet since the Second Lebanon War, thus refuting fears that the country has lost its deterrence capability. Credit Suisse Likely To Pay $536M In US Settlement 2009-12-15 20, DOW JONES NEWSWIRES Credit Suisse expects to pay a $536 million (£329 million) settlement for violating US economic sanctions, the Swiss bank revealed in a surprise statement last night. The bank said that it was in advanced discussions with American authorities to settle claims that it had transacted “certain US dollar payments involving countries, persons or entities that may be subject to US economic sanctions”. Credit Suisse had previously disclosed that it was subject to the investigations, which covered transactions made between 2002 and 2007. Yesterday it said that the settlement was likely to come to $536 million, hitting the bank with a pre-tax charge of SwFr445 million (£263 million) in the fourth quarter of 2009. The after-tax charge will be about SwFr360 million. The company did not indicate when the settlement would be finalised. The New York County District Attorney, the Department of Justice, the Federal Reserve and the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) are involved in the negotiations with the bank. Robert Morgenthau, the New York County District Attorney, said in October that he was investigating a large, international bank for facilitating transactions with Iran. He did not name the bank. Credit Suisse said yesterday that it had terminated in 2006 all business it did with countries under US sanction, which include Iran, Sudan, Syria and North Korea. It also closed its office in Tehran, the capital of Iran. The bank appointed a global sanctions compliance officer and improved the filters it used to screen transactions for sanctions issues. “Credit Suisse is committed to the highest standards of integrity and regulatory compliance in all its businesses and takes this matter extremely seriously,” the bank said in a statement. Credit Suisse depository receipts closed down 3.4 per cent at $48.23 each in the US. In January Lloyds Banking Group paid a $350 million penalty for hiding $300 million worth of Sudanese, Libyan and Iranian transactions from the US authorities between 1995 and 2007. The British bank admitted that it had altered identifying information on wire transfers by customers in sanctioned countries in order to dupe US regulators. Authorities suspect that the money was used in Iran to fund an illegal weapons programme — something that Iran denies exists. Credit Suisse’s settlement caps a bad year for Swiss banks operating in the US. In February UBS paid a $780 million fine after admitting that it helped American customers to evade tax by using offshore bank accounts. In August the bank agreed to give up the identities of 4,450 clients suspected by the US of tax evasion.

David Ignatius goes to the heart of Washington’s love -hate relationship with the mukhabarat in today’s Washington Post: Jordan’s ace of spies. The Mukhabarat are the secret police services that dominate Middle Eastern security regimes. The US has become dependent on them to protect its security interests in the region.

Mukhabarat are the antithesis of freedom and democracy, which America champions in much of the world. In the Middle East , however, the US seems to have lost its moral compass. The complex relationship between Washington and the various Mukhabarat forces of the Middle East stands as testimony to America’s need for muscle to protect its security interests in a region, where it is not popular.

Ignatius writes of Gen. Saad Kheir, “the brilliant but emotionally wounded spymaster who headed Jordan’s General Intelligence Department (GID) from 2000 to 2005.… he was a genius… a superstar….”

Kheir researched his targets so thoroughly that he got inside their lives…. A former CIA officer told me about one sublime pitch….. Like many Arab intelligence services, the [Jordanian mukhabarat] has a reputation for using brutal interrogation methods, and I’m sure that it didn’t get the nickname “the fingernail factory” for nothing. But Kheir’s successes in interrogation often came from a different kind of intimidation. Colleagues recall him standing behind a suspect, his voice deep with menace, as he talked of the suspect’s family, friends and contacts. That was much scarier than physical violence would have been. He waited for them to break themselves, and it usually worked…. in his prime, he was a genius… He made his name penetrating Palestinian extremist groups…. It’s hard to think of a foreigner who helped save more American lives than Saad Pasha.

Arab Mukhabarat chieftains, so reviled in the US press, are openly admired by the official class in Washington for their brutal freedoms.

Ignatius draws a sharp line between physical and mental torture. He reviles physical torture but recognizes the genius of mental menace, especially when used to break anti-American extremists.

Reading Ignatius’ opinion piece reminded me of an evening I spent with Staff Sgt. Eric Maddox who was the intelligence officer responsible for capturing Saddam Hussein. As a graduate of the University of Oklahoma, Maddox was a natural invitee to speak about the intelligence behind Saddam’s capture. Maddox was an excellent speaker. Like Ignatius, he abhorred physical torture and had spoken out adamantly and bravely against it within the US intelligence community. He explained that mental pressure was the key to gaining useful information.

