Being not from the US myself but currently living here, I find people educating me about the "third world" and how the evil West is to blame for everything. It's ironic, because I'm from what you would call a developing nation that was colonized by Germany and then Britain. The West has a lot to answer for no doubt, but this idea that the world is black and white and that other leaders are innocent and just victims of imperialist aggression is just factually incorrect. I have met Iraqis who themselves told me that the phase from 1979-2003 was a nightmare for them, and that even though the country is going through a difficult period, the situation will eventually stabilize but Saddam was never the answer to the problems Iraq is facing, he was in fact one of the biggest causes of those problems. I do not believe the West went into Iraq to "liberate Iraqis", they obviously had their own agendas, whether it was oil or US/Israeli geostrategic gains, and let's not forget the US propped up Saddam for 8 years in the war against Iran, but that doesn't mean Saddam wasn't an absolute genocidal maniac. Iraqis themselves will tell you this, but the left in the West is too fixated with the idea that anyone the West is against is automatically good and a champion of resistance, etc. If only the world were so easy.
I am tired of my banging my head against the wall try to show evidence of Assad's warcrimes to people, they will never believe anything, they will use the logic argument to say Assad didn't do xyz, but when you show them the logical basis for him using such tactics, they will ignore it and conveniently assert their own claim over anyone else's. Ironically, these people are fervently anti-Zionist in many cases, yet the arguments they make are so similar. Despite what countless human rights groups, the UN and the OPCW have reported, they will choose not to believe anything. I am against US military intervention because I think personally, the US does not care about civilians, the carnage in Yemen and the warcrimes committed by Israel which it fully supports does not bother the ruling class one bit, barring maybe a few, but in the case of Israel, practically no one. I do think any attempt to find a sense of justice needs to involve a reformation of the institutions we have, whether it is the ICC and the UNSC, so that they are not politicized and able to act in situations like these, where the aim is solely to protect civilians, not other agendas. These organisations need to be able to act regardless of who the perpetrators are. The ICC needs to be able to punish all leaders who commit warcrimes, be they Syrian, Russian, American, Iranian, Israeli, Saudi, Turkish, etc.
When they had protests in Iran earlier this year, Iran was brutally condemned by the US at the UNSC, why don't we see similar condemnations of Israel? Iran arrested over a thousand people, which is bad in itself but Israel shot around that number, yet they are called a democracy and Iran a dictatorship? I would argue Iran is more democratic than Israel, and based on the way Israel is handling these protests and others, maybe even less repressive, yet freedom house ranks Israel as a democracy, which makes no sense.
Also, in conjunction with this, I wonder if anyone has been keeping up with the rant against Jeremy Corbyn and his alleged anti-semitic views? The pro-Israel lobbies in Britain and America spend millions and millions of dollars to try and smear people who dare to criticise Israel and their policies, including looking for baseless allegations against people that have stood against racism all their lives. I distinctly remember, this video from Al Jazeera, where they found Israeli officials themselves convincing lobby groups in Britain to take down labour members that were too critical of Israel. There's no doubt the money that goes into these lobbying efforts, trickles down to not only how governments view things, but also how state protected corporations also enact their own policies. Indeed, corporations and individuals that support BDS in some states in the US are banned from doing business with the state. Thanks to the ACLU, prominent cases where these became relevant like in the firing of the teacher in Kansas who supported boycotting Israel and restricting funds to victims of Hurricane Harvey who supported boycotting Israel, the rule was overturned. I think we have to push back against this, I don't recommend deleting facebook, but try and use it to share information about Israeli human rights abuses, while our brothers/sisters in Palestine or in any other part of the world living under repression are unable to do so and if you get banned, open a new account, keep doing it so they know that people are not going to tolerate being shut down and give up.
