Bashar, like Saddam, knows there is no way out for him but to fight on and win or die.

Here is a story about Saddam that highlights that point:

“Saddam was realistic about the brutal reprisals that would be unleashed should he ever lose his grip on power. In their book Out of the Ashes (1999), Andrew and Patrick Cockburn tell of a family that complained to Saddam that one of their members had been unjustly executed. He was unapologetic, and told them, “Do not think you will get revenge. If you ever have the chance, by the time you get to me there will not be a sliver of flesh left on my body.” In other words, if he ever became vulnerable, his enemies would quickly devour him.”

Thanks for the posting from Mohammed D. above.

He writes very well as before, but the picture he paints is bleak – more people feeling they have to fight for their lives, more fear, more misery and chaos.

And it so didn’t have to be this way.

Those Alawis lives are being destroyed like all those other Syrians for one reason: they had the rotten luck to be born in a beautiful country that became hostage to a spectacularly vicious, stupid and destructive dictatorship.

I wish people discuss what came in the post today instead of cutting and pasting and referring us to other news sources.

The post as usual has a title that differs slightly from the contents.
it’s turning into a redux of Lebanon/Yugoslavia/Iraq, what else could it be? ask the masterminds “Arab spring… Iranian winter…” true in Egypt/Libya/Tunis so far: http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/5/32/52074/Arts–Culture/Film/Cairo-International-Film-Festival-bars-three-films.aspx

More on the lijan
http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/peoples-committees-syria-patrolling-local-borders

These so- called lijjan or more appropriately shabbiha are created in order to terrorize the Syrian people and commit atrocities against the Syrians.

Therefore, they are enemies of the people of Syria and should be legitimate targets for elimination by the Revolution.

No one should shed any tears on them.

Again we see the usual attempts by the insurgents to reframe what is in essence an uprising by reactionary conservative Sunni’s into a conflict between Sunni and Alawites. I am sorry to see that Western academics and journalists are still buying this instead of supporting Syria’s silent majority in its efforts to achieve peace.

Was aljazeera site hacked again?

Violence in Turkey escalating

25 soldiers killed in ammunition blast at Turkish military depot

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/25-killed-in-ammunition-blast-at-turkish-military-depot.aspx?pageID=238&nID=29514&NewsCatID=341

Twenty-five soldiers were killed and several others were wounded yesterday when a military depot filled with hand grenades exploded in the western province of Afyonkarahisar.

Hello Everybody………Peace

25 turkish soliders killed today, that’s ok, let them taste their own medicine.
Turkey is the worset enemy of the Arabs after Israel, beside it is a parasetic country to begin with.
Turkish are not difference than retard Pakistanis, everyone believe in retard Imams is a retard. Though, i like turkish women in the west where they have sex, drinks eat porks and other parts of the hot dog, then go back home and become virgins again within thier family.

Syrian troops take back Tel Chab, a town on the Jordanian border that has been used by smugglers and held for months by rebels.

http://news.yahoo.com/syrian-troops-town-refugee-flight-route-091925001.html?_esi=1

Syrian rebels, who claim to hold over half of the country’s territory, had been in control of Tel Chehab for months. Abu Houran said that the town had faced repeated government assaults in the past.

In the latest clashes, hundreds of Syrian soldiers backed by 20 tanks assaulted Tel Chehab, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and local activist Mohammed Abu Houran said. Rebels fought back but were pushed out.

What is happening in Kassab is a courageous preventive move.

The Alawis and the Armenians in Kassab are right to prepare themselves to repel any attempts by Sunnis thugs and their Islamist allies to move into their villages and bring the same desolation and blood they have brought into other less prepared villages.

Bloody revenge is going to cost more lives from all sides and destroy the country . All parties should grow up and look for once to what they have done.

Alawi villages are getting attacked on regular basis in areas like al Husn: they attacked Al Harash and Ush al Shuha today.

Sunni villages and towns they been getting attacked for a long time.

Anyone to stop this madness ?

Once, not long ago, the USA protected Kadhafi….

US waterboarded Libyan Islamists: report

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/us-waterboarded-libyan-islamists-report.aspx?pageID=238&nID=29517&NewsCatID=358

The United States waterboarded Libyan Islamists opposed to Moamer Kadhafi and handed them over to his regime for further torture during the Bush administration, a rights group said Thursday.
..
“Not only did the US deliver Kadhafi his enemies on a silver platter, but it seems the CIA tortured many of them first,” said Laura Pitter, the author of the report.
..
Human Rights Watch said one of the detainees, Khalid al-Sharif, is now head of the Libyan National Guard.

Syrians refugees fleeing Turkey to reach Europe?

Boat carrying Arab asylum seekers sinks, 58 dead

Published Thursday, September 6, 2012
http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/boat-carrying-arab-asylum-seekers-sinks-39-dead

Fifty-eight people drowned on Thursday after a boat carrying asylum seekers mostly from Iraq and Syria trying to reach Europe capsized in waters off western Turkey, the Anatolia news agency reported, citing a local official.
…
Turkey has become a hub of asylum seekers who aspire to cross into European countries for better lives. Neighbouring Greece is the busiest entry point for migrants trying to reach the European Union.

In August, Seven Syrians fleeing their country’s violence drowned after their boat sank while trying to reach Cyprus.

Neighboring Mediterranean states are bracing for an increase in refugees seeking to escape the Syrian conflict by desperate means.

“651. Tara said:

Hassan

You are very interesting and I would like to study you. Can you first prove your supremacy and lack of cowardliness by sharing with us who you are.”

Who am I ?

I am a soldier of Assad. Well, I joined the Syrian Arab Army in 1959 under the UAR, infact I have a picture of my hero Gamal Abdel Nasser shaking my hand at my graduation from the Infantry school. I retired from the Syrian Arab Army in October 1990. Between that time, I have gone on 4 training tours to the Soviet Union, fought in 4 Wars ( 1967, 1973, 1980-Aleppo and 1978-1990 Lebanon ). I was with Rifaat al Assad from 1972 till 1984, and with Bassil and Shafiq Fayad till 1990. I turned against Rifaat when he turned against HAFEZ. After retiring, I opened a lucrative business in Damascus and became a part of Damascus elite. Most of Damascus elites consider guys like me to be a saviour, a protector.

I am a trained paratrooper, anti-Tank specialist, Tank gunner and Artillery gunner. I am also a Mortarman.

Basically I have the same profile as that of 100,000 other guys in Syria, all of whom have been ASSAD’S COMMANDOS. Creme de la creme.

28. Tara said: …can you tell me why the FSA has not brought up the fight to Alawi villages? https://www.joshualandis.com/blog/?p=15947&cp=1#comment-326959

Mohammad D. writes above in Joshua’s featured article: “The Sunnis (Turkmen) had formed their own brigade, which is fighting under the banner of the Free Syria Army (FSA). The FSA has attacked the nearby Alawi villages on many occasions. One Alawi village; al-Sarayah, has been emptied of its inhabitants, except the men who are armed and fighting along side others in al-Lijan al-Sha’biyah.”

Why the disconnect? Probably because the opposition and it’s partisan press camp is not interested in publicising FSA attacks on Alawi towns, so Tara did not know.

West should reassess Syria stance: Putin

Published Thursday, September 6, 2012
http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/west-should-reassess-syria-stance-putin

Russian President Vladimir Putin urged Western and Gulf Arab powers Thursday to reassess their stance on Syria and ensure the security of its current leadership in any power transition process.

“Why should Russia be the only one reassessing its position? Perhaps our negotiating partners should reassess their position,” Putin told Russia Today television.

“Because if you recall what happened in recent years… you will see that far from all of our partners’ initiatives ended the way they wanted them to,” he said in reference to Western involvement in countries such as Libya.
…
He also made the security of the regime’s negotiating team and leadership a condition of any transition process. Putin made no reference to President Bashar al-Assad himself.

“To us, the most important thing is to end the violence, to force all the sides in the conflict… to sit down at the negotiating table, determine the future and ensure the security of all the participants of the domestic political process,” Putin said.

I should add that me and my kind can be best defined by the weapons we have trained and used. I can say that my weapons defined my life. I was trained to use almost 90 % of the weapons that the Syrian Arab Army has owned since 1958.

Basically we are the Military core of the regime. The regime has two cores – Military, and Politico-Economic. The Politico-Economic side is best represented by good people like Mr. Walid Muallem and Ms. Bouthaina Shaaban, our fine, handsome intelligent Mr. Jihad Makdissi, may God give him long life and good health to serve Assad ; our fine Mr. Bashar Jaafri, and the good, educated people who serve in the Planning Committee who make the Five-Year Plans. We are a strong, coherent, united, determined bunch and we will defend Assad till death. We have built Syria as you see it with our own hands and eyes for the last 49 years.

Hassan,

Impressive military resume. Are you Alawi?

“Syrian government spokesman said that the only change in Cairo since the ouster last year of Hosni Mubarak was Mr. Morsi’s beard.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/07/world/middleeast/Syria.html

“17. Hassan said:

Who am I ?

I am a soldier of Assad. Well, I joined the Syrian Arab Army in 1959 under the UAR, infact I have a picture of my hero Gamal Abdel Nasser shaking my hand at my graduation from the Infantry school. I retired from the Syrian Arab Army in October 1990. Between that time, I have gone on 4 training tours to the Soviet Union, fought in 4 Wars ( 1967, 1973, 1980-Aleppo and 1978-1990 Lebanon ). I was with Rifaat al Assad from 1972 till 1984, and with Bassil and Shafiq Fayad till 1990. I turned against Rifaat when he turned against HAFEZ. After retiring, I opened a lucrative business in Damascus and became a part of Damascus elite. Most of Damascus elites consider guys like me to be a saviour, a protector.

I am a trained paratrooper, anti-Tank specialist, Tank gunner and Artillery gunner. I am also a Mortarman.

Basically I have the same profile as that of 100,000 other guys in Syria, all of whom have been ASSAD’S COMMANDOS. Creme de la creme.”

Very impressive, what a shame that you nor your 100,000 colleagues have ever lifted a finger to liberate our country, help the palestinians our help Lebanon. All we’ve seen ASSAD’S COMMANDOS do is slaughter innocent women and children. Cowards.

Humanitarian?
Libyan convoy docks in Turkey and en-route to Syria

By Hadi Fornaji.
Tripoli, 6 September:
http://www.libyaherald.com/?p=13846

A relief ship reportedly carrying humanitarian supplies from Benghazi to Syria has been allowed to unload its cargo in Turkey, having initially been refused by the authorities in Ankara.

The supplies, which were unloaded on Tuesday, subsequently proceeded under armed guard to Antakya, situated just 20km from Syria’s Idlib province, which has been the scene of some of the fiercest fighting between Syrian revolutionaries and forces loyal to President Bashar Al-Assad.
…
The vessel carrying the supplies had previously attempted to unload its cargo on 18 August, but permission had been refused by the port authorities.

Following the refusal, both the captain of the ship, Mohammed Ahsibi and the head of the relief mission, Omar Emshiti, were taken in for interrogation.

This raised the question of whether it was only humanitarian supplies that were being transported on the ship.

In the past few months, there have been several reports of Libyans travelling to Syria to join the revolutionaries there and also of Libyan weapons finding there way into Syrian territory.

Libya is the only country in the world to have officially recognised the opposition Syrian National Council as the sole legitimate government of Syria.

Humanitarian?
Libyan convoy docks in Turkey and en-route to Syria

By Hadi Fornaji.
Tripoli, 6 September:
http://www.libyaherald.com/?p=13846

A relief ship reportedly carrying humanitarian supplies from Benghazi to Syria has been allowed to unload its cargo in Turkey, having initially been refused by the authorities in Ankara.

Zoo

“What is happening in Kassab is a courageous preventive move.”

You give the Armenians and the Alawis the right to self defense and you deny it to Sunnis. What should this be labeled?

أكدت الدكتورة أميمة كامل، مستشارة الرئيس المصري محمد مرسي لشؤون المرأة، أن القانون المصري لا يجرّم عمليات ختان الإناث، ولكنه يتحدث عن الاعتداء على أي جزء من جسم الإنسان.
وأوضحت كامل، في حوار لها مع صحيفة “التحرير” قائلة: من لم تحدث لها علمية ختان الإناث فإيمانها ناقص، مشيرة إلى أن الدراسات الواقعية تقول إنها ممارسة موجودة وستستمر نظراً إلى كونها عادة.
وأشارت كامل إلى أنه لا يجوز ختان الإناث قبل سن البلوغ، متابعة: البنت تتم عملية ختانها عند سن سبع أو ثماني سنوات وهذا خاطئ، والطب يقول لا يجوز قبل سن البلوغ، ثانياً ليس كل الفتيات يحتجن إلى عملية الختان أو عملية تهذيب أو تجميل.
يُذكر أن الدكتورة أميمة كامل، عضو جماعة الإخوان المسلمين، تشغل حالياً مقعداً في الجمعية التأسيسية لكتابة الدستور، كممثلة للمرأة المصرية!!.

Libya new PM election on the 12 September does not seem to get the western media’s attention.
Will the new PM be a technocrat or an Islamist?

Eight candidates for PM job

http://www.libyaherald.com/?p=13816

The eight contenders for the post of Libya’s next prime minister. (L-R Mustafa Abushaghur, Mahmoud Jibril, Mohammed Berween, Mohammed al-Mufti, Fathi al-Akari, Awad Barasi, Abdulhamid al-Nami and Mabrook al-Zway)

By Hadi Fornaji.

Tripoli, 5 September:

Eight names have been submitted to the General National Congress (GNC) for the post of prime minister, with the nominations process having come to an end today.
…
Given that 15 of the 200-member GNC had to propose each candidate, it would appear that as many as 75 of them are not backing the three front-runners — Jibril, Abdushagur and Barasi. This would therefore throw into question the claims that Jibril has the support of over 80 members, Abushagur of some 60 and Barasi of 50.

Putin: “Today some want to use militants from Al Qaeda or some other organizations with equally radical views to accomplish their goals in Syria. This policy is dangerous and very short-sighted. In that case, one should unlock Guantanamo, arm all of its inmates and bring them to Syria to do the fighting – it’s practically the same kind of people.”
http://rt.com/news/vladimir-putin-exclusive-interview-481/

the conversation between Tara and Hassan is not interesting,it is peculiar, I have a problem believing much of what is in Hassan’s post,not that it can not be true, it just does not add up.
Syria needs a national army not a regime army, the FSA will continue to be seen as a militia ,the same way many Syrians see the national army today, if it does not clean up its ranks and behave like a responsible force,It may be too late to do that now.

Tara

Of course they have the right, they have the whole of the FSA plus the Sunni islamists jihadist guerillas who vowed to defend them, and the Turks and Jordanians Sunnis are also ready to embrace them as welcomed refugees.

syrian gi ‏@gi_syrian
SANA: Syria, and North Korea have reviewed Tourism Cooperation

1h

http://twitter.com/gi_syrian/status/243707772967981056

Husam al-Najar, alias “Sam the Libyan Sniper” in dire straight in Aleppo
http://counterpsyops.com/2012/09/06/syrian-army-besieges-libyan-sam-no-choice-left-surrender-or-death/

Units of Syrian Army have stormed HQ for a group of snipers that has a foothold in the area of al-Saied Ali in Aleppo.

In an Exclusive statement to Breaking News Network, a military source has revealed that ‘the’ Libyan sniper, known as Sam, has been among the snipers group.

———-
Former Libyan rebels and snipers who helped oust Muammar Gaddafi are beefing up the Free Syrian Army to try to bring down Assad.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/158897#.UEjCIlLgyRM
…
Libyan-Irish fighter Hussam Najjar, who goes by the name “Sam,” told Reuters he is a trained sniper
…
In the months since he arrived, the rebel arsenal had become “five times more powerful”, he said. Fighters had obtained large caliber anti-aircraft guns and sniper rifles.

Although many rebel units fight under the banner of the Free Syrian Army, their commands are localized and poorly coordinated, Najjar said.

“One of the biggest factors delaying the revolution is the lack of unity among the rebels,” he said. “Unfortunately, it is only when their back is up against the wall that they start to realize they should (unite).
…
Najjar said militancy would spread across the region as long as the West does not do more to hasten the downfall of Assad.

“The Western governments are bringing this upon themselves. The longer they leave this door open for this torture and this massacre to carry on, the more young men will drop what they have in this life and search for the afterlife” with Islamic extremists, Najjar said.

In Gaza, Moslem Brotherhood Islamists hunt Salafi Islamists.
Is it a Qatar-Turkey-Egypt vs Saudi Arabia struggle for influence?

Hamas pursuing Salafists from “street to street”

http://www.asharq-e.com/news.asp?section=1&id=30963
06/09/2012
By Kifah Zaboun

Ramallah, Asharq Al-Awsat – Relations between the Hamas and Salafist Jihadist groups operating out of the Gaza Strip have entered a fractious stage as the movement has begun to tighten the noose around Salafist Jihadist elements.

20: Hassan,
I doubt who you say you are, I’m starting to believe what Ann said about you, that you are nothing but an isreali Agent,
If you are who you say you are answer these 3 question that only Refat men would know
In 1980 a number of hilcobters left from an air port in syria and went to the city of Tadmer and finshed off some of the oppistion members
1 what is the name of the air port
2 how many helcopters where they,
3 how many men were on that mission

In Syria, Allies Stage a Rerun of Afghanistan

By David Ignatius – September 6, 2012

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/09/06/in_syria_allies_stage_a_rerun_115352.html

WASHINGTON — The U.S. and its allies are moving in Syria toward a program of covert support for the rebels that, for better or worse, looks very much like what America and its friends did in Afghanistan in the 1980s.

The parallels are spooky, if you’ll forgive the pun. In Syria, as in Afghanistan, CIA officers are operating at the borders (in this case mostly in Jordan and Turkey) helping Sunni insurgents improve their command and control, plus other activities. Weapons are coming from third parties (in Afghanistan, they came mostly from China and Egypt; in Syria, they’re mainly bought on the black market). And finally, a major financier for both insurgencies has been Saudi Arabia.

“Only if Assad assesses that Western intervention is a real threat might he abdicate and make room for leadership with better prospects for halting the violence.”

Only bombing Assad’s forces will stop the slaughter now
It need not become ‘another Iraq’ and the Syrian military challenge can be met
Amos Yadlin

Thursday 06 September 2012
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/amos-yadlin-only-bombing-assads-forces-will-stop-the-slaughter-now-8106818.html
…..
The suggested strategy in Syria is to use gradual steps to convince Assad that an international campaign is a credible option: from moving aircraft carriers to the region and Turkish ground forces to the border, to reconnaissance sorties, no-fly zones, and humanitarian corridors.

Second, the Syrian military challenge can be met. Another argument postulates that the Syrian military presents a bigger threat to Western militaries than those confronted in Iraq and Libya. The Syrian defensive capability is not dramatically greater than Iraq’s of 1991 or 2003, which already included advanced Russian systems. As the Syrian military has been preoccupied with internal uprisings over the past year and a half, it is likely that its capabilities have even eroded. Therefore, those who doubt the West’s capacity to face the current Syrian defence ignore the fact that Western power was built to cope with much greater challenges.

Third, the lack of international consensus cannot justify passivity. Those who call for passivity in Syria claim that since there is no consensus among members of the UN Security Council and no explicit Arab League request, there is no legitimacy for foreign military intervention. These arguments ignore the moral obligation − the “Responsibility to Protect” principle − endorsed by the West.
….
Acting in Syria however, could weaken, if not break, the nexus between Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, and Palestinian terror organisations, and therefore likely contain Iranian influence in the Levant. This would have a dramatic impact on the balance of power between radical and pragmatic forces in the region. And it would signal to Iran the West’s resolve to back up its interests and threats with force.
…

No, Tara, I do not define myself as being from any religion or sect, we are Syrians and Arabs first and foremost.

أمة عربية واحدة ذات رسالة خالدة.

One Arab Nation with an Eternal Mission.

Dear Comrades,

Please pray for the town of HARIM in Idlib. This town (Sunni majority I should add) is very loyal to the Party and the Ldear and has been besieged on all sides by criminal Zionist terrorist gangs for 2 days now. This town is on the Turkish border and Turkish Opttoman forces are helping the terrorists. The 25,000 residents of the town are all armed to the teeth and ready to fight till death rather than give in to the terrorists. Especially pray for the 300 Syrian soldiers and officers who are stationed there, pray for the comrade Syrian soldiers and policemen who are defending the town, it is a detachment of 11th Division with whom I had the honor of working with in Lebanon. We fear a massacre. Especially we should salute this town in Idleb which has resisted all attempts of the terrorosts and Turkish imperialists.

ASSAD’S COMMANDOS FOREVER.

Russia’s Putin defiant on Syria, says Romney “mistaken”

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/06/us-russia-putin-syria-usa-idUSBRE8850CO20120906

(Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin signaled in an interview aired on Thursday that Russia was not ready to shift its stance on Syria, and suggested Western nations were relying on groups such as al Qaeda to help drive President Bashar al-Assad from power.
…
He noted that the United States had imprisoned many alleged Islamic militants at Guantanamo Bay and said it might as well “open the gates to Guantanamo and let all the Guantanamo inmates into Syria, let them fight. It’s the same thing”.

By 1980 I had already finished my tour in Aleppo killing some terrorists and on a short holiday to my home, and getting ready for the next deployment to Lebanon.

But there were exactly 450 men on that mission, that much I can tell you.

Lets not forget there were more than 55,000 of “Riffat’s men” , only a small number knew exact details of any single operation.

But we still respect Rifaat al Assad, he was sh*t hot, we thought he was a superman in those days.

29. ghufran said:

“the conversation between Tara and Hassan is not interesting,it is peculiar, I have a problem believing much of what is in Hassan’s post,not that it can not be true, it just does not add up.”

Why does it not add up ?

Hassan:
I belive you even though you gave the wrong answer,the reason I belive you, because only a Baathi would not know how to use Google
http://www.shrc.org/data/aspx/d4/94.aspx
and get the answer

EU already did its utmost for Turkey to be outside !
Bad viewer Rasmussen ! you may want to protect Erdogan our brothers Turkish Kurds ?

CIA director Petraeus was in Ankara just this last Monday: was this, the complete support of Turkey by NATO (both in terms of both humanitarian and military aid) the quid pro quo he gave to Edrogan for Edrogan’s decision to escalate Turkey’s military role against the al-Assad government?

NATO will do its utmost to protect Turkey, says Rasmussen
http://stratrisks.com/geostrat/7933

LOL epic fail by Hassan, although I understand the admiration for Rifaat’s butchers.

Assadist terrorist MiG 21 was shot down yetserday in Idleb :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kquGass0l0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mImdgv_9nQ

( warning : Carcass of Assadist pilot is shown)

If the FSA can take the battle to other areas such as Lattakia and open up new fronts imagine how demoralising that would be for the regime forces? It would show that even after all these recent regime offensives and massive efforts the rebels are not only holding on to territory but are spreading to new places.

Zoo

“Of course they have the right, they have the whole of the FSA plus the Sunni islamists jihadist guerillas who vowed to defend them, and the Turks and Jordanians Sunnis are also ready ”

Yet 23,000 mostly Sunnis were murdered compared to how 
many non-Sunnis?  10 to 20s …something wrong with this picture.  No?

Cont. from #46

Regime force morale would collapse as the fultility of their efforts dawns on them.

Syrian wrote:

“Hassan:
I belive you even though you gave the wrong answer,the reason I belive you, because only a Baathi would not know how to use Google”

A faulty reasoning to draw such a conclusion.

France to give heavy artillery to Syria rebels to ‘smash Assad regime’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gx7F4A7oStU
France is considering supplying heavy artillery to the Syrian rebels to help them fight President Assad’s forces. That’s according to diplomatic sources, who say Paris is also stepping up support for the Syrian opposition to help them forge a government-in-waiting.

France – the tail of the U.S. has no will in the world . it wants to show that it can do something such as a cheap woman.

31 Ghufran

“the conversation between Tara and Hassan is not interesting.”

I’m sure they’re both very sorry that they are not entertaining you. What do you want from them, Ghuffey? Drama? Pathos? Bathos? Actors need feedback, so tell them how they need to tweak their presentations to hold your attention.

#47 Tara

The figure you mention of 20,000 include sunnis, alawis, kurds, christians, turkmen, armenians as well as turks, afghans, libyans, egyptian, lebanese etc..

Alawis are only 10% of the Syrian population, so the proportion of killed Alawis would reflect this.

If you find a breakdown showing the exact proportion, then you can make your point valid.
Otherwise your claim appears to be part of the propaganda to show that the Sunnis are helpless and victimized, despite the FSA who claim to control 70% of the country and to protect the Sunni population.

have to say I enjoyed reading hassan’s fantasy work. Immersing and gives us a glimpse in the life of the typical illiterate alawite thugs who fought for the Assads and retired filthy rich in Damascus.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOzA0z_c0rk&feature=share&list=UUpwvZwUam-URkxB7g4USKpg
‘West “adventure” in Syria may backfire in face of the world by WW3’
France has started providing direct aid and money to rebel-controlled areas of Syria and is even considering supplying anti-aircraft weapons to the opposition, a diplomatic source has said. Geopolitical researcher F. William Engdahl says the rebel forces Paris is backing are fighting to impose their own order on the Syrian people.

Syria’s Christians support stability, not regime: church – 5 hours ago

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5h54Et8p30Z8dzJd86rtGfg4sCVtw?docId=CNG.6e407b6a8ce05880ef03e016b2221a0e.621

DIMAN, Lebanon — Syria’s Christians do not support the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, but they do want stability in their war-torn country, Lebanon’s Maronite Christian Patriarch Bishara Rai told AFP on Thursday.

“I tell Westerners who say that we (Christians) are with the Syrian regime that we are not with regimes, we are with the state. There is a big difference,” Rai told AFP, a week before the arrival in Lebanon of Pope Benedict XVI.

“In Iraq, when Saddam Hussein was removed, we lost a million Christians,” he said at the patriarchal residence in Diman in northwest Lebanon. “Why? Not because the regime fell, but because there was no more authority, there was a vacuum.”

The number of Christians in Iraq fell from one million under the regime of Saddam to 4,000 currently, following a wave of deadly attacks by Islamist extremist groups which triggered an exodus of Christians,

“In Syria, it’s the same thing, Christians do not back the regime but they are afraid of what may come next, that is their feeling,” said Rai.

The Islamist tide in the so-called Arab Spring countries has frightened many Christians, who are a minority in every Middle Eastern country and are concerned for their survival should the multi-religious nature of the region change.

Christians in Syria constitute one of the Middle East’s oldest communities, though they number just five percent of a population of 22 million. Ever since the rise to power of the ruling Baath party — led by the Alawite majority — they have also enjoyed religious freedom.

The Alawite community, which accounts for some 10 percent of the total population, follows an offshoot of Shiite Islam.

Many members of religious minorities in Syria fear that extremist Sunni Muslims, whose community has borne the brunt of the regime’s repression, might stage revenge attacks should President Bashar al-Assad fall.

“We wonder all the time what might happen in the future to the Christians of the East,” said Rai, one of the region’s most influential Christian figures. “In times of war, economic crisis and insecurity, everybody suffers, Christians and Muslims.”

“Unfortunately, they have sometimes suffered attacks, such as in Egypt and in Iraq,” said Rai. “In Syria, Christians have suffered the same fate as others, and when Homs (in central Syria) and Aleppo (in the north) were bombed, they fled.”

He said Christians in the Middle East should not be treated as “second-class citizens.”

“I reject Christians being treated as minorities requiring protection,” he said. “They have been here for 2,000 years, starting with the advent of Christ, and they played a role in their respective countries, like the Muslims.”

[…]

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5h54Et8p30Z8dzJd86rtGfg4sCVtw?docId=CNG.6e407b6a8ce05880ef03e016b2221a0e.621

For Gods sake. Hassan is a joker and a hoaxer. Wake up.

Zoo

Do you really believe what you wrote? The revolutionists are 99.9% Sunnis. The towns, villages, and cities that were shelled or bombarded by air were Sunni towns. The massacres were committed against Sunni neighborhoods. Even the big professor admits to this. You did not read what he wrote? Not only him but all independent analysts share the same view too.

How about I “ask” you to prove your claim with objective data as otherwise (borrowing your words) “your claim appears to be a part of the propaganda to show that it is not a minority regime oppressing the majority, rather it is a global conspiracy”

Nonetheless, I will not “ask” you because something in me does not want to believe that you are a part of a propaganda machine…

The stance by Mr. Muwaffaq Mahadin about the role of foreign powers in the Syrian crisis (reported in the leading post above) makes 100% sense if he is referring to Iran and Russia.

If he isn’t, then his critics are right to label him a naive person or conspiracy theorist with limited understanding of the world beyond Damascus.

The reports about what’s happening in Latakia posted by Joshua above are making me think about an exchange between VISITOR and RICHARD in the last thread.

Visitor: “I only hope that the Sunnis will exact retribution in the name of justice and not as pure revenge. There is no end without such retribution. Human nature demands it.”

Richard: “Human nature doesn’t demand retribution, human stupidity does. South Africa is example where human intelligence triumphed over human stupidity.

“I hope for the best case for Syria, which would be massively unanswered injustice.”

Comment: My heart agrees with Visitor and my head with Richard.

Why does my head agree with Richard as quoted above?

Because of what human beings have gone through but have managed to move on in Cambodia and Rwanda. And after WWII with France and Germany, Japan and its Asian neighbours. After the Civil War in America. Keep adding to the list.

