Syrian Civil War and The future of Syria after liberation

[ghazi52]

Looters had also been breaking into other buildings nearby – deepening anxiety about this in-between-time without a government in charge.

"The transition has to happen in a proper and correct way," said Alaa Dadouch, a 36-year-old father of three standing outside with his neighbours. "And the fact that he just left, you know…"

"Bashar al-Assad?" I prompted.

"Yes, you see I'm still scared to even mention this," he said. "But the fact that he just left, that is selfish. Our president should have taken the proper measures that are needed for him to give at least the army or the police control over those areas until a new presidency comes in."

He paused. "You know, two days back, I wasn't able to say that he's selfish, it would have been a big problem. A lot of everything is different.

"You can actually breathe, you can walk around. You can actually give your opinion. You can say what bothers you without being scared. So, yes, there is a change. I hope it's a good change. But we've been living under false hope for 13 years [of civil war]."

This country is caught between joy and fear, hoping for peace and worried about chaos.

 

[Ravenman]

Kurds have been fighting for their own state for ages. Their claim is as valid as that of the Palestinians.

But the world doesn't give a flying one when they are bombed, massacred and even chemical-bombed.

Nobody seems to care if it's a Muslim-on-Muslim genocide.

Palestinians had a own state for centuries, they had a own coin, own bank, own instutitions etc.

Kurds never had a state but interfered and schemed in other states internal affairs to backstabe governments with foreign powers.

I am a Kurd myself but i can say that Kurds are the condoms of the Middle East. Everbody throws them away after using.

Israel is supporting a Kurdish state to divide the muslim nations, not because they believe that Kurds have a right for statehood, otherwise they would give the Palestinians independance.

 

[giannoula]

To all "Muslims" who are racist to Kurds, maintain your dignity when talking about the people of Selahedîn Eyûbî And the prophet Muhammad had Kurdish companions like Jaban Kurdî.

 

[ghazi52]

White House official says who is running Syria this morning is "an open question"​

From CNN's Sam Fossum

White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said that preliminary reports indicate that US strikes against ISIS targets in Syria were successful and that it is “an open question” who is running Syria this morning following the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s dictatorship over the weekend.

“They do believe, preliminarily that they were very, very successful in hitting legitimate ISIS targets and further degrading their capabilities,” he said on CNN’s News Central, adding that it “remains to be seen” whether those strikes will continue this morning.

Kirby added that he “can’t speak to” any direct communication between the US and Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), the rebel group designated as a terrorist organization by the US, but that they are speaking with counterparts in the region who can deliver messages to all the rebel groups.

“We are going to be, as the President said yesterday, exploring our avenues to communicate with all those groups,” he said.

 

[giannoula]

Palestinians had a own state for centuries, they had a own coin, own bank, own instutitions etc.

Kurds never had a state but interfered and schemed in other states internal affairs to backstabe governments with foreign powers.

I am a Kurd myself but i can say that Kurds are the condoms of the Middle East. Everbody throws them away after using.

Israel is supporting a Kurdish state to divide the muslim nations, not because they believe that Kurds have a right for statehood, otherwise they would give the Palestinians independance.

You are a false flag Kurd. Real Kurds will support a statehood of Kurdistan free from Turkish tyranny.

 

[ghazi52]

Hunt for missing Syrians continues after rebels captured notorious "human slaughterhouse" prison​

From CNN’s Raja Razek and Lucas Lilieholm

An aerial view of Saydnaya military prison, Syria, on December 9.
Emin Sansar/Anadolu Images

A desperate search for missing Syrians goes on after rebel forces released prisoners from the notorious Saydnaya Military Prison outside Damascus, dubbed the “human slaughterhouse” by Amnesty International.

The Syrian Civil Defense, also known as the White Helmets, said in a statement Monday that they had deployed five specialized teams to look for secret cells or hidden basement rooms that might be holding additional prisoners.

Discussion has swirled online about the possibility of thousands of additional detainees being held in deeper levels of the facility. Those hopes were bolstered by a Facebook post from the Damascus Countryside governorate appealing for prison workers to provide door codes to reach additional inaccessible locations.

Teams continue to investigate allegations of a secret compartment in Sadnaya military prison on December 9.

However, a Monday statement from the Association of Detainees & The Missing in Seydnayah Prison (ADMSP) called those claims “inaccurate” and said all prisoners had been released by midday Sunday.

Mounir Al-Fakir, a former Saydnaya detainee and a founding partner at ADMSP, told CNN that the facility contains one underground level of cells, but he does not believe it likely that there are hidden layers below that.

Al-Fakir said that when rebels captured the prison over the weekend they saw people on security cameras in cells they couldn’t initially access as they were behind reinforced doors. They were freed after the necessary equipment had arrived, he said. Al-Fakir estimated that about 3,000 detainees were released.

The White Helmets said on Monday they were continuing to search for additional detention areas, without success so far.

 

[giannoula]

Kurds get no respect, but Salahuddin's name is everywhere. Hypocrites.

 

[KingQamaR]

So, what happened?
Let's say Russia sold it to HTS, and Turkey.
Was Israel in the loop?
What does Russia get in return besides keeping the navy base?

Russia may not lose the base. The new Sryian government will need money to govern snd rebuilt. A new deal may be renegotiated.

 

[giannoula]

Turkiye beat all of you Israel , Iran , ASSAD , Hezbis , ISIS , PKK-YPG in Syria

When ASSAD and Iran allowed Israel to occupy 30-40% of Syria via PKK-YPG only Turkiye blocked Israeli plans with 4 Turkish military operations

pathetic ASSAD-Iran only could attack innocent Syrian People ... nothing else

There are 40 million Kurds in this region. We deserve a state of our own whether u like it or not.

