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It has been reported that two friends of the Islamic State leader were captured alive and they have whisked off to an undisclosed site, maybe Turkey, Israel, Iraq, Cyprus
but my guess would be Jordan.Mr. Donald Trump has said the US should be able to take some of the Syrian oil, but critics say doing so would violate the Geneva Convention’s laws against pillaging natural resources.
Either the United States are getting out of Syria or they are not.
Surely they can not do both.White Helmet Heroes might be next to be ditched/stiffed.
Indeed they can’t do both, Michael!
First, they are not interested in the countries with low natural oil reserves.
Second, they locate the countries with high natural oil reserve and try to control them.
Third, they locate the countries which border the countries with high natural oil reserve and try to control them.
Forth, they influnce the countries which are biden or otherwise controlling the countries with natural oil reserves.
Fifth, they try to control the 2nd and 3rd and 4th countries.
Sixth, they try to demonise and de-humanise countries which counteract their activities.
Seventh, they demonise and de-humanise the people exposing their activities.I always ask myself – why? Why is oil so very important?
DISHONEST JOURNALISM
Is this article by Martin Chulov a blatant example of dishonest journalism? If so it is not an isolated case. Recent in all the media including the BBC concerning the pseudo withdrawal of US troops from Northern Syria all reiterate the notion that the Kurds where the most important allies in fighting and defeating Da’esh in Syria. In this narrative there is no mention whatsoever of the role played by the Russian intervention in 2015 which reversed the inexorable rise of Da’esh till then whilst the US and ‘allies’ watched at a distance, or of the logistic and economic support for Da’esh coming through Turkey, presumably financed by the Saudi and Gulf monarchies and with weapons supplied by the US and NATO.
But the Chulov piece is a masterful example of deceit through omission, an attempt to rewrite history, because as we know, Wikipedia and other sources are then more likely to quote this because it is printed in the Guardian.
So, let us analyze this piece and compare it to actual happenings: the title says it allAbu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s death comes as new order takes shape in Middle East
In aftermath of Isis’s toxic mix of chaos and intolerance, new spheres of influence are being demarcated
Mosul was the first to fall, its capture used by Baghdadi to proclaim the formation of a new caliphate on the lands of northern Iraq. Soon it spread to Raqqa, and to the east of Aleppo. The Iraqi Kurdish capital of Irbil was in the group’s sights, so too the oil city of Kirkuk, and very nearly Baghdad.
As the dominoes tumbled, Isis gathered momentum. Its toxic mantra of doctrinal intolerance took root in some areas, but in others it forced populations to flee en masse. Communities that had co-existed since the dawn of millennia were uprooted and are yet to return. Tented shanty towns of the displaced remain dotted across the Kurdish norths of Iraq and Syria a testament to an upheaval which could take generations to be reversed.It was very clear at this stage that the US and allies where very happy to stand by and watch the expansion of ISIS and here are two analyses, one from Jacob Siegal from the Daily Beast and the other from Seumus Milne from the Guardian that explain why the US was reluctant to interfere as the rise of ISIS if not really planned, suited the then current policy.
By mid last year a momentum that had seemed unstoppable had begun to slow. In Iraq, militia groups that had fought alongside the Iraqi army had clawed back all major cities. In Syria, Kurdish proxies of the US had recaptured Raqqa and nearly all the territory Isis had seized. The rest was retaken earlier this year in a painstaking push near where it all began for the forerunners of Isis, along the Euphrates River basin.
Where was Martin when Putin declared in the UN in September 2015 that Russia was going to interfere and defend the Syrian state?
The Russian involvement started by bombing extensive convoys of oil tankers stealing Syrian oil and transporting it illegally to Turkey for onward smuggling
This, and the Russian accusations against Turkeys role in this illegal trade did not go down very well with Erdogan who retaliated by shooting down a Russian warplane
The whole long battle which led to the liberation of Palmyra in March 2016 by the Russian and Syrian forces and subsequent beating back of Da’esh from central Syria to the banks of the Euphrates seems to be airbrushed from all the recent narratives including this one.