And when I think of Syrians being able to do the same, I feel hope and my heart also agrees with Richard.

Irritated,

Are you playing peek a boo?

I don’t like peek a boo. It is for toddlers only. I had to play it everyday for 3 years. I prefer Salwa ya Salwa.

Western powers after war of aggression in Syria
http://presstv.com/detail/2012/09/06/260187/west-after-war-of-aggression-in-syria/

A prominent analyst says Western powers are after a war of aggression in Syria by supporting and arming insurgents and terrorists, Press TV reports.

“It is well-understood that this is not a civil war; this is a war of aggression where forces of some NATO countries have entered the country; I am talking about elite SAS, MI6, US CIA, French and American forces, forces from Saudi Arabia and Qatar, mercenaries… the aggressors are the NATO countries and the FSA [the so-called Free Syrian Army] terrorists are their foot soldiers,” Michael Chossudovsky said in an interview with Press TV on Wednesday.

He went on to say that there is a breakdown of UN diplomacy because “the Secretary General (Ban Ki-moon) is in fact blaming the victims in the name of the aggressors.”

“He is blaming the victims in the name of the aggressors; it is well-documented that these atrocities directed against the Syrian people have been committed by FSA mercenaries and terrorists and these terrorists are supported by the Western military alliance,” the Canadian analyst noted.

Chossudovsky further argued that the underlying objective of the actions of the Western powers in Syria is to “destroy the Syrian nation.”

“What is happening now is a whole series of acts of intimidation, of threats, not to mention economic sanctions. The underlying objective is to destroy a nation; it is to kill a nation, to destabilize its economy, to trigger a humanitarian crisis and then send in the NGOs to pick up the pieces and so on and so forth or send in NATO,” he explained.

Many people, including large numbers of security forces, have been killed in the turmoil that began in Syria in March 2011.

Damascus says outlaws, saboteurs, and armed terrorists are the driving force behind the unrest and deadly violence, but the opposition accuses the security forces of being behind the killings.

The Syrian government says that the chaos is being orchestrated from outside the country, and there are reports that a very large number of the armed militants are foreign nationals.

A postscript to my head and heart comments.

Some of the main Cambodian, Rwandan, Japanese and German crimes against humanity figures faced formal justice.

But countless others involved in massacres and war crimes returned to their lives as civilians and mixed with their former victims.

Hard to understand how people can bear it, but they have. And it’s something that enables communities and countries to survive and regain the potential to thrive.

CITIZEN #62

If people want to read the ideas of eccentric old professional conspiracy theorist Michael Chossudovsky they can do it private. We don’t need him clogging up SyriaComment.

Here’s something that might grab their interest even more:

“Chossudovsky argues that High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) is an operational weapon of mass destruction with the potential to be used against “rogue states”, with the power to alter the weather, disrupt regional electrical power systems, and modify the Earth’s magnetic field, as well as potentially trigger earthquakes and affect people’s health.”

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Chossudovsky)

Chossudovsky’s known as “Canada’s nuttiest professor” who has built himself a nest-like niche generating over-the-top comments about matters well outside his expertise as an economist.

I just noticed 59 Syria Lover in which he brought to my attention an exchange between Richard and I from last post,

“Visitor: “I only hope that the Sunnis will exact retribution in the name of justice and not as pure revenge. There is no end without such retribution. Human nature demands it.”

Richard: “Human nature doesn’t demand retribution, human stupidity does. South Africa is example where human intelligence triumphed over human stupidity.”

Sorry I was away the last couple days on a trip and I wasn’t checking SC. Thanks SL for pointing that out.

But my response is of course for Richard. Human stupidity is best exemplified when a person thinks he/she understands what he/she reads but instead he/she applies his own thoughts into what he reads. And that case applies to you Richard exactly. So, unless you have understood clearly what was said in my comment, I would rather that you save us your condescending attitude.

What I said was retribution must be sought for the sake of exacting justice instead of revenge. And without such retribution there is no end to the Syrian saga and of course human nature DEMANDS It whether YOU say so or not.

TARA,

Irritated at least wears nifty boxing gloves and usually delivers punches that are consistent and aimed at targets.

You miss Irritated because the standard of anti-Opposition pro-Bashar posts here now has collapsed to tedious cut-pastes, cliches and self-contradicting propaganda.

Oceans of it, flooding this forum and driving away readers and good discussions. Probably too much even for Irritated to bother with.

If “Turkish” alawis (rather ‘Arab alevis’ as they call themselves) write in Turkish it just prove one thing: they are assimilated and don’t speak their mother tongue which is supposed to be Arabic.

They should not be confused with the much larger group of Anatolian (Turkish/kurdish ) alevis. They belong to an independent religion/philosopy, which is pacifist and totally unrelated to the arab Syrian one. It is more Sufi influenced with many pre-islamic elements. Anatolian alevis generally seem very nationalist (pro-Turkey), including the Kurdish ones I’ve met.

I just wanted to clarify these differences, because I saw many mistakes in media describing them as one group. It is not odd since alevi/alawi in fact is the same word but in different languages.

VISITOR #65,

Yes retribution, but it has to be formalized and limited. Otherwise there can be no recovery and future for anyone involved.

That is my point. Based on what has happened elsewhere in the world and through history.

No need to punch Richard so hard on the nose. He raised a real issue.

Just a question:

Aren’t many Turcomans in Syria shia (twelver) as well?

Do some of them have Iraqi/Iranian origin or only Turkish?

A not so crazy idea :

Why could the FSA not seek out Russia since the West is certainly not ready to help Syria in a meaningful way?

The West take is getting at Iran.

Annie

Not crazy at all. The FSA on the ground is busy defending people. Their political wing should be establishing contacts with everyone. If I was in the SNC, I would not even spare the Mullah’s wife. Unfortunately, Syrians were never allowed to do politics for 40 some years and that what you get. It is a learning curve.

ANNIE,

But Russia’s take is getting at the West. No interest in or care about the welfare of Syrians.

Without Putin’s paranoia and aggressive self interest your idea could make sense.

Russia under Putin has absolutely nothing constructive or of value to offer anyone anywhere, including its own citizens.

With all its mistakes and faults that can’t be said of the West.

49 BADR said
“A faulty reasoning to draw such a conclusion.”
Maybe the conclusion is wrong because no 70 years old ex Refat man can write English this good
But the reasoning is valid, of course there are exptinos (Ann and
Zoo) but those only proves the rule
Another proof is the pass word of the head of them all was 1234

Johannes@ 51

That was really funny!

I love that Lijan Sh3biyeh are now getting a romantic makeover as protectors of neighborhoods and villages. I don’t know about the specifics of Latakia or Damascus, but I have an ex-friend in Aleppo who was a member. These groups were organized with a single purpose: intimidate the peaceful protesters and end demonstrations. I have seen and taken a photograph of his official marching orders in June 2011 which stated that my ex-friend should report to a specific mosque for Friday prayers that month.

My ex-friend isn’t religious but comes from a Sunni background – most of the shabi7a in Aleppo were Sunni, although there are many Christians who also took part. Criminals who were released in Assad’s amnesty (where is Mazen Darwish) are also part of this nefarious organization.

This is the genesis story of the pro-Assad Lijan in the Syrian revolution. Some morphed into purely sectarian killing squads, others are now armed and are assisting Assad’s army. None of these groups want freedom, democracy and justice for Syria, just more of the Assad nightmare. Their mission is to oppress, not protect, and most Syrians know this to be true.

#58 Tara

“The revolutionists are 99.9% Sunnis.”

That’s one of the major failure of that ‘revolution’

What do you do with the non Sunnis who represent 20% of the Syrians. Do you agree with Visitor that they should be killed or exiled?
This revolution is discriminative and carries within it increasingly low ideals like revenge, sectarianism and totalitarism.

There is no redemption for it anymore.

Halabi

The Alawi Shabeeha’s excuse that the are afraid of annihilation should the revolution succeeds. The Christian shabeeha’s excuse that they are afraid of Islamist rule shoul the revolution succeeds. What is in Sunni’s shabeeha’s disturbed mind? Money?

I hope Comment #74 by Halabi is included in the next main post on SC as reference.

Who can believe the yoyos anymore?
Attack on Iran: Yes, No, Maybe, yes, No., Maybe. etc…

If Obama comes through with promised assurances, ‘Israel will not attack Iran’ — TV repor

thttp://www.timesofisrael.com/if-obama-comes-through-with-promised-assurances-israel-will-not-attack-iran-tv-report/

Netanyahu set to meet the president on September 27, Channel 10 says, claiming that sources ‘very close’ to PM regard an Israeli strike as ‘less and less likely’
By Times of Israel staff September 6, 2012, 8:45 pm 6

Zoo@75

So to follow your logic, one can conclude that if the Iraqi shiaa were to revolt against Saddam, their revolution is doomed to major failure and would have no redemption? Can we apply that same logic to Lebanese Shiaa’s resistance against
Israel since no other sects or ethnic groups in Lebanon resisting?

Revolution makers are those who are the most oppressed. Why would a privileged Alawis, Sunnis, or Christians revolt?

I am tired of false promises.  The impotent West.  Nothing moves it except the black gold.

Cameron and Hollande agree on hastening end of Assad’s rule in Syria
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 6 September 2012 15.50 EDT

France and Britain agree on the need to speed up the transition from President Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria to a new government, French president François Hollande said after a 40-minute meeting with David Cameron at the Olympic Park in London.

“David Cameron and I are in total agreement – we must accelerate the political transition [and] help the opposition to form a government,” Hollande said. He also reiterated his promise to recognise a provisional Syrian government so long as the Syrian opposition form one that is inclusive and representative.

Britain accepts there may come a point when such recognition of the disparate opposition is possible, and also accepts that this might in turn helped persuade the Russians to abandon their support for the Assad regime. But Cameron and his advisers still think it is premature to recognise an opposition that remains divided and unable to solve differences between external and internal opposition groups.

Tara – money is probably the most important motivator, but my ex-friend didn’t need the cash. There are people who believe in the regime to this day, from all sects, although their numbers are dwindling and the lines are increasingly sectarian.

Many people benefited from the corruption of the regime, such as the Barri clan (may they rot in hell) and other tribes who were allowed to form criminal organizations. There are also lots of Sunnis who believed in the “resistance” and the universal conspiracy. And there are haters, those who don’t want to join the revolution of the poor, conservative and rural Syrians.

I’m pretty sure you knew all this.

On another note, some menhebaks constantly say that Assad supporters, which could be as much as 40% of the population (although I’m certain it’s far less), have a political position that should be respected and accommodated. Hitler had many supporters, as did Saddam, Ghadafi, and probably the Kims in North Korea. Many in the colonies supporter the King during the American Revolutionary War, and others fought with the South.

Having supporters doesn’t matter. Syria has entered a phase of its history where difficult moral issues have to be settled. Will this country be free to choose its political leadership; will its courts, police, security forces and army protect the citizens rather than oppress them; will its resources go to the few, etc.

There are no nuanced answers to these questions. There aren’t two sides to these issues. Syrians are either with the corruption, oppression and murder of the Assad regime or with revolution that will bring change. No one knows what the change will be, although few think it could be worse than what is going on now, but it will still be different, a chance to move away from our situation. Keeping Assad and the police state won’t.

“VISITOR:
So, unless you have understood clearly what was said in my comment, I would rather that you save us your condescending attitude.

What I said was retribution must be sought for the sake of exacting justice instead of revenge. And without such retribution there is no end to the Syrian saga and of course human nature DEMANDS It whether YOU say so or not.”

Who is “us” – is that the royal plural?

I understood you the first time, and I simply completely disagree with you.

I find your calls for retribution under the pretext of “justice” to be deeply foolish. The idea that there is going to be any sort of justice to emerge from this calamity is insane.

As far as my condescending attitude, if you had to be the magnificent human being that is me for even one day, you too would find it hard to be humble. But this is my cross to bare (excuse the sectarian reference) and I will try harder in the future.

Lack of unity, now lack of motivation: Now the rebel fighters ask for ‘financial compensation’ to join in an attack.
Who pays more wins?

http://news.yahoo.com/syrias-rebels-struggle-tame-assads-air-power-190515334.html
..
Another perennial problem for the rebels is the lack of unity among the hundreds of small battalions that make up its ranks, each anywhere from a few hundred to a few dozen men.

For his assault on the airport, al-Mansour had to weld together the 12 different battalions that agreed to participate into a single fighting force.

“We asked everyone who would like to take part in the operation and support it with ammunition. Some accepted and some didn’t,” he said. “The cooperation is all on a personal level. If they agree, it’s a personal thing. I come to you, I have an operation, if you want, we do it. If you don’t, that’s it.”

He said some insisted on financial compensation as well.

Thanks to DamascusRose for her account of relatives in Allepo a while back, somewhere in the pile.

Watching the wounded family members on CNN is disturbing. But oddly, reading a desperate account in a forum is even more intense. TV video is kind of like a movie, seems like a reality TV show.

The reporters on TV are not coming in contact with hardcore Islamicists. They show (reportedly) Syrians, often smoking cigarettes, often unbeareded. I don’t know if this means so very much. But it suggests that the FSA is not overwhelmed by foreign jihadists.

82

Richard, VAT’s a pompous little prig whose main purpose in here is showing off his intellectual prowess. He’s not as smart as he thinks he is, but don’t tell him that. Just read his posts, roll your eyes and move on.

At the same time, it’s fun to occasionally pull his chain. You’ll notice he has no sense of humor. His girl friend must be one of those really anal retentive types who’s constantly wiping and sweeping and polishing and driving everyone around her insane. Including VAT.

82 Richard said,

“As far as my condescending attitude, if you had to be the magnificent human being that is me for even one day, you too would find it hard to be humble”

He who praises himself is insulting himself. Enough said.

I simply have to disagree with everything you said. And if you prefer to look at ‘us’ as the Royal ‘We’ then by all means do so.

————————
Syrialover,

Thank you again for pointing out to me things that I missed. If you think that I punched this guy in the nose, then in my opinion it was well deserved.

I can echo Damascus Rose’s anxious account of life for relatives in Aleppo. A hell of uncertainty and stress, and getting harder by the day.

A city of 4 million people, which will remember for generations Bashar Assad’s evil Syria-burning policy.

Also those inside tell me that they’ve found the FSA are normal decent Syrians and not imported Islamists. No surprise.

Halabi

“On another note, some menhebaks constantly say that Assad supporters, which could be as much as 40% of the population (although I’m certain it’s far less), have a political position that should be respected and accommodated. Hitler had many supporters, as did Saddam, Ghadafi, and probably the Kims ..

Having supporters doesn’t matter. Syria has entered a phase of its history where difficult moral issues have to be settled. Will this country be free to choose its ..”
——-
You are very right and it is very well said. I just find it more difficult to find excuses for the Sunni shabeeha for their thuggery. And also of Assad was sure that more than 50% of the population supports him, why didn’t he invite clean election to be conducted by the international community to prove it?

Aid for Syrian rebels: ‘France taking US hitman role’ – 06 September, 2012

http://rt.com/news/france-syria-aid-us-550/

France has taken the responsibility for supplying Syrian rebels with money and artillery on behalf of the US, which is not interested in soiling their hands before Novembers presidential elections, professor Engdahl told RT.

­The aid reportedly started flowing last Friday, to five local authorities in the so called “liberated zones” located in three provinces – Deir al-Zor, Aleppo and Idlib- according to a diplomatic source cited by Reuters.

These actions will not lead the country out of the conflict, but rather drag it into far more bloodshed, says geopolitical researcher researcher and author of Full Spectrum Dominance, F. William Engdahl.

RT: Why is France getting so involved in Syria – what’s Paris seeking to gain by supporting the rebels?

William Engdahl: I think France is being a very dishonest peace broker in this whole process. And I think they are acting as a cat’s paw, if you will, for the US State Department and Pentagon until after the US elections. Obama does not want to get involved in what will be an extremely messy conflict directly in Syria until after the US voter is over. I think France is playing this hitman role and the idea of giving heavy artillery to these so called buffer zones is the most cynical thing imaginable. It is going to create civil war; it is going to create bloodshed – anything, but peace. So, this is just one of the most dangerous moves of the whole Syria engagement by NATO in the last 18 months.

RT: Will direct French assistance be enough to tip the scales of the Syrian conflict?

WE: Well, I think if you look at what the Muslim Brotherhood is being reported doing since they took the presidency in Egypt, you will see that the Syria opposition is dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood, the same organization, and their long-term agenda is introducing an al-Qaeda or Taliban like fanatical Islamic Sharia law in Syria and ending the tolerance of different religions which has been the trademark of Syrian life for decades under the Assad family. In general there are reports from journalists inside Syria over the last few months of the so-called opposition, in many cases they are al-Qaeda or Mujahidin that have been boarding from Saudi Arabia or elsewhere proving weapons, that they have beheaded civilians and blamed the atrocity on the Assad government. I don’t know what you could call the equivalent of the recognition of a government in an exile or building government in exile. Perhaps if the Russian government were to recognize the Ku Klux Klan as a government in an exile and provide it heavy artillery so that they could go against Washington or something like that. It is just absurd.

RT: If France is leading, championing the lead into Syria, what are they gaining?

WE: That’s a good question. Historically France’s elite, going back to the Napoleonic era if you want, has always tended geopolitically to punch above their weight. And I think since Sarkozy and the French military backed Sarkozy the way to get France back in the NATO game as a player that they have tended every single time on major international decisions to punch above their weight with catastrophic consequences for France. With the syrian adventure Hollande- Fabius [French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius] and the government is engaged in, is going to back fire in the face of France and certainly of the world if it comes to World War III by miscalculation.

[…]

http://rt.com/news/france-syria-aid-us-550/

I have a question. The failings of the SNC and the opposition towards minorities especially the Alawite community is well documented (No thanks in part to the MB).

If negotiating with Bashar is effectively off the table, shouldn’t the Alawite community come up with an alternative figure that can speak on their behalf?

HALABI

Where should the post-Assad celebration party be held in Aleppo?

I really appreciate what you expressed with the following (#81):

“Will this country be free to choose its political leadership; will its courts, police, security forces and army protect the citizens rather than oppress them; will its resources go to the few, etc.

“There are no nuanced answers to these questions. There aren’t two sides to these issues. Syrians are either with the corruption, oppression and murder of the Assad regime or with revolution that will bring change. No one knows what the change will be, although few think it could be worse than what is going on now, but it will still be different, a chance to move away from our situation. Keeping Assad and the police state won’t.”

War artist observes Syrian life amid chaos

When British artist George Butler recently crossed the border from Turkey into Syria, he was greeted in the town of Azaz by abandoned tanks and piles of rubble from war-damaged buildings.

But normal life was continuing amid the chaos, and George – under the protection of the Free Syrian Army – started to sketch and paint watercolours of the scenes he observed.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19468300

A timeline of the revolution by the BBC:

Syria: The story of the conflict

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-19331551

Syrian hackers crack Nilesat website in retaliation for cutting state TVs broadcasting – 2012-09-07

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2012-09/07/c_131832874.htm

DAMASCUS, Sept. 6 (Xinhua) — A group of Syrian pro-government hackers cracked on Thursday the official website of the Nilesat satellite operator, in retaliation for cutting Syria’s official and pro-government TVs from the satellite feed.

The hackers, calling themselves the “Syrian Electronic Army,” replaced the main page of the website with a page showing the suspended Syrian media and direct links to their official websites for online watching.

The Arabsat and Nilesat satellite operators cut off the feed of the Syrian official and pro-government TVs on Wednesday after the Arab League officially asked them to stop the broadcasting of Syrian media, either public or private, according to local media.

“Your outrageous decision to cut the broadcast of the Syrian official and private TVs is nothing but a completion to the elements of the conspiracy against Syria … That is why we decided to hack your website,” the hackers said on the page.

“Our media is the sound of truth and we will exhaust all means in order to deliver our voice to the entire world,” the page said.

The Syrian Information ministry condemned the satellite operators’ move and said it contradicts the media working charter in a “rude and unjustified way.”

[…]

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2012-09/07/c_131832874.htm

SON OF DAMASCUS #90

A big problem for the Alawis, which I have frequently seen pointed out, is that they have failed to establish authoritative religious or community figures that can represent them. The Assads permanently corrupted and disabled any such options for them.

Putin reviews domestic policies, warns West on Syria – 2012-09-07

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2012-09/07/c_131832863.htm

The president answered questions from anchor Kevin Owen, covering major issues of domestic and international concerns, including politics, economy and international issues such as the Syrian crisis.

With regard to the crisis in Syria, Putin warned Western countries that their “risky” stance on the crisis could backfire and they need rethinking.

Putin said, by funding extremists in a bid to topple the Syrian government, some Western countries could hurt themselves in the end without realizing their selfish goals.

“Today, some want to use militants from Al-Qaida or some other organizations with equally radical views to accomplish their goals in Syria,” Putin said, adding such a policy was short-sighted and would lead to dire consequences.

He also rejected Western criticism of Moscow’s refusal to support U.N. draft sanctions against the Syrian authorities as well as suggestions that Russia should change its stance.

[…]

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2012-09/07/c_131832863.htm

And I have a question too. Where are the Alawites on this forum? Why none has stepped up to the plate, identified himself/herself as an Alawite and share his/her genuine thoughts, arguing, defending, criticizing, agreeing or whatever. I am sure many many Alawites read SC. Why aren’t we hearing their voices?! All we have gotten was a misrepresentation of them by some who only argue insults and Islamophobe slurs and if anything do not help their cause. Why isn’t their voice loud enough? Where is the Kheder and the Muhammad in them arguing at our level not just writing some main posts here and there.

Dear Dr Landis,

With this latest post above you also included a supposed “comment” by Ghufran from the previous post. In fact it is nothing but a section of an article lifted out of some newspaper site but without telling us which and written by whom. I have written and asked, politely, that people kindly tell us their sources. Do you think that it is good enough for you to dignify an un-identified cut and paste operation by making it part of one of the main posts at SC?

SyriaLover,

“The Assads permanently corrupted and disabled any such options for them.”

But wouldn’t and shouldn’t now be the time for someone to emerge that can be seen as a viable alternative?

The Syrian people are going to arm themselves and prepare for the time that they have to defend themselves if the government falls, what we see now is going to be nothing to what is coming if Assad has to step down, his supporters that are known by the opposition will be ready to defend their families.as they see that their death is on the agenda of the opposition.

Thanks SyriaLover. Sa’adallah Jabri square is the obvious choice, but I wouldn’t mind doing it at the globe near Seif al Dawleh, although it isn’t ideal due to the highway/tunnel, or in front of the medical school at Aleppo University. It will be a wonderful day and we will all celebrate, and then the real revolution begins.

Nice catch Atheist. Plagiarism (theft) is practiced by those without ideas or respect for other people’s work and property. Lifting graphs from the New York Times and attributing to an opponent of the revolution is very embarrassing.

Tara wrote:

And also if Assad was sure that more than 50% of the population supports him, why didn’t he invite clean election to be conducted by the international community to prove it?

Absolutely! That is what I (and millions) have been saying from day one. If he really loved and cared about Syria he would have announced for the whole world to hear: “Syria will always be for what is right on the Palestinian issue, everything other than defense and foreign policy is on the table and subject to change according to the will of the Syrian people.”

But he does not care about Syria or the people; he cares about the interests of the Assadist Mafia and its Associates in crime. He cares about hanging on to power, about passing the presidency to Hafez II, about BEING BOSS, just like all the other failed tyrants before him.

You also wrote:

I just find it more difficult to find excuses for the Sunni shabeeha for their thuggery.

Thuggery has no religion or sect, my dear Tara. Thugs do what they do for their benefit and to protect their interests and skins.

Otherwise, I join your calls for Alawis (besides Mjabali) to speak up, to join the discussion.

Son of Damascus, the slogan is:
الأسد أو لا أحد

I don’t think anyone can come out from the Alawite community and speak publicly without being threatened or killed. They have leaders and smart people who will emerge in the future but not before Assad is gone. At least that’s how it looks now.

I agree with your criticism. Alawis, Christians, Kurds and Sunni opposition to the revolution had to do more and have to do more in order to save the country. The minorities have to win over the majority with compromise and magnanimity rather than tanks and planes. There is still time for that to happen, but it seems like everyone is waiting to see if Bashar can pull off a Hafez and clamp down on the country again. And innocent people are slaughtered in the meantime.

Here’s another bone for menhebaks

Qatar says to invest $18 bln in Egypt economy
http://in.reuters.com/article/2012/09/06/egypt-qatar-investment-idINL6E8K6FMR20120906

ASSAD

I agree that thuggery has no religion or sect. It was the secular Sunni thug, Saddam Hussein and his clan, that tormented Iraqi Shias for many many years. It is the absolute power that turns otherwise ordinary people into thugs, therefore no single individual should hold power. It should be a collective property of the people.

Son Of Damascus #98

It would be very good for the Alawis if they could manage to do that. And great for everyone else in Syria too.

The comment is often made that the Assads destroyed their independence and identity by splitting them and creating wide gulfs in privilege and power between those Alawis linked to the regime and those who weren’t.

I suspect any Alawi setting up a separate tent to the regime camp would face particularly savage undermining and reprisals from the Assad loyalists.

Ask the former allies of Khaddam and Kanaan.

US sends more spies / diplomats to help organize, train and study Syria’s rebel ranks – September 6

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/us-sends-more-spies-diplomats-to-help-organize-train-and-study-syrias-rebel-ranks/2012/09/06/4eabe4be-f85e-11e1-a93b-7185e3f88849_story.html

WASHINGTON — The U.S. is ramping up its presence at Syria’s Turkish border, sending more spies and diplomats to help advise the rebel forces in their mismatched fight against the better armed Syrian regime, and to watch for possible al-Qaida infiltration of rebel ranks.

U.S. officials briefed on the plan said the modest surge in U.S. personnel in the past few weeks — estimated at fewer than a dozen people — has helped improve rebels’ political organizing skills as well as their military organization. The officials spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to discuss the plans publicly.

The diplomats and intelligence operatives from the CIA and other agencies stay outside war-torn Syria and meet with rebel leaders to help them organize their ranks, while also studying who makes up those ranks, how they are armed and whom they answer to, the officials say.

Information is also gathered from Syrian defectors and refugees as well as rebel troops, officials say.

“The model is to keep case officers away from conflict, and you collect through local forces [mules],” said former CIA officer Reuel Gerecht, now a fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington-based policy group that focuses on terrorism.

The effort is concentrated on the Turkish border instead of the border with Jordan where many Syrian refugees are fleeing, a U.S. official said, because the traffic between Syria and Turkey is still far greater.

[…]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/us-sends-more-spies-diplomats-to-help-organize-train-and-study-syrias-rebel-ranks/2012/09/06/4eabe4be-f85e-11e1-a93b-7185e3f88849_story.html

Syria – RAW ACTION – FSA Rebels battle for 100 feet [30 meters] in Aleppo – 06/09/2012

CNN’s Nick Paton Walsh on Syrian rebels, hindered by poor training, struggling to gain 100 feet [30 meters] of ground in Aleppo.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=b11_1346968273

91 SOD

“Shouldn’t the Alawite community come up with an alternative figure that can speak on their behalf?”

There is no “Alawite community” anymore. Why? The Assad Mafia, over the past forty-some years, emasculated the Alawite leadership to such a degree that it lost any effectiveness it ever had. Why? The Assads didn’t want anyone with any authority in a position to oppose them.

Halabi #91,

Sa’adallah Jabri square isn’t going to be anywhere big enough for the celebrations in Aleppo when Assad falls over!

Did you see this very interesting and entertaining analysis of the “million person pro-Assad demonstration” there last year?

Satellite analysis and calculations put the maximum capacity of the square to be more like 100,000 people.

Worth reading: http://7ee6an.wordpress.com/2011/10/19/the-millions-in-saadallah-al-jabri-suqare/

Another “FSA” Child Soldier!

Terrorist Slumped With Weapon – Shot Dead By Army Sniper

A member of the Syrian mujahideen (‘Free Syrian Army’) slumped dead with his weapon.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=e16_1346964895

It’s possibly been posted here earlier, but someone sent me this powerful cartoon depicting what Bashar Assad is doing:

http://wewritewhatwelike.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/syrian-nation.jpg

Moment Of Death Of Al-Qaeda Idiot Killed In an Ambush By Syrian Army

The man on left screams as the first bullet hits his hand. He makes a mistake of getting up, and the next bullet hits his chest. That’s when his boyfriend tries to rescue him before the last bullet finishes him off.

This was a surprise ambush by the Syrian Army on the Al-Qaeda affiliated ‘Islam Brigade’, which operates in the Damascus area and countryside. They were infiltrated by Syrian security prior to the ambush.

The video ponders the Islamic merits of martyrdom. However, militants seeking overthrow of governments are considered extremists and takfiris rather than martyrs by the majority of Islamic Sunni scholars through the ages. They are heretics like Osama Bin Laden and are considered to have died the death of ignorant people rather than an honourable martyrdom.

