Bible Quotation for today/Prayers & Patience
James 5/7-20: "Be patient therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it, until it receives the early and late rain.  You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Don’t grumble, brothers, against one another, so that you won’t be judged. Behold, the judge stands at the door.  Take, brothers, for an example of suffering and of patience, the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.  Behold, we call them blessed who endured. You have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the Lord in the outcome, and how the Lord is full of compassion and mercy.  But above all things, my brothers, don’t swear, neither by heaven, nor by the earth, nor by any other oath; but let your “yes” be “yes,” and your “no,” “no”; so that you don’t fall into hypocrisy.  Is any among you suffering? Let him pray. Is any cheerful? Let him sing praises.  Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the assembly, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord,  and the prayer of faith will heal him who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. If he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.  Confess your offenses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The insistent prayer of a righteous person is powerfully effective. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain, and it didn’t rain on the earth for three years and six months.  He prayed again, and the sky gave rain, and the earth brought forth its fruit.  Brothers, if any among you wanders from the truth, and someone turns him back,  let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save a soul from death, and will cover a multitude of sins".

Latest analysis, editorials, studies, reports, letters & Releases from miscellaneous sources

Maneuvering, Iranian Style/By: Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Alawsat/September 14/13
Muslim Persecution of Christians:/By: Raymond Ibrahim/Gatestone Institute/September 14/13
Obama and Putin’s Double Act Continues/By: Amir Taheri/Asharq Alawsat /September 14/13

The Post-Assad Opportunity/By: Yousef Al-Dayni/Asharq Alawsat/September 14/13

Syrian dictator: Murder will only continue/By: Hagai Segal/Ynetnews/September 14/13

Lives before glory/The Daily Star/September 14/13

Latest News Reports From Miscellaneous Sources For September 14/13

Lebanese Related News

Paris Gave 'Message of Reassurance' to Suleiman on Syria Strike

Declaration, Says Agreement a 'Serious Roadmap for Pacification'

Al-Rahi: No One Can Avoid Implementing Baabda Declaration

Berri's Bloc Tours Top Officials to Explain Dialogue Initiative

Plumbly Meets Miqati: International Community Remains United in Support of Lebanon’s Security

Bahrain Bans Books on Hizbullah because they 'Spread Hatred, Sectarianism

Newborn Girl Found in Trash Container in Baalbek

Drug Smuggling Attempt Thwarted at Airport

Miqati: Some Repercussions of Regional Conflicts Have Reached Lebanon

Miqati Says he Filed Libel Suit against Ayyoub for 'Crossing the Line

Raad Denies Hizbullah Adopting 'Autonomous Security' in Dahieh

Gunmen exchange fire after Hezbollah detains man in Beirut

Hariri lashes out at international community over Syria

Rai voices fear over sectarian killing in region

Miscellaneous Reports And News

Report: US and Iran laying framework for first direct talks in over 30 years

Shalom: Syria case sets worrying precedent for Iran
US considers approach to Iran at UN gathering
Syria chemical weapons sites being dispersed to avoid detection, report says
Erdogan vows to squelch efforts to 'create chaos' as police disperse protests
Syria says it ratified treaty banning use of chemical weapons
Kerry: Russia, U.S. to Meet at U.N. General Assembly to Set Peace Talks Date

Western strike force for Syria disperses. Syrian launches offensive near Israeli border
U.S., Russia see Syria arms deal aiding peace talks
U.S., Israel press Syria over nuclear stonewalling

U.S., Russia see Syria arms deal aiding peace talks

Analysis: Syria chemical weapons proposal is Putin’s masterstroke

Kerry says the future of Syria peace talks depends on outcome of chemical weapons deal

Kerry to Visit Jerusalem Sunday to Meet Israeli PM

EU 'Appalled' by 8-Year-Old Yemeni Girl's Death in Forced Marriage

Thousands of Morsi Supporters Rally in Egypt

U.N. Urges Kerry, Lavrov to Help Syria Rights Probe

HRW: Syrian Forces Executed 248 in Two Villages in May

Security forces on high alert as Israelis mark Yom Kippur

Middle Israel: The last war

Syrian deal: World interest map
Diplomacy: The Oslo reversal

Egypt Military Helicopters Hit Sinai Militants

Report: Hamas gives landmines to Egyptian Islamists, trains them in planting car bombs

Iraq attack against Sunni-Shiite prayer kills 30

Lives before glory
The Daily Star /September 12, 2013.
The rare meeting between U.S. Secretary of John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov Thursday and Friday comes at the end of a dramatic week of diplomatic dances between the two world powers. But it is imperative that the two work together for the good of the Syrian people, and not to pursue personal or political glory.
That the Syrian government has agreed, ostensibly, to rescind control of its chemical weapons supplies is a positive step, at first glance. But opposition allies – including the U.S., Turkey and the U.K, as well as the rebels themselves – are right to be skeptical. Even in times of peace, such a disarmament operation would take years. It would also require the deployment of possibly hundreds of weapons inspectors and personnel on the ground. When the small team of chemical weapons inspectors visited Damascus late last month neither the rebels or the regime could guarantee their safety, and their convoy was targeted by sniper fire.
All week, different parties have been variously claiming this development as their own achievement. But chemical weapons should not be used as a symbol, a mark of strategic success on the global stage. Egos must not get in the way of saving lives, as has too often been the case over the last two-and-a-half years of war. This opportunity, after months of dead-end negotiations and stalling by each side, perhaps represents a genuine chance to move toward peace. But that can only happen if U.S.-Russian talks on chemical weapons are allowed to become broader, to cover the path toward a cease-fire and wider plans for the future of Syria. A discussion on the dire situation facing millions of refugees, and internal destruction inside the country, is also necessary, in tandem with talks on chemical weapons. Without these aspects, and even if Assad’s entire chemical arms stock is located and destroyed, the killing will continue unabated, and the lives of Syrian inside and outside of the country will continue to crumble. Kerry and Lavrov should also tackle the knock-on effects of Syria’s war on its neighbors, for the instability prevalent in the region has already been revealed in Lebanon. Russia and the U.S. must not be left to deal with these issues alone. An international effort must be made to push through a peace plan for Syria, preferably backed by a Security Council Resolution. Short of that, the meeting over chemical weapons will be meaningless, and will be nothing more than yet another U.S.-Russian tug of war for global supremacy.
If carried out in a genuine, thoughtful way, these talks appear to offer a glimmer of hope. But they must be held with the aspirations of the Syrian people in mind, not the egos of the politicians holding them. After over two years of war, Syrians deserve a return to some semblance of normality, of a life not lived in constant fear. Talks which do not address these people will be nothing more than a publicity stunt
 

Report: US and Iran laying framework for first direct talks in over 30 years
By JPOST.COM STAFF, REUTERS 09/12/2013 Obama has exchanged letters with his new Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani in recent weeks.US President Barack Obama has exchanged letters with his new Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani in recent weeks, and the two leaders may hold a meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York later this month, The Los Angeles Times quoted US officials as saying.
According to the Thursday report in the Times, Washington and Tehran have been discussing the situation in Syria and tentatively laying the framework for direct talks over Iran's disputed nuclear program.
Such face-to-face talks would mark the first such interaction between the countries since the severing of diplomatic ties in 1978. At a meeting of the UN's nuclear watchdog on Wednesday, both the United States and the European Union expressed hope that the election of Rouhani, a relative moderate who took office as new Iranian president in early August, would lead to a softening of the Islamic state's nuclear defiance. But they also said Iran had continued to increase its nuclear capacity in recent months and that no progress had been made so far in a long-stalled UN investigation into suspected atomic bomb research by Iran, which denies any such activity. Reinforcing the West's message that time was of the essence in moving to resolve the decade-old nuclear dispute, the European Union told Tehran that any "further procrastination is unacceptable." They warned that they may seek diplomatic action against Iran at the next quarterly meeting of the 35-nation board of the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), in late November, if no progress has been achieved by then. US Ambassador Joseph Macmanus said Washington was ready to work with the new Iranian government "to reach a diplomatic solution that will fully address the international community's concerns" about Iran's nuclear program. "We are hopeful that the Rouhani administration will live up to its assurances of transparency and cooperation by taking concrete steps over the next several months," he told the closed-door board meeting, according to a copy of his speech. But, Macmanus added, "should Iran continue its intransigence and obfuscation, we will work with fellow board members at the November board meeting to hold Iran appropriately accountable."
"TWO TO TANGO"
Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, tasked with leading nuclear negotiations, said on Wednesday Iran's nuclear work ought to be operated transparently and under international safeguards, but world powers could not "wish it away".Zarif, a US-educated former ambassador to the United Nations, is regarded favorably by Western diplomats. "Getting to yes is our motto ... but it takes two to tango," he said in a live interview on Iranian broadcaster Press TV. Iran's last round of talks with the big powers - the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany, dubbed the P5+1 - was in April in Kazakhstan, before Rouhani's election, and both sides have said they want to continue soon. "If the United States and the rest of the P5+1 group are not prepared to get seriously involved in this process then it will be a totally different scenario," Zarif said in English. Citing the IAEA's latest report on Iran, Macmanus said it had expanded its enrichment capacity by continuing to install advanced and first-generation centrifuges. "These are concerning escalations of an already prohibited activity," he said.
Iran was also making further progress in the construction of the Arak reactor, which can yield plutonium for bombs, including putting the reactor vessel in place and beginning to make fuel.
"All of these are troubling developments," Macmanus added. Iran has been engaged in on-off negotiations with major world powers for more than a decade, and has been subjected to several rounds of UN and Western economic sanctions. Separately, Iran and the IAEA have held ten rounds of talks since early 2012 in an attempt by the UN agency to resume its investigation into what it calls the "possible military dimensions" to Iran's nuclear program, so far without success. A new meeting is set for Sept. 27 in Vienna, seen by Western diplomats as a key test of the new Iranian government's intentions. "International concerns will only be allayed by concrete actions, not by words," the EU statement said.