And now Trump fires Tillerson and hires neocon Pompeo for secretary of state. As bad as Tillerson was, he was one of the saner voices in the administration, now we're just getting a bunch of Pro-Israel neocons, will they drag us to war with Iran? How much will this cost? How many lives? The only reason we're interested in Syria is because of Israel's concerns about Iran. I think there needs to be a push to force AIPAC and these neocon Pro-Israel think tanks like the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, which writes baseless claims about Hezbollah like them running underground drug operations in London and places in Latin America to register as foreign agents. At a time when Russia seems to be a huge concern, we really should be having a conversation about Israel. Al Jazeera actually has blocked a video on the Pro-Israel lobby from being shown because of lobbying pressure, as Americans I think it is paramount for us to be able to see it. I really wonder if this alliance is something worth hanging onto really, Israel's policies are fundamentally against my own values, but thus far I have thought perhaps they serve our national interests, but day by day, it increasingly seems like Israel is more of a burden than anything else.
I always used to think Assad is the better option to his alternatives, but the more this war goes on and the more people die, I grow less and less certain of this perspective. As a Shiite Muslim myself, I was appalled by Khamenei's statement last week praising Assad's resistance, it's one thing to deal with him because the alternatives suck, but to praise him? That's downright shameful. That the majority of the people fighting Assad are not good people is true, but the more civilians and the more warcrimes are committed in fighting these people, the less convincing the argument that if the rebels take over Syria, minorities will be killed, women will lose rights becomes. You're basically saying that it is fine to kill as many innocent civilians as it takes to prevent groups from coming to power that will kill minorities (civilians again). How exactly do you have the moral high ground then? You don't. The Israelis make the same argument about giving Palestinian land back, they say that all Jews will be killed so the occupation is necessary, and we know that's a nonsense argument. I kind of wonder what the outcome would've been had Iran and Hezbollah had stayed out. Assad may have fallen and probably replaced by a horrible regime, but would the Syrians have wanted to live in a fundamentalist state like Saudi Arabia? Highly unlikely. They would've probably revolted and this may have led to the same bloodshed we're seeing now, but it wouldn't be blood shed in my name. It's difficult to not feel complicit in the atrocities being committed. However, I now know how it is possible for many Jews to be afraid to speak up against Zionism and to feel the need to defend it, I have become very unpopular for not fully throwing my weight around Iran in this war. I'm always told I desire to see Shiite genocide. Isn't that what anti-Zionist Jews are often told when they don't blindly defend Israel?
Thanks Larry. The painful reality here Larry is I don't know what the solution is. I don't have any answers as to how this should be approached, the AQ linked militants have to be taken out, but how? So much suffering, yet how do we end it? There are no easy answers. What needs to be said is that we need a reformation in our international justice systems like the ICC and the UNSC so that they are able to act against anyone that violates int'l law, regardless of who it is, such institutions should be free of influence from the great powers.
Alec, I understand the need for Syria to take back areas under Al Qaeda and their allies. The use of indiscriminate tactics in my view though cannot be justified. I am aware that there has been a great deal of propaganda from the white helmets and the western media. I however do not think we can dismiss every report from every human rights group that states the use of indiscriminate tactics. These human rights groups also report on Israel's indiscriminate bombing of Gaza and Saudi indiscriminate bombing of Yemen, so I am inclined to think they aren't reporting on this with a political agenda in place. Taking back the country from terrorists isn't the debate that's being had, it's the tactics that are being used. And while it is also true that the Syrian uprising was hijacked right from the early days with fundamentalist groups backed by the gulf states and people from other countries also flooded in through the Turkish border to fight, it is also the case that Assad allowed the discontent to grow through increased repression way before the war began. When you use repression, you risk radicalizing people. In fact the US sent people to Syria to be tortured because Syria agreed to cooperate with the US on their rendition program in the "war on terror".
I'd like to see justice everywhere, no one's hand in this war are clean. The US has killed plenty of civilians in Syria too and elsewhere all over the world. Russia has killed civilians too. The Saudi, Turkish funded rebels have too. If we seek a true just solution to this conflict, everyone must be held accountable not just the regime and its backers. While we're at it, we should hold Netanyahu accountable for what his army did in Gaza in 2014, and King Salman for what they are doing in Yemen. I'm all for accountability, but the way it is painted in the western media, it is all about vilifying one person, while turning a blind eye to people on "our side". I reject that premise. Let's have accountability, but let's cut the hypocrisy.