The brigade in this video was involved in the terrorist infiltration of Damascus which was much heralded by media after the bomb attack which killed high level ministers. They were comprehensively defeated by the Syrian Army.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=46e_1346961996

The Martyrdom of Shaykh Usama Ataya
http://freehalab.wordpress.com/2012/09/07/the-martyrdom-of-shaykh-usama-ataya/

112

Thanks for the cartoon. Very powerful. I photoshopped it and changed the caption:

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-xV-RrbllFGE/UElfw3e-qSI/AAAAAAAAAl8/nMtBcC6qzZY/s599/Bashar%2520the%2520doctor.jpg

Syria “Regime Change”: The US-NATO-UN Sponsored Brahimi Plan – September 6, 2012

Thierry Meyssan – Voltaire Network

http://www.infowars.com/syria-regime-change-the-us-nato-un-sponsored-brahimi-plan/

In the aftermath of the second Russian-Chinese veto which formally prohibited foreign intervention in Syria on February 4, the West feigned seeking peace while actively organizing a vast secret war. On the diplomatic front, they appeared to accept the Lavrov-Annan Plan, even as these same countries were facilitating the movement into Syria of tens of thousands of mercenaries and while UN Observers were escorting the leaders of the Free Syrian Army to get them through the roadblocks.

The July 18th attack that decapitated the Syrian military command was intended to open the gates of Damascus for these Contras as part of the West’s pursuit of “regime change.” This did not happen. Given the failure of these forces on the ground, and in open contempt of the third Russian-Chinese veto, the Western allies took things to the next level. Not being able to accomplish “regime change“, the strategic choice is to sew chaos. They therefore sabotaged the Lavrov-Annan Plan and proclaimed their intention to assassinate President Bashar al-Assad. The speeches of Obama and Hollande, both of which delivered sharp ultimatums on Assad’s hypothetical first-use of chemical weapons (in ways flagrantly reminiscent of the Bush Administration’s lies about Iraq) confirm that all forms of war are in play.

The latest operation commenced with organized leaks by the press. Reuters [1], NBC [2], Le Parisien [3], Le Canard Enchaîné [4], The Sunday Times [5], and Bild am Sonntag [6] revealed that Barack Obama had authorized covert military intervention months before and that the U.S., Turkey, France, Britain and Germany were acting in concert. The press announced that the secret war had been coordinated from headquarters established at the NATO base in Incirlik, Turkey.

Then the U.S. presidential order was revealed, Kofi Annan resigned from his mission. By his account, it would be futile to demand a ceasefire at the Security Council when the leading Council members were openly identifying themselves as belligerants. The Special Envoy of the U.N. and the Arab League clearly stated that it would be impossible for anyone henceforth to proceed with a peace mission given that the mission itself was illusory because of what he euphemistically termed the “disunity” within the Security Council. [7]

Despite his statement, the Western nations turned again to the Secretary Generals of both the U.N. and the Arab League to provide a veneer of pacific intentions and legality to their imperial ambitions. They designated a new Special Joint Envoy in the person of Lakhdar Brahimi. In the communiqué announcing the nomination, Ban Ki-Moon did not define the new mission as intended to fulfill the Lavrov-Annan plan previously approved by the Security Council. Instead, he signalled that the nominee would employ “his talent and extraordinary experience” to lead Syria toward a “political transition in accordance with the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people.” [8]

[…]

http://www.infowars.com/syria-regime-change-the-us-nato-un-sponsored-brahimi-plan/

Athiest,
The piece clearly stated the source,read the post from left to right.
I found out that many of you,us, do not read long articles or even bother to check the link,I receive thumbs down within seconds of posting a comment even before I am finished editing it, most Syrians today prefer sound bites and short comments, I am helping many by directly going for the beef, I will add links when I can. I myself do not read 80% of the comments especially if they are long, poorly written or have no added value. Others have the right to ignore my comments,that, and those thumbs down, mean very little to me.

116

Ann, Thierry Meyssan is a lunatic. Why do you burden us with this garbage?

An answer for Guffran post from a real intellectual who is also a Syrian
صبحي حديدي and also from his favorite news papers Alquds alarabi
”
وأمّا الذروة في دفن الرأس بالرمال، عند أهل المادية التاريخية والتحليل الماركسي للتاريخ بخاصة، فهو اليقين بأنّ ‘الرجعية العربية’ لا بدّ أن تتحالف مع ‘الرجعية التركية’، بقيادة من الإمبريالية الأمريكية، ومخفرها الأمامي دولة “إسرائيل، لإسقاط النظام السوري، ‘الوطني التقدمي’، ‘المدني’، ‘العلماني’، ‘الممانع’، و’المقاوم
http://alquds.co.uk/index.asp?fname=today6qpt995.htm&arc=data201299-066qpt995.htm

Visitor:

The notion that people are rational creatures who can seperate vengence-based retribution from justice-based retribution goes against all of recorded human history.

What does “justice” mean anyway? If your children are killed by a bomb, what retribution is appropriate that will achieve any sort of justice?

The only “justice” that is possible is of the symbolic sort, where war crimes are tried after the carnage.

For the most part, you can’t tell who is guilty in a war. War is savagery on all sides. It’s the absence of justice. And it engulfs tons of innocent people who get sucked-in based on fear, propoganda or conscription.

If you beleive in a just God, why not leave the justice part to your God?

نعى لواء “الله أكبر” في مدينة البوكمال 7 من مقاتليه في الهجوم الذي شنه على مطار “الحمدان” العسكري ، معلنا انسحابه من المناطق التي سيطر عليها في المطار ، بعد أن وقع في كمين نصبه “الشبيحة” في المنطقة.
و أوضح اللواء في بيان أصدره اليوم الأربعاء أنه و بمشاركة لواء القعقاع ولواء بشائر النصر ولواء أهل الأثر ولواء درع الجزيرة شن هجوما على مطار “الحمدان” في الساعة الأولى من صباح اليوم، و سيطر على جزء كبير منه ، قبل أن يضطر للإنسحاب إثر وقوعه في كمين نصبه “الشبيحة” في المنطقة حيث تمركزوا على أسطح المباني ، ما أسفر عن إستشهاد 7 من المقاتلين و إصابة 25 ، جراح بعضهم خطيرة.
This is an endless bloody dance, one win here and one loss there, those who think a military solution is possible in Syria are in denial.
The arming of pro Assad areas did not start in Kasab, it started in Homs a year ago, there is not a village in the coastal area that is not armed to the teeth, many alawites see Bashar as a weak leader and have realized that the army can not protect every village or town, I am not asking people to trust the regime or not to defend themselves, I want Syrians to stop killing for revenge or money, even if Assad is removed tomorrow, his supporters and the people who do not trust the Islamists will not open their doors to the rebels, stop kidding yourself,even people in Aleppo ,for the most part,refused to accommodate the rebels , most people want to live and let live, some rebels want to kill or die so they can have a visa to heaven, that is why I said the revolution has ended,it is an armed rebellion that can only bring death and destruction,no doubt about it.

Syrian, I think we agree with Subhi’s statement with one addition :
Clean revolutionaries still exist, they are simply unable to make their voice heard when the only language spoken in Syria today is the Gunnic Language.
The fact that Al-Quds alarabi allows dissenting opinions is another reason to read that outstanding newspaper.

(BEIRUT) — Activists say Syrian troops have recaptured from rebels a town on the border with Jordan used as a transit point by refugees fleeing the country’s civil war.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and local activist Mohammed Abu Houran say hundreds of Syrian soldiers backed by 20 tanks assaulted Tel Chehab on Thursday morning. Rebels fought back but were pushed out.
Abu Houran says about 2,000 refugees were in Tel Chehab when it was captured.
Read more: http://world.time.com/2012/09/05/turkey-accuses-syria-of-state-terrorism/#ixzz25kh8WIGD

120 RICHARD,

“If your children are killed by a bomb, what retribution is appropriate that will achieve any sort of justice?”

If my children get killed due to these events, then I would not rest until the culprits get tried and the DEATH penalty is applied.

This is a clear instruction and a sacred RIGHT given to us by God. Now, again you may look at ‘us’ and ‘we’ whichever way you like. I do not care. We DO not and WILL not turn the other cheek.

“For the most part, you can’t tell who is guilty in a war. War is savagery on all sides.

This is another one of your misconceived notions. The shabbiha criminals are well known by name and locality. Their actions are well documented by our people. But we also know who is the supreme culprit(s) in these events. If you do not know at least these by now, then you’ve been wasting precious time on this blog and perhaps on following the Syrian events of the last year and a half.

For ‘us’ (and again interpret it the way you like) Justice means the following:

ولكم في القصاص حياة يا أولي الألباب لعلكم تتقون

If you do not understand Arabic the above means,

And there is for you in legal retribution life, O you [people] of understanding, that you may become righteous.

This is how we understand Justice. And you also need to understand that the above is sacred and is not subject to any misconceived notions from whichever quarters they originate including your own.

We appreciate your apparent support for the Syrian Revolution, but that is not enough without the support for the legal retribution. It is all part and parcel. You cannot pick and choose.

Uzair,

good morning to you, have you heard from Galloways new move?

George Galloway paid £80k for joining ‘pro-Syria’ TV channel
THE Respect MP George Galloway has joined an Arabic TV station that is allegedly funded by Iran and Syria. Galloway is set to earn almost £80,000 a year from his latest broadcasting venture, reports The Times.

Galloway, who once described President Assad’s regime as “the last bastion of Arab dignity”, has started presenting a fortnightly show, A Free Word, for the Beirut-based broadcaster al-Mayadeen.

According to the Register of Members’ Interests, Galloway will earn £3,000 an episode – or a yearly income of £78,000 – on top of his MP’s salary. The TV station will also cover the cost of regular trips to Lebanon to pre-record the programme

http://all4syria.info/Archive/52876

The missing link (in more ways than one).

117. GHUFRAN said:

“The piece clearly stated the source, read the post from left to right.”

NO it doesn’t. And I find it strange for you to say it does.

The link to the piece from you in the leading post above does not even lead to your comment. And when I go back to find what you originally posted, it says nothing about where that statement comes from.

Now let’s be sane.

Here’s the source that should be given to properly inform readers, give your post credibility and avoid copyright problems:

Article: Syria Turmoil Exposes Rifts Among Arab Intellectuals

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/06/world/middleeast/06iht-m06-syria-leftists.html

كلام خطير لرياض الأسعد
http://mtv.com.lb/News/118317
Comment: there is a rift now between those who stayed in Syria and decided to fight and those in Turkey who chose comfort waiting for leadership positions after their country men do the job.

124. VISITOR said:

So VAT, the following Quranic verse has no place in your heart:

41:34 “One good and an evil deed is not equal. Reject the evil with what is better, and see, the one who is your enemy, become like a warm friend!”

124. VISITOR said:
“If my children get killed due to these events, then I would not rest until the culprits get tried and the DEATH penalty is applied….We appreciate your apparent support for the Syrian Revolution, but that is not enough without the support for the legal retribution.”

“Legal retribution” does indeed sound very right, very appealing. Nothing to argue with in principle. To the extent that legal retribution is possible, of course I support it.

Did Ghadaffi recieve legal retribution?

Young men with guns whose families have been killed and tortured do not administer legal retribution. They kill and sometimes rape. There will be little legal retribution in Syria. We have a bloody, brutal war driven by vengeance. That is the reality. And in most cases, that vengeance is well justified.

I say the best case scenario for Syria is for the rebellion to demonstrate they are going to win as soon as possible. I believe a no-fly-zone is best way for that to happen, but that may be irrelevant. The next step is negotiate a resolution that ends the slaughter, permanently. If you insist on legal retribution, such a negotiation becomes impossible. So you don’t get your legal retribution, you get more war and slaughter.

Maybe Zoo has a point.

Richard:

Visitor translated a verse from al-Quran. The translation was bad of course and does not give the real meaning. What is important is that he took the word Qasas قصاص, and translated it to “legal retribution.” Of course that is wrong.

The word Qasas has few meanings the most important for our discussion is: Punishment. The word Qasas means Iqab، عقاب. It means punishment. Straight and simple. And of course it has a revenge element. It also means in Islamic terms: to apply the Islamic Sharia rule in the case.

Where he got the word “legal” I have no idea. It is not legal in countries that does not apply Sharia law, but the word has a weight in countries like Sudan, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Afghanistan.

Syria is not going to move Forward unless a modern law is put in place to stop these “legal retributions.”

FSA becomes SNA hoping to reassure the international community about the unity of the armed rebels.

SNA commander rejects no-fly zone in Syria

06/09/2012
http://www.asharq-e.com/news.asp?section=1&id=30965
By Caroline Akoum
Beirut, Asharq Al-Awsat – Following the unification of the Free Syrian Army [FSA] and opposition brigades – at home and abroad – under the banner of the newly formed Syrian National Army [SNA], SNA commander-in-chief Major General Muhammad Hussein al-Haj Ali expressed his satisfaction with this “project”. He lauded the effective role the SNA will play in toppling the regime, maintaining peace and stability in the post-Assad period, as well as securing civil democracy and drawing up a modern constitution that is compatible with the Syrian people’s demands, in addition to guaranteeing “free and fair elections under international supervision.”
…
The SNA commander-in-chief declared his opposition to demands to impose a no-fly zone in Syria, asserting that this would have more negative aspects than positive ones.
….
As to whether the SNA is coordinating or in contact with the Syrian National Council [SNC] or any political opposition movement, Major General Ali revealed that there are contacts with various Syrian political movements. However he asserted that the SNA cannot work with these political movements, either bilaterally or as a political umbrella, in light of the divisions that are plaguing the Syrian political opposition. He added “we hope they will unite so that there can be coordination and dealings with them on this basis and in order to reach a free and independent Syria together.”

Ibn Taymiyah Brigade in Jabal al-Turkman near Kasab. Who said that there is hope for Syria?

128 DARRYL,

Despite your stupid slurs, here is the answer to your comment.

What you quoted does negate what I quoted. In fact, there is nothing in the Holy Qura’n which negates the verse which I quoted.

I will tell you how I will deal the verse you quoted. I will allow those who get tried and executed proper burial, a basic humane act the criminal regime is consistently denying its victims. And that would be consistent with other Qura’nic verses that you would find in chapter 5 before and after verse 31, Again, no pick and choose.

Nevertheless, congratulations on your progress in your attempt to understand the Holy Qura’n. Continue with your efforts and hopefully you’ll be saved.

————————————

129 RICHARD,

OK, so Ghaddafi did not receive legal retribution. What does that have to do with what I said?

I said retribution must be sought for the sake of justice and not revenge. And in my original comment I said I HOPE that would happen.

So in order to avoid falling into such cycle of revenge, legal retribution must be supported by everyone who believes in the Revolution. That is the only way out of this saga, of course after the regime has fallen.

Morsi new imaginative idea to Arabs FM: “Arab countries must cooperate to solve Syria’s crisis.

What have the Arab countries been doing in the last 18 months other than cooperating to topple the regime.. in vain ?

Morsi is now in serious competition with Erdogan and Hollande for the emptiest rhetoric contest

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/video/2012-09/06/c_131831862.htm
BEIJING, Sept. 6 (Xinhuanet) — Egyptian President, Mohamed Morsi is urging all Arab countries to cooperate to stop the bloodshed in Syria as foreign ministers of the Arab League meet in Cairo.

In a speech at the opening session, Morsi called for all relevant parts to explore a solution to the Syrian crisis, affirming that the Syrian people’s destiny is in the hand of the Arab countries. Arab League Secretary General Nabil al-Arabi also warned that the Syrian crisis threatens the security of the whole region.

The Arab League also said the appointment of international envoy to Syria Lakhdar Brahimi represents a fresh opportunity to negotiate an end to the bloody conflict that has seen Syria torn apart by civil war for nearly a year and a half.

RICHARD,

You can find the English text of the Qura’nic verse which I quoted in several recognized translations of the Holy Qura’n. The text is NOT MY translation.

The guy who is insinuating is suffering from a severe case of delusion, rejection, slurring and vulgarity. I usually ignore him because he has nothing to offer except that.

And you could see his inconsistencies and contradictions when he admits the term قصاص is used in the Sharia Rule, which is simply the Legal Jurisprudence system associated with Islam

Senior defection
Al-Arabiya has broadcast footage of a senior member of Assad’s security forces announcing his defection. The clip shows Awad Ahmed al-Ali, head of the criminal security branch in Damascus, after he fled to Turkey.
….
From the Guardian blog

Syria’s non-Violent Opposition groups seek end of Fight
(Omar al-Shaar | Dp-news)

DAMASCUS- As the bloodshed escalated; almost 20 opposition movements opposed to both President Bashar al-Assad regime and the rebels of Free Syrian Army gathered Tuesday in Damascus to call for a non-violent alternative and to hold a conference on “Saving the Syrian homeland”.

“We are faced with two sides that use violence, but weapons only lead to attrition,” said Raja Nassar, who coordinated the gathering.

“The regime has unleashed almost all its force on the ground, and has been unable to defeat the armed opposition, which for its part has yet to win a single victory,” veteran dissident Nasser told journalists after meeting.

Participants said they were organising a conference in September, 12 to call for “democratic change that preserves the unity of the nation and social peace.”

The parties and movements taking part in the gathering are opposed to both the main opposition coalition — the Syrian National Council — and the FSA, which have consistently called for international military intervention in Syria against the regime.

Tayyar Binaa Syria (Building the Syrian State) had announced on July that he is inviting Syrians to hold a conference on “Saving the Syrian homeland” in Damascus on Saturday 28/7/2012. But this time was rescheduled twice before Tuesday meeting.

http://www.dp-news.com/en/detail.aspx?articleid=129603

Short lived “freedom”, “dignity” in Islamists lead Arab countries.

Even Al Jazeera is starting to worry.

Was the revolution lost in Tunisia and Egypt?

http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/insidestory/2012/09/20129584729858732.html

As state censorship threatens freedom of expression, we ask if new leaders have adopted the old practices of oppression.
Inside Story Last Modified: 05 Sep 2012 11:18

#131

I thought pro-FSA would rejoice that the rebels are unifying their ranks under one leadership.
Instead the article gets a majority of thumbs down.
Puzzling…

فتح الإسلام يعلن مقتل أميره عبد العزيز الكوركلي خلال القتال بسوريا
a prince and a terrorist, one has to be really good to carry two big titles at the same time.

125. Juergen

Parts of the left are taking care of and responding to people like George Galloway. I admire him for his previous stances and also for his efforts on causes dear to our hearts, however, on Syria I am very disappointed with his views. I won’t turn against him but will ignore him. I’m sure he realises that he doesn’t have the same level of support as on previous issues. He said as much in a recent video*. Many of his colleagues and fellow activists (such as Anas al-Takriti, Yvonne Ridley) may differ with him on this issue. Let’s hope he sees sense**.

* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUZ5FwYmkhw

From 2min till 2min 50 sec.

It seems he felt the need to speak on Syria as he was probably facing a lack of agreement and support from amongst previously supportive friends and public. Hence this video.

** In this video George, on his Press Tv show, talks to an expert. The guest may have said some thing agreeable to George (geopolitical aspects) however he also expressed some home truths about the Assad regime. George accepts the point on the Golan. The last point, about the ‘reform’ is a slap in the face for Press Tv. In the following video the guest talks about the geoplolitical versus the people-centric view of the Syrian issue.

Golan – from 7min 40sec
Reform – from 10min 32sec

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmdOo-tNVFA

Btw about George working on the Lebanese channel. Well I’m not too fussed about that. However if he aligns himself and his views on Syria with Iran and Hezbollah then that is a problem.

Morsi’s speech in Teheran and to the AL is bringing expected fruits

Egypt: Qatar invests 18 billion dollars in energy, tourism

07 September, 11:00
http://www.ansamed.info/ansamed/en/news/nations/egypt/2012/09/07/Egypt-Qatar-invests-18-billion-dollars-energy-tourism_7439066.html

(ANSAmed) – DOHA, SEPTEMBER 7 – Qatar will invest 18 billion dollars in Egypt, the pan-Arab press reports. The investment will reportedly focus on the Egyptian industry and tourism sectors.

In particular, 8 billion dollars will be spent in the energy sector to built steel, iron and gas plants in the Suez Canal and 10 billion in tourist resorts on the Mediterranean coast.

Qatar has already donated 2 billion dollars to support Egypt’s budget and in August it transferred 500 million dollars to the central bank of Egypt in spite of a 4.8 billion dollars loan requested by Cairo to the International Monetary Fund.

Zoo

Ok. I gave you the second thumb up for 131.

Not enough TLC from the regime? Not unexpected. We are much better. You are chosing the wrong side. 😉

Zoo said: “Instead the article gets a majority of thumbs down.
Puzzling…”

Could it be the person posting that attracts the negative votes?

Not such a puzzle in fact.

143 Tara

Yes, if you are not with ‘us’ then you are “evil”.

I thought people woke up from Bush’s primitive rhetoric, but it seems some on this blog are convinced they represent the ‘good’ and the others, the ‘evil’

Tara

The masks of the Islamist regimes in Egypt and Tunisia are starting to fall, revealing that the countries may enter into another brand of repression, more insidious and harder to fight: Religious.

Because of these worrying developments in “Arab Spring” countries, the long-lasted secular nature of the Syrian government will soon appear more appealing to the West than what the non-democratic, religion-lead and money-lead Saudi Arabia and Qatar have under their sleeves for future Syria.
Therefore time may play against the revolution as it is gradually becoming more divided and more polluted by the money, religious influences coming from the above countries as well as the foreign agendas.
The rebels lead by the expats must hurry before it is too late

This is how Syrian state TV responded to Nile Sat decision to stop broadcasting Syrian TV signals, the company admitted that the decision was made by the Egyptian authorities. it is now obvious that the two companies involved (arabsat and nilesat) were paid to cover their losses, Morsi was compensated (follow the news from Qatar) but the guy effectively gave up his role as a potential mediator.

this is the egyptian company’s response:
كشف مصدر مصري مسؤول في إدارة شركة الأقمار الصناعية “نايل سات” عن أن “القرار الذي صدر أول من أمس من رئيس اتحاد الاذاعة والتلفزيون والمشرف على شركة “ايل سات” ثروت مكي بايقاف بث القنوات الفضائية التابعة للنظام السوري وهي “الفضائية السورية” و”الإخبارية” و”الدنيا”، وحجبها عن القمرين الصناعيين “عرب سات” و”نايل سات”، قد جاء بتعليمات سيادية، التي جاءت متواكبة مع خطاب الرئيس المصري محمد مرسي أول من أمس في اجتماع وزراء الخارجية العرب، الذي وجه خلاله انتقادات شديدة للنظام السوري”.
وأضاف المصدر لـ”الراي” الكويتية ان “القرار ليس مفاجئًا للخارجية السورية. حيث انه في 2 تموز الماضي تقدم مجلس وزراء الخارجية العرب بطلب الى ادارتي عرب سات – نايل سات، لوقف بث القنوات الفضائية السورية الرسمية وغير الرسمية بشكل نهائي وتمت احالة الأمر الى المسؤولين بالهيئة العامة للاستثمار ومجلس الوزراء”.
you can say what you want about Syrian TV, I personally do not watch it, but there is something stinky about the whole affair.
more on the subject:
تعرَّض موقع الشركة المصرية للأقمار الصناعية (نايل سات) على شبكة الإنترنت الجمعة لاختراق من قبل ناشطين موالين لنظام الرئيس السوري بشار الأسد ويطلقون على أنفسهم اسم “الجيش السوري الالكتروني”، وذلك ردا على قرار الشركة المذكورة حجب القنوات السورية الرسمية والخاصة عن البث يوم الأربعاء الماضي.
فلدى محاولة الدخول إلى الصفحة الرئيسية لموقع نايل سات على الشبكة العنكبوتية يظهر وكأنه لم يتم يتعرض لأي اختراق، ولكن سرعان ما يتم تحويل المتصفح تلقائيا إلى عنوان آخر يحتوي على البث المباشر للقنوات الفضائية السورية المحجوبة: الفضائية السورية وقناة الدنيا والإخبارية السورية

High Five to Canada,

http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/09/07/236663.html

Canada closes Tehran Embassy and kicks out all Iranian diplomats within 5 days because Iranian regime is assissting criminal Syrian regime in committing crimes against humanity.

Hollande and Cameron should show their ‘humanity’ by relieving Turkey of the burden of refugees and fly them out to France and the UK. That would be a safer no-fly zone…and the USA will surely agree.

61 refugees drown to death as boat sinks
An attempt for a ‘new life’ ends in tragedy when 61 migrants, including Syrians, Iraqis and Palestinians, perish in a boat that goes down in the Aegan.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/61-refugees-drown-to-death-as-boat-sinks.aspx?pageID=238&nID=29589&NewsCatID=341

IZMIR – Hürriyet Daily News
An attempt for a ‘new life’ ends in tragedy when 61 migrants, including Syrians, Iraqis and Palestinians, perish in a boat that goes down in the Aegan.

The İzmir-based Immigrant Solidarity Association president, Taner Kılıç, told CNNTürk the attempts of Syrian immigrants to pass to Greek islands had increased in the past two months. The camps that were set up in Turkey’s border regions in 2011 for Syrian immigrants were in good condition compared to other camps but still inadequate, Kılıç said, adding, “People are staying in those camps for one year. We can’t just say the circumstances are good compared to other camps because they cannot have any education; they cannot be involved in social life.”

Zoo

“Yes, if you are not with ‘us’ then you are “evil”.”

No, you are not evil to me.  As a matter of fact, I stun myself with the number if times I have made up excuses for you and some others..

حجة الاسلام Visitor:

You said about me:

” …suffering from a severe case of delusion, rejection, slurring and vulgarity.”

Mr. Visitor: your language reflects your inability to win any argument.

About delusions: remember what you said about the Shia and Arabs: is there a more delusional mind than yours that negates the existence of millions of Arab Shia?

As for vulgarity: isn’t it vulgar when an average man with an average education like you deems million of Shia as heretics that does not deserve to live.

Isn’t it vulgar mr. Visitor when you call millions of Shia the fifth column. Who are you? Who is conspiring against you? Why are you afraid of the Shia?

If you are that confident of your faith why don’t you debate them. If you are confident of your faith why don’t you let missionaries from other religions and non religions come and talk to the “faithful?” I promise you that people will be leaving your faith in droves. أفواجاً

Democracy is not compatible with any religious dogma because of the simple fact that under democracy people are free to speak their mind, something religions and religious figure do not want you to do.

About the Deir El-Zor recent reconstructive surgery and the fall of its military security center,

http://www.alarabiya.net/views/2012/09/07/236525.html

———————————-

159 MJ,

You failed again. Sorry, I cannot make LOOOOOOOSERS winners.

#117 Ghufran

Very disingenuous, or in plain-speak you’re fudging, mate.

We (at least I) don’t want to “go for the beef” that you choose for us, as often it is picked because it serves to demonstrate something you want to put across, while if one reads the original article in its totality, the impression can be completely different.

Take two more of your entries from the last post: #54 and #58: clearly there are sections that you did not write and you should say where you got them from so I can go there and read the whole thing, or maybe form a view based on where the piece appeared. I am also happy to read your own opinions when they are presented separately from some other journalist’s. And yes, I don’t have to read what you posted and you couldn’t care less, and that’s OK, too. But for Dr. Landis to take what you chopped up from goodness-knows-where, and then present it as part of a main post as if it was something you wrote yourself is really sloppy, I believe.

Earlier there was talk of rebels capturing military barracks in Hanano. Now:

@HamaEcho

Unification Brigade say a prison was discovered after capturing Hanano military barracks containing 350 political prisoners. #Aleppo #Syria

http://yallasouriya.wordpress.com/2012/09/07/%e2%80%8fhamaecho-unification-brigade-say-a-prison-was-discovered/

I hope they recorded it. Such scenes could have a powerful impact. Remember the scenes when Isreal left south Lebanon and inmates were freed from prisons?

Article looks at David Lesch’s new book.

The road from Damascus
By Roula Khalaf

How a western believer in Syria’s Bashar al-Assad was converted to skepticism

September 7, 2012

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/3d556fd4-f5b9-11e1-bf76-00144feabdc0.html#axzz25o1atF9O

Can the regime still feed all its troops?

Has the rebels taking the battle to the (economic) lungs of the regime (Aleppo) had an affect on business and trade?

Would any negative effects affect the ability of the regime to pay it’s employees and fund, fuel and feed its troops and war machine?

133. VISITOR said:
“So in order to avoid falling into such cycle of revenge, legal retribution must be supported by everyone who believes in the Revolution. That is the only way out of this saga, of course after the regime has fallen.”

OK, I see your point of emphasis.

130. mjabali said:
“The word Qasas means Iqab، عقاب. It means punishment. Straight and simple. And of course it has a revenge element. It also means in Islamic terms: to apply the Islamic Sharia rule in the case ….. Syria is not going to move Forward unless a modern law is put in place to stop these “legal retributions.” ”

OK, interesting.

We get lost in misunderstandings, not knowing other people’s intentions. I think perhaps Visitor meant he wants legal process to circumvent vigilante justice.

The Syrian people are getting plenty of punishment, including the guilty ones. The Assad regime is going to fall, eventually, and it is not going to be easy for his supporters, many of whom are already suffering.

My point, and I guess you agree, is to de-emphasize punishment, of whatever sort, and try to get some civility and safety. Justice really won’t be possible, IMO, other than in a limited, symbolic way.

War Crime: Syria Terrorists Blow Up Hospital And Brag About It
http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2012/09/07/war-crime-syria-terrorist-blow-hospital-brag-181211/
The UK’s Telegraph has posted a video showing Saudi Arabia’s Salafit Terrorists blowing up a hospital in Syria.

Such attacks on hospitals, ambulances, doctors and first responders are all war crimes under international law as is the murder of the innocent civilians who were in the hospital at the time.

Ever wonder why these international war crimes laws are constantly violated by the US, its NATO allies and the proxy terrorists cells they run through Saudi Arabia?

They are only in place to put severely hinder the self-defense capabilities of the targets of their imperialistic agenda.