US considers approach to Iran at UN gathering
By MICHAEL WILNER, JERUSALEM POST CORRESPONDENT 09/13/2013/
The US has maintained an indirect channel with Tehran through the Swiss to address Syria and the Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons. The US is ready and willing to negotiate directly with Iran over its nuclear program “quickly” – but no such talks have yet been scheduled, and are unlikely before the United Nations General Assembly in New York at the end of the month. National Security Council spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan told The Jerusalem Post that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s inauguration presents an “opportunity” for dialogue on the matter of Iran’s nuclear program, should Iran choose to change its position “quickly.” “Should this new government choose to engage substantively and seriously to meet its international obligations and find a peaceful solution to this issue,” Meehan said, “it will find a willing partner in the United States.” The US and Iran have not engaged in bilateral talks on the program, but the US has maintained an indirect channel to address regional matters. “We have conveyed our views regarding Syria and the Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons to the Iranian leadership through the Swiss, our protecting power in Tehran,” Meehan said. “This is a channel we have available to us to convey our views on a range of regional security matters.” While US officials will be carefully watching Rouhani’s speech at the General Assembly – it will be his first, and whether the US delegation chooses to walk out, as it did repeatedly during president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s tenure, is considered by US officials a significant diplomatic decision – few expect a bilateral meeting between Rouhani’s team and its US counterpart. “I am not going to get into hypotheticals at this time on when those talks will be,” a State Department official told the Post, citing deep and consistent concerns over the progress of the nuclear program. On Tuesday, the Los Angeles Times reported a letter exchange between US President Barack Obama and Rouhani in recent weeks, “tentatively laying the groundwork for potential face-to-face talks between the two governments.”The Post could not confirm the letter exchange independently. On Wednesday, Iran’s new envoy to the United Nations’ nuclear agency said that his government is prepared to work toward “overcome existing issues once and for all” over its nuclear program, while adding that Iran would never forfeit its right to peaceful nuclear energy. Rouhani said on Tuesday that the time for resolving Iran’s nuclear dispute with the West was limited, and urged the world to seize the opportunity of his election. He said he would meet with the foreign ministers from some of the six powers – Russia, China, France, Britain, the United States and Germany– when he attends the General Assembly.

Rai voices fear over sectarian killing in region
September 13, 2013/The Daily Star
BEIRUT: Maronite Patriarch Beshara Rai voiced Friday fears about the ongoing sectarian killing in the Middle East during a meeting with Patriarch Daniel of the Romanian Orthodox Church.
“I told the patriarch what frightens us today is that we are living wars, violence and sectarian killing in the Middle East and fighting between the moderates and the radicals,” Rai said, following his meeting with Daniel in Bucharest, according to the National News Agency. The two discussed the coexistence of Christians and Muslims in the Middle East. "We reject the continuation of wars, violence and terrorism because that destroys Muslims and Christians alike,” he said. Daniel encouraged the Maronite patriarch to promote such a message in the name of the people of Romania, Lebanon and the entire region, Rai said.
Rai traveled to Romania Thursday to inaugurate St. Charbel Church in Bucharest and he is expected to meet with several church officials there.  He invited the Romanian patriarch to visit Lebanon, saying he would coordinate such a trip with Greek Orthodox Patriarch John X Yazigi. For his part, Daniel called on Christians in the Middle East and all other sects to work together for peace in the region. "I received Patriarch Rai as a messenger of peace and we should all work together for peace and finding peaceful solution as an alternative to war and violence in this region where rich Christian heritage exists,” he said. He added that Rai explained the current situation in the region, saying he expressed his desire to work with the patriarch to promote peace. When asked about the two bishops who were kidnapped in Syria earlier this year, Daniel said: “Maybe our prayers could help end this case.”
 

Gunmen exchange fire after Hezbollah detains man in Beirut

September 13, 2013/The Daily Star
BEIRUT: A shootout between members of the Shamas family and Hezbollah took place in the suburbs of Beirut after a member of the family was detained Friday at a Hezbollah checkpoint on the airport road for refusing to show his identification, a security source told The Daily Star. Gunmen from the Shamas family opened fire at Hezbollah members in the Beirut southern suburb neighborhood of Mar Mikhael after the detention and Hezbollah returned fire. There were no reports of injuries. Hussein Shamas, who works for Al-Risala radio station and the Higher Islamic Shiite Council, was detained after Hezbollah members asked for his identification card at a checkpoint on the airport road and he refused to show it to them, according to the source. The man was later released after a few hours of detention. Hussein argued that the members of Hezbollah checkpoint did not have an official position in the Lebanese state to ask for his identification. Qassem Shamas, the brother of the detained journalist, told the Voice of Lebanon radio station that his brother was kidnapped and beaten up by Hezbollah.
“My brother was kidnapped by Hezbollah, I tried calling him and I heard him getting beaten up," he said. “My brother is a journalist and I hold Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah personally responsible for any harm that comes to my brother.” Qassem said he lost contact with his brother and Hezbollah members confiscated his cell phone. Qassem added his brother was a Shiite and a member of the Amal Movement and warned against the repercussions of keeping him detained. Hezbollah has boosted security measures in Beirut's southern suburbs after a bombing that took place in the pro-Hezbollah neighborhood of Ruwaiss killed 30 people and wounded many more.The party erected new checkpoints and its members inspect cars entering neighborhoods creating heavy traffic into Hezbollah controlled areas.
 

