War

The Army of Islam; Saudi Arabia’s Greatest Export

on the 29th of September, up to 50 rebel groups operating primarily in the area of Damascus merged to form Jaish al-Islam (Army of Islam). The Damascus merger also included a wide-ranging demographic of militant groups, from the supposed “moderate”, to overt Salafist hardliners. Jaish al-Islam is dominated by Liwa al-Islam, a large rebel group formerly of “FSA” branding, and led by Saudi-backed Zahran Alloush. Liwa al-Islam were also a signatory to the aforementioned statement of denunciation toward the western-backed political opposition.

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Diary

The four wars fought in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria over the past 12 years have all involved overt or covert foreign intervention in deeply divided countries. In each case the involvement of the West exacerbated existing differences and pushed hostile parties towards civil war.
More than most armed struggles, the conflicts have been propaganda wars in which newspaper, television and radio journalists played a central role. In all wars there is a difference between reported news and what really happened, but during these four campaigns the outside world has been left with misconceptions even about the identity of the victors and the defeated.

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The Mystery of Washington’s Waning Global Power

What if the sole superpower on the planet makes its will known — repeatedly — and finds that no one is listening? Barely a decade ago, that would have seemed like a conundrum from some fantasy Earth in an alternate dimension. Now, it is increasingly a plain description of political life on our globe, especially in the Greater Middle East.

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Iraq: The greatest ‘non-story’ of the modern era

If they had any sense of shame, the people who have destroyed Iraq would at least have had the grace to retire from public life. But neo-cons and liberal imperialists don’t do shame or remorse. The same bunch of ’humanitarian’ interventionists and hawks who urged the invasion of Iraq in 2003 have spent the last two years propagandizing for an attack on Syria. These manic warmongers would rather we ‘move on’ from Iraq to focus on the next Middle Eastern country on their hit list.

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Was Obama Planning on Striking Syria or Working to Gain Traction in Talks With Iran?

It has long been understood that Iran, Hezbollah, and their Iraqi and Palestinian allies would militarily react to a US attack on Syria. It has also been understood that Washington’s posturing against Syria has been a show of force against Syria’s allies, particularly Tehran. According to Walter Posch, an expert on Iran at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), the Iranians are not intimidated by US military posturing. Posch puts it like this: «If you come with a show of force to the Iranians, they usually call your bluff.»

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The Sarin Mysteries: Syria, Sarin, and Casus Belli

The one faintly positive development is that the FSA and the ISIS and all the murderous, Allah-is-great grouplets continue to attack not only the government forces but each other. Dozens of rebels have been killed in clashes with each other within the last few months.

Meanwhile young Syrian children, now living in refugee camps in Lebanon, go every morning to work long days in the fields, earning the few dollars a day upon which their families depend for survival. Some are as young as 5. When asked what they miss most about Syria, the children say, “school.”

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A Syrian solution to civil conflict? The Free Syrian Army is holding talks with Assad’s senior staff

Six weeks ago, a two-man delegation arrived in secret in Damascus: civilians from Aleppo who represented elements of the Free Syrian Army, the rebel group largely composed of fighters who deserted the regime’s army in the first year of the war. They came under a guarantee of safety, and met, so I am told, a senior official on the staff of President Bashar al-Assad. And they carried with them an extraordinary initiative – that there might be talks between the government and FSA officers who “believed in a Syrian solution” to the war.

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UK Secretary of State for Justice Asked to Initiate Penal Sanctions Against Tony Blair for War Crimes

I have pointed out to you the strong evidence that Anthony Blair and our ally, the USA, have, in the conduct of the Iraq war, committed gravest breaches of the Geneva Conventions. The use of depleted uranium (DU), white phosphorous, mercury, napalm equivalents and other toxins against a civilian population penned up in Fallujah in November 2004, were a significant war crime.

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How the Syrian Chemical Weapons Videos Were Staged

In the wake of the Syrian chemical weapons attack, shocking footage of the victims of that attack were widely circulated in an effort to raise the ire of the public and spur support for military intervention.

Now, a new report on that footage finds troubling inconsistencies and manipulation with the video that calls the official narrative of the attack and its victims into question.

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How the US is enabling Syriastan

Eleven, 13 or 14 “rebel” brigades (depending on the source) have ditched the “moderate”, US-propped Syrian National Council (SNC) and the not-exactly Free Syrian Army (FSA). The leaders of the bunch are the demented jihadis of Jabhat al-Nusra – but it includes other nasties such as the Tawhid brigades and the Tajammu Fastaqim Kama Ummirat in Aleppo, some of them until recently part of the collapsing FSA.

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Critical distance and open minds on Syria

The position I advocate is called maintaining “critical distance” and it the only insurance policy against being duped by our own side’s much more powerful and insidious propaganda. The denial of this obvious point by so many of those cheerleading another violent US-led assault on a Middle Eastern state makes me doubt their sincerity.

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