As immoral and disgraceful as the Assad regime is, this attack is a clear violation of int'l law, the US has no authorization to be in Syria, because it needs permission from the Syrian government, which is the only legitimate governing entity in Syria right now, and even though this is a reality many may not like given the atrocities committed by the regime, it is one that ought to be recognised nonetheless. I find it quite funny that the US can simply now use the powers it gave itself from the declaration of the war on terror to target "terrorists" however it defines them wherever it deems fit and if they then have to attack the legitimate government of a country later it is perfectly deemed acceptable. In fact they even call it defence when illegally present US troops are attacked by the government of the country they are in. It amazes me that many seem to fall for the humanitarian aspect of this, i.e. stopping the Assad regime from killing kurds but given how many dictatorships the US supports, that it allies itself with a country that's creating the largest humanitarian crisis in the world in Yemen and a country that is one of the last settler colonial states in the world. How can such claims of humanitarian intervention particularly among circles on the left be taken seriously?
I find it quite surprising that no one raises a question to US officials about what Israel's borders actually are. As far as I know Israel has no constitution and has no well defined borders, this isn't just about Jerusalem, Israel has attacked Lebanon and occupied it for 18 years, it only let it go when it assessed that the cost of doing so was very high because of the rise of Hezbollah. Israel also is apparently on an effort to increase its presence illegally on Syrian territory. Beyond the Golan, they've built up a security zone in Quneitra, and they are looking to expand this into Daraa now as well. They are looking at building a 40 km buffer zone. If you notice, a lot of the weapons being held by some of the "rebels" are provided by Israel. The middle east will never find any peace so long as the US does not move away from its morally bankrupt Israel policy and of course Israel isn't the only reason for instability, I think all countries are far from innocent, but our involvement in Syria is only because of our one-sided policy toward Israel, otherwise what strategic purpose does Syria serve? None! Israel was certainly a factor behind the Iraq war, perhaps not the most important factor, but it definitely was a factor. Why do we continue to isolate Iran and make threats of war against them when really it should be our ally at a time when we and most of the world have a common enemy that Iran has been heavily involved in fighting. This really has to end. Enough is enough.
Being not from the US myself but currently living here, I find people educating me about the "third world" and how the evil West is to blame for everything. It's ironic, because I'm from what you would call a developing nation that was colonized by Germany and then Britain. The West has a lot to answer for no doubt, but this idea that the world is black and white and that other leaders are innocent and just victims of imperialist aggression is just factually incorrect. I have met Iraqis who themselves told me that the phase from 1979-2003 was a nightmare for them, and that even though the country is going through a difficult period, the situation will eventually stabilize but Saddam was never the answer to the problems Iraq is facing, he was in fact one of the biggest causes of those problems. I do not believe the West went into Iraq to "liberate Iraqis", they obviously had their own agendas, whether it was oil or US/Israeli geostrategic gains, and let's not forget the US propped up Saddam for 8 years in the war against Iran, but that doesn't mean Saddam wasn't an absolute genocidal maniac. Iraqis themselves will tell you this, but the left in the West is too fixated with the idea that anyone the West is against is automatically good and a champion of resistance, etc. If only the world were so easy.
I am tired of my banging my head against the wall try to show evidence of Assad's warcrimes to people, they will never believe anything, they will use the logic argument to say Assad didn't do xyz, but when you show them the logical basis for him using such tactics, they will ignore it and conveniently assert their own claim over anyone else's. Ironically, these people are fervently anti-Zionist in many cases, yet the arguments they make are so similar. Despite what countless human rights groups, the UN and the OPCW have reported, they will choose not to believe anything. I am against US military intervention because I think personally, the US does not care about civilians, the carnage in Yemen and the warcrimes committed by Israel which it fully supports does not bother the ruling class one bit, barring maybe a few, but in the case of Israel, practically no one. I do think any attempt to find a sense of justice needs to involve a reformation of the institutions we have, whether it is the ICC and the UNSC, so that they are not politicized and able to act in situations like these, where the aim is solely to protect civilians, not other agendas. These organisations need to be able to act regardless of who the perpetrators are. The ICC needs to be able to punish all leaders who commit warcrimes, be they Syrian, Russian, American, Iranian, Israeli, Saudi, Turkish, etc.