Sleiman slams attacks on Baabda Declaration

September 13, 2013/ By Hussein Dakroub The Daily Star
BEIRUT: President Michel Sleiman defended Thursday the “Baabda Declaration” after Hezbollah and its March 8 allies had criticized the pact designed to shield Lebanon from the repercussions of the war in Syria.
The declaration is currently at the center of a heated debate between the March 14 coalition, which is pushing for the pact to be adopted as a policy statement of a new Cabinet, and the Hezbollah-led March 8 alliance, which wants to see the “Army, people and Resistance” formula remain in the next government’s ministerial statement.
“The Baabda Declaration constitutes an important document closely linked to the National Dialogue Committee’s work. In addition to its adoption officially by the United Nations and the Arab League, the declaration constitutes an inclusive political framework that can unite sincere efforts aimed at safeguarding this nation’s sovereignty and unity,” according to a statement released by Sleiman’s office and broadcast on local television channels.
“While it [the declaration] paves the way for discussing a comprehensive national defense strategy, it also outlines the sound path to benefitting from all available national capabilities to defend Lebanon in the face of the Israeli enemy and its ambitions,” it added.
The statement came days after several March 8 lawmakers, including Hezbollah and Marada Movement leader Suleiman Franjieh, criticized the Baabda Declaration.
The declaration, signed by rival March 8 and March 14 leaders during a National Dialogue session chaired by Sleiman at Baabda Palace in June 2012, calls for “keeping Lebanon away from regional and international conflicts and sparing it the negative repercussions of regional tensions and crises,” particularly in Syria. Nabatieh MP Mohammad Raad, the head of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, said recently that the Baabda Declaration was “stillborn.” In a television interview earlier this week, Franijeh said the declaration consisted of “mere ideas for discussion” proposed by Sleiman that were “neither read nor approved.”
The presidential statement said the clarification aimed to clear up the confusion after the declaration was linked to Sleiman’s plan for a national defense strategy presented during a National Dialogue session.
The statement said the Baabda Declaration was upheld during three consecutive sessions held following the session that approved it, while it did not address the divisive issue of Hezbollah’s arms.
“The Baabda Declaration did not contain any clause dealing with the Resistance or its weapons and did not address the issue of benefiting from the Resistance’s capabilities and placing them at the disposal of the Lebanese state,” the statement said.
It added that Sleiman presented a plan for a defense strategy to the National Dialogue meeting of Sept. 20, 2012, at Baabda Palace.
Sleiman’s plan was considered by the Dialogue Committee as “a springboard for discussion to reach a consensus on a national defense strategy,” the statement said.The plan was to be discussed in subsequent meetings that haven’t taken place yet, it added.
During a dialogue session held on June 25, 2012, leaders agreed on “the need to adhere seriously to the provisions of the Baabda Declaration, particularly those related to toning down security, political and media rhetoric, supporting the Lebanese Army, and neutralizing Lebanon from regional and international conflicts,” according to the presidential statement.
The Future Movement and its March 14 allies have accused Hezbollah of violating the Baabda Declaration with its military intervention in Syria – Hezbollah has defended its intervention, arguing that it is needed to protect Lebanon from the threat of Salafist groups.
Media reports said Hezbollah and its March 8 allies would respond to Sleiman’s statement in a strongly-worded declaration Friday, and Bint Jbeil MP Hasan Fadlallah, a Hezbollah official, refused to comment on Sleiman’s statement when contacted by The Daily Star.The Central News Agency quoted senior March 8 sources as saying that the Baabda Declaration would never serve as a policy statement of any Cabinet.
“Canceling the ‘Army, people and Resistance’ equation is out of the question,” the CNA quoted the sources as saying.March 8 insists on its rejection of the Baabda Declaration, which will remain ink on paper, the sources said. The March 14 coalition, which has strongly rejected Hezbollah’s “Army, people and Resistance” formula contained in the policy statements of previous governments, has called for the Baabda Declaration to be the basis of the next Cabinet’s policy statement. Hezbollah and its March 8 allies uphold the “Army, people and Resistance” formula as the best means to defend Lebanon against a possible Israeli attack.
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Maronite Patriarch Beshara Rai also joined the fray Thursday over the Baabda Declaration – Mikati told reporters that the declaration had been approved by all leaders attending National Dialogue sessions, while Rai urged the rival factions to abide by it.
“There was unanimous consensus on all the items of the Baabda Declaration during the dialogue sessions,” Mikati said. “The items were presented to us and we discussed some observations in order to amend some items and so we did and the agreement was displayed to all of us via a screen.”“We all agreed then – that’s what I remember and that’s what happened.”
For his part, Rai said at Beirut airport before leaving for a three-day visit to Romania: “The Baabda Declaration is known, and written, and has been agreed by all the parties who put it on a screen where it was read, rectified and drafted.”Responding to the pact’s critics, Rai said: “Some voices that say we didn’t discuss this or this doesn’t exist or ink on paper ... But ... the declaration was presented and put forward to all the parties and this is enough for them to abide by it.”He added that following Sleiman’s statement, none of the parties that signed the declaration could disclaim it.

Declaration, Says Agreement a 'Serious Roadmap for Pacification'
Naharnet /Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri on Friday endorsed a recent statement issued by President Michel Suleiman to clarify the Baabda Declaration, describing the agreement as a “serious roadmap” for dialogue and pacification. “During these difficult days that we are all going through, it is not appropriate to engage in a contentious debate, such as the debate they have started over the Baabda Declaration,” Hariri said in a press release.
“But the statement issued by the presidency in this regard must be endorsed in its entirety, not to glorify the presidency and its clarifications or drag it into the current political polarization in the country … but rather to acknowledge a historical fact that dates back to one year ago,” he added. The former premier said “unfortunately, the 'forces of confrontation and defiance' want to remove it from the memory and from the official records.”
“The Baabda Declaration is the serious and responsible roadmap for dialogue, stability and the pacification of situations,” Hariri added, calling on the rival March 8 camp to acknowledge this view.
On Thursday, the presdiency said in a statement that the 2012 Baabda Declaration -- an agreement reached among the country's leaders to steer Lebanon clear of the region's crises -- did not tackle the weapons arsenal of the resistance, or Hizbullah. The rival leaders from the March 8 and March 14 alliances affirmed on June 11, 2012 commitment to the Taef Accord and agreed to keep Lebanon away from the policy of regional and international conflicts to spare it the negative repercussions of the regional crises.
Their agreement became known as the Baabda Declaration, which Thursday's presidential statement said was affirmed by three consecutive sessions.
“The Baabda Declaration did not include any text on the resistance and its arms and did not suggest ways to benefit from the resistance's capabilities,” said the statement read by Retired Brig. Gen. Bassam Yehia, the coordinator of the national dialogue committee. “Such concepts came as part of the president's proposal of his vision on the defense strategy during a national dialogue session on Sept. 20, 2012,” he said.
The explanatory statement came after both the March 8 and 14 alliances made different interpretations of the document.

Hariri lashes out at international community over Syria

September 13, 2013/The Daily Star
BEIRUT: Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri lashed out at the international community in an article published Friday for what he says is their disregard of the suffering of the Syrian people.
“The suffering of the Syrian people is ongoing while they cannot find anyone from the leaders of the international community who admits their existence, freedom and dignity," Hariri wrote in an editorial published in Al-Mustaqbal daily. “Instead, they leave them to the beasts of these misfortunate times that have been attacking them for two years and chasing them with all the weapons of death and destruction,” he wrote.
Over 100,000 people have died in the Syrian war that has gone on for over two years. Hariri condemned the international community for a lack of humanitarian concern.
“There is no concern over the Syrian people in the interests of the leaders even if a million Syrian die and even if Damascus, Aleppo, Homs, Hama and all Syria was destroyed," Hariri, who heads the Future Movement, wrote. “The international concerns are elsewhere, particularly over the matter current discussed globally, the use of chemical weapons.”
Hariri’s comments come as Syria is engaged in dialogue on turning over its stockpile of chemical weapons to the international community to avert a U.S. military strike against the Assad regime.
The U.S. has threatened to strike Assad’s government in retaliation for the alleged chemical attack by regime forces against civilians in Syria in the southern suburbs of Damascus in August.
Hariri said the debate is circulating over the use of chemical weapons “as if it is a way of saying that the hundreds of casualties and victims who fell in Ghouta, and the thousands that Bashar Assad’s killing machine attacked before... are a zero in the eyes of the world’s leading countries as long as they weren’t killed with chemical weapons.”
Hariri also questioned the possible reaction of the international community in case the Assad regime had launched its chemical attack against another country in the region instead of targeting the Syrian people.
He asked if the Russian-backed proposal that would involve Syria giving up control of its chemical weapon stockpiles would be accepted if Assad's chemical attack targeted Israel, Turkey, Jordan or Lebanon.
“What if these chemical weapons were launched against Israel? Would the United States and Europe have dared to accept the Russian proposal? What if these weapons were used against Turkey? Would the NATO countries also have dared to accept the Russian proposal?” he asked. “And what if the chemical weapons were fired at Jordan? Would the American administration and the friendly European countries have moved ahead with the Russian proposal? And what if these weapons were directed towards Lebanon? What will the world countries do about this?”
He said that the possible international reaction in response to a chemical strike against Israel would be a fierce attack against Assad.
“All major countries, including Russia and China, will gather to wage war against the Syrian regime, without referring to senates or to the democratic and non-democratic parliaments,” he said.
He added that if Turkey was targeted, “The United States and Europe will reject the Russian offer and will strongly strike the Syrian regime.”
In criticism to his rival political camp, Hariri also anticipated March 8’s reaction to a possible chemical attack against Lebanon.
“Russia will make the same proposal, the United States and Europe will accept to remove the chemical weapons of the Syrian regime... the refusal will come from the March 8 forces, which will organize a new campaign aimed at accusing the takfiris of using chemical weapons.”He concluded his article saying “the masters of the international community take into account all interests in all directions; but unfortunately they don’t take into account the victims who are falling every day all over Syria.”

Paris Gave 'Message of Reassurance' to Suleiman on Syria Strike
Naharnet/France has reassured President Michel Suleiman that a possible Western attack against the Syrian regime would neither target Lebanon nor Hizbullah, As Safir daily reported on Friday. The daily's correspondent in Paris said French President Francois Hollande told Suleiman on the sidelines of the Francophone Games in the southern city of Nice that Paris was exerting all efforts to steer Lebanon clear of the developments linked to Syria and its chemical weapons. Washington alleges that some 1,400 people, including more than 400 children, were killed in an Aug. 21 attack in the Damascus suburbs involving poison gas.
U.S. President Barack Obama is seeking Congressional support to attack the Syrian regime over its alleged use of the chemical weapons. But As Safir quoted sources as saying that Hollande sent a “message of reassurance” to Suleiman by stressing that the possible strike against the regime of President Bashar Assad “would not reach Lebanon and would not target Hizbullah.”The French president also stressed to Suleiman that Paris was keen on the stability of Lebanon, and the importance of implementing the Baabda Declaration and the policy of dissociating the country from the region’s crises. Hollande's message was aimed at extracting reassurances from Hizbullah that it would not act against Israel – the main U.S. ally in the region – in case of a strike against Assad, As Safir said. On Monday, Assad warned the U.S. will "pay the price" if it attacks Syria. "It's an area where everything is on the brink of explosion. You have to expect everything." His comments did not rise to the level of a precise threat, but will do nothing to calm fears that Syria and it allies Hizbullah and Iran could act to destabilize its neighbors.