Not only did the US and allies and the MSM not acknowledge the role played by the SAA against Da’esh, they even tried to help the terrorist group by bombing the SAA at the Al Thardeh mountains during the battle to relieve the siege of Deir Ezzor .These events of course also took place while the Syrian Army with the help of Russia were also fighting the ‘moderate’ Al Qaeda linked rebels in other parts of Syria such as in Hama, Aleppo and East Ghouta in Damascus.
The US decision to abandon the Kurds who fought on their behalf is unlikely to bring stability to a still volatile area, where the stark realities exposed by the Isis rampage remain just as troubling in defeat. The ground war was won by non-state actors who fought on Iraq and Syria’s behalf. The national armies of both countries splintered in the face of the threat and are yet to fully regroup.
These ‘non state actors’ were the Hashed al sha’abi in Iraq sponsored by Iran and of course the Kurds, backed by the US. The US then discarded the Kurds as much as they had previously discarded the Mujahideen in Afghanistan, and Da’esh in the current conflict after they have fulfilled their purpose.
Isis took hold in the vacuum of the 2003 US invasion, which had ousted the Sunni ruling class in Iraq and diminished the status the sect held in society. The group positioned itself as a champion of the disenfranchised – willing to reclaim lost glories and restore Islamic precepts.
Mr Chulov seems to have conveniently forgotten how this vacuum was orchestrated, either deliberately or through negligence. The state in Iraq was dismantled and so was the police and army and all the security apparatus that went with them. This has led to a vacuum filled in by Al Qaeda which never existed in Iraq before. This was under the watchful eyes of the occupation forces. Eventually, the majority Shia were able to form a meaningful organised opposition and it was probably a deliberate divide and rule policy on the part of the coalition to introduce the militant Sunni factions to exploit the division this created. Ironically all of this allowed Iran to have a much more important input into Iraqi politics than was ever possible before the invasion.
A sense of Sunni grievance was central to its message, and it readily tapped into the fortunes of Sunnis elsewhere; in Lebanon, whose patron Rafik Hariri was assassinated in 2005 and in Syria, where the anti-Assad opposition was primarily drawn from the same sect.
This is another false narrative. The apparent years of dominance of the minority Sunni in Iraq and the oppression of the Shi’a majority does not seem to feature here but this lost dominance seems to now be the cause of the friction. The conflation of this with the assassination of Rafiq al Hariri as the representative of the Sunni in Lebanon is another attempt at conflating unrelated events into a conspiracy against Sunnis in the Levant. In Syria, the majority of the Syrian army is made up of Sunnis and again to pretend that the spill over of Isis as a representative of Sunni disgruntlement into the Syrian war is a laughable reinterpretation of facts.
But the huge disruption and grievances the group caused remain raw and largely unresolved. The naked failings of authority in the region are in many ways just as troubling. Weak political governance offers few guarantees of justice or reconciliation. Perceived losses are unlikely to be recovered anytime soon.
The disruption and grievances will remain as long as the alliance maintains the illusion that they can achieve a removal of the legitimate Syrian government and obstruct the reconstruction of Syria by punitive sanctions and prevention of aid to rebuild.
Instead, a new regional order is taking shape that underpins the tremendous chaos Isis has caused. New areas of influence are being demarcated and there is now a real chance that some of the region’s post second world war borders could be redrawn along ethnic sectarian lines.
Be honest Martin. The new order is that Russia has established its presence in the region in a constructive way and is trying to mend bridges and act as a go between previously irreconcilable enemies. The US and its allies have lost influence. The ME policy is in tatters and influence is daily being lost. Admission of defeat and attempt at construction would be the best way forward for everyone concerned.
In Syria’s volatile east, large restive populations of Isis detainees remain interned where, for the past six months, they have been able to reorganise. The new Isis camps are bigger and more combustible than the US versions in southern Iraq, where Baghdadi earned his stripes as a future leader during a nine month stint in 2004. Back then, he was able to convince his captors that he was a stabilising influence, and they let him go. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was anything but. He lived and died as one of the savage and influential figures of modern times.
