Israeli Professor Eyal Zisser thinks Bashar Assad has cause to celebrate. His report on Syria’s enhanced position, vis-à-vis the U.S., is here.
Both the Taliban, which has taken over Afghanistan, and the regrouped ISIS forces that have just made their presence known in Afghanistan, with the Taliban’s blessing, might encourage those in the Syrian opposition who are Islamic hardliners. For these arch-Sunnis, Assad’s Alawites are not real Muslims at all but, as Shi’a, regarded as “Rafidite dogs,” the worst kind of Infidels. That’s a worry for Assad, but what is more important for him is the humiliation of the Americans as a result of their chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan. And Prof. Zisser says there will be more retreats in the Middle East to come – including the removal of the last American forces that remain in Syria.
…In the shadow of Lebanon’s deep economic crisis, and in light of the drastic oil and gas shortages disrupting everyday life in the country, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, together with his allies in Tehran, launched a brilliant public relations campaign. The Iranians, mediated by Hezbollah, will send oil to Lebanon. In doing so, they will demonstrate who truly cares for the Lebanese people in their hour of need, help Hezbollah, and also gain another foothold on Israel’s northern front. Nasrallah even bothered to issue threats, which seemed to fall on attentive and even slightly alarmed ears in Israel, whereby if Iranian oil tankers are attacked he will consider it a violation of Lebanese sovereignty and respond in kind….
It’s true: the offer of Hezbollah to supply Lebanon with desperately-needed oil from Iran, will win both the terror group, and Iran, gratitude from the Lebanese. Hezbollah, and Iran, in coming to the rescue of the Lebanese with supplies of oil, will make many Lebanese overlook Hezbollah’s responsibility for the blast at the Port of Beirut on Aug. 4,2020, and overlook, too, the role of Hezbollah in the past, dragging Lebanon into wars with Israel that the Lebanese did not want, and acting as enforcers – by violently suppressing peaceful demonstrators against the ruling regime – for a political elite that has rightly been charged with mismanagement and corruption that have brought Lebanon to its present economic condition. All these may be overlooked by Lebanese relieved and happy to receive, through Hezbollah’s good offices, life-saving shipments of oil from Iran.
The Americans wanted to offer Lebanon an alternative source of energy so that Beirut need not accept the offer by Nasrallah to deliver Iranian oil to the Lebanese. Washington arranged a deal whereby natural gas from Egypt would flow through Jordan, and end up in Lebanon.
The problem is that the road [the gas pipelines] from Egypt and Jordan goes through Syria, and to seal such a deal, the blessing of the Syrian president is required. This blessing was happily given – in exchange for American promises that Washington won’t continue to object to his rule and intends to pull its troops from the country as soon as possible. This path, incidentally, also means the Americans will essentially have abandoned their Kurdish allies in Syria’s north – who helped them fight ISIS – to the Damascus regime. The Americans are apparently determined to prove they have no friends, only interests – and when the latter trump the former, the friendship is over.
Bashar Assad has given his nihil obstat to the Egypt-Jordan-Lebanon gas line, but in return for permitting the pipeline to pass through his country into Lebanon, he has exacted, according to Prof. Zisser, an American promise not to continue to object to his rule, but to accept the fact that Assad has won the ten-year civil war. Further, Zisser says, when the Americans do pull out their last remaining troops from Syria – there are only 900 left — that will leave our Kurdish allies, who were such loyal and effective allies in the fight against ISIS, in northern Syria without any support; they are now threatened by Erdogan’s Turkish troops, and by Assad’s Alawite-led Arab army, both of whom want to suppress the Kurdish peshmerga.
Consequently, as stated, Assad’s birthday was indeed a happy one. Not only has he survived his country’s brutal, bloody civil war, in which he slaughtered hundreds of thousands of his own people, some with gas, but now even the Americans have recognized his victory and are ready to “get back to business” with him. In Washington and in Israel, officials hope post-war Assad is maybe a “new” Assad, more attentive and cautious, perhaps even willing to make unrealistic deals – for example, booting Iran from Syria in exchange for American support. Hopes such as these, however, are destined to crash and shatter on the shores of reality. In the meantime, until the gas and electricity start flowing from Jordan and Egypt, Damascus has declared Syria’s willingness to help Iran deliver the oil to Lebanon through its territory. After all, why dance at one wedding when you can dance at a few?