Berri's Bloc Tours Top Officials to Explain Dialogue Initiative
Naharnet/Development and Liberation bloc MPs met on Friday with President Michel Suleiman and Caretaker Premier Najib Miqati to brief them on Speaker Nabih Berri's “roadmap” on the new government and the national dialogue. Berri tasked his lawmakers to meet with top officials and parliamentary blocs to explain to them his initiative, which he said is aimed at bringing the country's political deadlock to an end.The speaker, who is also the head of the Amal movement, reiterated in remarks to An Nahar daily published Friday that his roadmap paves way for ending the current crisis and facilitating the formation of the new cabinet. He said if Miqati makes a similar proposal, then he wouldn't oppose it. Miqati revealed Thursday that he would also announce an initiative to resolve Lebanon's political crisis. A statement issued by Baabda Palace following the bloc's visit Friday said Suleiman welcomes any initiative that seeks dialogue. He “stressed the necessity to review the mechanisms for the implementation of previous decisions reached at the national dialogue table such as the Baabda Declaration,” it said. The caretaker PM's press office also said that Miqati reiterated his support for any initiative that revives the all-party talks to “lay understandings that protect the nation at these difficult circumstances.”
Miqati said he would cooperate with Berri to “salvage Lebanon” after he described him as an official who is keen on the constitutional institutions and the unity of the Lebanese. The speaker has called for the resumption of national dialogue at Baabda palace for a period of at least five consecutive days to discuss the form and policy statement of the future cabinet. He said Premier-designate Tammam Salam should attend the all-party talks that bring together the rival March 8 and 14 alliances. He also called for reviving talks on a new electoral law, supporting the military to deal with arms proliferated in several regions and addressing a national defense strategy, a reference to Hizbullah's arms.The Development and Liberation delegation will also meet with Salam on Friday.

Kerry: Russia, U.S. to Meet at U.N. General Assembly to Set Peace Talks Date
Naharnet/U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Friday he would meet again with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in New York later this month to try to set a date for a long-delayed peace conference for Syria.
"We both agreed... to meet again in New York around the time of the U.N. General Assembly around the 28th in order to see if it is possible then to find a date for that conference," Kerry told reporters at a joint press briefing in Geneva with Lavrov and the U.N.-Arab League envoy to Syria, Lakhdar Brahimi.
The peace talks, first proposed during Kerry's visit to Moscow earlier this year, have failed so far to materialize, while the fighting on the ground in Syria has intensified. Kerry said both Russia and the U.S. were "deeply concerned about the death toll and destruction, the acts on both sides, all sides, that are creating more and more refugees, more and more of a humanitarian catastrophe."
He said Washington and Moscow were "working hard to find common ground" to implement the so-called Geneva II peace talks, which aim to bring together the Syrian regime of President Bashar Assad and the opposition to negotiate a political solution to the conflict. Much of the way forward "will obviously depend on the capacity to have success here in the next day, hours, days, on the subject of the chemical weapons," Kerry said at the hastily convened press briefing. He and Lavrov were due to head straight back to a Geneva hotel to join a second day of talks under way among their delegations on how to implement a Russian proposal to put Syria's chemical weapons under international control. But the two sides are also working on the parallel political track seeking to implement a ceasefire agreement hammered out in the Swiss city on June 30, 2012. Lavrov said it was "very unfortunate that for a long period the Geneva communique was basically abandoned and we were not able to have endorsement of this very important document in the Security Council.
"We agreed to meet in New York in the margins of the General Assembly and see where we are, and what the Syrian parties think about it and do about it," he added.
Brahimi said the three men had had "useful" discussions at the United Nations Friday. But he also hailed the chemical weapons talks as "extremely important for all of us who are working with you on trying to bring together the Geneva II conference successfully."SourceAgence France Presse.

Maneuvering, Iranian Style
By: Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Alawsat
I don’t understand how US president Barack Obama conceives his plans. I doubt that those close to him, or those, like me, monitoring the scene from afar, can understand his strategy towards the Middle East as a whole. . . . That is, if he has one in the first place. On Tuesday, President Obama promised us a “potentially positive development” regarding the Russian proposal to dismantle Syria’s chemical weapons stockpiles. For his part, Sergey Lavrov, the grim face of Russian diplomacy, said he was waiting for Syria’s reaction to the proposal. This was a theatrical, if not farcical, gesture.
It was strange how this waiting period did not last long. In fact, it was not destined to last long, particularly after Syrian foreign minister Walid Muallem was summoned to Moscow to appear in a staged press conference that took place in the context of Russia’s PR counter-campaign aimed at blocking Obama and the Western leaders’ efforts to convince the public of the merits of a punitive military strike against the Assad regime.
The scenario is clear: what Russia needs is to gain more time in order to dishearten already-reluctant and unenthusiastic Western leaders, in addition to misleading the Western public—along with their leaders—by placing the issue of chemicals, and the debate raging around this, center stage in the Syrian crisis.
The allies of the Assad regime have managed to impose their agenda on the international community despite the fact that the August 21 chemical attack was one of the worst atrocities committed against civilians in modern history. They directed the world’s attention away from a series of disturbing facts, reducing the entire tragedy to the issue of chemical weapons disarmament.
No one today speaks about the siege of Baba Amr, the children of Dara’a or Aleppo’s ancient souks.
No one speaks about the between 100,000 and 150,000 Syrians who have been killed or the third of the population that has been displaced.
No one speaks about how extremist Takfirist groups have been able to enter a police state that has been ruled by the security and intelligence services for over four decades. This is a police state where any political opposition figure found themselves thrown in jail for years on end.
No one speaks about the state of sectarian and religious polarization today poisoning the atmosphere of the entire Middle East.
The liberal and progressive powers in the West insist on not repeating the mistakes of Iraq, forgetting at the same time that the only way to rectify the mistake of Iraq is by changing the geopolitical situation produced by the 2003 war and its repercussions on the ground.
In fact, we are facing a situation that is closer to that of Iran expanding its nuclear program in full view of the world despite the international community’s empty verbal condemnations.
We are now watching the Tehran–Moscow axis presenting the Syrian crisis to the world within the framework of the fight against takfirism and protection of minorities, carrying out the same maneuver they patiently and very successfully used regarding Iran’s nuclear program. This has resulted, as we all know, in the West maintaining silence over Iran’s growing nuclear power, allowing Tehran to secure greater regional influence in the Middle East—something that is tacitly approved by the Israelis, although Tel Aviv would deny this. In fact, one could say that the Tehran–Moscow axis has completely redrawn the regional map, while the Arabs have been conspicuously absent from this process.
This bitter reality must not be ignored.
Yes, there is a crisis caused by extremist Takfirists who confuse and threaten the countries of the Mashriq. Unfortunately, some of the Syrian opposition’s credibility has been damaged by repeatedly denying the influential role played by these extremist groups in the fight against the Assad regime. The reality is that such groups do exist, and they pose the most serious obstacle to the Syrian revolution. The fact of the matter is that these groups are the true allies of Assad and his regime, particularly as he takes every opportunity to make reference to their presence on the ground and their unacceptable practices. The Christian village of Maalula has enjoyed its fair share of world media coverage, varying between objective reporting to blatant incitement; however, the confrontations between extremist groups and the residents of Al-Raqqa and other Syrian Sunni-dominated cities are a reality that deserve to be brought to light.
The pro-Assad Christian propagandists appearing in Lebanon during the past days as Maalula took center stage in the Syrian crisis are a part of a campaign to mobilize international public opinion against the Syrian revolution. What happened in the Christian-dominated town of Maalula and the car bombs in the Druze-dominated district of Jaramana and the Ismaili majority city of Al-Salamiyah represent the tip of the iceberg of the regime’s grand regional project. Today, it seems clear that President Obama does not have much time to consider the issue of extremist Takfirist groups and their network of ties throughout the region. He does not want to know who has infiltrated and is hosting these groups, exploiting their presence on the ground.
It is necessary and essential to protect minorities in Syria and its neighboring countries. However, the international community is very much mistaken if it believes that allowing tyrants to oppress their people will provide minorities with sufficient protection from the risks of fundamentalism and Takfirist extremism.
The entire world has seen how Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship and non-democratic practices only served to strengthen Iran-backed Shi’ite radicalism. It would therefore be beneficial to learn from the lessons of Iraq when dealing with a Syrian dictatorship that originally belonged to the same Ba’athist school of thought, in addition to adopting similar principles of exclusion and monopolization of power.
It was natural that the majority of Shi’ites in Iraq during the era of Saddam Hussein found a refuge from dictatorship in sectarianism. Therefore, it is normal that the same thing would happen in Syria with regards to the Sunni majority. What does this all mean? It means that US president Barack Obama must see the big picture, rather than throwing away his compass and simply following Moscow and Tehran’s lead. Obama must realize, before it is too late, that the Iraq mistake can be rectified by learning its lessons, as well as by creating pluralistic and democratic entities that allow the minorities and the majority to live in an atmosphere of coexistence and mutual respect, rather than handing the Levant and Iraq over to a sectarian regional project that will only drive the minorities away.