Once Maddox realized that he had arrested the head of Saddam’s insurgency, Muhammad Ibrahim, US soldiers swept up over forty members of Ibrahim’s family and extended clan in Takrit. Maddox explained that the psychological pressure he could bring to bear on Ibrahim was overwhelming. Ibrahim knew that he could have his entire family freed if only he provided information on Saddam. Ibrahim caved quickly.

In the audience at OU was a Syrian refugee, Mohammad Al Abdallah, whose father still languishes in a Syrian prison. Mohammad had also been imprisoned but was eventually released after a long and grueling period of interrogation. On his release he had traveled to Lebanon, from where he was eventually granted refugee status in the US. Mohammad arrived in the US only the month before Maddox came to talk at OU. By coincidence, Mohammad was settled by US authorities in Oklahoma City, where he looked me up. I invited him to dinner and to hear the Maddox talk.

Ironically, Mohammad’s father worked for the PLO, which for most of its existence was considered a Palestinian extremist group by the US. His father could easily have been one of the prisoners that Ignatius wrote about. At the end of Maddox’s talk, Mohammad raised his hand and explained that he was a recent refugee who had been tortured, not so much physically as mentally. He explained that he appreciated Maddox’s distinction between physical and mental torture and that he understood the importance for the Americans and Iraqis of capturing Saddam Hussein. All the same, he described how he had been subjected to mental torture by intelligence officers who were probably no less convinced of their righteousness. The Syrian secret police were holding Mohammad’s father when they interrogated Mohammad. He explained that he would have preferred to be physically tortured.

The audience hushed. One could hear only awkward shuffling. Staff Sgt. Eric Maddox also fell silent. What could one say? It was a very important moment for everyone at the talk.

All the Mukhabarat services have experts like Saad Kheir, who are experts in a “different kind of intimidation.” They know how to “stand behind a suspect with menace and talk of the suspect’s family, friends and contacts.”

Jordan’s ace of spies
By David Ignatius
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Washington Post

…. I asked Tenet in 2003 if any foreign intelligence services had been especially helpful against al-Qaeda, and he answered instantly, “The Jordanians,” and continued with Tenetian enthusiasm, “Their guy Saad Kheir is a superstar!”

So the next time I was in Amman, I asked the royal palace if I could meet the legendary intelligence chief, and it was duly arranged. I was driven to the GID’s fearsome headquarters, past its black flag bearing the ominous warning in Arabic “Justice Has Come” and escorted upstairs to the pasha’s office.

Kheir had a rough, boozy charm — somewhere between Humphrey Bogart and Omar Sharif. He was dressed elegantly, as always — in this case, a cashmere blazer, a knit tie and a pair of what looked to be handmade English shoes.

The pasha told me a few stories, and others filled in the details: He made his name penetrating Palestinian extremist groups, such as the Abu Nidal organization. Once he had burrowed into the terrorists’ lair, he was able to plant rumors and disinformation that set the group’s members fighting among themselves. Before long, Abu Nidal’s fraternity of killers had imploded in a frenzy of suspicion and self-destruction. I stole that idea for “Body of Lies.”

Kheir researched his targets so thoroughly that he got inside their lives. A former CIA officer told me about one sublime pitch: Kheir tracked a jihadist to an apartment in Eastern Europe and handed him a cellphone, saying: “Talk to your mother.” The man’s mom was actually on the line, telling him he was a wonderful son for buying her a new TV and a couch and sending her money. “The spoken message was, ‘We can do good things for you.’ The unspoken message was, ‘We can hurt you,’ ” explained the CIA officer. I took that scene, too, verbatim.

Like many Arab intelligence services, the GID has a reputation for using brutal interrogation methods, and I’m sure that it didn’t get the nickname “the fingernail factory” for nothing. But Kheir’s successes in interrogation often came from a different kind of intimidation. Colleagues recall him standing behind a suspect, his voice deep with menace, as he talked of the suspect’s family, friends and contacts. That was much scarier than physical violence would have been. He waited for them to break themselves, and it usually worked.