 

[ghazi52]

Syria's economy was already in crisis – what will happen next?​

More than a decade of civil war and sanctions has left the Syrian economy in tatters.

An estimated 90% of people live below the poverty line, and more than half the country’s population faces acute food insecurity, according to United Nations humanitarian officials.

Syria’s gross domestic product is estimated to have fallen by more than 85% since the outbreak of civil war in 2011, according to an analysis by Capital Economics. And its already-small oil output now amounts to under 100,000 barrels per day — “a rounding error for global oil production,” as the consultancy put it in a note Monday.

Inflation reached 115% in 2023, according to an estimate by the World Bank, which also forecast that the country’s economy would shrink by 1.5% this year.

That economic crisis presents a huge issue for the disparate group of Syrian rebel forces as they assume power. The most prominent of those rebel groups is Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), a former al Qaeda affiliate, which still faces sanctions from the United States, Europe and United Nations due to its terror designation.

“There are already now discussions in several countries, including the UK, about whether HTS should be removed from the terrorist list,” said Aniseh Bassiri Tabrizi, associate fellow at UK think tank Chatham House and senior analyst at consultancy Control Risks.

“At a minimum, there will be an exploration of the different opposition groups involved now in post-Assad Syria, to see if some sort of engagement can take place with them,” which will affect the implementation of sanctions, Bassiri Tabrizi said.

She added that competition over oil reserves is one key area where tensions might emerge between opposition groups. The Kurdish-led ranks of the Syrian Democratic Forces, backed by the US, are the main beneficiaries of current oil production.

CNN’s Isabel Donaldson contributed to this report.

 

[ghazi52]

Israeli armored vehicles seen in Syria buffer zone​

From CNN’s Abeer Salman and Antoinette Radford

CNN team sees Israeli armored vehicles in the Syrian buffer zone on December 9.
Abeer Salman/CNN


As Syrian rebels captured the country’s capital Damascus over the weekend, neighboring Israel ordered its military to seize the buffer zone that separates the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from the rest of Syria.

On Monday, CNN teams on the Israeli side of the zone saw amored vehicles inside the Syria buffer zone, and troops stood by the military vehicles.

While visiting the Golan Heights on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said: “Together with the defense minister, and with full backing from the cabinet, I directed the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) yesterday to take control of the buffer zone and the dominant positions near it… We will not allow any hostile force to establish itself on our border.”

CNN team sees Israeli armored vehicles in the Syrian buffer zone on December 9.
Abeer Salman/CNN

The buffer zone, a demilitarized area within Syria and administered by its government, was established in 1974 and was patrolled by United Nations peacekeepers. Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967 and annexed it in 1981.

 

[giannoula]

Why doesn’t Turkey just end this war with the kurds and give a country their own end of story end of conflict

Let them have their country let them rule themselves no more fighting

Turks are largely islamified Greeks and other natives of Anatolia.

I advocate for large-scale DNA testing of the Turkish population to reveal this truth.

 

[ghazi52]

Damascus is free?​

Ashraf Jehangir Qazi
December 9, 2024

The writer is a former ambassador to the US, India and China, and head of UN missions in Iraq and Sudan.

The Arabs cannot make war without Egypt. But they cannot make peace without Syria.—Henry Kissinger

SYRIA was my first ambassadorial assignment, so I have a special affinity for it and its people. On welcoming me, a Syrian official told me “You have served in Egypt. They are more charming. We are more honest.” Like all such sayings, there is a grain of truth in it. Nevertheless, I love Egypt and the Egyptians just as much.

I arrived in Damascus — reputed to be the oldest capital city in the world — just after President Hafez al-Assad had destroyed Hama in crushing an uprising against his Alawi-dominated regime. He was widely regarded as being as brilliant a strategist as he was ruthless a ruler. After the 1971 Arab-Israeli war and the Kissinger-engineered defection of Egypt from the frontline of Arab states against Israel, Syria emerged as the leader under Assad. Kissinger, while a strategic opponent, also admired Assad’s strategic acumen.

After 53 years of Alawi rule over Syria, it has suddenly ended. Depending on one’s inclination, Damascus has either fallen or is free. In truth, both descriptions are accurate.

Damascus, as the metropolis of Arab dignity and resistance to US and Israeli neo-imperial dominance over the region, has indeed fallen. And yet, given the brutal minority rule of the elder and younger Assad regimes that saw the brutal repression of any dissent, Damascus is indeed free — for the moment.

 

[MMM-E]

We are not Syrian army soldiers. We will fight back and win

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[ghazi52]

Great power dynamics

Ashraf Jehangir Qazi
December 9, 2024

Eventually, though, the larger picture will shape the course of events in the Middle East and beyond. US strategic policy has been, in recent years, largely directed towards bringing about regime change in Moscow, Tehran, and Damascus. Now, they have done so in Syria. The deep state in the US would like to build on this success to explore what is possible in Russia.

As the Ukraine war has demonstrated, Russia has been considerably weakened since it was unable to come to the rescue of Bashar al-Assad. This is an enormous setback for the Putin regime. Iran’s inability to effectively come to the assistance of Hezbollah in Lebanon has added to Russia’s embarrassment.

However, Trump’s alleged soft spot for Putin is considered by some observers as a possible opportunity for Putin to save face. This is a dubious assumption. Much more important than Trump’s attitude towards Putin — and he seems to admire strong men who are in control, not strong men who may be losing control — are two other factors.