Obama and Putin’s Double Act Continues
By: Amir Taheri/Asharq Alawsat
In my column on August 30, I wondered whether US President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin were engaged in a danse macabre. I didn’t know that this suspicion would soon be reconfirmed with a new round in that dance around Syria. Last week it had become clear that Obama was looking for a way out of his Hamlet-like trap after his huffing and puffing about “punishing” Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad for alleged use of chemical weapons. Obama regretted his bellicose utterances almost as soon as he made them. This is why he surprised everyone by announcing that he would do nothing without a vote in the US Senate and House of Representatives. For a few days he hoped that Congress might get him off the hook by voting “no”. Last Saturday, however, there were signs that he might secure a narrow majority for what US Secretary of State John Kerry described as an “unbelievably small” attack. It was then that Obama’s partner in this danse macabre, Putin, rushed to the rescue by flying an unbelievable kite regarding “international control” over Assad’s chemical weapons—weapons that the Syrian insists he does not have. Overjoyed that he was no longer required to act, Obama returned to his favorite sport of making speeches, often on TV, and announced that the Congressional vote was postponed “indefinitely”, and the “unbelievably small” attack was on hold. For years, Putin has helped get Obama off the hook by playing “bad guy” to his “good guy” image. But why should Putin be keen to save Obama from the consequences of his incompetence?
The answer is that, as far as Moscow is concerned, Obama is the best news from Washington since Jimmy Carter. Carter is the one-term president who gave the now defunct Soviet Union four full years in which to project global power. In those years, Moscow pushed Iran’s Communists into coalition with mullahs under Rouhollah Khomeini to topple the Shah. Then, Moscow used Khomeini to flush out the 23,000 American advisors working for the Shah’s air force. Khomeini also dismantled the 32 “listening stations” set up by the United Nations under an international treaty to monitor Soviet missile tests. Next, came the demonstration of American helplessness as Khomeinist and Communist “students” raided the US Embassy in Tehran and held its diplomats hostage for 444 days.
That was not all.
Moscow ordered the assassination of Afghanistan’s President Hafizullah Amin and replaced him with a KGB man, Babrak Karmal. When the Afghans revolted, Moscow sent the Red Army to crush them.
In the Horn of Africa, the pro-Moscow Mengistu Haile Mariam seized power as Carter started his presidency. In the four years that followed, the USSR established itself as the key power in Africa.
In Europe, the USSR dotted the territory of Warsaw Pact partners with SS-20 missiles, upsetting the Cold War balance of power. Carter reacted to the Soviet expansionist frenzy by boycotting the Moscow Olympics, a move that allowed Russians to win even more gold medals.
Well, that was then, you might say, what has Obama done to please Putin?
The answer is: plenty. Here are some examples:
- In August 2008, Russia invaded Georgia and occupied 25 percent of its territory. The Security Council was supposed to act in a session in February 2009. That never happened. Just-sworn-in-as-president Obama simply brushed the matter under the carpet. Since then, Russia has effectively annexed South Ossetia and Abkhazia and is busy turning what is left of Georgia into a satellite state.
- Putin has pressured Central Asian republics, notably Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, back into the old Soviet fold, pushing Americans out and forcing the closure of US logistics bases.
- The pro-West government in Ukraine has been toppled and its leader imprisoned. Its place has been taken by men looking to Moscow not Washington.
- Putin “persuaded” Obama to scrap a missile-defense shield that President George W. Bush planned to build in Central and Eastern Europe.
- Putin has strengthened anti-US alliances that include Iran and Syria, and, in a different context, China and the Central Asian republics. Before Obama became president, Moscow’s arms exports to Latin America were limited to one country: Cuba. By 2013, the number had grown to 14.
- With Obama’s cooperation, Putin has fudged Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Five resolutions of the Security Council have been put on hold in exchange for sporadic “talks about talks”. When Obama became president, Iran had 100 kilograms of uranium enriched to 3.5 percent. Today, it has 3,000 kilograms, partly enriched to 20 percent. Before Obama, Iran had 800 working centrifuges; now it has 12,000.
- Obama dropped US objections that, despite 18 years of negotiations, prevented Russia from joining the World Trade Organization (WTO), giving Putin an easy ride and a big diplomatic victory.
- Started under Bush, the redesigning of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and its extension to new members and/or partners in Europe, Transcaucasia and Central Asia has been put on hold. Cooperation agreements with six Arab countries have also been de-activated.
The Obama-Putin partnership may suit both leaders, however, three points merit attention:
The first is that the double act does not necessarily suit the interests of either the US or Russia.
The second is that while Obama and Putin do their double act, the carnage in Syria continues. The danger of Syria becoming a Somalia on the Mediterranean should not be dismissed.
Finally, Putin would do well to re-read history. Carter was good for the Soviet Union for four years. But Carter paved the way for Ronald Reagan and the fall of the Soviet Empire.