For example Syria terrorists are smuggling weapons and driving around under the cover of UK ambulances.
………….(….)….

US sends more spies, diplomats to Turkish-Syrian border
The US is beefing up its presence along the Syrian border with Turkey.

US officials say they are sending more intelligence agents and diplomats to advise the rebel forces in their mismatched fight against the better-armed Syrian regime, and watching for al-Qaida’s infiltration of rebel ranks.
The officials say intelligence officers are gathering information from refugees and defectors, while State Department workers are helping the rebels organize politically. The officials spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to discuss the plans publicly.

The increased intelligence is intended to help the White House decide if its current policy of providing only non-lethal aid is enough to keep momentum building in the nearly 18-month revolt against Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime.
http://stratrisks.com/geostrat/7952

Roula Khalaf’s review of “The Fall of the House of Assad” makes a compelling case for reading Lesch’s book. We have read of the others who were close to Assad in earlier years, from Ayman Abdel Nour to Manaf Tlass. Lesch offers the perspective of an American establishment scholar with much ‘hope’ in a US/Syrian rapprochement during the George W Bush years.

This foreign policy wonk met with Assad many times (to 2008) and now, in retrospective perfection, sketches out the change in Assad that led to disenchantment. None of this will be particularly new or revealing to Syrians, perhaps, and it may not solve any mystery (like how a mild-mannered popular dauphin became brutal warlord of Syria), but the psychological perspective on the course of the change is useful.

Here is Khalaf (preview the book with Amazon’s ‘search inside’ feature; click my name to land at Amazon):

In the years after he inherited the presidency of Syria in 2000, Bashar al-Assad was often criticised in the west. But not everyone subscribed to the image of him as a duplicitous and mischievous ruler and, particularly in the second half of the last decade, there were politicians and academics prepared to argue his case. Assad, they countered, should be seen rather as a victim of the Bush administration’s belligerent policies in the region and even as a potential ally, with whom the US should seek to engage.

[ . . . ]

David Lesch, a professor of Middle East history at Trinity University in San Antonio, was among those who flocked to Syria to learn about the new ruler of Damascus. He reckons that he knew Assad “probably better than anyone in the west”, having interviewed him extensively in 2004 and 2005 and continued to meet him regularly until 2008.

In 2005, Lesch published his first book on the subject – The New Lion of Damascus: Bashar al-Assad and Modern Syria – in which he argued that the young leader should be given a chance. Assad, he found, was indeed “the hope”, as he was being called in Syria, and his government held the promise of a better future.

[ . . . ]

The deepest insight we get into Assad is the apparent transformation he underwent in 2007, when Lesch says he noticed a self-satisfaction that he had not detected before. Assad had been reconfirmed as president in a referendum. The man Lesch had found to be “unpretentious, even self-deprecating”, had started listening to the “sycophants” and believing that it was his destiny to lead the country.

[ . . . ]

Given this state of mind, it is not surprising that Assad thought he would be immune from the popular revolts that struck the Arab world at the start of 2011. As Lesch writes, the Syrian president misunderstood the source of disenchantment of Arab youth, wrongly believing that leaders such as Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak were toppled because they were seen as lackeys of the west and soft on Israel. Syria, a crucial player in the resistance front against Israel, would remain safe, Assad argued at the time.

Nonetheless, Lesch continued to believe in Assad, writing to him after the outbreak of the first protests to urge that he announce genuine reforms. He was soon reminded of the true nature of the Syrian regime, controlled by the Assad family for four decades. As he says: “When a domestic threat appears, there is a push-button response of quick and ruthless repression … No one questions it.”

I invoke fair use for these excerpts of Khalaf’s review, and note my support for the questioning of persistently poor or missing references..

It is basic courtesy to reference an excerpted article with a URL. Not ‘when I feel like it,’ but every time, as every other responsible commentator manages to do routinely. We may lack moderation at the moment, but the means to self-moderation are plain: Joshua Landis’s rules, linked at the top of the page.

Ghufran, perhaps some of the thumbs-down (of which you care not a whit) are because some readers feel you thumb your nose at them by dropping references.

I do not understand what prevents you from doing what every responsible commentator does as a matter of course. Is it technical? — do you use a smart-phone that isn’t smart enough to copy URLs?

High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/3d556fd4-f5b9-11e1-bf76-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz25o8rSr6W

Syrian Orient TV’s Daily News Bulletin in English
http://freehalab.wordpress.com/2012/09/07/syrian-orient-tvs-daily-news-bulletin-in-english/

308 demonstrations in Syria today and 140 martyrs.

❗

😐 Is this a Shabeeha defection to the rebels ❓

http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-snc7/391615_349982155093877_666819280_n.jpg

😆

Syria “Regime Change”: The US-NATO-UN Sponsored Brahimi Plan – September 6, 2012

To comprehend what is currently underway requires a closer look at the “the talents and experience” of Mr. Brahimi. Son of a collaborator during the WWII occupation of France and not of a hero of the Algerian Independence with the same name as he would have people believe, Lahkdar Brahimi is one of the leading sycophant acolytes of the doctrine “humanitarian intervention“, the new scarcely-veiled substitute for neocolonialism. His name is still attached to the report of the Commission for U.N. Peacekeeping Operations, which he had chaired. He never questioned the legal aberration that allowed the U.N. to create so-called peacekeeping forces in order to impose political solutions against the will of the warring parties rather than overseeing the implementation of peace accords concluded equitably by them. Instead, he has been an active advocate for further consolidating the world governance role of the United Nations on the basis of a doctrine of intervention and the creation of a supranational intelligence service. [9] This was the origin of the “decision support service.” Not long after, and without informing the Security Council, Ban Ki-moon signed on September 23, 2008 a protocol with his NATO counterpart linking this newly-created service to the Atlantic Alliance. [10] So much for Brahimi’s “talents“.

As for Mr. Brahimi’s “experience“, in the late 1980’s he masterminded the Lebanese Confessional System (the Taif Accord ) and, following the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, the Bonn Agreement with put in place the present-day Afghan narco-regime. He also participated in the machinations to “remodel” after the Western invasion of 2003 which sought to partition the country into three districts, one of which a Sunni section where the Hashemite monarchy would be restored. Mixing business with pleasure, he married off his daughter Rym, a CNN journalist, to Prince Ali. Had Ali become king, she would have become the nominal queen of Iraq.

And this is not all. His official biographies neglect to mention that Lakhdar Brahimi, as a “paragon of democracy“, was one of the ten members of the High Security Council who perpetrated the coup d’etat in Algiers in January 11, 1992, nullifying the legislative election results, forcing President Chadli Bendjedid to resign and installing the putchist generals [11] in power. [12] What followed was a civil war—precisely along the model that Washington now hopes to engender in Syria—where both sides are simultaneously manipulated by the U.S. In Algeria, the Islamist leader, Abbassi Madani, now a refugee in Qatar, took as his political advisor the pseudo-secularist Burhan Ghalioun, none other than the future president of the Syrian National Council. The armed Islamist faction, the GSPC [13], renamed in 2007 Al Qaeda in the Islamic Mahghreb (AQIM), was engaged in arms training with the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, rebranded in 1997 as Al Qaeda in Libya. The majority of the combatants in the two groups have now integrated into the Free Syrian Army.

In these circumstances French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius travelled to inspect the rear-area support bases proliferating in the states bordering Syria. Passing through Jordan, he asserted, “I am conscious of the weight of what I am about to say; Bashar Al-Assad does not deserve to be on Earth.” [14] Without having to give a thumbs down, Emperor Fabius has clearly moved from “Bashar must go” to “Bashar must die!”

[…]

http://www.infowars.com/syria-regime-change-the-us-nato-un-sponsored-brahimi-plan/ann

FSA Terrorists Destroy Minaret in Aleppo to Blame it on Assad – Sep-3-2012

This video is taken by the “Free Syrian Army” (FSA) terrorists as proof that Assad’s forces are destroying minarets in Syria, showing that the Syrian Arab Army has suddenly turned anti-Muslim and anti-Sunni. The truth can be seen by any 3-year-old. Those terrorists were waiting for the minaret to explode, which is the ultimate proof that this is a planned destruction (detonated bomb) by those terrorists who are destroying Syria in a sectarian way to inflame religious and sectarian tensions, drawing in more Jihadist fighters to enter Syria for more chaos, death, and destruction.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=ab0_1347028077

Is Canada going to allow Iranian movies to participate in it’s film festivals?  Iran is losing it’s soft power too with those Mullahs. 

Canada has closed its embassy in Tehran and ordered the expulsion of Iranian diplomats from Ottawa, partly because of the country’s backing of the Syrian regime.

Canada’s foreign affairs minister, John Baird, cited Iran’s support for Bashar al-Assad, its disputed nuclear programme and continued human rights violations as reasons behind his country’s decision to sever diplomatic ties with Tehran. He said the Canadian government perceived Iran to be “the most significant threat to global peace and security in the world today”. “Canada has closed its embassy in Iran, effective immediately, and declared personae non gratae all remaining Iranian diplomats in Canada,” Baird said.
….
“I think the closure of Iranian embassy in Ottawa should be seen in the context of concerns by the Canadian government about the Islamic republic’s recent activities in its Ottawa mission, including using it to establish wider presence in Canada through a series of ostensibly cultural activities, at universities and other institutes and infiltrating the Iranian diaspora and neutralising opposition to the regime,” he said.

According to latest official figures more than 400,000 Iranians live in Canada. “There is an significant Iranian diaspora in Canada, we call Toronto, Tehranto, even many regime insiders live here but the majority consists of refugees or migrants,” said Akhavan.

“Canadians who have Iranian nationality are warned in particular that the Iranian regime does not recognise the principle of dual nationality,” it said. “By doing so, Iran makes it virtually impossible for government of Canada officials to provide consular assistance to Iranian-Canadians in difficulty.”

The frosty relations between the two capitals became even more restrained in 2003 when an Iranian-Canadian photographer, Zahra Kazemi, died while in jail in Iran. Iran said she died of a stroke but Canada insisted she died under torture because of a skull fracture.
…,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/07/canada-cuts-diplomatic-ties-iran

Foreign Policy: Finally eyes are opening about the responsibility of the SNC in the mess Syria is now.

The Gang That Can’t Shoot Straight

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/09/07/the_bunch_that_cant_shoot_straight?page=0,1

The Syrian National Council has failed to galvanize international support for the rebellion — and it has only itself to blame.
BY MALIK AL-ABDEH | SEPTEMBER 7, 2012

..
The Syrian National Council claims to be the largest, the best-financed, and the most well-organized of all the various Syrian opposition coalitions. According to its own books, it has received over $25 million from Libya, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, not to mention assistance from the U.S. and the UK in the form of “non-lethal aid.”

Last week, SNC President Abdulbaset Sieda lashed out at U.S. officials for saying that it was premature to speak about a transitional Syrian government. He described the many differences within the SNC as “normal.” Normality is a relative concept, but in suggesting that the SNC’s performance during the past year could in any way be considered “normal” in a country crying out for alternative leadership is as breathtakingly insulting as it is naïve.
…
The SNC has done nothing of the sort. Its control over the Free Syrian Army and other armed opposition groups remains tenuous, sustained only by payments of cash but little else. Repeated attempts to bring the armed opposition under its political wing have failed because there is little trust in the SNC as a representative body. The resultant void in leadership has been filled by radical jihadist groups that have emerged as powerful challengers to the SNC.

Despite its claims to “serve as a political umbrella for the Syrian Revolution in the international arena,” the SNC has yet to appoint a single delegate or spokesperson in any of the world’s major capitals.

Competing factionalism within the SNC means that ponderous and ineffective delegations of twenty or more fly around the world at great expense because none of the constituent parties trust each other to sit with foreign governments alone. It should come as little surprise that no country apart from Libya recognizes the SNC as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people.

Among the Syrian revolution’s rank-and-file, the SNC appears distant and increasingly irrelevant
…

Taliban “guest” fighters leave Pakistan, head to next conflict – September 06, 2012

FRANCIS ELLIOTT – The Australian

FOREIGN insurgents are leaving the tribal areas of Pakistan, some to join the Syrian rebels, as US drone strikes and dwindling funds make life increasingly uncomfortable for the Taliban’s “guest” fighters.

About 250 militants, mainly from Arab nations, have left in the past few months alone, insurgent and tribal sources say. A security official in Islamabad confirmed the trend.

Some have left their families and promised to return, but others have sold all their possessions and left for good. So many have sold their weapons that the price for an automatic rifle is said to have halved in Waziristan.

The departure of Arab fighters to join the Syrian conflict comes after previous outward waves to Libya and Egypt, but a militant commander insisted that the trend would have no large impact on insurgent operations.

“We have a lot of fighters with us and in fact we are happy that they are going back to help our brothers in Arab countries,” he said in a telephone interview from North Waziristan.

Most of the Arabs were allied to the Haqqani network, which is estimated to have about 2,000 fighters and directs most of its efforts against NATO forces in Afghanistan.

[…]

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=bbd_1347008000

An exhaustive analysis of the irrelevance of the SNC

The G…ang That Can’t Shoot Straight

The Syrian National Council has failed to galvanize international support for the rebellion — and it has only itself to blame.

BY MALIK AL-ABDEH | SEPTEMBER 7, 2012
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/09/07/the_bunch_that_cant_shoot_straight?page=0,0
,,
The Syrian National Council claims to be the largest, the best-financed, and the most well-organized of all the various Syrian opposition coalitions. According to its own books, it has received over $25 million from Libya, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, not to mention assistance from the U.S. and the UK in the form of “non-lethal aid.”
….

Will the non-lethal “aid” return as body bags?

US sends more spies, diplomats to help organize, train and study Syria’s rebel ranks

By Associated Press, Published: September 6

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/us-sends-more-spies-diplomats-to-help-organize-train-and-study-syrias-rebel-ranks/2012/09/06/4eabe4be-f85e-11e1-a93b-7185e3f88849_story.html

WASHINGTON — The U.S. is ramping up its presence at Syria’s Turkish border, sending more spies and diplomats to help advise the rebel forces in their mismatched fight against the better armed Syrian regime, and to watch for possible al-Qaida infiltration of rebel ranks.

U.S. officials briefed on the plan said the modest surge in U.S. personnel in the past few weeks — estimated at fewer than a dozen people — has helped improve rebels’ political organizing skills as well as their military organization. The officials spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to discuss the plans publicly.
..
It’s part of a two-pronged effort by the Obama administration to bolster the rebels militarily without actually contributing weapons to the fight, and politically, to help them stave off internal power challenges by the well-organized and often better-funded hardline Islamic militants who have flowed into the country from Iraq and elsewhere in the Persian Gulf region.

Those who call the FSA terrorists are themselves terrorists.

The FSA are the best Syria has produced. They are the heroes of Syria. Syrians are fortunate to have the FSA that are fighting the regime of thugs.

On the other hand the thugs falsely parading as Syrian army, in addition to the new so-called lijjan, are terrorists. They are both the enemies of Syria along with hizbistan, the Iranian mullahs and the Russian thugs headed by Lavrov and Putin.

Syria’s friends are Turkey, France, Britain, GCC, Egypt, Yemen and Libya.

Beating up the Turks
For pushing Syrian freedom

Last Updated: 2:27 AM, September 7, 2012
Amir Taheri

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/beating_up_the_turks_fCe5QcwhOZSmfI7lea9atL

Iran — with Russia’s help — is evidently trying to punish Turkey for its support for the pro-democracy movement in Syria.

When the Syrian uprising started in 2011, Iran and Turkey contemplated working together to contain the crisis — but it soon became clear that the two were pulling in opposite directions.

Tempted by neo-Ottoman dreams and under growing pressure from Saudi Arabia and other oil-rich Arab states, Turkey began to back regime change in Syria.

Iran, facing internal divisions on how to react to the Arab Spring, at first couldn’t find a coherent Syria policy.
….
The Iran-Russia tandem was initially wary of provoking a clash with the Turks, for fear it might lead to US involvement. But once they saw that Washington wouldn’t get involved, at least not before the Nov. 6 election, they decided to teach Turkey a lesson.
…
The “lesson” has three facets.

1) Swamp Turkey with Syrian refugees. This is achieved partly by making it more difficult for Syrians to escape to Lebanon or Iraq.
…
2) Reactivate the PKK , the Kurdish Workers Party, an armed group that long fought for a Marxist state in southeastern Turkey.
….
Since February, the PKK has provoked 27 clashes, causing the death of over 800 people, a quarter of them Ankara’s soldiers. The latest clash, on Sunday, claimed 43 lives, including 10 Turkish troops.
…..
3) Economic pressure . Iran, the main source of oil and natural gas for Turkey, is scaling down supplies. It is also reducing transit trade through Turkey. Russia has meanwhile all but frozen economic cooperation with Turkey and is setting hurdles to Turkish trade with Central Asia.

A NATO member and a US ally since the 1940s, Turkey must not be left alone to fight the Irano-Russian tandem, a dark alliance out to stop the Arab Spring from liberating Syria.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/beating_up_the_turks_fCe5QcwhOZSmfI7lea9atL#ixzz25pD6HfkQ

“We are waiting for God..”. 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/07/syria-daraya-massacre-ghost-town

Syria crisis: Daraya massacre leaves a ghost town still counting its dead
….
Shortly after the events, in an extraordinary act of indecency, the pro-regime television journalist Micheline Azar, entered the town to interview the dying, sticking her microphone in front of their bloody and wounded faces. She said the killings were “in the name of freedom”. Not even children were spared her intrusions.

“It was horrific,” says Reem, a Daraya resident. “She was a vulture. She went through the crowds talking to the wounded as though she was floating on water, as though there was not this scene of hell in front of her.”
….
A woman who comes to the graveyard each day to check a list for news of her sons says: “We are still searching houses and abandoned ruins trying to find them.” She says everyone waits for the hour when the gravedigger arrives and there are new bodies to identify.

In the ashen aftermath of war, it is impossible to imagine what this place looked like before, or what really happened here. It was first bombed, the centre flattened, before house-to-house operations were conducted. Some witnesses say men and boys were killed at close range with guns; others say knives were used.
…..
“We are waiting for God, waiting for victory,” says Rashid, looking around his wasted street. “But victory doesn’t seem very soon now.”

More foreign terrorists are being sent to help prop up this failed regime.

Iran sends elite troops to aid Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria

Iran is intensifying its support for the regime of Bashar al-Assad by sending 150 senior Revolutionary Guards commanders to Syria to help repel opposition attempts to overthrow the government.

Western intelligence officials say that Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has personally sanctioned the dispatch of the experienced officers to ensure that the Assad regime, Iran’s most important regional ally, survives the threat to its survival.
In addition, Iran has shipped hundreds of tons of military equipment, including guns, rockets, and shells, to Syria through the regular air corridor that has been established between Damascus and Tehran.

Intelligence officials believe the increased Iranian support has been responsible for the growing effectiveness of the Assad regime’s tactics in forcing anti-government rebel groups on the defensive.

In the past few weeks, pro-Assad forces have seized the offensive by launching a series of well-coordinated attacks against rebel strongholds in Damascus and Aleppo.

The Iranian operation to support Mr Assad is being masterminded by Qassem Suleimani, the head of the Guards’ Quds force which is responsible for overseeing Iran’s overseas operations. The decision to increase Iran’s support for Syria was taken after the Syrian defence minister and Assad’s brother-in-law were killed in a suicide bomb attack at Syria’s national security headquarters in July, together with a number of other senior defence officials.

[…]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/9526858/Iran-sends-elite-troops-to-aid-Bashar-al-Assad-regime-in-Syria.html

Treating the children at an Aleppo hospital

By Nick Paton Walsh, CNN

Aleppo, Syria (CNN) – They are so used to seeing blood outside Dar alShifa hospital, the magnet of all suffering in Aleppo, that passersby simply walk over it, oblivious. When they mop out the building’s tiny reception area, the blood runs in small, dirty streams into the gutters. This is a hospital trying to get by day-to-day while lacking the most basic in supplies. It has itself been hit by shelling: two separate attacks have left its right side punctured with gaping holes in what was once the maternity ward.

One afternoon, a rush of the most frail and vulnerable come towards the exhausted doctors; children, some suffering from sheer terror. One is malnourished. They have cuts, bruises – but more often much worse. The government has, the doctors say, closed the main children’s hospital owing to a paperwork issue, so this is where they must come.

Mohamed is aged eight and was hit by shrapnel from regime shelling in his right leg. It shattered his femur. In Europe, surgery would mean he’s playing football again within months, but here a list of precarious challenges form. He remains quiet, brave, patient almost, as the doctors work out what to do.

The tough natural solution they hit on is a stark reminder of how desperate the task is of getting medical care to the wounded here in rebel-held territory. The government hospital has better equipment, and can probably save Mohamed’s leg. So, lifting him on the blankets they use as makeshift stretchers, they take him, bewildered and confused, into a nearby taxi to cross the front lines. His ordeal is far from over. It is perverse to know that only those who hurt him can also heal him.

[…]

http://amanpour.blogs.cnn.com/2012/09/06/treating-the-children-at-an-aleppo-hospital/

Syria – NATO FSA terrorists under The Syrian Hammer – Sep-6-2012

NATO FSA terrorists get flanked and take some heavy fire with painful results

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=093_1346978533

172

“Syria’s friends are Turkey, France, Britain, GCC, Egypt, Yemen and Libya.”

You forgot Saudi Arabia and the USA, VAT. The countries you listed above don’t even go to the W/C unless the Saudis and the Yanks say it’s okay.

Assad will have to kill some one or two million people and destroy 80 % of all syrian villages and towns in order to end this revolution. He is determined to do so. Then the only way to stop this from taking place is a Turkish-Saudi-French-GB direct attack to centres of power. Specially hitting places where leaders of the Syrian Massacre Republic of Assad are located. They have enough technology to know where they are. Come on kill them for Christ, Mahoma, Mousa and all the prohets if you cannot do it in the name of freedom and dignity. We have got enough. All the stupid people still suporting the criminal regime must know that this is over.

I am refering here to hundreds of people I know in Damascus and Aleppo who may still support the regime. You are empty brains, failure human projects, simply stupids.

Terrorists Killing Terrorists 8)

Syria rebels say they killed leader of extremist group that kidnapped 2 journalists – Sep. 07, 2012

http://www.kansascity.com/2012/09/07/3802582/syria-rebels-say-they-killed-leader.html

BAB AL HOWA, Syria — Members of one of the largest groups fighting to topple the government of President Bashar Assad two weeks ago killed the leader of an extremist band thought responsible for the kidnapping in July of two European journalists, according to rebels encamped in this town near the border with Turkey.

Members of the Farouq Battalion are hesitant to discuss the death of Abu Muhammad al Shami al Absi – “They have threatened us,” one Farouq fighter said – and the exact circumstances of his demise are unclear.

But Absi’s death appears to be the first indication of how deep the rivalries have become among rebel groups that must compete for both resources and influence with one another.

The existence of Absi’s group became public in late July when two photographers, one Dutch and one British, were freed by other rebels after spending a week as hostages. During their time as prisoners, the journalists said, members of Absi’s group threatened them with death and told them that the group intended to impose an Islamist government in Syria after Assad’s fall. Among the group’s members, the journalists said, were several apparently of Pakistani descent who spoke English with British accents, as well as members of other nationalities.

The kidnappings and the subsequent accounts from the journalists confirmed fears voiced by the United States and other would-be supporters that extremist elements were working to gain influence over the armed anti-Assad opposition.

Rebels here acknowledge Farouq’s involvement in Absi’s death, though they tell different versions of how it happened. Some describe his death as an assassination, the result of a dispute that had developed between Absi and another individual. Others said his death came as the result of a military operation mounted by Farouq and other nearby groups that had left Absi and four others dead. None said the death was in response to Western concerns.

All, however, welcomed his killing, saying they do not share Absi’s ideology and had found his group difficult to work with.

“Jihadis don’t share in fighting against the regime, because they say we are kafirs, and they won’t fight with kafirs,” said one Farouq member based here who asked to be identified only by his nom de guerre, Abu Azzam. “Jihadis” is an Arabic word for warriors that is used in reference to Islamist fighters. “Kafir” means unbeliever.

Absi’s group is known as the Mujahedin Shura Council. It participated in June in the takeover of Bab al Howa, the Syrian side of a border crossing with Turkey, and held onto the crossing until Farouq, which now largely controls it, kicked it out about two weeks ago.

“There were about 100 of them,” said Abu Azzam. After the confrontation, Absi’s group left, but it did not go very far.

“Now they are in Tal Aqbreen, the next village,” he said. “They are trying to come back and make a problem for crossing, but we will stop them again. They thought the crossing belonged to them.”

The presence of religious extremists in Syria has prompted some financial backers of the rebels to support groups that do not espouse religious ideology as a counterweight to those that do.

The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood has also funneled support to a range of groups, according to rebel leaders in Syria, including the Tawhid Battalion, which is doing much of the fighting in Aleppo, the country’s largest city.

Rumors of turf battles have surfaced before, especially as rebel groups have competed for resources and backers have competed for influence. In recent months, reports of non-Syrian Muslims fighting in the county have proliferated, the most prominent being the presence of Libyans, one of whom commands his own brigade in northern Syria.

“We cannot deny they are there, but they can be controlled for now,” said Abu Shaham, a Syrian who provides support for three battalions near the city of Hama.

[…]

http://www.kansascity.com/2012/09/07/3802582/syria-rebels-say-they-killed-leader.html

Palestinians fleeing Syria denied help in Lebanon – 7 September 2012

http://electronicintifada.net/content/palestinians-fleeing-syria-denied-help-lebanon/11652

Our great heroes of the FSA are making great strides and advancing on all fronts especially in Aleppo, Deir and many other parts of Syria,

http://www.aljazeera.net/news/pages/86d765c6-4865-4bde-8761-545d540edcd6?GoogleStatID=1

With the Grace of Allah our heroes are made victorious while the evil thugs of the criminal regime are being vanquished.

181. ANN

Right, palestinians are being denied help. But do not manipulate information as usually. All syrians are being denied assistance by a country, Lebanon, ruled by an ally or Assad Mafia and Iran Theocracy. Nobody will find refuge in Syria and Lebanon while they are ruled by crazy illuminati supported by your Russian and Iranian thuggish regimes.

This just in! The Canadian government perceives Iran to be “the most significant threat to global peace and security in the world today.”

Wow! Who saw that coming? I always thought the most significant threat was Norway. Or maybe Turkmenistan.

According to Erdogan, in Syria Sunnis are massacring Shias?

PM Erdoğan likens Syrian crisis to Karbala Massacre

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/pm-erdogan-likens-syrian-crisis-to-karbala-massacre.aspx?pageID=238&nID=29671&NewsCatID=338
ISTANBUL – Hürriyet Daily News
Criticizing the Syrian regime for the ongoing violence in the country, Erdoğan tells a religious summit: ‘What is happening [in Syria] is exactly the same as Karbala.’ AA photo

Criticizing the Syrian regime for the ongoing violence in the country, Erdoğan tells a religious summit: ‘What is happening [in Syria] is exactly the same as Karbala.’ AA photo
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has compared the current situation in Syria to the battle of Karbala that took place 1,332 years ago.

“I say it very clearly, what is happening in Syria right now is exactly the same thing as what happened in Karbala 1,332 years ago,” Erdoğan said during his opening speech at an international conference on “The Arab Awakening and Peace in the Middle East: Muslim and Christian Perspectives” held in Istanbul on Sept. 7.

“The victims might be different and the cruelty might be different here, but what is happening [in Syria] is exactly the same as Karbala.”

Syria kidnappings becoming increasing problem – September 7, 2012

“Free Syrian Army” freeing kidnap victims and kidnapping for ransom to fund uprising.

Kidnappings in Syria are becoming common for rebels fighting President Bashar al-Assad and common thugs looking for a quick dollar, The Telegraph reported.

According to the newspaper’s sources, the Free Syrian Army is trying to negotiate the release of kidnapping victims, but also stands accused of the crime itself.

The FSA is going as far as publishing a telephone number that relatives can call to ask for help.

However, others accuse the FSA of abductions to fund the uprising against Assad.

Many of the kidnappings are happening in Syria’s second city and its financial capital, Aleppo.

The Syrian Network for Human Rights confirmed kidnappings are becoming more common.

“The FSA know who the rich families are in Aleppo,” a Catholic clergyman told The Telegraph. “They watch their homes and movements.”

[…]

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/syria/120907/syria-kidnappings-fsa-hostages-epidemic

Obama seeking Jewish vote, has promised Netanyahu to put pressure on Iran so he does not attack Iran: USA’s ally, Canada withdraws its “skeleton” embassy in Iran

Netanyahu congratulates Canada
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/09/07/pol-baird-canada-iran-embassy.html

Iran hasn’t had a full ambassador in Canada since 2007, following a breakdown in relations after Iranian-Canadian photographer Zahra Kazemi was tortured and killed in Iran in 2003.

The Department of Foreign Affairs is asking Canadians in need of assistance in Iran to contact the embassy in Ankara, Turkey. Anyone who needs urgent assistance should call the department’s emergency line at 613-996-8885 or send an email to sos@international.gc.ca.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement congratulating Prime Minister Stephen Harper on the move, calling it a courageous act of leadership.

“The determination which Canada demonstrates is extremely important so that the Iranians understand that they cannot continue in their race to achieve nuclear weapons. This practical step must serve as an example to the international community [as regards to] moral standards and international responsibility,” Netanyahu said.