The belief that Assad would ever turn on Iran, which has been his most valuable militarily ally throughout the decade of civil war, is fanciful. Bashar Assad is not going to “boot Iran from Syria,” as some dreamy souls in Washington think might happen; he knows that, unlike the U.S., Iran sticks by its friends, and besides, it is doubtful that even if he wanted to, he would dare try to expel Iranian forces from Syria. And what kind of financial support for Syria would American taxpayers be willing to offer Syria, when since 2011 they have heard all the stories of Assad’s atrocities? And having spent – wasted — several trillion dollars in Iraq and Afghanistan, they would be deeply unhappy if more American money were now sent to another Muslim country, and its monstrous regime.
Frank Anderson says
Sometimes it is necessary to break eggs to cook an omelet. There is a war NOW. All the present-day Neville Chamberlain imitators are doing is postponing rather than avoiding it, and making the results far worse. That war was declared, not by agreement, but unilaterally 1400 years ago and will never end until one side or the other wins. That could be the lesson to be taken from the DUNE series of books started by Frank Herbert and continued after his death, covering a 10,000 year conflict..
Of 22 years I have spent in classrooms as a student, I consider the 16 week Dale Carnegie first course the most useful. One of his collected points of wisdom is “cooperate with the inevitable”. How many times in history has appeasement prevented wars?
Infidel says
The US has nothing in Syria. Just leave it to the Russians, and let them stabilize Assad’s regime. As for the Kurds, all the evidence I have seen points to them being islamic, and only vary in degree from the Arabs: we’ve seen how Yazidis and Assyrians have been persecuted by the Kurds. So no, it’s not worth our trying to carve out any parts of Syria or Iraq for an independent Kurdistan, which won’t be viable: just look at South Sudan as an example. So it’s fine to withdraw from Syria, where at least we don’t have billions in assets to leave to either ISIS or Assad or anyone else
GreekEmpress says
Kurds were right in the thick of it with the Turks, murdering and looting during the genocide.
spiro says
Do you mean 1924
My spelling is very bad. But Smyrna comes to mind
A Muslim is a Muslim
And I see your a smart Greek who knows your history
gravenimage says
This is grimly true. The Turks persecuted the Kurds, yet the Kurds were also some of the most enthusiastic perpetrators of the Armenian Genocide.
Walter Sieruk says
The outcome of horrible man ,Joe Biden in Office seems to have no end or limit.
Now that fiendish man ,Biden , creates the catastrophe of the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan and simultaneously inspires more zeal in Islamic terrors organizations around the world.
Walter Sieruk says
That victory for the Taliban might well be very galvanizing to many Muslim terrorists, because of Joe Biden because of his arrogant conceit refused to heed the wisdom the US generals who advised of him for a planned gradual withdrawal of the Americans military forces from Afghanistan..
Likewise, this this triumph of the Taliban in Afghanistan may, indeed, serve as catalyzed for different Islamic terrorist organizations further strive to fulfill their goal for the violent jihad for the cause of Islam.
So it’s actually the fault of that President pretender Joe Biden that the increase of the deathly violence of Islamic terrorism in the world because of the awful judgement and terrible folly of Biden concerning Afghanistan that zeal will rise among the jihadists with their Islamic terror entities.
This proves that this bogus president now sitting in the Oval Office of the White House masquerading as a genuine Chief Executive of the USA is a very dangerous and wicked man.
OLD GUY says
Hey look at the bright side, our military can now begin gearing up for the China problem, new equipment to be purchased to replace what we left behind around the world. The Military contractors are once again the beneficiaries of huge taxpayer contracts for weapons and equipment of all sorts. Biden will be able to brag about all the new jobs he has created in the workforce. And don’t forget our military will be going WOKE and GREEN in the defense of America. Nothing is too good or too expensive for us American tax payers.
Why would we surrender to Syria? We have the best equipped and strongest military in the world, problem is we get into these situations and then don’t have the political strength to follow through when things get ugly. You can’t win a war if you are not willing to kill the enemy and their countries citizens. We should know that by now.