U.S., Israel press Syria over nuclear stonewalling
By Fredrik Dahl | Reuters – VIENNA (Reuters) - With international attention focused on Syria's tentative offer to give up its chemical arsenal, the United States and Israel used a U.N. nuclear agency meeting to press Damascus to also open up to an inquiry into its atomic activities. Though not seen as cause for immediate alarm like Syria's poison gas stocks, Damascus' continuing failure to cooperate with U.N. nuclear inspectors was singled out by U.S. and Israeli envoys at the closed-door session of the agency's board of governors in Vienna, diplomats said. The International Atomic Energy Agency has long sought to visit a Syrian desert site U.S. intelligence reports say was a nascent, North Korean-designed reactor geared to making plutonium for nuclear bombs - before Israel bombed it in 2007. "Syria is as much trustworthy in the nuclear domain as it is in the chemical domain," Israeli Ambassador Ehud Azoulay told the IAEA's 35-nation board on Thursday, according to a copy of his speech made available to Reuters after the meeting. A senior U.S. diplomat said Syria - ravaged by a civil war that has killed more than 100,000 people since 2011 - must grant the IAEA access to all relevant locations, materials and persons for its five-year-old inquiry. "Until the agency is able to resolve all outstanding questions about the exclusively peaceful nature of Syria's nuclear program, Syria's non-compliance will remain a matter of serious concern," U.S. Ambassador Joseph Macmanus added. Syria's envoy to the IAEA was not available for comment.
Syria has said the site at Deir al-Zor in eastern Syria was a conventional military base but the IAEA concluded in 2011 that it was "very likely" to have been a reactor that should have been declared to its anti-proliferation inspectors. IAEA inspectors examined the site in June 2008 but Syrian authorities have barred them access since. In February, opposition sources in eastern Syria said rebels had captured the destroyed site near the Euphrates River.
PROLIFERATION RISKS?
The IAEA has also been requesting information about three other sites that may have been linked to Deir al-Zor. IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano told the board that his agency remained "unable to provide any assessment concerning the nature, or operational status" of those locations. A U.S. think-tank, the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), said Syria was not believed to have an active, secret nuclear program now. "But Syria is believed to be actively hiding assets associated with this past, undeclared nuclear reactor effort," it said in a report published late on Thursday. Israel is widely assumed to be the Middle East's only nuclear-armed power, drawing Arab and Iranian condemnation. The Jewish state and Washington see Iran's disputed nuclear program - and to a lesser extent Syria's possible activities - as the volatile region's main proliferation concern. Tehran says its program is an entirely peaceful energy project. Iran's envoy to the IAEA, Reza Najafi, accused Israel during this week's board discussion on Tehran's nuclear program of trying to "divert the attention from its clandestine nuclear weapons program by making unsubstantiated allegations". Western and Israeli security experts earlier this year said they suspected that Syria may have tons of unenriched uranium in storage and that any such stockpile could potentially be of interest to its ally Iran. Even if Syria did have such a stockpile, it would not be usable for nuclear weapons in its present form, a fact that makes it less of a pressing concern for the West than government forces' alleged use of chemical weapons against their foes. "Any known or suspected nuclear materials inside Syria are not nearly as dangerous as Syria's chemical weapons stockpile ... since the nuclear material in this case cannot be used directly to make nuclear weapons," ISIS said. Nonetheless, a large stock of natural uranium metal would pose nuclear proliferation risks as it could be obtained by militant groups or countries like Iran, the think-tank said. The Syrian government has offered to join a global pact banning chemical weapons to head off the risk of punitive U.S. air strikes over an August 21 poison gas attack that killed hundreds of civilians in a rebel district. (Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Kerry says the future of Syria peace talks depends on outcome of chemical weapons deal
By By Matthew Lee And John Heilprin, The Associated Press | The Canadian Press –
GENEVA - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Friday the prospects for resuming the Syrian peace process are riding on the outcome of U.S.-Russian talks aimed at securing Syria's chemical weapons arsenal that lurched into a second day. As American and Russian chemical weapons experts huddled in a Geneva hotel to haggle over technical details that will be critical to reach a deal, Kerry and Lavrov met a short distance away at the U.N.'s European headquarters with U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi to examine political developments and plot a new international conference in Geneva to support the creation of a Syrian transitional government.
Brahimi acknowledged the high stakes when he told the diplomatic pair that their chemical weapons negotiation "is extremely important in itself, and for itself, but it is also extremely important for us who are working with you on trying to bring together the Geneva conference successfully."Kerry, flanked by Lavrov and Brahimi, told the Geneva press corps after an hour-long meeting that the chances for a second peace conference in Geneva will require success first with the chemical weapons talks, which have been "constructive" so far.
"I will say on behalf of the United States that President Obama is deeply committed to a negotiated solution with respect to Syria, and we know that Russia is likewise. We are working hard to find the common ground to be able to make that happen. We discussed some of the homework that we both need to do," Kerry said.
Kerry said they agreed to meet around Sept. 28 on the sidelines of the annual U.N. General Assembly high-level meetings in New York. But, he said, the future of peace negotiations depends on the outcome of the weapons talks. "And we are committed to try to work together, beginning with this initiative on the chemical weapons, in hopes that those efforts could pay off and bring peace and stability to a war-torn part of the world," he added.
Brahimi also met privately with Kerry at a Geneva hotel on Thursday to explore ways to resume international negotiations last held in Geneva in June 2012 aimed at ending the Syrian civil war.
Lavrov said Russia has supported the peace process from the start of the Syrian conflict but that "it is very unfortunate that for a long period the Geneva communique was basically abandoned."
Lavrov said he, Kerry and Brahimi discussed ways of preparing for a second conference along with the document, which "means that the Syrian parties must reach mutual consent on the transitional governing organ, which would come with full executive authority. And the communique also says that all groups of Syrian society must be represented."
When the talks began Thursday, Kerry bluntly rejected a Syrian pledge to begin a "standard process" by turning over information rather than weapons — and nothing immediately. The American diplomat said that was not acceptable.
"The words of the Syrian regime, in our judgment, are simply not enough," Kerry declared as he stood beside Lavrov. "This is not a game."
Salem Al Meslet, a senior member of the opposition Syrian National Coalition, said he was disappointed in the outcome of the Kerry and Lavrov meeting.
"They are leaving the murderer and concentrating on the weapons he was using," he said of Assad. "It is like stabbing somebody with a knife then they take the knife away and he is free."
He spoke on the sidelines of a two-day opposition conference in Istanbul.
The talks were the latest in a rapidly moving series of events following the Aug. 21 gas attack on suburbs in Damascus. The U.S. blames Syrian President Bashar Assad for the use of chemical weapons, although Assad denies his government was involved and instead points to rebels engaged in a 2-year-old civil war against his government.
President Barack Obama began building a case for support at home and abroad for a punitive military strike on Assad's forces, then changed course and asked Congress to give him explicit authority for a limited strike. With the campaign for lawmakers' building to a vote — one that he might well lose — Obama said Tuesday he would consider a Russian proposal calling for international control of Assad's chemical weapons and their eventual destruction.
Obama dispatched Kerry to Geneva to hammer out the details of the proposal even as he kept alive the possibility of U.S. military action.
"We believe there is nothing standard about this process at this moment because of the way the regime has behaved," Kerry said on the opening day of talks. The turnover of weapons must be complete, verifiable and timely, he said, "and, finally, there ought to be consequences if it doesn't take place."
Lavrov seemed to contradict Kerry's negative view of Assad's offer to provide details on his country's chemical arsenal beginning 30 days after it signs an international convention banning such weapons. Syria's ambassador to the United Nations said that as of Thursday his country had become a full member of the treaty, which requires destruction of all chemical weapons.
The Russian said the initiative must proceed "in strict compliance with the rules that are established by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons." That suggests Russia does not agree with the U.S. that this is an exceptional case and that Syria should face tougher standards than other countries.
"We proceed from the fact that the solution to this problem will make unnecessary any strike on the Syrian Arab Republic, and I am convinced that our American colleagues, as President Obama stated, are firmly convinced that we should follow a peaceful way of resolution to the conflict in Syria," Lavrov said.
The distrust in U.S.-Russia relations was on display even in an off-hand parting exchange at the news conference. Just before it ended, Kerry asked the Russian translator to repeat part of Lavrov's concluding remarks.
When it was clear that Kerry wasn't going to get an immediate retranslation, Lavrov apparently tried to assure him that he hadn't said anything controversial . "It was OK, John, don't worry," he said.
"You want me to take your word for it?" Kerry asked Lavrov. "It's a little early for that."
They were smiling at that point. Shortly after making their opening statements, the two went into a private dinner.
Assad, in an interview with Russia's Rossiya-24 TV, said his government would start submitting data on its chemical weapons stockpile a month after signing the convention. He also said the Russian proposal for securing the weapons could work only if the U.S. halted threats of military action.
At a meeting in Kyrgyzstan of an international security grouping dominated by Russia and China, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Friday that Syria's efforts have demonstrated its good faith.
"I would like to voice hope that this will mark a serious step toward the settlement of the Syrian crisis," Putin said.
Even as diplomacy took centre stage, word surfaced that the CIA has been delivering light machine-guns and other small arms to Syrian rebels for several weeks, following Obama's statement in June that he would provide lethal aid to the rebels. White House National Security Council spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan said the administration could not "detail every single type of support that we are providing to the opposition or discuss timelines for delivery, but it's important to note that both the political and the military opposition are and will be receiving this assistance."
Current and former U.S. intelligence officials said the CIA has arranged for the Syrian opposition to receive anti-tank weaponry such as rocket-propelled grenades through a third party, presumably one of the Gulf countries that have been arming the rebels. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the classified program publicly.
Loay al-Mikdad, a spokesman for the Free Syrian Army, told The Associated Press that his group expected to receive weapons in the near future.

Western strike force for Syria disperses. Syrian launches offensive near Israeli border
DEBKAfile Special Report September 12, 2013/Russian President Vladimir Putin, while engaged in active cooperation with President Barack Obama over Syria, was not averse to going over his head to push his agenda with “the American people” in an article he published in The New York Times Thursday, Sept. 12. He continues to protest against all the evidence that the calamitous chemical attack of Aug. 21, east of Damascus, was perpetrated by Syrian rebels, not the Syrian army. This is clearly an attempt to turn the American people and its lawmakers once and for all against US military intervention in Syria in any shape or form.
If Putin succeeds in getting his message across, it would be the second time in a decade that Moscow has worked its will on the American people. The first time, the Russians aimed at discrediting the Bush administration by convincing the world ahead of America’s 2003 invasion of Iraq that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction, although he was on record as having gassed 5,000 of his Kurdish citizens to death in 1988.
In his article, Putin went on to say sanctimoniously: “It is alarming that military intervention in internal conflicts in foreign countries has become commonplace for the United States. Is it in America’s long-term interest? Millions around the world increasingly see America not as a model of democracy but as one relying solely on brute force.” The famously peace-loving Russian leader was lambasting an American president known for his extreme shyness of military action. Putin must be utterly confident that Obama is too far along their joint diplomatic path with Iran on Syria to back out now. He is evidently counting on a military attack being finally off the table and the Assad regime guaranteed safe. debkafile’s military sources report that the Western military armada built up opposite Syria in the past two weeks was breaking up as the US president’s resolve for military action faded under relentless pressure from Moscow. The British and French ships headed through the Suez Canal for the Red Sea Wednesday, Sept. 11, and the American vessels pulled back from Syrian shores to waters between Crete and Cyprus.
Obama has therefore caved in on his original intention of keeping the war armada in place - as heat for Assad to comply with the Russian plan for the elimination of his chemical weapons.
Every reputable chemical and military expert has advised the US president that there is no way that Assad’s chemical arsenal can be located and destroyed without importing an army of monitors long term for the job, and this can’t be accomplished while a civil war is raging in the country. Even if it becomes feasible, it will take years.
Meanwhile, the Syrian army is not waiting for diplomacy to run its course and Thursday, resumed offensive operations in the south, targeting Deraa and advancing rapidly towards the Syrian-Jordanian-Israeli border intersection.
The rebels’ morale is in the pits out of a sense of betrayal by the Obama administration and their resistance to the Syrian army’s onslaught is half-hearted at best.