Zoo,

What did Zahra photographed in Iran to “deserve” skull fracture?

I am waiting for the day when fire is silenced by a new free regime. Then first thing to do will be visiting Syria from Albukamal to Kassab and from Daraa to Ain Diwar so I can personally visit all the places that witnessed what could become the most important revolution in the 21st Century, as the Bolchevik Revolution was to the modern world in the first quarter of the 20th Century. Syrian people is writing history with his blood, but their blood is not for free so words Freedom, Justice and Democracy will remain for long decades in our next constitution and in our hearts. All history books will mention the role played by the FSA and their Heroes. Assad will be reduced to garbage and eroded from the creation of modern Syria.

The bussinesmen and politician rats hiding behind Assad thugs will receive what they deserve. Maybe they ignore it but at this very same minute someone is Damascus is writing names of Shabbiha members, torture teams in Syrian prisons, Bussinessmen financing the regime, etc.

Just be prepared for what will come.

188. Tara

Nobody deserves a skull fracture…

191. ZOO

You are so politically fair. So well intentioned. Well raised. Nobody deserves a skull fracture, oh is it from Sheakspeare or from Mother Therese of Calcute?… but 30.000 people deserves death for opposing the Criminal Mafia. Pfuu ala Illah Assad.

Last time I was in Sweida it was in April 2011. One colleague explained to me what he saw inside Sweida prisons while alegedly being questioned. Now I have got knowledge that he is a moukhabaraat operator in tortures. He will probably receive bad news in the future. I do not desire any well to him. Humans can commit mistakes in life, specially children and young people, but people 40+ old years killing and torturing repeatedly is not a mistake. Their life is a whole mistake. The mistake is letting this people live.

OTTOMAN Tears 8)

Burden of Syrian Rebellion Weighs on Turkey – Friday September 7, 2012

http://www.northjersey.com/news/international/168982926_Burden_of_Syrian_Rebellion_Weighs_on_Turkey.html

Turkey is complaining that the United States and others have left it abandoned on the front line of a conflict bleeding across its border.

With its calls for an international safe haven inside Syria going nowhere, Turkey is rushing to shelter an influx of about 80,000 refugees. In the east, Kurdish militants who Turkey alleges are aided by Syria are intensifying deadly attacks. And in this Alawite-heavy border region, a rest and resupply hub for the mainly Sunni Syrian rebels, there is growing worry that Syria’s sectarian strife might infect Turkey.

Turkish officials stand behind their Syria policy, and so far the problems pose little threat to the moderately Islamist government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan or to Turkey’s carefully cultivated popularity in the region. But as opinion polls indicate declining domestic support for the government’s stance, Turkey is finding it has limited room to manage fallout that analysts say it did not anticipate when it turned against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad last year.

“Ankara now realizes that it doesn’t have the power to rearrange — forget it in the region, but also not in Syria,” said Gokhan Bacik, director of the Middle East Strategic Research Center at Turkey’s Zirve University. “So Ankara desperately needs American support. But American support is not coming.”

Turkey backtracked on a recent statement that it would close its doors at 100,000 refugees. But Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who is facing growing criticism at home, suggested regret last week over the open-door policy.

“There is an increasing sense in Turkey that, through making such a sacrifice and tackling an enormous issue all by itself, we are leading the international community to complacency and inaction,” Davutoglu said at the United Nations.

Yet even as Turkey condemns Assad, frets about a growing power vacuum in Syria and pleas for international intervention there, officials and analysts say the country has no appetite for deploying its military unilaterally, either to confront Assad or secure a refugee zone.

There is widespread public opposition in Turkey to military action, and analysts say Turkey is wary of jeopardizing its popularity in a region where the legacy of Ottoman rule remains fresh. The Turkish military is ill-prepared for what could be a prolonged, Iraq-style sectarian war, said Henri Barkey, a Turkey expert at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania.

“They realize this is a Pandora’s box that you go in and God knows how you’re going to come out,” Barkey said.

Barkey said Turkey’s 566-mile border with Syria made the conflict “a no-win situation for the Turks from the beginning.” Even so, Turkish commentators and opposition politicians have seized on the issue as a policy failure, and some analysts and U.S. officials said Turkey exacerbated its woes by limiting U.N. involvement in the camps and allowing Sunni rebels and refugees to concentrate in the largely Alawite province of Hatay.

“The government is facing a crisis for which it has no answers, and a public at home that is growing increasingly uneasy over this,” Semih Idiz, a foreign policy analyst, wrote in the Hurriyet Daily News, an English-language newspaper in Turkey. “If this is not a debacle, then what is?”

Antakya was previously a shopping destination for Syrians. Since the rebellion, it has become a base for Syrian refugees and rebels, including thickly bearded men who stand out in a town where sundresses and shorts are common. Cross-border trade has slowed, and apartment prices have spiked.

Yet support for Assad here remains strong, and there is simmering anxiety that Erdogan, the prime minister, is supporting the Syrian rebellion to cement Sunni supremacy in the region. The fears have been stoked by Turkey’s main opposition party, which has accused the government of training radical Islamists in a nearby camp for defectors. The government denies that and says it has not armed rebels.

“They’re shaping some new religious fighters. What is the guarantee those fighters would not fight back against Turkey some day?” said Refik Eryilmaz, an opposition parliamentarian from Hatay, which hosts five refugee camps.

But tensions are festering. In interviews, Antakyans readily complained about Syrian rebels ditching restaurant tabs or robbing women of their jewelry, though none could cite personal experience. Last weekend, several thousand people protested against Turkey’s participation in what was described as an imperialist plot against Syria. Some said all rebels must leave Turkey.

“They are saying, ‘After we finish in Syria, we will cut your throats here,’ ” said Ali Zafer, 33, a teacher who said he supports Assad, describing one common rumor about the rebels. Turkey, he said, “especially brought them to Antakya, to kill Alawites.”

[…]

http://www.northjersey.com/news/international/168982926_Burden_of_Syrian_Rebellion_Weighs_on_Turkey.html?c=y&page=3

Zoo

Welcome to the Islamic Republic of Iran:  Do you really not know the story?  

Traveling back to her birth country using her Iranian passport, Kazemi was allowed into Iran to take photographs of the possible demonstrations that were expected to take place in Tehran in July, 2003. The demonstrations did materialize but were effectively crushed after the sixth day by a massive deployment of security forces and paramilitary vigilantes, or “plainclothesmen.” Following the clampdown, an estimated 4000 students “had gone missing” and were thought to have been arrested for protesting and taken to Evin prison, Tehran’s political prisoner detention facility. As was customary after such events, family members of the missing gathered outside of Evin prison in north Tehran in hopes of learning what had happened to their children. On June 23, 2003, Kazemi drove to the prison to take pictures of these family members, possessing a government-issued press card that she thought made it permissible for her to work around Tehran, including at Evin.

According to Shirin Ebadi – an Iranian lawyer and former judge who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003, and later became the main representative of Kazemi’s family at the trial over Kazemi’s death – when a prison staff member saw Kazemi taking photographs he demanded that she give him her camera, as photography is prohibited in front of the prison.
Worried that officials might harass the families whose photos she had already taken, she flashed her press card and exposed the film to the light. The guard angrily yelled at her, ‘I didn’t ask you to expose your film, I told you to give me your camera’ ‘You can have the camera’, she retorted, ‘but the film belongs to me.’ She was detained, and was interrogated over the next three days by police officers, prosecutors, and intelligence officials.

The story did not become a major controversy until almost two years later, when Shahram Azam, a former staff physician in Iran’s Defence Ministry, released a statement saying, he examined Kazemi in hospital, four days after her arrest and found obvious signs of torture, including:

Evidence of a very brutal rape
A skull fracture, two broken fingers, missing fingernails, a crushed big toe and a broken nose.
Severe abdominal bruising, swelling behind the head and a bruised shoulder.
Deep scratches on the neck and evidence of flogging on the legs.

Read more…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zahra_Kazemi

Turkey may loose its success because of its foreign policy.

‘Turkey needs to grab bull by the horns on foreign policy’

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/turkey-needs-to-grab-bull-by-the-horns-on-foreign-policy.aspx?pageID=238&nID=29640&NewsCatID=338

ISTANBUL – Hürriyet Daily News
Turkey achieved a foreign policy miracle in the last decade but the aura of this success has been fading fast in the last two years, an international relations professor says. The country needs to grab the bull by the horns and alter its course, as many believe it is fanning the fires of regional polarization, says Kemal Kirişçi

Ankara succeeded in becoming a regional player that was a force for dialogue over the past 10 years, but its foreign policy has lost its luster as Turkey has come to be seen as a divisive actor, according to a Turkish professor.

“There is a feeling that Turkey is encouraging a polarization along Shiite-Sunni lines in the Middle East. We may cry at the top of our lungs that this is not what we are doing, but this is what the world thinks, and we cannot keep blaming the world,” said Kemal Kirişçi, an international relations professor.
“We need to take a look in the mirror,” he told the Hürriyet Daily News this week.

Syrian troops repel militia attack on army barrack in Aleppo – 2012-09-07

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2012-09/07/c_131835416.htm

DAMASCUS, Sept. 7 (Xinhua) — Syrian troops repelled Friday an attack by armed groups that attempted to assault the Hanano barrack in northern Aleppo province, the pro-government Addounia TV said.

The Syrian troops have inflicted hefty toll among the assailants, the TV said.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2012-09/07/c_131835416.htm

Tara,

People still supporting the regime are those who have something invested in it.

This means they continue to enjoy some form of privileges, status, security, financial advantage or whatever at the expense of others and don’t want to give it up.

They are a micro version of what is keeping the Assads determined not to yield.

And now, after what the regime has done to Syrian people and property, they are also living with bizarre rationalizations and false hope.

They can only operate with a broken sense of what is civilized, rational and normal.

The real world feels alien to them.

Without delusions and playing games on forums like this they would be lost.

Tara

I do not want to excuse the treatment that Zahra Kazemi got during her trip in Iran.
She is a dual nationality Canadian-Iranian journalist. Yet when she entered in Iran with an Iranian passport, she lied about her profession and said she was coming to see her family. She went on to take photographs in front of the largest prison in Teheran, the Evin prison, an extremely sensitive area, without permission. When she got caught taking photos, she burned them and resisted her arrest. She was immediately assumed to be a spy.
In the USA, she would have been submitted to waterboarding or other sophisticated psychological tortures the CIA is famous for.
She was probably tortured to reveal the names of her accomplices, we do not really know the truth as we don’t know the truth about all ‘terrorists’ and ‘spies’ that the USA caught and tortured in Iraq. She probably did not survive the torture.

Iran is at war with the USA and Israel. There has been many murders of scientifics in Iran and Iran has accused Israel and the USA for this. Anyone doing illegal activities is suspected to be a spy.
If she was not really a spy, which we do not know either, it is unfortunate that Kazemi took such useless risks in provocating the Iranian police authorities to make a journalistic scoop, maybe too confident that being a Canadian, she would be immune.

200

“it is unfortunate that Kazemi took such useless risks in provocating the Iranian police authorities.”

You are such a pantload, Zoo. You stink in your own nostrils. And by the way, it’s “provoking, ” not “provocating.” Learn the language, okay?

Afra Jalabi a prominent non-violence advocate, member of the SNC and one of 50 people working on the “Day after plan” is interviewed by Deutsche Welle.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WnEQ_HpxPM

I really hope Dr. Landis can bring her interview to more prominence in the next post.

In the interview for those that won’t or cant watch it she explains how 5 years ago she was part of a group that approached the regime to bring about “A gradual transition into democracy” without a revolution, the regime obviously rejected that.

A few excerpts that I transcribed quickly:

It is really in the hands of Syrians, it is through their sacrifice and their determination and the incredible willingness to give so much blood and lives that is really bringing about the change

The host brings up her history in the non-violence movement and asks her bluntly whether she is with or against the armed struggle to topple Bashar:

It is happening, I support the Syrian struggle that is why I have been supporting the civil rights movement in Syria, I am more involved in the non-violence movement in Syria that is still struggling to keep its voiced heard because even if there is an armed struggle you’ll still need the civil elements which will actually help in rebuilding the country because we dont want to fall again into a military dictatorship

Compare this lady to the female mouth pieces of the regime from the BS Doctor to Reem “the refugees are just visiting their families in Turkey” Haddad…

FP: Turkish Dilemma

Turkey’s voluble prime minister has talked himself into a corner on Syria. Will the spiraling unrest next door finally force him to back up his words?

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/09/06/turkish_dilemma
..
Erdogan complains that he has received little support from Turkey’s allies. On Sept. 5, he told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour that the United States “lacked initiative” in dealing with the crisis in Syria. “There are certain things being expected from the United States. The United States had not yet catered to those expectations,” he said. “Maybe it’s because of the pre-election situation.”
….
He has pushed Turkey, which is 99 percent Muslim, in a more socially conservative direction, sparking controversy in May by calling for restrictions on abortion, equating it with murder. For years, he has faced liberal criticism over his endorsement of headscarves, worn by his wife and daughters.
….
In Istanbul’s trendier cafes, it has become a source of amusement. Socially liberal Turks joke that the volume of the daily call to prayer has been turned up to unconscionable levels in a misguided attempt to get non-observant Muslims to pay attention.

Combined with his support for a predominantly Sunni uprising in Syria, the effect has been to cast Erdogan as a figure bent on imposing his religious views across not only his own country, but the entire Middle East.
…
As these issues come to a head, Erdogan will be faced with a tough decision: Intervene and risk the wrath of his electorate, or stand by and watch as Syria explodes in his face. In the meantime, Erdogan’s tightrope will grow thinner and wobblier.

Is Silentio the reincarnation of a talkative old SC commenter in Homs who spent half his posts correcting English language mistakes made by bloggers.
What was the nickname of that weirdoz?
Wasn’t Abboud?

Zoo,

“She is a dual nationality Canadian-Iranian journalist. Yet when she entered in Iran with an Iranian passport”

That is because Iran does not recognize dual citizenships, as such even if she tried entering with her Canadian passport the embassy in Ottawa would not issue a Visa because she has an Iranian passport.

“she lied about her profession and said she was coming to see her family. She went on to take photographs in front of the largest prison in Teheran”

No she did not if you happened to actually read what Tara linked you would’ve seen this bit about the circumstances for her arrest:

Worried that officials might harass the families whose photos she had already taken, she flashed her press card and exposed the film to the light. The guard angrily yelled at her, ‘I didn’t ask you to expose your film, I told you to give me your camera’ ‘You can have the camera’, she retorted, ‘but the film belongs to me.’ She was detained, and was interrogated over the next three days by police officers, prosecutors, and intelligence officials

May I ask, why sully and blame the dead victim? Is it so hard to admit that the Iranian regime is run by a bunch of thugs, or is it too close to home for if you admit that about the Iranian regime it would force you to think likewise about the Assadi regime?

Zoo

The only difference is that the US does not treat their own citizens that way. They will subject foreign citizens to water boarding and other method of torture but never their own. Exactly the opposite takes place in Iran and Arab countries.

It was her curse to have been born Iranian. If she was just a Canadian, she may have been imprisoned but not tortured. She may have been alive right now. The sad truth is that we are worth nothing in the eyes of our dictators..

Son of Damascus,

Blaming the victim is a symptom of rationalizing out of discomfit with the truth.

It’s a reflex action we’re recently seeing a lot of on this forum.

#205 SOD

Kazemi is the only case in Iran of a ‘journalist’ who died while in custody.

Is Turkey a brutal regime?

Quick: What country jails the most journalists?

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2012/03/turkeys-jailed-journalists.html

If you guessed China, you were close, but no cigar. Twenty-seven reporters are in prison there, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists in New York. If you guessed Iran, you’re getting warmer—forty-two in prison there—but you’re still off.

How many of you guessed Turkey?

Measuring strictly in terms of imprisonments, Turkey—a longtime American ally, member of NATO, and showcase Muslim democracy—appears to be the most repressive country in the world.

According to the Journalists Union of Turkey, ninety-four reporters are currently imprisoned for doing their jobs.

Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2012/03/turkeys-jailed-journalists.html#ixzz25q6TFmTt

I was expecting the usual cliche: “Blaming the victim”…

Was this journalist surely an innocent victim? I do not know, neither you.
She may have been a CIA or an Mossad spy. They don’t wear a badge, you know.

Zoo@209

She may have….but surely, the interrogators who committed torture and rendered her dead from skull fracture after 4 days of her arrest did not know for sure either, yet without this knowledge, they raped, tortured, and killed.

Zoo,

“Was this journalist surely an innocent victim?”

Even if she was a spy having your skull bashed in and raped is not excusable what so ever. And bringing Turkey into the discussion is just distracting from the fact that you keep blaming the victim.

In no world or circumstance is rape and murder correct, blaming the victim of rape for the crime committed on her/him is not something someone should just brush off as “cliche”…

My goodness you hold the opposition to such high standards yet rape is a cliche for you, in what world does this make sense I don’t know.

SyriaLover,

Even when I know what the answer might be, I can’t help but ask.

Zoo said:

“I do not want to excuse the treatment that Zahra Kazemi got during her trip in Iran.”

So why do it?

Ask yourself what’s compelling you. Get help.

Alawi militias will have access to heavy weapons as soon as the need for those weapons emerge, this is the dirty reality of civil war,those militias will also move to offense the same way the FSA did, that is another dirty reality of civil war. One tragic result of moving the uprising to this level is that there will be too many victims to compensate and too many criminals to prosecute, the blood of innocent victims may be spilled for nothing, that what happened in Lebanon. Go back to SC year old posts and read what many have said about the illusion of violence and the inevitable destruction of the hearts and minds it brings to all. Syrians are not dumb, they are just consumed by anger and vengeance and many lost the ability to see beyond their nose or think outside the box,it took Lebanese 15 years to realize that they were wrong, I hope Syrians discover how destructive this war has become and wake up before 2026.
Tara, it is well established now that all developed nations torture or help torture citizens who are labelled as terrorists or terrorists sympathizers, there were also a number of citizens from those nations who were assassinated or imprisoned without due process, this is not to say that developed nations are equally guilty as oppressive regime in the Middle East, we are still the kings of human rights abuse
( source: me, I hope atheist can relax now)

http://www.alquds.co.uk/index.asp?fname=today%5C07z498.htm&arc=data%5C2012%5C09%5C09-07%5C07z498.htm
It looks like the Syrian government had a plan-B when it came to boycotting its Sat. Channels.
Where is plan-B to end this bloody mess?

Wrong, menhebakji number 204. Ha! When I want to post here, I’ll do so under this name. Too many Abboud’s on the Internet. But only one Amjad of Arabia. Thanks to a regular reader who let me know that menhebakjis still dream of me. It’s a very potent power to have, to be able to torment Qurdahans without even being here.

So, your prethident admitted his “dethithive” battle was a big flop, and that the war is going to take a long time? Tsk tsk, and he hasn’t even managed to retake Aleppo yet. What new areas is he going to give up now he’s lost the Kurdish ones? Maybe the Druze will get their areas in time for Eid.

Keeping a family tradition:
http://www.alquds.co.uk/index.asp?fname=today%5C07z493.htm&arc=data%5C2012%5C09%5C09-07%5C07z493.htm
What about Majouj of arabistan as a nick name?
( that was a joke, aoa)

Genocide in Syria

This week Ireland’s Junior Foreign Minister, Joe Costello, visited Syrian refugee camps in Jordon. When he was there he may have heard the word atfal; Arabic for children. Genocide, the word politicians hate to hear, is the other word he might have heard. Genocide is happening now in Syria. Criteria appear to be met solely, but not exclusively, on Article 2 Section (e) of the Genocide Convention which focuses on children.

Adopted by the UN’s General Assembly on December 9, 1948, Article 2 of the Genocide Convention states, “genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group such as: (a) killing members of the group; (b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group (c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or part; (d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; and (e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”
Six respected organizations have documented evidence of Section (e) committed by Assad’s state military against its own child-civilian population. Syria qualifying as genocide under Section (e) distinguishes Assad’s regime from other modern mass atrocities, such as Bosnia or Rwanda. Children are often collateral damage but Assad’s deliberately targeting children makes Syria “disturbingly unique.”

War Child UK released, Syria: A War on Childhood, documenting how Assad’s forces take children from their parents, schools and communities and transfer these children to detention centers or military units for use as human shields. The children are brutally tortured, raped, and murdered. “Children and young people have been summarily massacred; illegally detained; sexual abused; used in combat; abducted and tortured; denied schooling and access to humanitarian aid; and deliberately targeted in violent attacks.”

In November 2011 the UN’s Human Commissioner for Human Rights (HRHC) presented a detailed report on Syria. Over 223 people were interviewed. Anal rape of young boys, the summary execution of a two year old girl, and the severe torture of young children resulting in death were all documented. In March the High Commissioner said, “They have gone for the children… in huge numbers. Hundreds detained and tortured… it’s just horrendous.” In June the Commission released a second report documenting the massacre in Al-Houla were children and women were executed in their homes. In Homs parents were forced to watch the rape of their daughters.

[…]

http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/foreign-policy/246709-genocide-in-syria

So many naivity around here. Obviously brainwashed by the ‘clean’ countries you live in.

All ‘democratic’ governments are responsible for horrible crimes in the human history, the only differences is that they have the means and the power to hide them or excuse then as war of the Good versus the Evil and it is a sufficient justification for you.
Bush and Blair are criminals, they are responsible for the death of more people that Saddam ever killed.
Yet they are invited to give conferences and advise other government. They are ‘clean’.
Guantanamo is a shame for humanity, yet it is viewed as justified in the ‘war’ on terror.
When an adventurous journalist is killed in a Iranian prison, that’s a high level crime, just because Iran is ‘evil’.

Give me a break with this infantile self-righteous preaching.

عبد الباري عطوان
ع راسي حارتك
http://www.alquds.co.uk/index.asp?fname=today%5C07z999.htm&arc=data%5C2012%5C09%5C09-07%5C07z999.htm

Amjad ( Abboud reincarnated from Homs to Arabia)

Prepare yourself, you’ll find a strong competition with Silentio in watching English vocabulary and grammar mistakes.

Zoo #219 said: “Give me a break with this infantile self-righteous preaching”

No, no YOU give US a break. Be fair.

It’s funny that your statement is followed by a rush of infantile self-righteous preaching.

Nothing is more infantile than trying to make a moral equivalent between elected leaders from western democracies and Saddam Hussein, Assad and the Mullahs.

And if some people here are brainwashed by “clean” countries, you are demonstrating that others can be even more seriously brainwashed by “dirty” countries. Or rather, “dirty regimes”, not the suffering citizens of Iran, Syria and Russia who you seem to disregard.

Read and research, that’s the cure I keep recommending.

219

“Bush and Blair are criminals, they are responsible for the death of more people that Saddam ever killed.”

How do you know, Zoo? Do you have the numbers? Did you do a body count? Personally, I think Saddam killed more. First there’s all the Iraqi Shias he killed over his 30 years in power. Then there was the 8 year war with Iran (Iran says it lost a million dead). Then there was Saddam’s war on the Kurds (the Anfal Campaign). Then there was the invasion of Kuwait. Add up all the dead and Saddam probably killed more than B & B.

You see, Zoo, whenever a phony intellectual poser like you trots out a statement like “B & B killed more than Saddam” I say, Prove it. Give us the numbers. And you know what? You can’t. Because you don’t know. To you, it’s all just so much hot air.

But nice try, Zoo. You took some flak for your patently stupid defense of the Iranian torture and murder of the Canadian lady, so like a coward, you fall back on your old tried and true, “B & B killed more people than Saddam” which has nothing to do with anything we were talking about. You fall back on B & B, instead of being a real man and apologizing for your stupidity.

Remember this. Stupid men don’t apologize. They just keep on being stupid.

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs
September 2012

The Destruction of Syria

By Patrick Seale
http://www.wrmea.org/archives/515-washington-report-archives-2011-2015/september-2012/11356-the-destruction-of-syria.html

Once one of the most solid states in the Middle East and a key pivot of the regional power structure, Syria is now facing wholesale destruction. The consequences of the unfolding drama are likely to be disastrous for Syria’s territorial integrity, for the well-being of its population, for regional peace, and for the interests of external powers deeply involved in the crisis.

The most immediate danger is that the fighting in Syria, together with the current severe pressure being put on Syria’s Iranian ally, will provide the spark for a wider conflagration from which no one will be immune.

How did it come to this? Every actor in the crisis bears a share of responsibility. Syria is the victim of the fears and appetites of its enemies, but also of its own leaders’ mistakes.

With hindsight, it can be seen that President Bashar al-Assad missed the chance to reform the tight security state he inherited in 2000 from his father. Instead of recognizing—and urgently addressing—the thirst for political freedoms, personal dignity and economic opportunity which were the message of the “Damascus Spring” of his first year in power, he screwed the lid down ever more tightly.

Suffocating controls over every aspect of Syrian society were reinforced, and made harder to bear by the blatant corruption and privileges of the few and the hardships suffered by the many. Physical repression became routine. Instead of cleaning up his security apparatus, curbing police brutality and improving prison conditions, he allowed them to remain as gruesome and deplorable as ever.
…..

Zoo,

“So many naivity around here. Obviously brainwashed by the ‘clean’ countries you live in.”

So it takes western brainwashed naivety to condemn the torture, rape, and murder of an innocent woman just because she took pictures?

Tell me Zoo does it takes brainwashed naivety to condemn this:

“Children and young people have been summarily massacred; illegally detained; sexual abused; used in combat; abducted and tortured; denied schooling and access to humanitarian aid; and deliberately targeted in violent attacks.”

Or should I believe that these children might be agents of the Mossad therefore they deserved this?

Further disturbing evidence that you would brush off as a cliche:

One witness from the Latakia state torture center said “one boy came into the cell bleeding from behind. He couldn’t walk. It was something they just did to the boys.”

Where is your outrage Zoo? You say Bush and Blaire killed so many people, well the Assad regime has accomplished something not seen in modern history:

Syria qualifying as genocide under Section (e) distinguishes Assad’s regime from other modern mass atrocities, such as Bosnia or Rwanda. Children are often collateral damage but Assad’s deliberately targeting children makes Syria “disturbingly unique.”

Maybe I am “brainwashed” by western ideals, but this kind of evilly is beyond monstrous, I have no clue how anyone can just ignore this…

http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/foreign-policy/246709-genocide-in-syria

#223 Smart Silentio

Why didn’t the USA ever published the number of killed Iraqis? Too afraid to show the horrors they have committed.

If you have no counter argument than stupid and arrogant insults, keep spitting them, maybe you’ll get some relief of your ailing brain.

I wonder what Bronco and Irritated think about Zoo’s justification for the use of rape to interrogate prisoners. It would be great if we could have a meeting of minds to argue when rape should be used as a coercive tool. Obviously raping someone who took photographs and then exposed the film to light is a no-brainer, but should the entire family be raped just to be sure?

Biden: Romney ready for war with Syria, Iran… if…

By PHILIP ELLIOTT | Associated Press – Sun, Sep 2, 2012

http://news.yahoo.com/biden-romney-ready-war-syria-iran-195714873–election.html

YORK, Pa. (AP) — Vice President Joe Biden said Sunday that Republican rival Mitt Romney is “ready to go to war in Syria and Iran” while hurting the middle class.
…
Romney has said he would consider military action in Syria if the war-torn country’s chemical weapons were at risk of falling into the wrong hands. Obama, who has opposed military action in Syria, has made similar remarks, calling it a “red line” for the U.S. if Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime were to use chemical or biological weapons.

And like Obama, Romney has said the U.S. must keep all options on the table, including a military strike, when dealing with Iran. But Romney has suggested that Obama has been too soft on Iran and — without offering specifics himself — said he would prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

Several people are jumping on your case, Zoo. I can see that you’re not handling it very well. Not used to being criticized, eh? Too bad about that.

Halabi,

Yeah what’s happened to Bronco?

Irritated is hardly here, Syria No Kandahar and Alan seem to have quit and the formidable Jad is now down to fleeting occasional visits, if that.

Zoo is clearly carrying a lonely burden, battling long and hard without relief. “Ann” doesn’t count – a very poor performer.

I wonder why those others have abandoned Zoo in his valiant struggle. He’s no quitter, I have to hand it to him.

Maybe one day all might be revealed.

Have the other combatants sneaked off and defected, leaving Zoo alone in the garrison with no reserves?

The ebb and flow of battle. Just like inside Syria.

Re. the nonsense in #167:

“Syrian Arab Army has suddenly turned anti-Muslim and anti-Sunni”
http://freehalab.wordpress.com/2012/09/08/syrian-arab-army-has-suddenly-turned-anti-muslim-and-anti-sunni/

@20
We have built Syria as you see it with our own hands and eyes for the last 49 years.

you have built nothing, what you have done is robbing a great country of its real potential and placing what was once a rising economy into the worst of the worst lists starting from economic performance passing through the list of terrorist states and not ending with the list of worst human right violators

Now you and your buffoon athad are not content with having stunted the growth of a wonderful country are burning it and destroying the little development the great people of syria managed to attain, despite of you.

Contemptible, that is how history will mention you.
For every child your bombs have mutilated… history will curse you
For every free man and woman you have tortured… history will curse you
For every hard working Syrian you robbed… history will curse you
And for every dream you prostituted at the feet of tyrants… history will simply place you where you belong, among the traitors of their nations for what you have done is nothing less than treason.

231

Yup, they defected.

And poor Zooey, at heart a pom pom girl for the Assads, will soldier on, holding down the fort, until they pry that RPG from his cold, dead hands.