Kheir ran afoul of his boss, King Abdullah, when he began pushing into politics and business. It was the classic overreach of intelligence chiefs in the Middle East, and he was sacked in 2005. His dismissal took a cruel toll: Kheir could be seen carousing late at night at his favorite restaurant in Amman, no longer a master of the universe or even, fully, master of himself. But in his prime, he was a genius….

Addendum (13 December 2009): Some sources are attributing to me information about Majd al-Assad that I deny. The only information that I have about him is published on my website and comes from the report on SANA, which I copy below.

Joshua Landis

President al-Assad Announces the Passing Away of His Brother Majd
Dec 12, 2009

Damascus, (SANA) – President Bashar al-Assad announced the passing away of his brother Majd Hafez al-Assad in Damascus on the morning of Saturday 12/12/2009 after suffering from chronic disease.

The pure body of the late deceased will be laid to final rest in the city of Qardaha following the afternoon prayers on Sunday 13/12/2009.

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Turkey’s move to create a Northern Alliance is the biggest thing to happen in the Middle East since the US invasion of Iraq created a power vacuum in the region. President Bush spent eight years trying to build up a coalition around Saudi Arabia, Israel, Egypt and Iraq to counter Iran and Syria. What a singular failure that effort was.

Turkey is trying to clean up the mess Bush created on its border. Making sure that the US does no further damage to the neighborhood is Turkey’s first concern. Should the US allow Israel to bomb Iran or be successful in strangling it economically, Turkey and its neighbors would be adversely impacted. China, Russia, India and Turkey are unlikely to allow the US to lead a catatonic world into further deadly sanctions. There seems to be enough alternative leadership to stop such a unconstructive move. Turkey is at the forefront of the effort.

As Israel, the US and EU ramp up threats to hurt Iran, the Norther Alliance — Turkey, Iran and Syria — have been doing some pushing back of their own.

Erdogan: Israel should expect a Turkish “Earthquake” if it ever tried to violate Turkey’s airspace to attack another country (J Post)

Iran will attack Israeli nuclear installations in response to any Israeli attack on its territories (Fox news)

Syria: We’ll revert to resistance to regain the Golan, as Israel closes the door on peaceful solution (Syria News)

Diplomats in Damascus Divided on Cause of Bus Explosion: I asked a diplomat in Damascus how fellow diplomats were breaking on the bus explosion. Did they believe Syrian authorities claims that it was an accident and not terrorism? Here is the response I got.

Dear Joshua,

Not surprisingly, the diplomatic community in Damascus is split over the bus explosion. Most western diplomats with whom I talked about the tire explosion believe the government’s explanation. Here are some indicators in support of their acceptance that it was an accident:

1. – first, the Syrian authorities allowed free access in the area of the incident; this means no sealing of the site, as usually :)…
2. – from a purely techincal perspective, the bus didn’t look as damaged as it would have had the explosion resulted from a bomb. (not shattered into pieces).

By and large, the Arab members of the diplomatic community, as is often the case with these things, looked at the situation differently.

Sharaa pointed out that Syria has worked to fill the “strategic vacuum” after the war on Iraq by strengthening ties with Iran and establishing a strategic relationship with Turkey. (Naharnet)

Sharaa: Accusations against Syria of Hariri Crime Backfired on Them (Assafir)

–Syrian VP Says Damascus Overcame All External Efforts to Undermine It
–Hopes Formation of Lebanese Govt. Will Open Horizons for Lebanese-Syrian Ties
(Translation/summary from Middle East Reporter)

Syria’s Vice President Farouk al-Sharaa confirmed Wednesday that Syria overcame all external efforts to undermine its unity since 2003, stressing that the US-Israeli scheme in the Middle is destined to fail, the Beirut leftist daily AS SAFIR reported Thursday. “The claims of the enemies of Syria have failed in justifying the war on Iraq, and their fabrications against and accusations of Syria in the Feb. 14, 2005 crime have backfired,” Sharaa said. This is a reference to the assassination of Lebanon’s former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri in 2005, a crime that Lebanese anti-Syrian parties and the West had accused Damascus of involvement in. A United Nations probe linked Syria to the crime, a claim Damascus denied. Syria was internationally isolated since 2004, until a rapprochement with France in May 2008 led the way for a warming of tied with other countries.