When they had protests in Iran earlier this year, Iran was brutally condemned by the US at the UNSC, why don't we see similar condemnations of Israel? Iran arrested over a thousand people, which is bad in itself but Israel shot around that number, yet they are called a democracy and Iran a dictatorship? I would argue Iran is more democratic than Israel, and based on the way Israel is handling these protests and others, maybe even less repressive, yet freedom house ranks Israel as a democracy, which makes no sense.
Also, in conjunction with this, I wonder if anyone has been keeping up with the rant against Jeremy Corbyn and his alleged anti-semitic views? The pro-Israel lobbies in Britain and America spend millions and millions of dollars to try and smear people who dare to criticise Israel and their policies, including looking for baseless allegations against people that have stood against racism all their lives. I distinctly remember, this video from Al Jazeera, where they found Israeli officials themselves convincing lobby groups in Britain to take down labour members that were too critical of Israel. There's no doubt the money that goes into these lobbying efforts, trickles down to not only how governments view things, but also how state protected corporations also enact their own policies. Indeed, corporations and individuals that support BDS in some states in the US are banned from doing business with the state. Thanks to the ACLU, prominent cases where these became relevant like in the firing of the teacher in Kansas who supported boycotting Israel and restricting funds to victims of Hurricane Harvey who supported boycotting Israel, the rule was overturned. I think we have to push back against this, I don't recommend deleting facebook, but try and use it to share information about Israeli human rights abuses, while our brothers/sisters in Palestine or in any other part of the world living under repression are unable to do so and if you get banned, open a new account, keep doing it so they know that people are not going to tolerate being shut down and give up.
And now Trump fires Tillerson and hires neocon Pompeo for secretary of state. As bad as Tillerson was, he was one of the saner voices in the administration, now we're just getting a bunch of Pro-Israel neocons, will they drag us to war with Iran? How much will this cost? How many lives? The only reason we're interested in Syria is because of Israel's concerns about Iran. I think there needs to be a push to force AIPAC and these neocon Pro-Israel think tanks like the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, which writes baseless claims about Hezbollah like them running underground drug operations in London and places in Latin America to register as foreign agents. At a time when Russia seems to be a huge concern, we really should be having a conversation about Israel. Al Jazeera actually has blocked a video on the Pro-Israel lobby from being shown because of lobbying pressure, as Americans I think it is paramount for us to be able to see it. I really wonder if this alliance is something worth hanging onto really, Israel's policies are fundamentally against my own values, but thus far I have thought perhaps they serve our national interests, but day by day, it increasingly seems like Israel is more of a burden than anything else.
I always used to think Assad is the better option to his alternatives, but the more this war goes on and the more people die, I grow less and less certain of this perspective. As a Shiite Muslim myself, I was appalled by Khamenei's statement last week praising Assad's resistance, it's one thing to deal with him because the alternatives suck, but to praise him? That's downright shameful. That the majority of the people fighting Assad are not good people is true, but the more civilians and the more warcrimes are committed in fighting these people, the less convincing the argument that if the rebels take over Syria, minorities will be killed, women will lose rights becomes. You're basically saying that it is fine to kill as many innocent civilians as it takes to prevent groups from coming to power that will kill minorities (civilians again). How exactly do you have the moral high ground then? You don't. The Israelis make the same argument about giving Palestinian land back, they say that all Jews will be killed so the occupation is necessary, and we know that's a nonsense argument. I kind of wonder what the outcome would've been had Iran and Hezbollah had stayed out. Assad may have fallen and probably replaced by a horrible regime, but would the Syrians have wanted to live in a fundamentalist state like Saudi Arabia? Highly unlikely. They would've probably revolted and this may have led to the same bloodshed we're seeing now, but it wouldn't be blood shed in my name. It's difficult to not feel complicit in the atrocities being committed. However, I now know how it is possible for many Jews to be afraid to speak up against Zionism and to feel the need to defend it, I have become very unpopular for not fully throwing my weight around Iran in this war. I'm always told I desire to see Shiite genocide. Isn't that what anti-Zionist Jews are often told when they don't blindly defend Israel?