@15
Anyone to stop this madness ?

Could be, if someone from Athad Commandoth wakes up and realizes that all it takes is to place 20 grams of lead where the madness lies, between two blue eyes.

I am sure that as a rational person, you have thought that such is a possible solution, even for a split second.

@ 231.
Have the other combatants sneaked off and defected, leaving Zoo alone in the garrison with no reserves?

No, they have not, scorpions can survive even nuclear fall out. I think they are simply running out of sources for cut and paste so it takes longer to accumulate enough of their garbage. But wait a little and you will see you know who coming up with a blitzkrieg of rotten articles from all the intellectual and journalistic brothels that character likes to frequent.

Hamster
It is all nice in your black and white world. Anyone who has defected is “an angel”, isn’t it? Soon you’ll have more regime members on the angels side, uh? What else but silence and grief can you express in front of this Pakistanisation, Lebanization, Mexicanization (and Iraqization, as far as the Christians are concerned) of your country?

Ghufran @214

Don’t you worry, man, I’m cool. I can see when the words are your own and when they are “borrowed”, from a mile away, despite my old and tired eyes 😉

Now to the first part of 214: you keep saying that the Syrian People need to wake up, you make it sound as if they have a choice. OK, let’s follow that line of argument: the armed opposition lays down its arms en masse, that’s it no more shooting. So you’re telling me that the Assadists will immediately withdraw the tanks and the planes and order the troops back to their barracks? Did they do any of the sort in the first few days of the Annan Plan, even as a minimal expression of good faith?

Ghufran, I want this madness to stop as much as you or any other concerned Syrian or lover of Syria does, but I fear that you continue to talk and write as if the Assadists are the wronged party in this whole sordid affair, while in fact they are the very cause of the problem and the initiators of violence and killing. Can a leopard change its spots after 42 years of ruling the jungle? (Bad analogy, I must admit, leopards are magnificent creatures that don’t kill, imprison and torture for power and fortune!) Let me try this: you think an executioner or a torturer will lay down his tools of the trade, hug his victims and accept to be governed by laws and rules the victims promulgate, laws that strip him of his special powers to instill fear and terror in the hearts and minds of all around him? Like hell he will!

Just read the bits of Seale’s article above. The Assadist Mafiosi and Associates are not capable of reform, Ghufran. And for the rebels to lay down their arms is to sign their own death warrants and to also tell the civilians around them to go put their heads back under the big Assadist boot.

If you have a good plan, do share it with us. The only plan I can think of is for the AsMAA to take their loot and bugger off to the mountains north of Tehran. I hear the skiing is good there in winter.

BTW, for Zoo to post the above sections of Seale’s article is a bit surprising actually; maybe he’s trying to atone for his faux pas re the Iranian/Canuck journo?

@237

BS and you know it. Your grief is fake and your silence is an elitist response to a catastrophe of the making of your ideological kins who screwed up historical opportunities to make something out of their nations after independence and opted to create and support totalitarian rigid regimes based on torture, corruption, and murder under the guise of nationalism and resistance. You have it easy, let the low class shabee7a and baltajees do the dirty work and set yourself too high to get in the trenches with them, sure, they are cheap cannon fodder for you and your “intellectual” griefstruck friends. You worry about iraqazation but don\’t see the destruction of lives , en mass, being committed by this filthy regime?… how dishonest can one get.

More Christians left Syria one after the other during the heydays of your two subjects of idolization and worship, who had/has no qualm using them, as they used everyone, including morally challenged, self important fascist leaning lefties left-over such as yourself to cement this filthy clan\’s wealth and brutal rule. They have worked so diligently to corrupt all of the spiritual leadership of all sects as well as the political leadership of the left and to isolate it from their surrounding, and gave them the scraps along with huge dozes of fear from their brethren.

Hamster you said something about Syria’s economic potential having been wasted. It may well be so, but then which Arab country can be described as having realized this potential? (those with oil windfalls excluded of course)

To further re-inforce my note above I would like to refer Ghufran and everyone else to Maysaloon’s latest blog entry; so well written, I’m jealous (in a good, brotherly way). In fact, I don’t think I could have come close to expressing it as clearly or eloquently:

http://www.maysaloon.org/2012/09/syrian-summary.html

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 01, 2012

The Syrian Summary

Well we’ve finally arrived at a civil war, and no I don’t think that this was avoidable or an accident. It is a deliberate policy and gamble by Assad to hold on to a sliver of power. Reforms were always out of the question because the slightest slip would have spelled the end of his family’s grip on power. Let us be clear about it, this is one family’s grip on a country, not a party’s, not a minority’s, but one family only and with its barons and loyal core of supporters. Assadism is the litmus test upon which you can test the revolutionary credentials of the artificial opposition that is sprouting domestically. These smart suited and highly educated technocrats with their talk of reform and convenient focus on only the transgressions of the regime’s opponents never openly criticize or call for the overthrow of Assad. They have permission to tear the regime to shreds (verbally, of course) but the person of Bashar al Assad is inviolable, and the mere mention of his name in a way that could be construed – even remotely – to be a criticism is avoided.

Assad Lobbyists

It is these acolytes that we see on television and at debates on Syria in the West. They are never representing Syria in any “official” capacity, instead they are members of various “societies” that purport to be friends of Syria in this or that country. Playing the role of devil’s advocate, they…
.
.
.
Civil War and Feudalism

Today the future of Syria is being decided with guns. The use of weapons, and the turning of Syria into a battleground, is the only reasonable route that Assad could ever have taken. By going to war Assad can mobilize his powerful international backers, he can take advantage of the confusion to paralyse international efforts, and, by radicalizing his victims through brutality, he can justify the violence that he instigated…
.
.
.

What happened to Miss peggy words that Assad’s days are numbered! I think she will be out before Assad. The uncivilty of the Syrians in this dirty war proves that arabs need to be ruled by boots nt by democracy. Most of the defection if not all are guided by financial motive

Hamster,
I told you a year ago that I am afraid of people who consider that shouting “yeah yeah kill kill” on FB and Twitter is equivalent to a political stance.
You never wonder why Obama didn’t close Guantanamo? Why the US didn’t support the Palestinian bid at the UN last year?
Enjoy: http://videos.arte.tv/fr/videos/la-face-cachee-du-petrole-1-2–6894478.html
(sorry, only French and German versions available)

D-a-l-e,

Have you noticed that despite all the insults you uttered against Zoo, he refrained from reciprocate? Does that tell you anything?

Can you please refrain from insulting people and calling them names? It is not cool.

Hamster, please when you have a chance, explain me why it is elitist to say “cautious guys, it will end up as in Lebanon and Iraq; play it smart, if indeed Maher killed Hariri he is certainly not going to stay quiet at home and wait until someone comes and arrest him.”
But we’ve seen every single person who dared put it doubt the sincerity of the Qataris and Saudis attacked personally, so why discuss anything with people who cannot get out of a teenager mentality?
Just an example of someone who has been regularly attacked for presenting elements annoying for both sides of the conflit:
http://angryarab.blogspot.de/2012/09/syrian-revolution-webpage-as-vile-and.html
There is no point to discuss a civil war. As said here before, you don’t stop a civil war without seating at the negociation table. Sorry for the Twitter fans of Avaaz’s Dr “Too little too late”.

MINA,

While you are a consistent promoter of the blog by “Angry Arab”, you are consistently angry about Arabs in general.

You remain relentlessly critical, negative and pessimistic about the Middle East and anyone connected with it.

But also about the West.

It’s a real mystery what dog you have in which fight.

Zoo @219

“All ‘democratic’ governments are responsible for horrible crimes in the human history, the only differences is that they have the means and the power to hide them or excuse then as war of the Good versus the Evil and it is a sufficient justification for you.
Bush and Blair are criminals, they are responsible for the death of more people that Saddam ever killed.
Yet they are invited to give conferences and advise other government. They are ‘clean’.
Guantanamo is a shame for humanity, yet it is viewed as justified in the ‘war’ on terror.
When an adventurous journalist is killed in a Iranian prison, that’s a high level crime, just because Iran is ‘evil’.”
—–

You were severely attacked and this point was entirely missed.  And to be fair to you, I don’t think you meant to excuse the Mullah’s case torturing and killing Zahra.  You have already stated that no one deserves a skull fracture.
 
I agree with you on #219.  Bush, Blair, etc are as criminal as the Iranian regime and responsible for many more crimes in term of the sheer number of casualties.  Iran and the Arab dictators use savage ways to torture and kill, whereas the civilized West uses sophisticated methods.  Iran and the Arab dictators would kill as much if they can.  They absolutely are comfortable killing massive number of people if the can.  The motive is different though.  For the west, it is to maintain the interests of their own people.  For our dictators, it is to hold on the chair.   
Now which motive do you prefer?

ZOO is just a lowlife shabbiha who needs a hard tight slap across his face by an FSA commander to make him come to his senses.

Whereas for people like HASSAN et. al, thank God AK 47 bullets can peirce the skin of most human beings.

Where are Assad’s commandos HASSAN ? Why haven’t they been able to crush the FSA yet ?

2 – Bashar al-Assad is like Slobodan Milosevic: He is not. This opinion, which is based on an intellectual laziness similar to the leftist tendency to regard every authoritarianism as “fascism,” confuses firing against armed opponents and people with genocide. Bashar al-Assad is a dictator, but he is not a genocide-maker. He is not any worse than Mubarak or George Bush. Actually, Bush caused more deaths.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/seven-syrian-myths.aspx?pageID=238&nID=29131&NewsCatID=396

Tara said: “Bush, Blair, etc are as criminal as the Iranian regime and responsible for many more crimes in term of the sheer number of casualties”

Careful, you are falling into a trench with Zoo. You live in the west and come across as too educated and thoughtful to be doing that.

If you are into sheer numbers, the Iran-Iraq war killed many hundreds of thousands and was economic suicide for Iran.

BUT you very right and insightful when you say: “The motive is different though. For the west, it is to maintain the interests of their own people. For our dictators, it is to hold on the chair.”

B & B led democratic countries that voted to put their soldiers on the ground and go to war. They did it after intensive and inclusive debate and negotiations in their parliamentary systems, investing manpower and resources as agreed by their citizens.

They didn’t terrorize their own people, forcibly enlist them in fights or sponsor terrorist attacks abroad.

And they didn’t hold onto personal power by the gun and get into foreign disasters without the informed consent of their own people.

Tara

It seems that many of the bullies on this SC have nothing else to do except bashing anyone who dare come with an argument or dare disagree with their fixed obsession. They read what they want to read with their twisted interpretation and use insults as often as I guess they must use in their daily life to shut any free opinion…
It’s no use to even try a discussion with them.
Therefore they can bark as they want, I will just skip their posts, something I should have done long time ago as it is depressing to read boring and aggressive posts that only show their short-sightedness and their infantile behavior. It is convincing me more everyday that most of the anti-regime on this Blog are like the SNC, polluted, full of prejudice, self-righteous, often megalomaniac, stubborn, vulgar and ultimately worse than the present regime.
Ironically the pro-regime on this blog are the ones who are bringing useful press information and try to bring some sanity on this blog.
When I read the specimens of bitter Syrian expats on this Blog, I am not surprised that the opposition is a mess and that Syria is on a brink of the chaos they are aiming at.
So long..

Syria Lover, Antoine, SOD, Silentio and the other bullies

Keep bashing, barking and insulting. If anything else, at least, you’re good at that.

Avoiding a sectarian split in the Middle East

By James Jeffrey, Published: September 7

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/avoiding-a-sectarian-split-in-the-middle-east/2012/09/07/c7420c5c-f901-11e1-8398-0327ab83ab91_story.html

James Jeffrey, a visiting fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, served as ambassador to Iraq and to Turkey in the Obama administration

The sense that Assad’s days are numbered has prompted worries that militant Sunni extremists might claw their way to the top in Damascus. A greater and related danger, however, is that the uprising will degenerate into a Sunni-Shiite conflict that could spread beyond Syria’s borders and further destabilize the Middle East.
…
Already, reports are mounting that sectarian violence is commonplace in Syria and beginning to take hold in neighboring Lebanon. The Iranians and Assad have done their part to aggravate the problem by stoking fears among Iraqi Shiites and other Shiite groups about the consequences of a Sunni triumph in Syria.

But even without Iranian meddling, the danger is urgent. For Iraqi Shiites, the birth of the Shiite-Sunni split is as vivid as if it had happened yesterday. In fact, the divide began in Kabala more than 13 centuries ago, when forces from what is now Syria, who became Islam’s Sunni branch, put to the sword the prophet Mohammed’s grandson Hussein and many members of what became the Shiite sect.

Fueling Shiite anxieties today is the fact that al-Qaeda in Iraq has taken its anti-Shiite violence to Syria, and Arab leaders in the Persian Gulf have been reluctant to distance themselves from inflammatory Sunni clerics who have cast Arab Shiites as “apostates.”

Adding to this combustible mix, Hamas has left Syria, opting for solidarity with their fellow Sunnis instead of maintaining Iranian support, and Turkey has lined up with the conservative Arab states against Syria and Iran.
…
Assad’s fall would deprive Iran of an ally in a strategically vital region and could open the door to a representative, humane Syrian state. But such gains may never materialize if we do not handle the sectarian fallout of the Syrian uprising.
..
But serious antagonisms between religious groups could easily burst into all-encompassing violence region-wide, undermining the “Westphalian” model of statecraft by shifting loyalty from governments and the rule of law to one’s religious brethren and a “hate thy neighbor” theology.

If the sectarian fires grow, the first victims could be Lebanon and Iraq, with their unhappy history of Shiite-Sunni violence; the international community has barely managed to contain this in wars past. The upheavals in the Balkans in the 1990s — a violent fissure between Orthodox Christians and Muslims that eventually involved most of former Yugoslavia — provide a taste of what might be in store for the Middle East. Only concerted and forceful U.S. action averted a broader regional war in Europe in the ’90s, and the Middle East is an even tougher neighborhood.
..
There is still time for the United States to control this growing sectarian threat, but the volatile cocktail of religious antagonism, national interests and oil requires immediate and vigorous action.

Joshua

Your experiment is failing miserably and is pushing  SC as a blog to committing suicide.  Lots of people have left and lots will leave soon.

You suppress free speech when insults and vulgarity reign in.  

I was hoping that you demonstrate to us what democracy really means but you failed first class when you abandoned your own poll that asked for tight moderation and instead made an emotional response abandoning moderation all together to satisfy one or two complaints from self-entitled people who abused this site the most.

I am asking you to reconsider…

I am also sorry to be direct and blunt.  

By cutting ties with Iran, we just shot ourself in the foot

DOUG SAUNDERS
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/by-cutting-ties-with-iran-we-just-shot-ourself-in-the-foot/article4527936/
…
Libya’s embassy in Ottawa was more menacing than Iran’s has ever been – it employed goons in Moammar Gadhafi’s intelligence agency to infiltrate visiting students, follow them daily, and sometimes threaten to kill their families.

Even after Libyan embassies in other countries had fallen to anti-Gadhafi rebels last year, the Ottawa mission remained firmly loyal to the dictator. Yet, Prime Minister Stephen Harper didn’t order it closed until August of 2011, after Canada and its NATO partners had been at war with Libya for months.
….

“This is the first time in decades that a Canadian prime minister, Liberal or Conservative, appears to be advocating approaches that reduce diplomatic opportunities for peace during an international crisis,” Canada’s last full ambassador to Tehran, John Mundy, wrote on this page this year when Stephen Harper began talking about abandoning negotiations. We now have another unfortunate first. The Prime Minister ought to listen to his diplomats.

Is Obama’s soft support for Israel aggressive stance toward Iran will make him loose the American Jewish votes?

Column One: God, Jerusalem and American foreign policy
By CAROLINE B. GLICK
09/06/2012 22:17
By removing both God and Jerusalem from the platform, Obama and his fellow Democrats stirred the furies of that American soul at its foundations.
http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=284167

Tut Tut Tara….I have my own way of pushing repulsive people off this blog and I rather intend to do the same with ZOO…..remember the last time I succeeded in pushing BRONCO off the comments’ for a week ? Please bear with me while I unleash my own artillery barrage against this little Shabbih, first of all ZOO is very irritating because he is a Mukhabarati Spammer, 75 % of the comments on SC nowadays are spam posts by ZOO ( or maybe his handlers at the “Electronic Army” )

So I request you TARA to delete that post of yours, we need less moderation, not more. SC Moderation is Oppression.

Dr. Landis, we do not need any moderation at all, especally banning members for violations is an infringement on the freedom of expression.

Stop barking ZOO, we all know you have rabies.

I am Proud to be an SC Bully, even SC Shabbih, just to push the real shabbiha off this blog.

May all the regime supporters on this Blog join our friend HASSAN on his latest deployment to the frontlines in Syria, so they might get killed and liquidated by FSA. Because all regime supporters deserve to meet that fate.

So I ask all regime supporters on this blog to get away from the keyboard and get into the real fight with the other “Commandos”, Syria needs you.

Tara, another of your points which doesn’t give a full picture:

“Guantanamo is a shame for humanity, yet it is viewed as justified in the ‘war’ on terror.”

Nobody would dispute that Guantanamo was no fun for its inhabitants. But in reality it’s not as much a shame for humanity as the sickening horrors that have been going on for decades in places like Tadmor and Evin prisons.

And interestingly, if you were following the Afghan war at the time, you would be aware that those on Bin Laden’s side that fell into the hands of the Americans and ended up in Guantanamo were the lucky ones. The Afghan Northern Alliance suffocated captives en masse in shipping containers, summarily executed them in droves and made sure none of them survived torture.

Here, read the transparent facts on Guantanamo from Human Rights bodies. Bush released 500 of the 700-odd there, and Obama has kept releasing them. Of those who remain, many are still there because it is not safe for them to return to their own countries and other nations – including all the anti-Western regimes – are not willing to take them. See: http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/pdf/USLS-Fact-Sheet-Gitmo-Numbers.pdf

Why is Turkey not acting military in Syria? One of the reason is probably that its army has never been in such a bad state.
They still don’t know who is behind the huge explosion of a ammunition store that killed 25 soldiers. A suicide bomber? Syrian agents? Iranian agents, PKK?

The state of the Turkish military

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/the-state-of-the-turkish-military-.aspx?pageID=449&nID=29666&NewsCatID=409

Tara

How dare you ask for moderating the vulgarities on this blog!

Watch it, the wild bunch is after you now..

SyriaLover

I am not ignoring you and would like to share my thoughts with you but I am working this wkend, lucky me. So will have a chat afterwards.

Dear Antoine,

Zoo is not a Shabeeh,

And you are Hassan. Sorry, I guessed.

Antoine, our revolution and the sacrifices of our people is too sacred to spoil with illegitimate means. Don’t you agree?

FSA Turkmen fighters already in control of parts of Kasab (Qasab) –

TARA, we are fighting against an illegitmate bunch aaginst whom all sorts of tactics are okay.

Btw why are you guessing so ? I have been connected to all sorts of people starting with Visitro, Tlass, and now Hassan.

Its really funny.

Antoine

Wallahi ya dear Antoine, I know what I am saying. I just know… I just have the sense for it.

Tara, Zoo and others,

The real damage to this forum has come from the arrival of pro-regime cut-pasters who have systematically swamped it and undermined discussion.

Most of the grievances and tensions are directed at them, and they are shameless at persisting in their crude campaign.

The ill-informed and aggressive pro-regime comments are also distressing and offensive for those of us who have a stake in Syria and care deeply about what is happening there – which is why we visit this blog.

They have made it impossible for this forum to constructively dissect and discuss the opposition movement and other crucial issues.

A number of people have told me over the past year they don’t bother with Syria Comment any more because it appears to have been hacked.

The damage has been done, mirroring events in Syria.

SL,

Sorry again but I beg to differ. While Ann’s cut and paste 27 paragraphs without reading them becomes very annoying, this is not applicable to other pro-regime.

Where else can you read the other’s POV summarized in a concise fashion? I personally appreciate logging into SC to read a summary of relevant articles despite it sometimes increase my blood pressure.

Zoo,

“Keep bashing, barking and insulting. If anything else, at least, you’re good at that.’

Do you hear that? It is the worlds smallest violin playing the worlds saddest song just for you…

May I ask how do all the victims of rape feel when callous individuals like yourself deny that they have been raped or blame them for it?

Syria Druze back Sunnis’ revolt with words but not arms
September 8, 2012

The Druze of Idlib province have not yet taken up arms in the war to unseat Syrian President Bashar al-Assad but have declared their support for Sunni Muslims at the heart of the rebellion.

“We are and will forever remain brothers,” says Ayham, an elder of the Druze community in the northwestern province where the two communities live side by side.

Among mountains covered with olive groves and criss-crossed by rocky paths that wind among magnificent Byzantine ruins, 14 villages inhabited by the Druze religious minority live in harmony with their Sunni neighbors.

Locals give Jabal al-Aala, near the Turkish border, the name “little Druze mountain,” a reference to an eponymous and historic region in southern Syria that is also Druze-dominated.

“For years everyone here, Druze and Sunni, has wanted the end of Bashar al-Assad’s regime,” says Abu Ahmad, an elder of the Druze village of Qalblozeh, home to a fourth-century Byzantine church.

“When the protests began 18 months ago we wanted to take part and send delegations next door to Kafar Takharim, where the revolution was flourishing,” recalls the thick-mustached man in his fifties.

“The local rebels told us not to move in order to keep our villages as a safe haven for populations fleeing army intervention,” he continues.

“No one here supports Bashar. He may have a few on his side, but they do not make this known,” says Ayham. Some Druze defectors from the Syrian army now live in the village having gained permission to stay and not return to their barracks, he adds.

Jabal al-Aala is populated by farmers, who tend to their olive groves and tobacco plants.

It is a semi-autonomous place, isolated from regime-controlled urban centers and suffering the consequence of having no electricity.

Ayham proudly honors his guests with a generous meal cooked over a wood fire, asserting that “everything is harvested [locally] here.”

A portrait of Lebanon’s Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, adorned with multicolored plastic flowers, watches over proceedings.

Public services have ceased to function in Qalblozeh. Elders arbitrate local disputes and lead the community.

But this fiercely independent spirit does not undermine good relations and solidarity with Sunni neighbors.

Druze villages have welcomed with open arms numerous refugees fleeing the army’s bombardment of rebel-controlled areas in Idlib, who are housed in homes, schools and other public buildings.

The Sunni-Druze solidarity is confirmed on visits to surrounding Sunni villages.

“Our relations are very good, as before the revolution,” says a resident of Qorqania, a hamlet very close to regular scenes of helicopter bombardments.

The Druze villages of Jabal al-Aala are not spared the threat of bombardment either. The Syrian army keeps two garrisons stationed 20 kilometers away, at Harem and Salqin.

Rebel Free Syrian Army convoys also rumble through the region, sometimes with boisterous cheering after returning from an operation.

Several rooms at a clinic in one village are reserved for injured FSA fighters, on the orders of local commander Abu Saeed.

But so far, no Druze number among the rebel ranks.

“Firstly, we have no weapons,” says Ayham. “Second, we are loath to spill the blood of our countrymen.”

He clarifies: “All the Syrian Druze support the revolution and have solidarity with refugees… [but] we fear the specters of civil war.”

“The regime wishes to divide the Syrian people, and we will not fall into that trap,” says Abu Ahmad. “If the revolution were against foreign aggression, we would be the first to battle.”

“The army has not attempted to penetrate here. Our Sunni neighbors have promised to protect us. And if the army comes, we will fight,” affirms Ayham. “You will see our reputation as a warrior people is deserved.”

-AFP

S.O.D,

We should deal with them just like the FSA are doing.

Antoine HAT,

Tara does not need to guess so. First few comments I had no idea it was you, every subsequent comment posted by “Hassan” gave you up more.

Btw can you please explain why you would understand someone liking Rifaat’s men as you had posted earlier?

I have no idea what people are talking about. People are getting mad…its an epidemic. What the hell are some people talking about on this blog ?

Shut up SOD, don’t make accusations without any solid proof.

Antoine HAT,

The proof is in the pudding, or should I say same EXACT style and spelling mistakes.

Anyways I should not pick on you for doing so cause there are more than a few people here writing under different handles….

S.O.D,

Again I ask you to bring up those examples and statements side-by-side to prove it before all. I challenge you.

Btw how did “VAT” change to “HAT” ? Why is “V” not in the group ?

Maybe you would want to consult with DARYLL and JOHANNES on this pudding.

Antoine HAT,

“A hard tight slap”

What makes a tight slap? Is there a “loose” slap as well?

maybe you should make it double tight to really make sure it slaps the smart away from my ass.

Btw were you not the one lamenting about my “wasted time” conversing with the other side at 7ee6an? What would you call trolling under different handles? Time well spent?

Syrialover said:

“And they didn’t … get into foreign disasters without the informed consent of their own people.”

I am usually pretty much on the same wavelength as you, but I have to disagree with the above. Surely you don’t believe that. GW, Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfwitz and Douglas Feith and the other neo-cons pushed through untrue and doubtful intelligence so as to attack Iraq, so hardly “informed consent”…in fact attacking Iraq was already on GW’s agenda as soon as he became president (loose ends left over from Papa’s days). And even if leaders take their countries to war ostensibly for their countries’ national interest they are still criminals since they cause the deaths of many on both sides of the fight. WAR is criminal, period.

That’s why I am so mad at Syria’s Jr. and just as mad at Bush Jr. because both chose to start wars that have killed and are still killing many on all sides. And Blair is far from innocent, too.

People keep screaming “political solution, dialog, negotiations” , but that should have been initiated by those in power at the very start or even before, not now after so many have lost their lives and livelihoods. It is too late.

This report belongs with the post up top.

Group tries to recruit Hatay Alevis into Assad army

Local intelligence sources in Hatay, a province in southern Turkey on the border with Syria, say a terrorist organization named the Turkish Peoples’ Liberation Party-Front — The Urgent Ones (THKP-C Acilciler) is trying to actively recruit Arab Alevi youth in Hatay to fight in Assad’s army in Syria.
Some neo-nationalist groups in the province of Hatay support the THKP-C Acilciler, whose leader, Mihraç Ural, is a fugitive wanted by law enforcement. Hatay has a population of 500,000 Alevis, and these groups, local intelligence sources say, are trying to politicize the Alevi community. The purpose is to draw Turkey into a sectarian conflict in Hatay, and at the same time force the Turkish government to abandon its current Syrian policy, which is anti-Assad.

Ural, according to reports from the region, has set up an armed group in Syria called the Revolutionary People’s Army. Alevi youths who want to fight against opposition forces alongside Assad’s army are referred to this organization, intelligence sources claim. Ural is better known for his “revolutionary” side than his Alevi identity.

Security forces blame the provocative rally in Hatay on Sunday, when about 1,000 protesters gathered in a demonstration to show their support for the Assad regime, on Ural. A security official who asked to be unnamed said: “Mirhaç Ural is trying to create confusion by stirring up the city to end Turkey’s Syria policy. But he is not effective. Alevis aren’t supporting him. The Mukhabarat is using Mihraç Ural, and Syria is protecting him.”

[…]

http://www.todayszaman.com/newsDetail_getNewsById.action?newsId=291247

Tara,

You’ve forgotten how excessive and destructive it has been. Go back and look. Jad used to dump acres of stuff here, and Zoo has kept going at the rate of up to 10 articles an hour. “Ann” has currently slowed down a bit, but it’s still a challenge and a chore to approach this forum because of the endless flow of cut-paste.

I certainly appreciate other points of view summarized in a concise fashion and summaries and links to articles. But that’s not what we’re not talkng about here.

Whenever I switch off from SyriaComment and return after a few days it is a shock and a bore to be confronted with a comments section submerged in uncontrolled cut-pastes.

That’s all other people see and that’s why they have fled. You have possibly become desensitised to it over the months.

As I’ve often said, I’ve been reading SC for many years and persist out of loyalty like a few others long-timers here.

I know what the standard and value of the discussions used to be, and still could be and SHOULD be. There are still flickers of it, which is why I haven’t quit.

And I am not out to censor opposing views. In fact, I really wish Alex would come back. And hope he will, when this terrible crisis is somehow resolved and we can get into rebuilding Syria.

“I agree with you on #219. Bush, Blair, etc are as criminal as the Iranian regime and responsible for many more crimes in term of the sheer number of casualties.”

This is unbelievable. I should say SOD is right. You seem to be losing compass TARA.

If you are trying to be accommodative with this Zoo, you’re taking the wrong approach.

Much of what Zoo writes (or actually copies), I wouldn’t even consider intellectually stimulating.

So, what exactly are you trying to preserve or achieve by accommodating a full-fledged supporter of rogue regimes?

While, I would not go as far as some are going, I think his so-called contributions here are quite boring.

I look at the ‘themes’ he is trying to put forward. And to be honest with you he only has one or two ‘themes’ that he keeps nauseating. There are robots these days that can fulfill this function even more efficiently. The electronic army of the criminal regime would probably start looking at this option as its funds dwindle.

# 277. Atheist Syrian Salafist Against Dictatorships

There was a lot, lot more to western entry into Iraq than the WMD claims. I followed it intensively at the time, and there is now a lot of amnesia and selective reminiscing on the subject in the media and elsewhere.

I agree with the savage kicks to the backside and public disgracing of Rumsfeld and a few others, mainly because of the mess they made once inside Iraq. A mess that developed in many ways because of the failure to prevail by the US State Department and military, which you’ll see if you care to read their advice and critiques both back then at the time and subsequently.