The large restive population of Isis supporters that was left for the Kurds to be dealt with reflects the fact that many foreigners swelled the ranks of Isis. It is the refusal of the countries from which these foreigners came, to take them back to deal with them in the framework of their law and international law that has left the Kurds, not a developed state, to care for them. Their regrouping is everything to do with relegation of duties of the allies to deal with this festering problem.
And as to the assertion that Baghdadi convinced his captors that he is a stabilising influemce…, this is pure fiction. I wonder whether these same people also thought Al Jolani, al Nusra and the FSA may be able to take over this role. Oh wait, I think they do by the looks of it.Even Brett Mcgurk is bewildered at the action to send US troops to ‘protect Syria’s oilfields.
Node, I regret getting so angry at you, but I am sick and tired of your accusations that I am perpetrating some sort of plot. If you ever feel like talking with me as a person, you know where to find me.
I personally feel a bit saddened when long term contributors here whom one comes to know through time, get angry and accuse each other of unmentionable deeds. This detracts from our common goal and our common enemy which is their desired effects. My personal views on 911 is that there are so many strange things that happened that day that it is impossible for us to find the truth. What we do know very clearly though is that there are seriously malign operators amongst leaders or substrate actors in the West and there are extensive coverups which even when exposed, are still either denied or ignored and that the MSM is playing a big part in this charade. What we need is a truly independent press.
SA, I very much agree with the whole of your above comment; thank you. I add only that “our common enemy” would seem to be a self-sustaining system rather than a group of people; everyone does good and bad, both deliberately and inadvertently, but the system promotes those who act so as to sustain it.
I fully agree it is the SYSTEM we should be fighting not its manifestations and dupes.
The total number of troops on the ground in Eastern Syria would remain around 600.
However, following the seventieth NATO Party in England, it is said that American troops could be removed, if substituted for other NATO troops?
https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/201912051077490851-pentagon-not-ruling-out-further-reduction-of-troops-in-syria—us-defence-secretary/A million man march in Iraq against US occupation. This of course you do not hear about in the MSM.
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/watch-live-iraqs-million-man-march-against-us-presence/Revisiting Raqqa 2017. Quentin Somerville for the BBC showing how 4000 battle hardened ISIS fighters were let out of Raqaa and transported to Turkey under the aegis of the US and the SDF.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=58&v=5SDq8OTIvnc&feature=emb_logohere.https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=58&v=5SDq8OTIvnc&feature=emb_logoIsrael are Bombing Damascus …
Tom Duggan
Brian and besides they frightened my cats .spent most of the attack trying to get the cats to safety
Yet more Surprise Israeli strikes on Damascus suburbs put a civilian aircraft in serious danger and forced it to divert to Russia’s Khmeimim airbase as the Syrian air defense was activated to repel the attack, the Russian military said.
An Airbus A320 flying from Tehran to the Syrian capital was forced to make an emergency landing following an Israeli missile attack, the Russian Defense Ministry said. It added that using civilian aircraft as a “shield” is “commonplace” for Israeli Air Force pilots.
https://www.rt.com/news/480281-israel-strike-damascus-civilian-flight/This is happening, too often, to be another mistake.
Why are the Israelis immune from World condemnation.
If Craig is listening,
is shadowing a civilian airliner to bomb, so as to expect the defending country to retaliate, with the high possibility of bringing down the civil airliner
a war crime?Of course it is. But so what? It only matters when war crimes are commuted by our enemies and that we are then able to take kneejerk retaliation without proof.
This is what is thought to have happened in Ukraine, Tehran and off the coast of Lebanon to the Russian plane, apparently brought down by Syrian air defence, attempting to deter four Israli aircraft attacking Syria.
Five Turkish soldiers were killed and five others were wounded on Monday as a result of “intense” shelling by Syrian government forces in Syria’s northern Idlib province, according to the Turkish defence ministry.
Yes certainly getting very, very active in Northern Syria.
The Turkish Defense Ministry has confirmed that a Syrian government helicopter was destroyed in the small village of Al Nerab, southeast of Idlib. The incident occurred after Turkish troops were killed by shelling in Idlib, Syria.
https://www.rt.com/news/480571-syrian-govt-chopper-downed/There seems to be an open war now in Syria.