Thanks Larry. The painful reality here Larry is I don't know what the solution is. I don't have any answers as to how this should be approached, the AQ linked militants have to be taken out, but how? So much suffering, yet how do we end it? There are no easy answers. What needs to be said is that we need a reformation in our international justice systems like the ICC and the UNSC so that they are able to act against anyone that violates int'l law, regardless of who it is, such institutions should be free of influence from the great powers.
Alec, I understand the need for Syria to take back areas under Al Qaeda and their allies. The use of indiscriminate tactics in my view though cannot be justified. I am aware that there has been a great deal of propaganda from the white helmets and the western media. I however do not think we can dismiss every report from every human rights group that states the use of indiscriminate tactics. These human rights groups also report on Israel's indiscriminate bombing of Gaza and Saudi indiscriminate bombing of Yemen, so I am inclined to think they aren't reporting on this with a political agenda in place. Taking back the country from terrorists isn't the debate that's being had, it's the tactics that are being used. And while it is also true that the Syrian uprising was hijacked right from the early days with fundamentalist groups backed by the gulf states and people from other countries also flooded in through the Turkish border to fight, it is also the case that Assad allowed the discontent to grow through increased repression way before the war began. When you use repression, you risk radicalizing people. In fact the US sent people to Syria to be tortured because Syria agreed to cooperate with the US on their rendition program in the "war on terror".
I'd like to see justice everywhere, no one's hand in this war are clean. The US has killed plenty of civilians in Syria too and elsewhere all over the world. Russia has killed civilians too. The Saudi, Turkish funded rebels have too. If we seek a true just solution to this conflict, everyone must be held accountable not just the regime and its backers. While we're at it, we should hold Netanyahu accountable for what his army did in Gaza in 2014, and King Salman for what they are doing in Yemen. I'm all for accountability, but the way it is painted in the western media, it is all about vilifying one person, while turning a blind eye to people on "our side". I reject that premise. Let's have accountability, but let's cut the hypocrisy.
As immoral and disgraceful as the Assad regime is, this attack is a clear violation of int'l law, the US has no authorization to be in Syria, because it needs permission from the Syrian government, which is the only legitimate governing entity in Syria right now, and even though this is a reality many may not like given the atrocities committed by the regime, it is one that ought to be recognised nonetheless. I find it quite funny that the US can simply now use the powers it gave itself from the declaration of the war on terror to target "terrorists" however it defines them wherever it deems fit and if they then have to attack the legitimate government of a country later it is perfectly deemed acceptable. In fact they even call it defence when illegally present US troops are attacked by the government of the country they are in. It amazes me that many seem to fall for the humanitarian aspect of this, i.e. stopping the Assad regime from killing kurds but given how many dictatorships the US supports, that it allies itself with a country that's creating the largest humanitarian crisis in the world in Yemen and a country that is one of the last settler colonial states in the world. How can such claims of humanitarian intervention particularly among circles on the left be taken seriously?
I find it quite surprising that no one raises a question to US officials about what Israel's borders actually are. As far as I know Israel has no constitution and has no well defined borders, this isn't just about Jerusalem, Israel has attacked Lebanon and occupied it for 18 years, it only let it go when it assessed that the cost of doing so was very high because of the rise of Hezbollah. Israel also is apparently on an effort to increase its presence illegally on Syrian territory. Beyond the Golan, they've built up a security zone in Quneitra, and they are looking to expand this into Daraa now as well. They are looking at building a 40 km buffer zone. If you notice, a lot of the weapons being held by some of the "rebels" are provided by Israel. The middle east will never find any peace so long as the US does not move away from its morally bankrupt Israel policy and of course Israel isn't the only reason for instability, I think all countries are far from innocent, but our involvement in Syria is only because of our one-sided policy toward Israel, otherwise what strategic purpose does Syria serve? None! Israel was certainly a factor behind the Iraq war, perhaps not the most important factor, but it definitely was a factor. Why do we continue to isolate Iran and make threats of war against them when really it should be our ally at a time when we and most of the world have a common enemy that Iran has been heavily involved in fighting. This really has to end. Enough is enough.