July 12, 2016

Atmospheric Changes Over Syria

With Cameron leaving as UK Prime Minister another top politician who demanded that "Assad must go" has left the political scene. The Syrian President Assad is still in place and there is no sign that he will leave in the foreseeable future. It seems that real life facts still have more weight than "regime change" propaganda platitudes.

The facts continue to be persistent that there is therefore again some wind of change detectable in the political atmosphere.

The Syrian army and its allies are closing the only road to the eastern parts of Aleppo. This effort requires intense urban warfare (vid) against Jihadi terrorists. According a Pentagon spokesperson that part is held by al-Qaeda:

[I]t's primarily al-Nusra who holds Aleppo, and of course, al-Nusra is not part of the cessation of hostilities.

All attacks on east-Aleppo are thereby completely legitimate and do not break a ceasefire.

Despite that another media "outrage" campaign will be created to condemn the "siege on Aleppo" that this blockage allegedly creates. Such "outrage" propaganda pieces, like this one today in the LA Times, do not even acknowledge that west Aleppo, with nearly two million people living there, is on the side of the government. They speak of "Aleppo" but only mean the eastern parts. They also exaggerate the number of civilians left in east-Aleppo as several hundred thousands. The Guardian journalist Martin Chulov has traveled to east-Aleppo several times over the last years. He reported a year ago that there are far less:

Those who remain in eastern Aleppo, roughly 40,000 from a prewar population estimated at about a million, ...

It is doubtful that the number of people in east-Aleppo has since increased. There was also enough time for the fighters and their families in east-Aleppo to prepare for a siege. As even the LA Times piece admits:

Anticipating a siege, local authorities stocked food for three months and medical supplies for three to six months, Sahloul said.

A Reuters piece confirms this:

Rebel areas of Aleppo have stockpiled enough basic supplies to survive months of siege ...

The soon coming claims of imminent famine in east-Aleppo are thereby already debunked.

The change in the political atmosphere is a convergence of the "western" and Russian view on which groups are terrorists in Syria and must therefore be fought. This follows a change in the public perspective.

Amnesty Internationally recently claimed, six years too late, that several U.S. supported "moderate rebel" groups torture and abduct civilians and regularly commit war crimes. The "moderate rebels" who recently attempted another offensive in Latakia openly advertise themselves as foreign Jihadis. Ahrar al Sham, which not long ago wrote op-eds for "western" papers claiming to be "moderate", is now threatening U.S. supported "moderates" in south Syria because they are tired of fighting and keep with the ceasefire.

The French president Holland has finally recognized al-Qaeda as an important enemy in Syria that should be fought:

"We must coordinate among ourselves to continue actions against Daesh but also... take effective action against Al-Nusra," Hollande said, directing his appeal at Russia and the U.S.

Back in 2012 the French government lauded al-Qaeda's role. The then Foreign Minister Fabius said that "Nusra does good work."

U.S. Secretary of State Kerry has not only acknowledged al-Qaeda's role but is now extending the terrorist label to Ahrar al-Sham and other Salafist groups:

“There are a couple of subgroups underneath the two designated — Daesh and Jabhat al-Nusra — Jaysh al-Islam, Ahrar al-Sham particularly — who brush off and fight with that — alongside these other two sometimes to fight the Assad regime,” he said, referring to two rebel groups that the United States has not named as terrorist groups until now.

That is a very significant concession to the Russian position which has for months argued for adding these groups to the UN terrorist list.

Also noticeable is that the Saudi/U.S. sponsored Syrian hotel opposition is again ready to negotiate with the Syrian government. That group had broken off negotiations during the last round. Someone now ordered them back into the play.

The Russians again demonstrated their commitment to Syria. They not only support the Syrian army in the siege of east-Aleppo but also renewed air strikes with long-range bombers which started from Russian soil. A sure signal that Russia is ready as ever to escalate again.

The biggest move is probably happening in Turkey. After having made a mess out of Turkish foreign policy, under heavy economic pressure and startled by recent terrorist attacks on Turkish soil President Erdogan decided to change course. He fired his long time sidekick Davutoglu and perused better relations with Russia and other countries. After he apologized for the earlier ambush of a Russian fighter plane, Russia resumed relations and lifted some economic sanctions against Turkey. But there will be more demands to fulfill before Turkey is again allowed to have good international standing. Some softer words are spoken but the real Turkish position on Syria has yet to change:

“The normalization of Syria is possible but everybody should make sacrifices for this. Our strategic partners and coalition partners should heal the bleeding wound in Syria and take more responsibility. As Turkey, we are exerting necessary efforts to open the doors of peace and security,” Yıldırım said. But Yıldırım said there would be no meeting with the country in the short term. “The oppression should first end. The dictatorial regime should end. What will you agree on with a regime that has killed more than a half million of its people without blinking an eye? Everybody already agrees on this,” he said.

It is still "Assad must go" but a slight change in tone is detectable. The new U.S. and French position on al-Qaeda and Ahrar al-Sham, both coddled by Turkey, increase the pressure on Ankara to move away from its rigid position. Erdogan may otherwise find that he, like Cameron, will have to go before Dr. Assad even thinks about leaving his position.

While all the above items are in themselves only small changes of positions they sum up to some significant change in the political atmosphere over Syria.

Posted by b on July 12, 2016 at 16:52 UTC | Permalink

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