Between Turkey and Syria.The Syrian army carries out attacks against terrorists in the Idlib province, not civilians , Kremlin said after Turkey threatened Damascus with military action, accusing it of shelling its soldiers.
Turkey has failed to clear the de-escalation zone in Syria’s Idlib Province of jihadist groups, despite promising to do so under the 2018 ceasefire agreement reached by Moscow and Ankara, the spokesperson for the Kremlin Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday.“These groups are still attacking the Syrian forces from Idlib, as well as conducting aggressive actions against our military sites,” he said.
Erdogan has been accusing the Syrian army of shelling Turkish soldiers and of bombing villages. On Wednesday, he threatened to strike Syrian government forces in Idlib and beyond if Turkish troops are harmed. The Kremlin’s spokesperson denied that Damascus deliberately targets anyone except the militants. “The Syrian army’s strikes in Idlib are strikes against terrorists, not civilians,” Peskov said.
As for the shelling of Turkish forces, Moscow said that one such confirmed incident had occurred because Ankara failed to properly notify the Syrian military about its troop movements.
https://www.rt.com/news/480660-kremlin-idlib-turkey-syria/Today in Parliament Ian Blackford made a fool of himself ranting about Butcher Assad, Ian seems to have no understanding, whatsoever what has been going on in Syria?
The U.N. human rights office on Wednesday released a list of more than 100 companies it said are complicit in violating Palestinian human rights by operating in Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank – a first-ever international attempt to name and shame businesses that has drawn fierce Israeli condemnation.
https://www.france24.com/en/20200212-un-releases-long-awaited-list-of-firms-linked-to-israeli-settlements-in-west-bankThe Middle East is in a frenzy of change.
A Saudi Tornado fighter jet had “fallen” while carrying out a support mission near Yemeni army units,
according to Saudi Arabia’s state news agency SPA.Yemen’s Houthi rebels said they shot down the plane.
The Saudi-led coalition has been battling the rebel Houthi movement since 2015.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/51515682
Recently two Syrian helicopters have been brought down in Idleb Province, by fighters backed by Turkey.American troops and equipment are moving from Iraq into Syria.
US forces stationed in Syria have started building a new military base in the oil-rich north-eastern province of Al-Hasakah near the town of Tell Brak, Turkey’s Anadolu news agency reported, citing anonymous sources. Its rapid construction reportedly started on 3 February with equipment and materials arriving from Iraq via the al-Waleed border crossing.
The news agency’s sources claim that the base has been erected in order to prevent Russian forces, deployed in the Arab Republic at the behest of the government, from reaching the Rmelan oil field.
https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/202002091078268685-us-troops-establish-new-military-base-in-syria-to-cut-off-roads-to-eastern-oil-fields–report/This is a dangerous development.
Michael
I can only see this as short term spoiling tactics. If US looses access to Iraq as a friendly state, how is this oil going to be usefully exported? It would still be in a geographically isolated location under the control of the Kurds and presumably Turkey will not allow its export which will benefit the YPG. I personally think this is a diversionary tactic and is also aimed at denying Syria access to their oil but this sounds very short term its and not thought through. Also in time I am sure the Kurds in Syria and the other Arab tribes in that part will reconcile with Damascus and the US troops will have to leave. There are already some signs of cooperation in Afrin and around the Al bab area. Also the recent sweeping campaign in Idlib and Aleppo have been a great boost to the SG and it is becoming clear that a regime change is a really unviable idea now. In fact the main headache for Turkey and also Europe is how to deal with the foreign terrorists in the remains parts of Idlib? Nobody really wants the m to go back to where they came from as they will be destabilising and Erdogan’s actions in Syria now seem to indicate that he is not keen to have them in Turkey, for obvious reasons.Very likely in Northern Syria, as happened in the enclaves in Southern Syria, there is much concern, that Islamic State or al Qadea or other special contractors will squeal when the Syrians have captured them and paraded them on television, some very hasty obfuscation/extraction/elimination is on-going.
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