Syria’s enemies also “failed in destroying the resistance (Lebanon’s Syria-backed guerrilla group Hizbullah) and humiliating Lebanon and Syria in the July 2006 war. And they will not succeed in inciting against Syria,” Sharaa added. Syria backed Hizbullah during its war with Israel in 2006, which was sharply criticized by anti-Syrian Lebanese groups. The main aim behind “the campaign against Syria was to make the Syrian citizen lose faith in himself first and in his leadership second. Therefore, saboteurs tried to split Syria up as a nation and oust the regime. But they failed in both goals and the choice of the Syrian people prevailed,” according to the Syrian official.

“The prevalent situation (in Syria) is better than that of the past six years. This is due to the high spirits of the Syrian people who preserved their Arab identity, unnerved by traitors here and there,” Sharaa went on to say. He added that Damascus proved that “betting on the national resistance cannot lose.” He said, “The US-Israeli scheme in the Middle East is not destined to succeed.”

After the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, Damascus boosted its ties with Tehran and Ankara to overcome the strategic void, Sharaa pointed out. Syria “worked on filling the strategic void by cementing its ties with Iran and establishing strategic relations with Turkey without ruling out a role further than the region.”

Meanwhile, Sharaa hoped the recently formed government in Lebanon would lead to positive bilateral ties. “We hope the formation of a national unity government will open the way to positive horizons for the Lebanese people and excellent Syrian-Lebanese relations,” Sharaa added. Lebanon and Syria established last year diplomatic relations for the first time since their independence from France in the 1940s.

A New Ambassador: From the Cable at Foreign Policy

“It’s been half a year since the Obama administration pledged to send an ambassador to Damascus after four years’ absence and now we are seeing movement. The State Department has reportedly sent its recommendation to the White House for approval and final deliberations are said to be underway.

The two names leading the rumor mill in Washington as of now are Jacob Walles, the immediate past consul general in Jerusalem, and Nabil Khury, a veteran Foreign Service officer of Lebanese descent…..

Sources close to the discussions also say that the job was offered and declined at some point by both Fred Hof, a Syria expert and deputy to Middle East Special Envoy George Mitchell, and Daniel Kurtzer, who was U.S. ambassador to Israel from 2001 to 2005 but is not currently in government.

At the start of the Obama administration, there was some talk and expectation that things with Syria could move relatively quickly, not necessarily toward a huge breakthrough but at least toward a warming of the relationship in some sense. But public examples of such a warming are hard to find and the lack of progress has had an effect of its own.

“The decision was expected a while ago, so even though it’s significant, part of its significance has been eroded simply by the virtue of how much time has elapsed,” said Aaron David Miller, a former Middle East negotiator now with the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, “There’s been frustration, disappointment, and some misunderstanding on both sides.”

Underlying the dynamic is the disparity between the two sides over what the reinstatement of a U.S. ambassador means. The Syrians view it as a return to normalcy while the U.S. side sees it more as of a reward. “Whatever bang one would expect to get from the naming of an ambassador has been diluted because the Syrians feel like they’ve been unfairly punished and have had to wait too long,” Miller said.

There were both bureaucratic and political reasons for the delay, ……….. On the political side, the question was how to calibrate the speed at which the U.S. moves to normalize relations with Syria and how that decision factors into other regional issues that are moving on parallel tracks. Also, the U.S. still feels Syria is engaged in activities seen as counter to U.S. interests in the region….

U.S. officials are said to have different takes on Syria. More senior officials, such as Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg and Deputy National Security Advisor Tom Donilon, are seen as skeptics, feeling that Syria has to prove itself and demonstrate more constructive behavior before getting rapprochement with the U.S. The office of Vice President Joseph Biden is also said to be cautious about advancing relations with Syria, but that could be out of concern for maintaining delicate but good relations with Iraqi President Nouri al-Maliki. Biden is the White House’s point man on dealing with Maliki’s government, which accuses Syria of fomenting chaos in Iraq.

One level down the State Department hierarchy, officials for whom Syria is a larger and more specific part of their portfolio want to see diplomacy with Damascus move more quickly. Assistant Secretary of State Jeffrey Feltman is one who is said to want more movement, but the Syrians might not view him that way based on his past reputation as a Syria critic during his tenure as the U.S. ambassador in Beirut, sources said.

State Department advocates for moving forward are allied with some in the Pentagon and U.S. Central Command, who are in favor of more interaction with the Syrians, although the military is by no means monolithic on this issue.