But those individuals B & B did not simply order killings and destruction. It was a collectively sanctioned and supported war.

Unlike the case with Bashar Assad, Saddam Hussein and Gaddafi. As Tara said, their crimes are committed solely to keep themselves in illigitimate power. And worse, they are committed against those they are in theory meant to protect.

Visitor,

“This is unbelievable. I should say SOD is right. You seem to be losing compass TARA.”

I’ll answer you later but where did SOD say that?

You said the quoted words in my previous comment.

Losing compass was my summary of 250 which was SL and not SOD.

Morning without coffee could be distracting sometimes.

http://news.yahoo.com/russia-rebuffs-clinton-syria-iran-penalties-152652475.html

Who said that Russia and the USA not in agreement on Syria!
It is called bring jihadists to Syria and bashar will finish them. It is Syria turn to be the place to wipe them of earth it sounds reasonable.
When it is over obama will make up his mind to keep Assad or time to go for sure ms Piggy told Putin keep supplying Syria with weapon and will give jihadists communication equipments so they are traced easier

More precision strikes on civilians in Aleppo that I’m sure will warm the hearts of the genocide enthusiasts, rape apologists and sectarian opponents of the revolution.

http://youtu.be/EVqJmDjzdiU

A few days ago a toddler survived and his story was told by Tracey Shelton.

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/syria/120905/aleppo-video-bomb-attack-children-death-toll

On another note, lots of talk about slapping people today. In Aleppo we say: الكف لمن سطروا

It is difficult to predict anything Kurdish in Syria. The desire to keep bloodshed to a minimum seems the uniting motive.

An SAA artillery attack on a northern Aleppo neighbourhood killed Kurds, however, which has led to angry reaction. In the Kurdish-maintained towns, what will these killings mean? Will there be more assistance and coordination between Kurdish factions and FSA factions?

I do not understand the action of the regime in shelling a neighbourhood with a great concentration of Kurds and other minorities (the Jewish, Armenian and Syriac cemeteries abut), the regime is bringing the promised total war to a heretofore untouched area of at least ‘neutral’ population. If it was a miscalculation of the war machine, it is stupid enough. If it was deliberate targetted attack . . . what motivated the attack, what goal was sought, if not to deepen terror and aggression?

The LA Times reports:

Syria funeral is focus of Kurdish anger

A bombing in Aleppo that killed a woman, two of her children and their young cousin triggers outrage among Kurds at a village funeral and throughout the region.

EFRIN, Syria — The mourners chanted, “Long live Kurdistan!” as the doleful cortege moved slowly toward the hillside cemetery, past the olive groves and pomegranate orchards.

Funerals have long become settings for political theater in strife-ridden Syria, where each side has tried to turn burials of war dead into highly public affirmations of their adversary’s barbarity.

But the procession Friday through the village of Basuta wasn’t just another instance of a funeral becoming a rallying cry against the government of President Bashar Assad. [ . . . ]

Rudaw reports:

Deadly Attack Claims Many Lives in Aleppo’s Kurdish Sector

On Thursday 21 Kurdish civilians were killed in the Aleppo neighbourhood of Sheikh Maksud when Syrian forced shelled an area near the Marouf mosque.

Dozens of others were injured in the attack and a number of homes were destroyed.

This has been the biggest attack on the country’s Kurdish population since the beginning of the anti-government revolution in Syria a year and a half ago.

Activists said the Syrian forces attacked Sheikh Maksud to target a large number of Syrian opposition members and civilians who have taken refuge in the relative safety of the Kurdish populated sector. [ . . . ]

Assad’s Minority Strategy Will Not Change the Inevitability of his Demise

Assad’s ploy, however, is unlikely to solve the problem of his continuously dwindling manpower. None of these minorities is eager to enlist in Assad’s army, and most choose to flea the country instead. Nor is it clear that the disparate, small-scale formations of Druze and Christian neighborhood militias will be sufficient to embroil the FSA and limit its increasing expansion. In other words, the military significance of this strategy is highly questionable.

Rather, the move is primarily political. Assad seeks to assemble the minorities around him in order to present himself as the sole and unavoidable interlocutor on behalf of these segments of Syrian society, where he has cultivated loyal patches.

Realistically, Assad’s only viable strategy is to maintain his hold on loyal, but contracted territory, mainly in the coastal mountains, and secure Damascus and parts of Aleppo for as long as possible, in the hope that such a prolonged stalemate would force a negotiated, power-sharing settlement with him.

Iran supports this endgame, as evident from its recent call for a contact group on Syria, as well as from the statement by Hezbollah MP Nawaf Musawi that the solution in Syria can only be a Lebanon-style “no victor, no vanquished” compromise settlement.

The endgame for the US and its regional and international allies, however, should remain unchanged: the total eradication of the Assad regime. As for Syria’s minorities, one can only hope they don’t foolishly choose to allow Assad to ride on their backs. Either way, tailoring policy to their contours is not the way to go.

To read more: http://www.nowlebanon.com/NewsArticleDetails.aspx?ID=434289#ixzz25uAECPiV
Only 25% of a given NOW Lebanon article can be republished. For information on republishing rights from NOW Lebanon: http://www.nowlebanon.com/Sub.aspx?ID=125478

286 said
“what motivated the attack, what goal was sought, if not to deepen terror and aggression?”
The thing about this regime is it doesn’t use common sense even when it is for it is own good, one of the revolution weapons is the stupidity of the regime itself
You should have figured that out by now Bill

In a new democratic Syria, freedom should be a daily living not like this pigs in Pakistan, who jail this innocent girl of something she didn’t do.
it is clear how muslims want it both way, they persecute the minorities all over the centuries and claim to be peaceful when living in the west, until the destroy the west by bringing their own retard values to their new living societies.
TO anyone who is going to bash me, give proofs otherwise.

http://news.yahoo.com/pakistan-frees-christian-girl-accused-blasphemy-130326246.html

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/08/us-syria-crisis-jihad-idUSBRE88708W20120908
“(…) Showing his muddied surgical case, shoes and clothes, Beres said that Turkish forces had flooded the Reyhanli border area with water making it difficult for refugees to cross unnoticed.

“We were caught by the Turkish army. It took us 20 hours to cross the border and I was fined $500 for crossing the border illegally. They flooded the border completely so that they can hear who is crossing. Those they do catch they are sending back,” he said.”

By Reuters
Foreign Islamists intent on turning Syria into an autocratic theocracy have swollen the ranks of rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Assad and think they are waging a “holy war,” a French surgeon who treated fighters in Aleppo has said.

Jacques Beres, co-founder of medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders), returned from Syria on Friday evening after spending two weeks working clandestinely in a hospital in the besieged northern Syrian city.

In an interview with Reuters in his central Paris apartment on Saturday, the 71-year-old said that contrary to his previous visits to Homs and Idlib earlier this year about 60 percent of those he had treated this time had been rebel fighters and that at least half of them had been non-Syrian.

“It’s really something strange to see. They are directly saying that they aren’t interested in Bashar Assad’s fall, but are thinking about how to take power afterward and set up an Islamic state with sharia law to become part of the world Emirate,” the doctor said.

The foreign jihadists included young Frenchmen who said they were inspired by Mohammed Merah, a self-styled Islamist militant from Toulouse, who killed seven people in March in the name of al-Qaida. The seven people included three soldiers from North African immigrant families, a rabbi and three Jewish children.
[ … ]

http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/jihadists-join-syria-fight-eye-islamic-state-french-surgeon-says-1.463554

The rape death in Iranian custody of a Canadian photographer may be pertinent to the gallery of horrors in Syrian Mukhabarat dungeons, but scoring Blair and Bush (not Stalin, Hitler, Ceaucescu?) takes the eye off the baseline of repression in Syria. One can compare the regimes of Guantanamo and that which is charged with rape and torture by the young men below. How many in Guantanamo raped and disappeared, again? How many put on the tire, beaten on the soles of the feet or electrocuted? How many sodomized? How many in unmarked graves or delivered home to mom in a box?

From the fifty-thousand foot vantage of a ZOO or a Bronco or an Irritated, the things that happen in dungeons and in the bomb-bays of SAA aircraft, and in the field command of artillery, and in the orders of the shabiha ‘cleansers’ who follow infantry into civilian areas after shelling and bombing — from fifty thousand feet none of these things are of central significance.

From up in the air where the details become obscure, what happens inside Syris’s detention facilities is easily outstripped and out-awfulled by USA and allies.

This moral myopia is staggering. Zoo (though not alone) does not even have the moral courage and clarity to tell us what he is, where he hails from, where he lives and how he came to be so committed body and soul to Syria. Yet he wishes to be an authority on torture and death and the value of human lives.

These two young in Now Lebanon’s story would have an interesting conversation with Zoo. Would he not hear what they are saying, or have the least empathy in his heart for their struggle? Bush Blair blah blah. Terrorist Qatar Erdogan blah. Zoo will not watch gruesome or grieving videos. Does testimony of detainees register?

Hey, mysterious ANN! — can you please post any Xinhua stories you find about the use of torture in Syria? Thanks.

War by rape

Talking to a male victim of the Syrian state’s sexual violence

The Syrian regime is reportedly using rape as a tool of war against opposition forces. Human rights monitors have documented cases of sexual violence perpetrated by regime security forces against both men and women, however, first-person testimonies have been hard to come by. NOW sat down with a Syrian refugee in Lebanon who asked to be called Shero and who claims that he and his friend Meshaal were raped by regime forces.

The two young men are activist from the Monastery of Saint Moses the Abyssinian, a monastic community of Syriac Catholics north of Damascus. They worked closely with Father Paolo Dall’ Oglio, the Roman Catholic priest who was recently expelled from Syria for criticizing the regime’s violence.

Why were you and Meshaal detained?

Shero: We worked closely with father Paolo on humanitarian issues relating to the Syrian crisis. We also worked closely with caricaturist Ali Ferzat. Meshaal is Kurdish and I am half Kurdish, half Christian, and we both called for regime change. The regime was not happy with our activities.

[ . . . ]

Why is sexual abuse seldom reported?

Shero: We live in a patriarchal society; it does not encourage us to talk about it because of fear and shame. Documenting such cases, especially against women, is extremely difficult. Societies are conservative and a family’s honor is tied to the virtue of women. Two friends of mine, girls, were raped, but they would not consider speaking up. One of them is Christian and she was raped because she was a Christian protesting.

Why did you decide to speak up?

Shero: I want to speak up so the rest can find the courage to. I want the world to know that the revolution is not sectarian; Christians along with Muslims and Kurds are taking to the streets. The uprising is against the regime, and the regime is practicing violence against all those who defy it, whatever sect they belong to.

I believe that the regime is full of psychopaths. They have no cause and no values. They sexually harass to humiliate the protesters as a price for challenging the system and to frighten them against taking to the streets again. They want to break the people. It is a sign of a crumbling regime. But Meshaal and I defied them; we continued with our activism.

Even Patrick Seale who once was the official biographer of Hafez Al Assad and an important defensor of him, is now clearly against Bashar Al Assad and the mess he has done of the country he inherited.

It gives me more clues about how the end of the regime is nearer and nearer. It is a question of time…. and of how many tens of thousands will have to die in both sides until the psychopath become non-elected President leaves or dies.

Death to Assad, death to syrian traitors. Assad is worth a the price of a bullet in the head.

It is nearer the time when muslims and chirstians will go back to the Ommayad Mosque of Damascus to pray together to celebrate the end of a balck era.

284 Erin

“Who said that Russia and the USA are not in agreement on Syria!
It is called bring jihadists to Syria and Bashar will finish them. It sounds reasonable. When it is over Obama will make up his mind to keep Assad.”

Erin, I don’t think President Obama has much say over Bashar’s actions. What’s happening in Syria is not a deep plot involving the USA, Russia and the Assad Mafia. Sorry to put a damper on your fantasy world, but it’s only in your sad little drug-addled mind.

A truce is still holding in Qudsayya, Dummar and Alhamah. Another effort is bringing results in Tal Kalakh:
أسفر مؤتمر مصالحة ومسامحة بمدينة تلكلخ، عن تحرير تسعة مدنيين تم اختطافهم من قبل مسلحين في المدينة، في حين شهدت مدرسة الشهيد محمد الهنداوي بحي الشماس عملية تسوية لأوضاع 277 شخصاً ممن تورطوا في الأحداث التي شهدها الحي.
GCC reports from Aleppo are not true, there is no clear winner yet but time is not on the rebels side, I stand by my position that the rebels will not be able to win Aleppo but the city will be destroyed, armed rebels are guilty as sin in Aleppo, a city that was dragged by force to join this bloody dance.
Assad can not be president for Syria even if his troops win over the rebels,whether alawites will accept him or not,that depends on what options they are given. Saying that all of this destruction is due to one family’s hold on power is too simplistic despite the fact the Assads and Makhkoufs were the worst thing that happened to Syria after independence.
No serious person though should ignore the effect of GCC, Islamist thugs and anti Iran powers on the crisis, one question that begs an answer when the issue is the destruction of the state is how come Syrians lived under oppression and fear for 42 years but were still able to send their kids to school,go to work and travel without taking the risk of getting kidnapped or killed? If what we see today is the price of freedom,why nobody thought if Syrians are willing to pay this price, who can guarantee Syrians freedom and security ?
This armed rebellion is forced on many Syrians who are still on the receiving end while others make decisions on their behalf, many of those ” others” do not live in Syria and will never send their kids to fight or demonstrate,we all know who is dying in Syria today, the writings are on the wall for those who want to read.

I can’t tell you the level of disgust, despise and outrage I feel at this Sneaky Evil Jew commnet here:

“..It is nearer the time when muslims and chirstians will go back to the Ommayad Mosque of Damascus to pray together to celebrate the end of a balck era….”

Consdering that he was for a year celebrating every Christian genocide made by his Jews backed terrorists in Syria, just as they did Lebanon and Iraq before. Disgusting scam. Repulsive people indeed. They think everybody is just Stupid Goyyim, with no memory beyound the next T.V. commerical.

http://www.jewwatch.com

In a new democratic Syria, freedom should be a daily living not like this pigs in Pakistan, who jail this innocent girl of something she didn’t do.
it is clear how muslims want it both way, they persecute the minorities all over the centuries and claim to be peaceful when living in the west, until the destroy the west by bringing their own retard values to their new living societies.
TO anyone who is going to bash me, give proofs otherwise.

http://news.yahoo.com/pakistan-frees-christian-girl-accused-blasphemy-130326246.html

Densdeshe

¨Consdering that he was for a year celebrating every Christian genocide made by his Jews backed terrorists in Syria, just as they did Lebanon and Iraq before. Disgusting scam. Repulsive people indeed¨

You last comment lacks of any logical comprehension. Look for the nearest psychiatrist.

Visitor @280

So let us have a candid discussion..

What exactly was the problem to hastily accusing me of losing a moral compass? Was it my characterization of Bush’s and Blair’s criminality against the Iraqis or was it that I agreed with a “full-fledge regime supporter” ?
—–

Caffeine addict? Tell me about it..

[…] News Sources on September 8, 2012 At Syria Comment, Mohammad D. writes: There are important new developments in Lattakia and its surrounding recently. The violence that […]

The new discovery of Dendendeshe, Hackering of SC thumbs up and down is working again. You are a genious. You maybe so brilliant in you own world. But you lack the knowledge of real Syria. You are far away from reality. Syrian people are not genious simply plain people with human expectations. Multiply by some millions and there you have a Revolution. There is no deep political rivalries, no old political histories. This is a Revolution from the people to the people. This is what you cannot understand.

Model Syrian citizens according to Addounia TV and the Assad regime… How pathetic…

Why the F***k I came here to ruin my weakened and be disturbed. I was happily on m way to nice beach trip in good mood, great weekend and here I get Ghufran RSS , something about Tel kalakh that needed to read and get this crappy Zionist Jew hiding behind Christian name insulting my intelligence and wants to send me to psychiatrist. I should have listened to SNP advice to stay away from this Jewish charade for the mentally insane and enjoy my time.

Is this authentic Syria idea or some PR firm advise.  Read the last paragraph..alarming if true.  

Syria’s revolution is being branded
guardian.co.uk, Friday 7 September 2012 10.54 EDT

The revolution is being branded. A young Turkish graphic designer from the small border town of Kilis in Turkey has been commissioned by the Free Syrian Army (FSA) to design their logo.

More accustomed to creating posters declaring “girls need to go to school” for the local municipality’s education programmes, 28-year-old Sedat Akpinar looked up from his computer to find the FSA’s northern border commander, Abu Hayder, standing in his shop.

With designers and materials in short supply in Syria, the commander had crossed the border last week, hoping to find someone in Turkey who could help him create “an identifiable symbol” to be placed on cars, trucks, tanks, T-shirts, baseball caps and bandannas.

With him, Hayder had brought his “quality controller”: an FSA soldier with a background in design, now occupied as a full-time sniper. The recruit had a bullet wound in his arm over which he had tattooed a sword. “Designed by me!” he declared proudly.

Sedat didn’t feel like arguing, so he set about mocking up a design employing the green, white and black and three red stars of the Syrian flag superimposed with an eagle and an assault rifle “representing war”.

The man who controls the FSA’s operations around the border with Turkey then handed the designer $300 (£187) and a flash drive full of footage and photographs of the conflict. These included interviews with senior FSA commanders and images from the frontline; even gruesome footage allegedly showing a soldier from the regime’s forces being decapitated with a chainsaw. “Sell that to CNN or the BBC and you can keep the profits!” the commander told the designer.
,,,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/07/syria-rebels-revolution-designer-logo

300. Aldendeshe

Nice comedy, I´m loving it. Enjoy the beach dear Zionist. Do not forget your kosher ¨pique-nique¨.

301. Tara

Even if it was true it does not change the basic facts that support this Revolution. Of course there will be some guys in the FSA who are out of control cellules but in a civil war this is the less you can expect. Hatred is increasing and nothing can´t slow it down but the Fall of Assad. Being killed in the hands of a kind of Freddy Kruger is probably an easier way to die than the death by torture that have suffered thousands of people before and during the Revolution.

TARA,

You said,
“I agree with you on #219. Bush, Blair, etc are as criminal as the Iranian regime and responsible for many more crimes in term of the sheer number of casualties.”

The above is simply not true, even in terms of sheer numbers.

In fact, The Syrian and Iranian regimes are responsible for killing more Iraqis after 2003 than the Americans and the British. Syria and Iran were both conduits for fighters to cross to Iraq for the only purpose to kill Iraqis . If we go back prior to 2003, then you would be swamped with the number of Iranians and Iraqis killed by their own regimes. To compare B & B with such abominable regimes as the Iranians and the Iraqis is not for you to do and the least one could do would be to express your disgust at the person (Zoo) who even suggested the comparison.

Much of what Zoo says is simply outrageous, and I dismissed him long ago as irrelevant simply by identifying the few ‘themes’ that he keeps nauseating. I do not perceive of any intellectual benefits arising from conducting any discourse with such hardcore supporter of criminal regime(s), not to mention accommodating him. You claim he is not shabbih. May be that is so in the sense that he may not be involved in actual killings. But, a quick look at many of his copy and paste comments would readily convince even the novice that he is no more than an electronic shabbih.

I can even design a better robot that will fulfill his role. Believe me, I am not kidding.

There is no difference between him and this spammer called Ann.

SL,

CC: ATHEIST SYRIAN SALAFIST AGAINST DICTATORSHIPS

What ASSAD said at 270 is exactly what I wanted to say. I was against Saddam and I am happy with the divine justice inflicted upon him and his sons, but I did not support the Iraqi invasion under the false intelligence of WMD pushed onto the world by Collin Powell and the neo-con behind him. They did not have a “humanitarian agenda” and they are criminals in my opinion.

Visitor,

Following my intention for candid conversation, I want to gently “warn” you that I am pretty direct and am not shy. 

Invading Iraq is what set the stage up to the chaos that followed.  This is a popular opinion shared by so many people.  And In my opinion, criminals are comparable whether they wear a suit or wear a Mullah’s rope and head piece..

OK, I hear your opinion about Zoo, and I happen to have a very different opinion about him.  And yes, I have, more often than not, initiated the conversation with him; sometimes despite his resistance to converse.  I happen to think he brings an intellectual depth and breadth to many subjects and I appreciate it.  What is the problem with that?  One can be hard-core anti-regime but manages to see some supporters’ point of view and not judge them for it.  Having a different opinion should not be a qualifier to have lost my moral compass, should it?    

This site is becoming like, retard people living in LaLa land.
Many of the pro revolution here are either MB or Salafits, who are living in the nice west, at the expense of the Syrian blood.
if you are that much for Syria, leave the west and go back fight assad.
it is the BS to believe that any of you wants secular Syria.
first throw your retard stone age mentality, when anyone can have the freedom to believe and denounce retard ideolog and theology then you can think of having democratic Syria..

The great “humane” Erdogan sends back to the Syrian wilderness a Syrian woman who has just delivered twins.
Official reason: We are full house in the camps, come back later.
Possible untold reason: Syrian babies born in Turkey could claim the Turkish nationality if they register in Turkey.

Twins born in Turkey are sent back to Syrian border

By PAUL SCHEMM | Associated Press – 2 hrs 53 mins ago
http://news.yahoo.com/twins-born-turkey-returned-syrian-border-180459845.html

BAB AL-SALAMEH, Syria (AP) — Pregnant with twins, Fatima Abdallah survived shelling, hid under relatives’ beds and went without food during a treacherous weekslong trip across the Syrian border.

Safely in a Turkish hospital, she gave birth to a healthy boy and a girl. But after just two nights, she was sent right back, the victim of the overwhelmed country’s ban of new refugee arrivals until more camps can be built.

Sandro@303

Yes, I agree very much with you. I didn’t link it to cast a doubt about the revolution. I just believe that we need to bring up the negatives when we see them, in order to hopefully shape the outcome to the best of Syria.

306 TARA,

Direct is what I really like and you already know that.

To answer your outrageous claims:

Are B &B criminals?

Absolutely not. Anyone who makes the suggestion is insane. Simple and no apologies offered. How is that for direct?

Second. Was GWB justified in attacking Iraq?

Based on the WMD pretext, most people judge in retrospect including you. So that judgement is irrelevant at the time of the invasion. Saddam was given ample time to come out clean. If he was smart enough he would have easily foiled the even more mentally challenged GWB. I am sure you could retrace the events that led to the invasion and ascertain that Saddam was responsible for the trap he found himself in.

As to your other ridiculous assertion that the invasion somehow justified sending al-Qaida fighters to Iraq by the Syrian and Iranian governments, I say that GWB was naive to declare victory before liberating Damascus. The US army should have continued all the way to Damascus and that would have saved countless Iraqi lives and also in retrospect countless Syrian lives. I cannot be more direct than this. Can I?

Judging from the result of the invasion, you can have a variety of opinions. Iraq as a country lost. But many inside Iraq are celebrating. On the other hand none of this Arab Spring would have come to light including the Syrian Revolution.

I must say I am sorry to have forced you to come out so direct. But credit must given where credit is due. We owe GWB, or more precisely his team, the Arab Spring.

As for this Zoo, I do not see any benefit whatsoever in conducting any discourse with his likes. He is an outright shabbih with the same level of intellectual depravity as any other shabbih.

Direct any time.

A Post-Assad glimpse …

عصابات “لواء التوحيد” تتلف وتحرق شاحنة كحول في مدينة حلب

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xtedep_yyyyyy-yyyy-yyyyyyy-yyyy-yyyyy-yyyyy-yyyy-yy-yyyyy-yyy_news#from=embediframe

William Scott Scherk put it very well (#291) when he said:

“…scoring Blair and Bush (not Stalin, Hitler, Ceaucescu?) takes the eye off the baseline of repression in Syria”.

He also went on to neatly describe the moral confusion of those arguing here in defense of the Assad regime.

But I don’t necessarily agree with his call for people like Zoo to unveil their identity and location (though Zoo refers to Canada as “we”, so there’s a clue).

Many of us need to be careful not to be identified for the sake of family and friends still inside Syria.

This could also apply to those supporting Assad, I’m afraid. And nobody wants their name on lists to be checked for future entry and departure from Syria.

We can all guess though – and even to a degree understand. My assumption is that Zoo is connected with some who have prospered under the Assad regime and face losing a lot.

Visitor,

Direct any time? Then direct anytime it is.

Drop “insane” and ridiculous” from your dictionary when you talk to girls then I may continue conversing. Meanwhile it takes me a while to want to talk when I get mad.

And FYI, I was not “asserting that the invasion justifies sending al Qaida”. It was an expected outcome, so next time, ask me what I meant then I will answer before you rush to tell me what I think.

Is there anyone counting the money the pro revolution are hacking from the west and putting it in new accounts abroads, the syrian refugees are getting nothing but the Syrian MB took much money from the state department to stay at 5 stars hotels.
a prorevolution would not spend money on him/her self but give to the needy and stay in down to earth hotels.
Chalabi in Iraq is being repeated daily in Syria.
Alcohol is good for the human being because it makes monkey like you looks beautiful to the Americans.

Another post-revolution glimpse: Syria will become a beggar country just like Egypt and Yemen.

Syria Economic crisis will last long
(Dp-News – Trend)

http://www.dp-news.com/en/detail.aspx?articleid=130052

SYRIA- Everything that has been created through excessive labour for years is being destroyed at an incredible speed. Damage is being caused to infrastructure, housing stock, the tourism sector, industry and the agricultural sector. People are dying, hundreds of thousands of refugees left without shelter.

The Syrian economy is being thrown back for years as a result of clashes between the government forces and armed opposition lasting for about 18 months.

The war radically undermined the already weak economic foundations, created economic uncertainty, when impunity always prevails over the law, when a small minority makes huge profits taking advantage of their privileged positions while the vast majority of the population is rolled back to the line of absolute poverty.
It is known that about three million Syrians now face the threat of famine due to losses in the agricultural sector which this year is $1.8 billion. Since the conflict began, tourist trips to the country almost stopped and therefore, the country has lost $8.3 billion in revenue (the amount the country received in 2010). These two sectors were the main sources of income of ordinary Syrians and the budget. According to statistics for 2009, in Syria, agriculture accounted for 17.7 per cent of the GDP, the service sector -55.8 per cent and industry – 26.5 per cent of the GDP.

Oil has also been a major source of export earnings as long as its export wasn’t subject to Western sanctions. Losses from international sanctions against the Syrian authorities were calculated as yet for May totaling $4 billion.

A ban on oil imports from Syria imposed by the European Union in September 2011 cost the country $4 billion. Then the next, 16th and 17th round of sanctions were introduced which burdened the economic situation in the country even further. In particular, they have led to a reduction in foreign trade and investment and to the stopping of large scale investment projects.

Considerable damage to industrial facilities was caused by being sabotaged by rebels who have repeatedly damaged oil and gas pipelines, electric power facilities and railway tracks along which fuel tanks were transported. The work of one of the country’s largest refineries in Homs was virtually paralysed, and a cotton factory burnt, where the fire destroyed 260 tons of raw materials.
…
This means that devastated Syria will fail to restore its economy independently. It will completely dependent upon international aid. However, this source can also fail.

According to the example of some countries that have survived the ‘Arab Spring’, foreign countries which promised to help Egypt in a hard and unstable period, did not in fact do this. After Gaddafi’s regime fell, all foreign allies left Libya, but the countries that will assist Syria, will demand their interests, often running counter to their own interests, to be observed.

SyriaLover

“This could also apply to those supporting Assad, I’m afraid.”

Funny you should say that. It was a pervasive thought all day today for me. I hope I do not see a day where I lose the pride I have taken from supporting the revolution. The human nature can be very scary.

300 Aldendeshe

“Why the F***k I came here to ruin my weekend and be disturbed. I was happily on my way to nice beach trip in good mood, great weekend.”

Hey, I’ve got a really original idea. Why don’t you go to that beach and drown yourself? I mean, seriously, you’re wasting your time and ours, breathing OUR air.

# 307. ERIN said:

“Many of the pro revolution here are either MB or Salafits, who are living in the nice west, at the expense of the Syrian blood.
If you are that much for Syria, leave the west and go back fight assad.”

Very smart and tough. Yes.

I am waiting for your assurance that YOU are not “living in the nice west, at the expense of Syrian blood”, and that YOU are “that much for Syria, you would leave the west and go back to fight” FOR Assad.

I’ll accept that you could be officially busy maybe in Russia or somewhere. But not being in Syria to help Assad when he is having such a tough time, leaving it to Iranians and Russians to come to the rescue on the ground?

Otherwise your talk is ridiculously cheap and hypocritical.

Our heroes.  Alfatiha upon their souls.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2200283/Killed-instant-Moment-Syrian-rebel-checkpoint-takes-direct-hit-captured-powerful-photographs-cost-war.html

Tara

The bullies have switched to become inquisitive “mokhabarati” trying to find out who is who and following any clue they can get at, even pressing others to disclose what they know about the bloggers they hate.
Their purpose and they don’t hide it is to threat and get rid on this Blog of anyone who disagree with them or another more sinister intention.
I think they will win, because dealing with sneaky parasites is not something anyone cares to do these days.
Then they wonder why Bronco and Jad left. There is a limit to the amount of threats, bashing and insulting anyone can accept.

313 TARA,

“Drop “insane” and ridiculous” from your dictionary when you talk to girls then I may continue conversing. Meanwhile it takes me a while to want to talk when I get mad.

Sorry, these are part of the dictionary and they appropriately describe the case we’re discussing. Also, I am not going to give a cyber-female the leeway. You did not reply to my response except by appealing to gender intricacies.