U.S., Russia see Syria arms deal aiding peace talks
By Stephanie Nebehay and Oliver Holmes | Reuters –
GENEVA/BEIRUT (Reuters) - Russia and the United States agreed on Friday to push again for an international conference aimed at ending Syria's civil war as talks on removing chemical weapons raised hopes for broader negotiations. After a further meeting Geneva to discuss Moscow's plan for securing poison gas stocks in order to avert U.S. air strikes, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said they would work together to end a conflict that has divided the Middle East and the world's major powers.
They would meet again in about two weeks, around September 28 during the United Nations General Assembly in New York, and hoped progress in Geneva in the coming day on a chemical weapons disarmament deal would help set a date for a peace conference. "We are committed to trying to work together, beginning with this initiative on the chemical weapons, in hopes that those efforts could pay off and bring peace and stability to a war-torn part of the world," Kerry told a joint news briefing. Washington and Moscow still had work to do find common ground, Kerry said of a dispute that has raised echoes of the Cold War and to reach an agreement on scheduling peace talks. "Much ... will depend on the capacity to have success here in the next hours, days, on the subject of the chemical weapons," the secretary of state added.
Lavrov said work on a chemical weapons deal would go on in parallel with preparatory work for a Geneva peace conference.
Russia has resisted calls from Syrian rebels and Western leaders for President Bashar al-Assad to make way for an interim transitional government. Assad's disparate opponents and their foreign allies say they see no place for Assad after the war. Kerry cautioned after meeting Lavrov on Thursday that the United States could still carry out a threat to attack Assad in retaliation for a poison gas attack last month if Washington was not satisfied with Syria's response. U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who also represents the Arab League, met Kerry and Lavrov together on Friday. He said working to remove chemical weapons from Syria would form an important element in efforts to hold new peace talks, following an earlier failed attempt at Geneva last year.
FIGHTING IN DAMASCUS
As the diplomacy continued in Switzerland, Assad's forces were on the offensive against rebel-held suburbs of Damascus, opposition activists and residents said. Warplanes and artillery were bombing and shelling, notably in the Barzeh neighborhood, where activists said there were also clashes on the ground.
"It seems that the government is back to its old routine after the past couple of weeks of taking a defensive posture from a U.S. strike," said one resident of central Damascus, who opposes Assad. She heard jets overhead and artillery in action. Damascus formally applied to join a global poison gas ban - a move welcomed on Friday by Russian President Vladimir Putin. He called it "an important step towards the resolution of the Syrian crisis" and added: "This confirms the serious intention of our Syrian partners to follow this path."
China, too, hailed Assad's decision, as did Iran, Assad's key ally in a regional confrontation with sectarian overtones between Shi'ite Tehran and Sunni Muslim Arab states.
But Kerry has underscored that Washington could still attack: "This is not a game," he said on Thursday.
The talks were part of a diplomatic push that prompted President Barack Obama to put on hold his plans for U.S. air strikes in response to a chemical weapons attack on August 21. Moscow's proposal also spared Obama facing a vote in Congress on military action that he appeared likely to lose at this stage.
The United States and its allies say Assad's forces carried out the attack with sarin nerve gas, killing more than 1,400 people. Putin and Assad have blamed rebel forces.
The United Nations said it received a document from Syria on joining the global anti-chemical weapons treaty, a move Assad promised as part of a deal to avoid U.S. air strikes.
Assad told Russian state television in an interview broadcast on Thursday that he would finalize plans to abandon his chemical arsenal only when the United States stops threatening to attack him.
Lavrov said on Thursday: "We proceed from the fact that the solution of this problem will make unnecessary any strike on the Syrian Arab Republic."
AL QAEDA THREAT
Along with other world powers, Moscow and Washington see the instability in Syria as fuelling wider security threats, but differ sharply on how to respond. Western powers say that Assad is a tyrant who should be overthrown. Russia, like Assad, highlights the presence in rebel ranks of Islamist militants. In an audio recording released a day after the 12th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri referred to Islamist fighters in Syria among other battlegrounds as he urged supporters to carry out attacks in the United States to "bleed America economically". Putin's Russia has been Assad's most powerful backer during the civil war, which has killed more than 100,000 people since 2011, delivering arms and - with China - blocking three U.N. resolutions meant to pressure Assad. Kerry said any agreement must be comprehensive, verifiable, credible and implemented in a "timely" way - "and finally, there ought to be consequences if it doesn't take place." Kerry called a peaceful resolution "clearly preferable" to military action. Assad told Russian TV: "When we see the United States really wants stability in our region and stops threatening, striving to attack, and also ceases arms deliveries to terrorists, then we will believe that the necessary processes can be finalized." Assad said Syria would provide an accounting of chemical weapons stocks in 30 days, standard practice under the treaty. (Writing by Will Dunham and Alastair Macdonald; Editing by Giles Elgood)