President Obama is also said to favor movement, but the top White House leadership is simply unable to devote a lot of attention to Syria right now….. “It’s not among the 10 most important issues for the administration, so it’s one where the power of inertia is more significant than whatever forward movement advocates are pushing,” another Middle East expert said…”

RABIYA, Iraq — Iraq’s border with Syria runs for hundreds of miles through barren land patrolled by a relative scattering of security forces. But despite claims about exiled Saddam Hussein loyalists sneaking across to disrupt Iraq’s upcoming elections, the only evidence around one key outpost is faded slogans of Saddam’s banned Baath Party painted on the wall of a decaying grain elevator.

Cigarette smugglers? Certainly. Foreign fighters? Sometimes.

But Iraqi and American security forces alike around the border town of Rabiya say they’ve neither seen nor heard of Baathists illegally crossing the border in recent months.

The claim has been raised with increasing force recently by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who has blamed horrific bombings in Baghdad — including the ones Tuesday that killed at least 127 people — on an alliance of Sunni insurgents and Baathist loyalists who want to derail Iraq’s elections planned for March.

On Thursday, al-Qaida’s umbrella group, known as the Islamic State of Iraq, posted a statement claiming responsibility for the attacks this week.

“Nothing’s been communicated to me about Baathists,” Maj. Gen. Tony Cucolo, commander of U.S. forces in northern Iraq, said in an Associated Press interview this week. He added he has been informed “about foreign fighters and insurgents.”

“What we’re seeing is some illegal smuggling, some contraband, smuggling of cigarettes — things like that,” Cucolo said.

To be sure, it is hardly likely that Baathists would identify themselves if captured. Former Baath Party members could also try regular border crossings with their Iraqi passports, but many of the Baath leaders still at large are on an Iraqi watch list and could need to rely on illegal crossings.

Though the number of arrests of obvious insurgents or foreign fighters crossing the border is relatively small, Cucolo said the Americans just don’t know what their presence here has deterred…..

DAMASCUS — Syria warned Israel on Thursday it risked closing the door to renewed peace talks, a day after the Israeli parliament agreed to consider a bill that would make it far more difficult to return the occupied Golan.

“The current Israeli government of (Benjamin) Netanyahu is perfectly aware that Syria will not resume indirect talks brokered by Turkey unless this prime minister commits himself to a full withdrawal from the Golan,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.

“Syria’s recovery of its occupied territory is non-negotiable as it is a right recognised by UN resolutions.”

Israel seized the Golan Heights in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it in 1981, in a move never recognised by the international community….

Syria hit out at Netanyahu for giving his government’s support to the bill’s passage through parliament, saying he was going back on the policy of previous Israeli governments over nearly two decades.

“Since the launch of peace negotiations at the Madrid conference (in 1991), every Israeli prime minister has committed to a full withdrawal from the Golan to the June 4, 1967 line,” according to the ministry statement.

“Through this action, Israel is once again defying the desire of the international community to achieve a comprehensive peace in the region in accordance with international resolutions and the principle of the exchange of land for peace.

“Israel is defying the whole world with its rejection of peace and it is proving that its goverment’s stated wish to make peace is nothing but a political manoeuvre.”….

Iran, Syria call for expansion of defense ties
Tehran Times Political Desk

TEHRAN – Iranian Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi and his Syrian counterpart Ali Mohammad Habib have called for the expansion of defense ties between the two counties.

Vahidi met with Habib during the first session of the Iran-Syria joint defense commission, which was held in Damascus on Wednesday.

http://www.damascus-metro.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/why-network-highquality-new.jpg

I can’t figure out if they are going to connect it to the airport. It’s a shame if they will not.

The latest feasibility study (15-Nov) decided to that the design would be similar to Dubai’s metro (overground in most areas).

If Dubai is an indication, Damascus should embrace for a long period of street diversions and major congestion once construction starts. I hope this will not drag on for decades to complete the announced Green line.

Syria should shape up, scholar says
Published: Dec. 10, 2009, (UPI)

David Schenker, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, writes the emergence of Hezbollah as a political force indicates Damascus
has “regained the upper hand in Lebanon.”

Schenker accuses U.S. President Barack Obama, who on Thursday accepted the Nobel Peace Prize, of negligence in the rise of Hezbollah.

“To date, the Obama administration appears to have done little to stem the tide, but given the stakes, Washington should act quickly to reverse the trend,” he says.