Smaller than expected protests were held in Syria on Friday that were nevertheless met with deadly force that left between 7 and 10 dead. An alleged 5000 come out in the southern city of Deraa and some 2000 in the Duma suburb of Damascus.
Al-Sharq al-Awsat says that for the first time there were also demonstrations by Kurds in Kamishli, demanding equality with Arabs. Syria (pop. 22 million) has some 2 million Kurds, who often see themselves as oppressed by the regime’s emphasis on Arab nationalism. Tens of thousands of Kurds had their citizenship taken away in the 1960s.
CNN says that altogether thousands demonstrated in Daraa, Latakia, Homs, Baniyas and Kamishli
Despite the crackdown, the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood rejected outside intervention in Syria. Brotherhood leader Mohamed Tayfur supported, however, the UN-authorized intervention in Libya: “Gadhafi was killing his own people. There was no other option … ” The Muslim Brotherhood is to anti-imperialism what Ben & Jerry’s are to ice cream, and even they are supporting NATO!
Aljazeera English reports:
Why is it that very little attention is focused on NATO’s almost deliberate delaying tactics before they decided to act? There is much speculation about their complicity in creating the desperate situation that demanded their intervention in Benghazi. They have been anything but consistent since.
Juan, you continue to ridicule the notion that there are legitimate objections from the left to this foolish intervention. If you want to believe in Obama’s new war and support that belief with facts, it’s your blog. But it would be better to be consistent and follow the same basic notions of anti-interventionism that you applied to Iraq and other wars. Is there any other path to de-militarizing our country, or should we make excuses when a purported liberal is in the WH?
Also, I am beginning to wonder how far you will follow the President in this newly minted ‘doctrine’? Even unto Tehran?
I haven’t ridiculed anyone.
Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds.”
I oppose war with Iran unless there is a legal casus belli.
A legal causus belli? When was that ever reqired by Bushie or Obama? Both consider themselves above the law; free to ignore the Constitution.
Considering our supine Congress, your opposition to war with Iran means noting. Unless, of course, you and others take to the streets to demand respect for the law.
There is no foolish consistency here. Rather the foolish consistency is that our hyper-militarization has led us to see military solutions where there are none. As predicted by sober and nonpartisan analysis, the Libyan resistance is already bogged down and will require boots on the ground to even stand a chance.
If Americans want ‘humanitarian’, how bout we stop bombing Pakistani villages and stop supporting the ethnic cleansing of Palestine? This action, if even authentically motivated by humanitarian concerns, is rather like a rapacious mafia don adopting a stray puppy.
The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood seems to be quite a bit better at math than a lot of western “anti-imperialists” shouting about double standards.
It’s a damn shame that security forces are killing tens, dozens, even scores of people in places like Yemen, Bahrain, and Syria. That’s still about a thousand times less that what we were looking at happening in Libya.
Military force and foreign intervention need to be a last resort, reserved for only the most extreme cases. It’s odd, after the Bush years, to see this point being embraced by the interventionists and seemingly forgotten by the anti-s.
But Saleh has been literally bombing and killing his own people for a couple years running now, with extensive American support. Not al-Qaeda, the Houthis. The Saudis like it, and we underwrite the whole operation.
The Liberal Interventionists are right about one thing: we cant do everything for everyone; but what we can do is stop actively supporting and committing the killing of innocents in the Middle East.
I absolutely did not understand this sentence:
“The Muslim Brotherhood is to anti-imperialism what Ben & Jerry’s are to ice cream, and even they are supporting NATO!”
I must be missing some cultural element, could you spell out what this means?
You would expect the Muslim Brotherhood to condemn Western intervention.
Cheers. Juan