Again, no apologies offered.

You want to discuss, answer point by point or just drop away.

Direct again.

قتل الشيخ عبد السلام الخليلي في الهجوم الذي شنه الجيش السوري على معقل ميليشيا الجيش الحر في منطقة دير العصافير بريف دمشق.
وقد إشتهر الشيخ الخليلي الذي ينحدر من مدينة درعا بالخطبة النارية التي القاها في الأيام الأولى للثورة، والتي اثارت حنق ابناء طائفة الموحدين الدروز في محافظة السويداء
From press reports, not just regime sources, there was fierce battles in dayr alasafeer in eastern Ghoutah, activists reported that the army stormed the town, one source claimed that 175 people got killed, I did not see this number mentioned in western press. .

Visitor

You got it. I will drop away.

“I believe that the regime is full of psychopaths. They have no cause and no values.”

(quote from male rape victim in WSS #291)

That is because the “leadership” of Syria has given them permission and rewards to be that way.

And the arrival of any adventurist wannabe Islamist warriors is down to Syria being run like a failed state by its “leader”.

I am bored by fear mongering about future control by foreign fighters. They are misfits with delusions that collide with reality and run out of juice with the challenge of a legitimate government and order.

Watch those roving warriors bawl for help and repatriation by their home governments when the crisis is over and post-Assad Syria rounds them up and points them to the border.

I’m still laughing about the Islamist warriors whimpering for help to run Northern Mali after they captured it (story I posted earlier here).

Like a dog chasing a car but with no point if they catch it.

نقلت صحيفة “الأخبار” عن وزير أردني، رفض ذكر اسمه، ان “الأوضاع الآن قد تحسنت” في مخيم الزعتري بالأردن، “ونحن
نعمل على تحسينها أكثر، لكن التدفق المفاجئ للاجئين بدأ يزداد وقد تجاوز في الأيام الأخيرة ألفي لاجئ في الليلة الواحدة”، كما
تحدث عن أن “بعض اللجوء مفتعل من أناس أوضاعهم الاقتصادية سيئة”، متهماً “الجيش السوري الحر بأنه يدفع كثيراً من السوريين
إلى اللجوء خارج البلاد”، حسب وصفه.
ولم يخفِ الوزير وجود معلومات مؤكدة لديه بأن “كثيراً من قاطني المخيم يرغبون في العمل مثل أقرانهم الذين دخلوا البلاد وفق نظام
الكفالات”. ولفت إلى أن “لاجئي المخيم يعرفون أن اللاجئين السوريين في بعض المدن تسللوا إلى سوق العمل، وباتوا يحصلون على
أجور عالية”، في بلد محدود الموارد والإمكانات، وبلغت نسبة البطالة فيه العام الماضي 12،9 في المئة.

294. Ghufran said:
“GCC reports from Aleppo are not true, there is no clear winner yet but time is not on the rebels side, I stand by my position that the rebels will not be able to win Aleppo”

Time is certainly on the rebellion’s side. They started with nothing, and will only get better organized and better armed. If Assad is not able to crush the rebellion in Allepo quickly with the advantage of a large, professional army and air force, he is doomed.

“No serious person though should ignore the effect of GCC, Islamist thugs and anti Iran powers on the crisis”

True enough, these are factors in the mess.
No honest person endorses the regime propoganda that foreign influences are the primary force behind the rebellion. The rebellion arose and continues mostly by Syrians seeking freedom and dignity, fighting a police state ruled by a minority sect.

“Syrians lived under oppression and fear for 42 years but were still able to send their kids to school,go to work and travel without taking the risk of getting kidnapped or killed? If what we see today is the price of freedom,why nobody thought if Syrians are willing to pay this price, who can guarantee Syrians freedom and security?”

What did South Africa look like when apatheid was overthrown? It looked like hell for several years. Was it worth it?
The answer to your legitimate concerns is not to wish for the regime to re-establish brutal control of the country. The answer is to unite Syrians behind a provisional government that will respect human rights to greatest extent possible. As difficult as that sounds, that is the difficult work that must be done.
YOU HAVE NO GOOD CHOICES.

who dies, is going to heaven straight, let all these jihadists make it there fast, please, I will pay the transportation and the taxes.

#326 Ghufran

A sign of the great Arab solidarity … When is the humanistic Arab League or the united SNC visiting these refugees camps?
Instead they will meet in 5 stars hotels in Morocco for the nth edition of the circus “Friends of Syria”

Zoo

Any news about Samaha?

Tara

You better ask the bullies-mokhabaratis, they know everything before everybody and even more. They are more up to date than me, I am sure. As they claimed it, I am supposed to have moved from Iran to Canada; a bit far from Lebanon to get up to date news, don’t you think?

I won’t steal them the pleasure of giving again one of their brilliant analysis.

Erdogan in mystical splendor

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/images/news/201209/n_29671_1.jpg

Hmm. Zoo is acting upset and throwing his toys out of the playpen.

Which is what it is, a playpen. And the toys are those distractionist assertions on the evil world Vs Assad, and how Syrians should rightly expect death and starvation for opposing Assad.

Sorry, the realities in Syria are too heavy for me to join the game. I can’t help Zoo in his quest to feel justified for whatever it is he is trying to protect and preserve.

Russia’s Putin Defies West on Syria
Posted September 6th, 2012 at 8:30 am (UTC-4)

http://blogs.voanews.com/breaking-news/2012/09/06/russias-putin-defies-west-on-syria-2/

Russian President Vladimir Putin says Moscow is not ready to shift its stance on supporting the Syrian government, and suggested Western nations are using militant groups such as al-Qaida to help drive Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from power.

Speaking on Russia Today television, Mr. Putin questioned why Russia should be the only one reassessing its position. He said “Perhaps our negotiating partners should re-evaluate their position.”

The Russian leader was asked whether Moscow should rethink its views on Syria after vetoing three Western-backed U.N. Security Council resolutions designed to pressure Mr. Assad to end violence that has killed 20,000 people.

Without naming any country, he said Western nations looking to oust Mr. Assad are backing militants to help topple him. He called it a “very dangerous and shortsighted policy.”

Also Thursday, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told VOA Mr. Assad’s forces have recaptured from rebels a town on the border with Jordan used as a transit point by refugees fleeing the country’s civil war.

The watchdog group said hundreds of Syrian soldiers backed by tanks assaulted Tel Chehab early Thursday. Scores were arrested and rebel safehouses set ablaze.

Activists said about 2,000 refugees were in Tel Chehab when it was captured.

The Observatory also said two kidnapped brothers of a Syrian rebel commander were killed on Thursday, as battles raged between rebels and army forces in several districts of Damascus.

It is really funny how a suporter of the regime keeps describing the oppositions  with the word “mokhanartis” ,a profession  that was created and perfected by the regime he support.
It was William who naively asked you to reveal more about yourself, we Syrians who grow up in syria’s Assad know better to not ask that question

SyriaLover & A.S.S.A.D,

While I agree with A.S.S.A.D regarding the unjust invasion of Iraq in my opinion the blunder post invasion is where the real criminality started. The US had an opportunity to “fix” its arrogant mistake, and actually help expedite the transition of Iraq into a democratic country. Instead the US along with Iran (and Syria by proxy for Iran) helped plunge Iraqis into a cycle of death and destruction. The mismanagement of the transitional process lead to far more deaths and exasperated further the underlying sectarianism that arises in times of trouble.

I don’t know if you remember a fellow named James Garner that was in charge of the transitional process before being hastily replaced with Paul Bremer. He had a different plan than Bremer did:

As in any totalitarian regime, there were many people who needed to join the Baath Party in order to get ahead in their careers. We don’t have a problem with most of them. But we do have a problem with those who were part of the thug mechanism under Saddam

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1004842-1,00.html

Obviously his plan was not without its flaws as the Time article clearly indicates, but I am told by someone that had dealings with him that he at least had a plan that can be implemented and worked with.

Richard,
You may be a new comer, if you were not you would have known by now that I agree with much of you said especially the part about the regime’s responsibility for the mess, the reason why Syrians revolted and the need for a new government. The problem with the opposition is that they want a government that only represents them, I want elections to decide who heads the country and the government , it is not the job of the SNC, the GCC or the West to decide who should win or lose.
Your use of S.Africa to explain the Syrian mess is far from being fair or objective, Syrians from all ethnic and religious groups suffered from the regime, when it comes to racial discrimination nobody can beat the West’s “colorful” history, you also know that national reconciliation not revenge or counter killing is what put S.Africa on the right track, do not waste your time trying to find the word ” reconciliation ” in the dictionary of militant Muslims and their backers on this forum.

AFP from Aleppo- in Arabic
http://www.alquds.co.uk/index.asp?fname=latest%5Cdata%5C2012-09-08-15-13-19.htm
Jordan now follows Turkey in declaring that it is unable to take more refugees, these two countries want more money from the GCC and the West before they can take more refugees.

#337 Ghufran

Will the Saudi and Qatar traditional generosity extend to paying the destitute refugees a portion of what they are spending on weapons and salaries for the heroic rebels ?

فايز ساره

عندما تضع الحرب في سوريا أوزارها، كيف يمكن أن تكون صورة البلد؟ لعله السؤال الأهم الذي على السوريين والمهتمين بسوريا في المستويين الإقليمي والدولي أن يفكروا فيه، ليس من زاوية الاهتمام بما تركته تلك الحرب من دمارات على البشر والحياة من حولهم، والتي هي دمارات مأساوية، بل أيضا لجهة التفكير بكيفية النهوض من دمارات الحرب والعودة بسوريا والسوريين إلى سياق الحياة العادية، وهي مسؤولية الأطراف المحلية والإقليمية والدولية دون شك.
Fayez is wrong, nobody cares about the little guy in Syria.
Syria has little oil and no real friends, those who oppose the regime and those who support the regime has one thing in common: they could not care less about the welfare of ordinary Syrians, the future looks dark and grim, this is why I did not think violence is a viable solution to this crisis, people who are talking about the billions Syria will receive after a regime change are naive or liars, I realize that a new regime that is hostile to Iran and more receptive to the GCC will be rewarded financially but the rewards will be a fraction of what is needed to rebuild the country, pity the birthplace of the first alphabet, Syrians will be poor inside their country and unwelcomed refugees outside it.

Hey Ghufran why are you so shy of linking the whole article of Fayez Sarah?

Are you afraid that some mentally challenged shabi7h may ask you why you read AA or al-Arabiya?

OK, here is the full article, just to make sure there are no copy-rights infringements,

http://www.alarabiya.net/views/2012/09/09/236907.html

By the way did I not tell you that al-Arabiya and its AA affiliate have assembled the most professional team of journalists in the Arab World? They are the best trustworthy source of Arab affairs. So do not be shy next time. I bet you most of your all other copied quotes come from either one of them.

Honesty usually pays.

——————————————

And what did Russia say to Hizbistan?

http://www.alarabiya.net/views/2012/09/09/236911.html

You will not see this on any GCC or ikhwanji media :
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-syria-aleppo-20120906,0,5057890.story
What is sad is that much of what in this article was already spoken about here on SC, some people are too stubborn to accept the truth
Bravo,LA times.

Guffran you link inً337 did not lead to the story about Jorden but about a story from
Aleppo that really make Abd Bari Atwan go to a new level of idiocy

Azaz is a mini version of what violence have brought to Syria. This town,which just 18 months ago, had 50,000 residents and was a busy commercial hub,is now destroyed and most of its residents have left.
Based on who wins the battle in Aleppo,and in Syria at large, the victor will blame the other side for the utter destruction in Syria, the truth is that both the regime and the rebels were partners in this continuous crime, finger pointing will not bring the dead back or undo the destruction.
For those who do not know, Azaz is under the rebels control, congratulations.

#335. Son of Damascus,

Yes, we sure agree on the mess America made in Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein. And that article you posted on how it could have turned out differently reflects how Rumsfeld and his offsiders dismissed more potentially constructive and better-informed strategies offered by both the US State Department and US military.

Believe it, it’s true. Years ago I read online some substantial planning and position papers generated by those two organizations in the leadup to the US invasion. In view of what Rumsfeld and his appointees chose to do instead, it was infuriating and heartbreaking to read. These might still be available.

You can also get an insight into the deep internal frustration and anger about the avoidable errors during the post-invasion phase by looking at interviews and presentations (and I think some books) by a steady stream of senior US Generals in the years that followed as they retired and felt free to speak out.

Relevance to Syria? I mention all this because we can only desperately hope that some of those foolish lessons in post-dictator Iraq will be applied in Syria when the time comes.

From the above I believe there would be a lot of clear-thinking and competent Americans and others who were disregarded during the Iraq debacle who would be desperate to see the transitional process in Syria done better.

Syrian, my post has two stories, that was too much for some to comprehend, I will let readers judge Atwan and others, to me idiocy is screaming at our face, the truth has a funny way of popping its stubborn head when people in denial try to hide it.

When the FSA says it controls an area it most of the buildings are intact and there are never massacres of women and children like in Houla and Darraya. Assad army reduces everything to rubble and then announces it reclaimed territory, see Baba Amr and most of Homs.

This is the attempt to recapture the barracks and military recruitment facility in Hanano.

http://youtu.be/TAtkU4M5DyY

Assad allegedly told some Damascus businessmen that, if he’s forced to leave, he would reduce the city to rubble. He appears to be true to his word.

Amid all the pain there are Syrians who are still going out to peaceful protests. I’m pretty sure Ashrafiyeh in Aleppo, which has a large Kurdish population, is under the regime’s “control” – here they are protesting in a very civilized manner that many on this forum think they should be executed for, perhaps even raped.

http://youtu.be/TAtkU4M5DyY

Of course both videos were staged in Qatar…

336. Ghufran said:
“The problem with the opposition is that they want a government that only represents them, I want elections to decide who heads the country and the government , it is not the job of the SNC, the GCC or the West to decide who should win or lose.”

There was talk of elections around the start of Kofi Annan’s tenure. Russia supported elections. The sticking point was whether Assad would resign prior to elections, which would add legitimacy to process. My impression was that Assad was unwilling to turn-over power to election result, perhaps your opinion is different.

Elections are preferred approach, sure, but they simply can’t happen now. The only practical path is to follow the Libyan model, where a reasonably representative provisional government is formed. Of course we know that Libyan council was flawed, some tribes in Misrata & Western Libya grumbled. But it worked well enough until elections could be held.
I realize Syria is much more difficult with its religous mix. But even in Libya, people said the tribal tensions presented impossible barrier. The impossible has to be overcome in Syria.

I post the upsetting item below to acknowledge the deaths of these brave ordinary Syrians and prove they are not the foreign fighters as the regime and its supporters hysterically claim.

Article: killed in an instant: Moment a Syrian rebel checkpoint takes direct hit is captured in powerful photographs that show the cost of war

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2200283/Killed-instant-Moment-Syrian-rebel-checkpoint-takes-direct-hit-captured-powerful-photographs-cost-war.html#ixzz25wIze500

321 VAT

“I am not going to give a cyber-female the leeway.”

Good one there, VATTY. That was a really smooth move on your part. I’m sure Tara was mesmerized by your hands-on, take-charge approach

336. Ghufran said:
“national reconciliation not revenge or counter killing is what put S.Africa on the right track, do not waste your time trying to find the word ” reconciliation ” in the dictionary of militant Muslims and their backers on this forum.”

You are describing an obstacle to be overcome. Militants will have to have limited representation in a provisional government. Islamicists had some voice on the Libyan Transitional Council.

Oh, and remember, foreigners will have zero presence in a transitional government.

ps. It occurs to me that I have developed a “Lawrence of Arabia” complex, telling the “little peoples” of Arabia to unite. Heee Heee. My middle name is even “Lawrence.” I don’t blame you all if you want to hate me. Heck, great loves often start with hatred.

#339 Ghufran, you are DETERMINED to paint as bleak and pessimistic and frightening picture about Syria’s future as you possibly can.

Imagine if others thought like you. Thank God many millions of Syrians don’t.

I hope you will stay well away in the post-Assad recovery phase. Your attitude would be toxic fumes among those who will be courageously and energetically and optimistically getting on with the future.

I’ve challenged you on this before. Is there anything you could possibly do personally to assist in the restoration and rebirth of Syria?

341. Ghufran

Thanks to the LA times story you posted, we are back to the middle age when excited warriors would gather to watching the lynching of their evil enemies in an extatic jubilation, shouting “God is with us”

A interesting glimpse at what the Ommayad square may be used for in the ‘Post-Bashar” era.

SL,
You are right, I am a pessimist now but that does not mean I did not help Syrians in the past or that I will not help Syrians in the future, my obligation towards Syria is not affected by who resides in almuhajireen presidential palace, most Syrians today are paying for the sins of their government and the new thugs who want to establish another dictatorship in Syria, my focus was and still is helping Syrians in need. Sending money to buy weapons is not my type of charity.

Ghufran

Why are you trying to depict the future of Syria in such dark terms?
You need to be severely scolded.
Don’t worry, you will get what you deserve in terms of advices until you accept to sing in the chorus that all will be rosy in OZ when the wizard will be gone.

Ghufran,

I am not talking about sending money to buy weapons. There are a lot of organizations providing help and hope to refugees.

And I am sure you are not far away from some organizations that are thinking about and working on ideas and plans to help post-Assad Syria.

Competent expatriate Syrians will have a big role in expertise and support and encouragement to play – not just charity.

To whom it may concern

We now know that local Syrians who never left Syria and who suffered that messy revolution are worthless.
Long live to the brilliant experts expats, the saviors of the Post Basha era…

Do you think that’s how loud voice cowards deserve to be welcomed?

A good story from Syria:
أنباء عن تحرير المختطفين في قرية القصب.. طريق اللاذقية حلب القديم التي شهدت أحداثاً طوال الأيام الماضية
الأنباء تتحدث عن تحرير حوالي 75 شخص من سكان القرية .. و وصول عدد منهم إلى مدينة اللاذقية بعد وساطة و مفاوضات جرت مع عدد من رجال الدين
More often than not,when Syrians from outside the two fighting factions intervene to solve problems, solutions can be found.
This is the third success story I read in similar situations in the last two weeks.
SL, expats can and should help, the extent of that help depends on the level of violence and the type of treatment expats receive from the Syrian government, I am not a fan of charity organizations, I prefer direct private channels.

ZOO,

You are telling us that you think Syrians are different from the many successful expatriate Afghans and Iraqis (and now Libyans and Tunisians) who returned and invested individual energy and funds in trying to rebuild their country.

The first two largely failed and had to withdraw because of security reasons. But I guess that’s what you are craving will happen in Syria too to prove your point about the wrongness of opposing Assad.

You make us wonder what it is you stand to lose and what makes you think so little of Syrians.

A Syrain man comes out from under his bombed house and sends a message to Bashar

There goes Ghufran again: @357
طريق اللاذقية حلب القديم التي شهدت أحداثاً طوال الأيام الماضية
الأنباء تتحدث عن تحرير حوالي 75 شخص من سكان القرية
Where did you get these nuggets of information..you seem loathe to tell us. Why?
…………………………………………………

Tracey Shelton, a courageous Australian foto-journo with the GlobalPost has been reporting from Syria. Don’t know if this has been posted here already, but if yes, sorry for the repetition.

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/syria/120905/aleppo-video-bomb-attack-children-death-toll

and an amazing series of stills:

http://www.globalpost.com/photo-galleries/planet-pic/5718451/life-and-death-aleppo-photos

BTW, the latter link contains an article titled:

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/syria/120719/not-everyone-hates-bashar-al-assad

by the same TS. Just so that people don’t think me totally one-sided 😉

I could easily write a very long and point by point counter argument to what the young daughters say to the journalist, but there is no need. All pro-freedom posters here can do that and already know the answers to such claims and fears.

And here is an an interview by Ch4 with Tracey herself:

http://www.channel4.com/news/images-of-war-the-lasting-legacy

Tracey Shelton ‏@tracey_shelton
“As horrible as it sounds, I was actually picking small pieces of flesh and debris from my backpack the following day.”

# 360. Atheist Syrian Salafist Against Dictatorships

No matter how much footage I see or how many accounts I read, it is still a raw shock to see ordinary Syrian people in their homes being randomly bombed and destroyed by military force.

And for no known reason or strategy except to terrorize civilians and satisfy primitive chaotic impulses by those directing it to be done. That’s basically how I’ve heard puzzled expert military observers sum it up.

That first video by Tracey Shelton you linked showing that tiny boy rescued from the rubble where all his family died and the targeting of a hospital tells the world everything about how debased, out of control and driven by sheer hatred of humanity the Assad regime has become.

They could not sink any further.

SyriaLover:

Just one small correction above, if I may:

“…how out of control and driven by sheer hatred of humanity the Assad regime has become” —> “…the Assad regime was,is and always will be“

The last 53 seconds in the live of three men

347. Halabi said:

“This is the attempt to recapture the barracks and military recruitment facility in Hanano.

http://youtu.be/TAtkU4M5DyY ”
___________________________________________________________

Lol the destroyed building (looks more like a Prison) still has some of the words of “Umma Arabiya Wa7ida zat” painted over the facade.

Ghufran

I would like to point out that equating the regime and the opposition in your assessment of guilt is not acceptable.
The regime claiming legitimacy is obligated by all internal and external and international norms and laws to uphold the security and the well being of its people.
The opposition has picked up arms in self defense in response to the brutality of the regime.
I challenge the regime to withdraw its heavy weapons and to cease firing indiscriminately and let us see how much destruction the opposition will continue to meet out.

Your description of Izas being destroyed by the action of both is dishonest as the 99% of the destruction was meted out in simple revenge and under the slogan Assad or we burn Albalad.

So here are my questions
Are you a pacifist, and this means that you will not fight back even if attacked and continue to protest peacefully, and if so do you expect the others to sit and wait while they watch their children tortured to death and their women raped and their houses destroyed.
If you are not a pacifist then you would recognize the right of self defense and in that situation where is your argument that the people cannot and should not defend themselves.

ZOO

Can you distract us with more news from Putin and Co

HASSAN

Where are you I do miss your comments and I look forward to them and I truly am disappointed each time I check and you are not there.

Where are JAD and IRRITATED AND MAJBALI
I do miss their posts

Interesting article (in french) from a journalist opposed to the regime but realistic. He analyzes well the background, fears and motivation of the Alawite community and the dangers of the Islamist excesses in the region.

Are our ministers badly advised or naive on Syria?

Nos ministres sont-ils mal conseillés ou naïfs sur la Syrie?

http://blog.lefigaro.fr/malbrunot/2012/09/alain-chouet-nos-ministres-son.html

A joyful wedding in Hatay with pro-Bashar Alawite Turks

Turkey is now hosting another wanted criminal..

Fugitive Iraqi VP sentenced to death

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/fugitive-iraqi-vp-sentenced-to-death-.aspx?pageID=238&nID=29697&NewsCatID=352

An Iraqi judge sentenced fugitive Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi to death by hanging for the murder of a lawyer and a brigadier general today, an AFP correspondent reported.

His secretary and son-in-law Ahmed Qahtan was also sentenced to die.

OBSERVER, Ghufran is not a pacifist, not at all. He supports Hamas, Hezbollah, PFLP, PFLP-GC, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Saddam, and Gaddafi. He supports the mass detention and mass execution of Islamist opponents of Arab dictatorships. He supports the killing and persecution of his ideological opponents since the 1950s and 1960s. He and his prototype is the reason why he have so much of hate in Syria today.

According to Ghufran and his sort, those who oppose an anti-Western Arab dictatorships on ideological or religious grounds, are in the same moral trench as israel and Zionists. It is a simple equation for them. Thousands of young lives were snuffed out in Egypt and Syria in the 1960s using this simple equation.

His sort will rot in Prisons after the Talia Muqatila come to power in Syria. Talia Muqatila have a long blood feud with Ghufran’s sort, when I mean “blood feud”, I really mean it, his sort will not be able to live in peace even in New York or Paris, they will be hunted down by the Talia Muqatila, the same people his sort are having a blood feud since July 22 1952.

If you can guess, Talia Muqatila represents the will of the majority of the Syrian people, the common man, the “small man”, the small, humble Syrian citizen.

SOURCE : Persons from both sides who were active participants in the “blood feud” between the State and its Islamist opponents, in Syria and Egypt, in the 1950s and 1960s.

An old, withered aquaintance of mine, who worked in a high-ranking position in the Egyptian Prison Service at the time Sayyid Qutb was hanged, has lost his nerves after Morsi came to power.

I hope to receive a reply to this comment, OBSERVER. I would also like your own thoughts about this “blood feud”.

369. ZOO said:

“A joyful wedding in Hatay with pro-Bashar Alawite Turks”

_______________________________________________________________-

I can’t believe how easy those Hatay Alawis are having it in democratic Turkey. They are getting off lightly. They are basically disagreeing with and opposing the National Foreign Policy. This is a grave crime in the eyes of a totalitarian State. Erdogan is letting them off lightly.

Syrian Sunnis did not have the same luxury in 1976 when Hafez attacked the PLO, nor did Syrian Christians have the same luxury in 1981 when Hafez was shelling Zahle and East Beirut.

Are these Hollande’s predictions of imminent major defections?

http://www.asharq-e.com/news.asp?section=1&id=30980

Two Syrian diplomats in Malaysia announced late on Friday that they had joined the opposition, according to a report by pan-Arab television channel Al Arabiya.

Two men identifying themselves as First Secretary Imad Ahmar and Attaché Mahmoud Obedi from Syria’s Kuala Lumpur embassy read out a statement on the channel declaring their “support for the Syrian people’s revolution against the tyrannical regime”.

Bad news for the opposition: It is increasingly confirmed that the FSA is been taken over by Islamists.

Jihadists join Aleppo fight, eye Islamic state, French surgeon from Doctors without Borders says

By John Irish
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/09/08/uk-syria-crisis-jihad-idUKBRE88708Y20120908
PARIS | Sat Sep 8, 2012 4:20pm BST

(Reuters) – Foreign Islamists intent on turning Syria into an autocratic theocracy have swollen the ranks of rebels fighting to topple President Bashar al-Assad and think they are waging a “holy war”, a French surgeon who treated fighters in Aleppo has said.

Jacques Beres, co-founder of medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres, returned from Syria on Friday evening after spending two weeks working clandestinely in a hospital in the besieged northern Syrian city.

In an interview with Reuters in his central Paris apartment on Saturday, the 71-year-old said that contrary to his previous visits to Homs and Idlib earlier this year about 60 percent of those he had treated this time had been rebel fighters and that at least half of them had been non-Syrian.

“It’s really something strange to see. They are directly saying that they aren’t interested in Bashar al-Assad’s fall, but are thinking about how to take power afterwards and set up an Islamic state with sharia law to become part of the world Emirate,” the doctor said.

The foreign jihadists included young Frenchmen who said they were inspired by Mohammed Merah, a self-styled Islamist militant from Toulouse, who killed seven people in March in the name of al-Qaeda.

Assad himself has consistently maintained that the 17-month-old insurgency against him is largely the work of people he refers to as “foreign-backed terrorists” and says his forces are acting to restore stability.

During his previous visits to Syria – in March and May – Beres said he had dismissed suggestions the rebels were dominated by Islamist fighters but he said he had now been forced to reassess the situation.

The doctor’s account corroborates other anecdotal evidence that the struggle against Assad appears to be drawing ever greater numbers of fellow Arabs and other Muslims, many driven by a sense of religious duty to perform jihad (holy war) and a readiness to suffer for Islam.

But while some are professional “jihadists”, veterans of Iraq, Afghanistan, Chechnya or Libya who bring combat and bomb-making skills with them that alarm the Western and Arab governments which have cheered the rebels on, many have little to offer Syrians but their goodwill and prayers.

Beres described treating dozens of such jihadists from other Arab countries, but also at least two young Frenchmen.

“Some of them were French and completely fanatical about the future,” he said. “They are very cautious people, even to the doctor who treated them. They didn’t trust me, but for instance they told me that Mohammed Merah was an example to follow.”

Merah tore a wound in France’s fragile sense of community in March when he gunned down three soldiers from North African immigrant families, a rabbi and three Jewish children.

Paris has for several years been concerned that French radical Islamists who have travelled to lawless zones would return to plot attacks at home. Merah had travelled to Afghanistan and Pakistan to receive training.
…

In order for any reconciliation to ever happen the abuser has to recognize their hand in the bloodshed. To expect dialogue unconditionally with those that perpetrated the overwhelming majority of the crimes, bloodshed and destruction is just not feasible. Not at this point.

To this day you can’t get a clear condemnation by the supporters for the crimes perpetrated by the regime, let alone to get the regime to admit to what it did. If this regime ever wanted dialogue they would have implemented at least ONE POINT from the Annan 6 point plan.

While maybe the majority of the victims won’t ever get the justice they deserve, they at the very least deserve ACCOUNTABILITY.

@DebraTice:

@Makdissi Have compassion on our family and release our son, Austin Tice to us.

@Mikdissi:

@DebraTice if he is to be found inside Sy. Iam def sure ur gov will B notified. R u sure he is inside Syria? Reports he entered illegally

133. VISITOR said:
“The US government must do something about it other than just mere condemnation or invoking the mantra of free speech.”

Free speech in the US is not a mantra. It is the right of U.S. citizens guaranteed by the Constitution. It is about as sacred to many Americans as Mohammed is to many Muslims. Just as Muslims reject the notion that a crazy Muslim represents Islam, so Americans reject the notion that a crazy American represents the US. What’s so hard to understand about this?