October 10, 2013

Three Articles About Syria

Global leader of al-Qaeda (pictured above), and the foot soldiers of al-Qaeda (pictured below).

Below is an excerpt from, "A Syrian Solution?" by Philip Giraldi, AntiWar.com, October 10, 2013:
"For those who argue that a negotiated settlement can’t happen in Syria because too much blood has been shed one need only point to the examples of similar conflicts in Africa and Asia over the past fifty years. They too seemed intractable and some of them have continued to fester but, by pushing the right buttons and enabling the right compromises, most of them have been resolved or at least have receded from a state of full scale civil war and genocide. All it requires is a serious commitment to diplomacy as opposed to arming one side or the other. Nearly everyone would be able to find a comfort zone if the Syrian civil war were to end, so there is strong motivation to take whatever steps are necessary to accomplish just that. And it would be a political victory for nearly everyone involved, with the US and its allies claiming that they had stopped the bloodshed while blocking the extremists from forming a government. Turkey could claim that it had secured its border from terrorists. Best of all, a seriously pursued negotiated solution might actually end much of the killing while giving al-Assad a respectable exit. Do President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry have what it takes to do the right thing? We shall see."
Below is an excerpt from, "Getting to Geneva II: Three Challenges" by Ibrahim Humeidi, Al Monitor, October 10, 2013:
Western Diplomatic sources told Al-Hayat that three obstacles stand in the way of the Geneva II conference scheduled for mid-November. The sources noted that the past days have witnessed intensive meetings between the Friends of Syria Group, comprising 11 countries, so as to find common ground for divergent stances regarding the international conference. Additionally, there are talks about postponing the conference for a few months, until the necessary conditions are there.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, have asked the UN to hold the conference as soon as possible, given that the date was set for mid-November. This came in tandem with the announcement by UN-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi that holding the conference as scheduled was not certain.

The sources said that there are three obstacles impeding the conference. The first is related to the gap between the regional stance and the international understanding that was expressed through the American-Russian agreement on destroying chemical weapons in Syria, according to a schedule that ends by 2014, simultaneously with the end of President Bashar al-Assad’s mandate.
Below is an excerpt from, "Syria’s Chemical Weapons: Western Military Alliance and Israel continue to Support Al Qaeda Affiliated Rebels" by Prof. Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, October 10, 2013:
Washington has supported the Al Qaeda affiliated rebels from the very outset including the rebel assault on al Safira.  Moreover, according to Israeli sources,  NATO and Turkey’s High command were involved as of mid-2011 in the recruitment of Mujahideen to be dispatched to Syria.

What is not mentioned by the mainstream media is that rebel stronghold in Aleppo province was largely acquired with the support of the US and its allies including Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar through the dispatch of weapons and special forces across the border from of Turkey.