Muslim Persecution of Christians: June, 2013
By: Raymond Ibrahim/Gatestone Institute
http://www.meforum.org/3609/muslim-persecution-of-christians-june-2013
The degradation of Christian women living in the Islamic world continued in the month of June. In Syria, after the al-Qaeda linked rebel group conquered Qusair, a city of the governate of Homs, 15-year-old Mariam was kidnapped, repeatedly gang raped according to a fatwa legitimizing the rape of non-Sunni women by any Muslim waging jihad against Syria's government, and then executed.
According to Agenzia Fides, "The commander of the battalion 'Jabhat al-Nusra' in Qusair took Mariam, married and raped her. Then he repudiated her. The next day the young woman was forced to marry another Islamic militant. He also raped her and then repudiated her. The same trend was repeated for 15 days, and Mariam was raped by 15 different men. This psychologically destabilized her and made her insane. Mariam became mentally unstable and was eventually killed."
In Pakistan, Muslim men stormed the home of three Christian women, beat them, stripped them naked and tortured them, and then paraded them in the nude in a village in the Kasur district. Days earlier, it seems the goats of the Christian family had accidentally trespassed onto Muslim land; Muslims sought to make an example of the Christian family, who, as third-class citizens, must know their place at all times.
The rest of June's roundup of Muslim persecution of Christians around the world includes (but is not limited to) the following accounts, listed by theme and country in alphabetical order, not according to severity:
Attacks on Christian Worship: Churches and Monasteries
Iraq: During the middle of the night, armed men attacked St. Mary's Assyrian Catholic Church in Baghdad; they wounded two Christian guards, one seriously. Later the same day, bombs were set off at two Christian-owned businesses, both near the church; they killed one Christian shop owner, a parishioner at St. Mary's. Since the U.S. "liberation" of Iraq in 2003, 73 churches have been attacked or bombed, and more than half of the country's Christian population has either fled or been killed.
Kenya: Motorbike assailants hurled an explosive device into the Earthquake Miracle Ministries Church in Mrima village church compound during the Sunday of June 9, injuring 15 people, including one pastor who had both his legs broken, another pastor who sustained serious injuries, and a 10-year-old child. Said another church leader, "The Christians living around the scene of the incident are still in shock and are wondering as to the mission behind the attack, while several pastors looked demoralized. But others said prayers will help them stand strong in sharing the Christian faith." Islamic extremists from Somalia's jihadi organization Al Shabaab are suspected of this and other attacks on Christians in the coastal areas of Kenya.
Nigeria: Four churches were burned in an attack committed by members of the jihadi group Boko Haram in Borno State in the Muslim-majority north of the country. According to Agenzia Fides, "A group of armed men with improvised explosive devices and petrol bombs attacked the Hwa'a, Kunde, Gathahure and Gjigga communities on Gwoza Hills, burning the 4 churches, raiding and looting cattle and grain reserves belonging to the population." Discussing the ongoing terrorism Christians in the north are exposed to, one pastor lamented, "There are Christian villages that have been completely wiped out by these Muslim terrorists… Christian fellowship activities and evangelism outreaches are no longer possible…. For a number of years, the attacks on Christians in these three local government areas have caused the displacement of thousands of Christians there. There is a very lamentable problem, as we are no longer able to worship God as Christians in this part of Nigeria."
Syria: An Islamic jihadi rebel wearing a suicide belt reportedly detonated himself outside the Virgin Mary Greek Orthodox Church in an old Christian quarter in Damascus; the attack left four people dead and several injured. Rebel sources confirmed the attack but said it was caused by a mortar bomb. Around the same time, jihadi rebels massacred the Christian village of al-Duwair near Homs, while destroying its churches. Also, according to Agenzia Fides, a Belgian Catholic priest, Fr. Daniel Maes, 74, of the religious Order of "Canons Regular Premonstratensian," was last reported as being "in the sights of jihadi groups who intend to eliminate him and invade the monastery of San James mutilated in Qara," which dates back to the fifth century. Earlier the priest had denounced the "ethnic cleansing" carried out on Christians in Qusair, after the town was taken by the rebels and jihadi groups: "The surrounding Christian villages were destroyed and all the faithful who were caught were killed, according to a logic of sectarian hatred… For decades, Christians and Muslims lived in peace in Syria. If criminal gangs can roam and terrorize civilians, is this not against international laws? Who will protect the innocent and ensure the future of this country? … Young people are disappointed, because foreign powers dictate their agenda. Moderate Muslims are worried, because Salafists and fundamentalists want to impose a totalitarian dictatorship of religious nature. The citizens are terrified because they are innocent victims of armed gangs."
Attacks on Christian Freedom: Apostasy, Blasphemy, Proselytism
Indonesia: The Indonesian Ulema Council in Tegal issued a fatwa against Catholic schools, saying they are "forbidden" and "morally unsound" for young Muslim students, despite its pupils, both Muslim and Christian, routinely scoring higher than in other schools. "For the schools," reported Asia News, "the fatwa is a great blow, coming in the wake of attacks from Muslim extremists and local governments that included threats of closure that were however eventually dropped… [M]any Muslim families have come to the defence of the two schools, claiming their right to a quality education. In fact, many schools run by nuns, priests and lay Catholics offer such excellence in education that they are sought after by non-Christians." Earlier the influential Indonesian Ulema Council lashed out during flag-raising "because Mohammed never did it;" before that announcement, the Islamic clerics "launched anathemas against Facebook for its 'amoral' nature, as well as yoga, smoking and voting rights, in particular for women."
Pakistan: A 16-year-old boy who converted to Christianity from Islam a year ago, and began attending Bible lessons in a Protestant community, was abducted in Peshawar. Local sources said he was kidnapped by Taliban-linked Islamic militants "and his fate may already be marked, as he is considered 'guilty of apostasy,'" the penalty of which is death. As one Pakistani pastor explained: "If a young Muslim converts to Christianity in Pakistan, he is forced to live in hiding. Every Muslim might feel compelled to kill him. The change of religion is not punished by the civil law, it is punishable by Islamic law. For this reason cases of Muslim conversion to Christianity are very rare and some convert in secret."
Somalia: Islamic terrorists from Al Shabaab ("The Youth") publicly executed a 28-year-old man after determining that he had in fact become a Christian. Aiming at his head, he was shot "to death." As Morning Star News explains, "Somalis are considered Muslim by birth, and apostasy, or leaving Islam, is punishable by death." After the execution, the man's parents, widow and son fled the region. The Al-Qaeda linked Al Shabaab has vowed to cleanse Somalia of all Christian presence, and its members have murdered dozens of Muslim converts to Christianity.
Uzbekistan: Four police officers raided the home of a 76-year-old Christian woman, ill with Parkinson's disease. After removing her from her bed and without producing a search warrant, they "turned everything in the home upside down," and confiscated her Bible and other Christian materials. Since then, the woman has been subjected to innumerable legal proceedings. Most recently, she was convicted of "Illegal production, storage, or import into Uzbekistan with a purpose to distribute or distribution of religious materials by physical persons." The judge ordered that her Bible, 14 Christian books, six DVDs and a video be destroyed. She was told by court officials, "This is a Muslim country and all of your Christian books including the Bible are outlawed." Because these proceedings have caused her extreme anxiety, after one hearing an ambulance was called for her.
Dhimmitude: A Climate of Hate and Contempt
Bangladesh: A mob of some "60 extremists" raided a predominantly Christian village. According to the Barnabas Aid group, "they plundered the residents' livestock and other possessions and threatened to return to burn down homes. The attackers then moved on to nearby Bolakipur and targeted a Christian seminary. Battering down the doors, they forced their way into the building and severely beat the rector and a number of students. The previous day, two church leaders from Tumilia were beaten and robbed."
Egypt: "Unknown persons" kidnapped a 7-year-old Christian girl in Dakhaleya Province in northern Egypt. The girl, Jessica Nadi Gabriel, was attending a wedding ceremony with her family when she was seized and torn away. Her father later revealed that the 7-year-old girl's abductors called him demanding a ransom of 650,000 Egyptian Pounds (nearly $100,000 USD). Two weeks earlier, a 6-year-old Coptic boy who was kidnapped and held for ransom, was still killed and discarded in the sewer—even after his family paid the Muslim kidnapper the demanded ransom. Also, a Coptic Christian man named Milad, living in Tanta, said that "unknown persons" invited him and his family to renounce Christianity and submit to Islam and convert. According to widely-read Egyptian newspaper, Youm7, "They also snatched at the crucifix he was wearing around his neck, and threatened to kidnap his children and wife if he refused to convert to Islam." As they wore the trademark white robes and long beards, the man identified them as members of the Salafi movement in Egypt. Meanwhile, U.S. ambassador Anne Patterson was urging the Coptic pope to forbid the Copts from protesting against Muslim Brotherhood rule -- even though they, as Christians, would suffer under it most -- while Al Azhar, the world's oldest Islamic university, based in Cairo, called on new Catholic Pope, Francis I, to declare that "Islam is a peaceful religion."
Iran: According to a June 19 Morning Star News report, "Six more Christians were sentenced for practicing their faith last week, while Iran's presidential election of a moderate politician was not expected to soften the regime's persecution of religious minorities." The same six Christians had been arrested earlier in February 2012, when police raided their house-church meeting. Officials rejected their appeal for release on bail; they are being held in Adel Abad Prison in Shiraz, which houses hardened criminals and often lacks heating or health facilities, and where officials routinely deny medical treatment to prisoners.
Pakistan: Three months after a mob of 3,000 Muslims attacked a Christian neighborhood in Lahore, burning down two churches and 160 Christian homes, few of the perpetrators are in prison. Hundreds of those detained immediately after the incident were released; of the 83 who were arrested, 31 have been released on bail. "Most of the people who were stopped after the attack were declared innocent by the police and immediately released, for corruption or political pressure," said a Christian lawyer. Meanwhile, the Christian whose arrest on blasphemy charges was the occasion for the rampage has gone on trial, even as he insists he never insulted Islam's Prophet Muhammad. Palestinian Authority: Five schools in Gaza—two Catholic and three Christian—face closure if the Hamas government follows through on an order forbidding co-educational institutions. According to Fr. Faysal Hijazin: "This will be a big problem. We hope they will not go through with it, but if they do, we will be in big trouble. We don't have the space and we don't have the money to divide our schools." In addition to finding additional space, he said, the schools face having to hire more teachers. Under Islamic law, men and women teachers would not be allowed to teach classes to members of the opposite sex older than the age of 10. "It is a concern that in education things are getting more conservative," said the priest. "It reflects the whole society. This is of concern to both Christians and moderate Muslims. It is not easy to be there."
Tanzania: Two Christian pastors were attacked by Muslims. On the night of Sunday, June 2, a Muslim mob broke into the home of Robert Ngai, the pastor of the Evangelical Assemblies of God Church in northeastern Tanzania, and attacked him with machetes. The pastor received serious cuts on his hands and arms when he raised them to protect his head from the blows; when last heard of, he was in the intensive care unit. Two nights earlier, the home of Daudi Nzumbi, Pastor of the Free Pentecostal Church of Tanzania congregation in Geita, also came under attack. However, the attackers fled after they were confronted by Pastor Nzumbi's large, barking dogs. When Nzumbi called police, the officer in charge told him, "I cannot protect every pastor!"
About this Series

Because the persecution of Christians in the Islamic world is on its way to reaching pandemic proportions, "Muslim Persecution of Christians" was developed to collate some—by no means all—of the instances of persecution that surface each month. It serves two purposes:
1) To document that which the mainstream media does not: the habitual, if not chronic, Muslim persecution of Christians.
2) To show that such persecution is not "random," but systematic and interrelated—that it is rooted in a worldview inspired by Sharia.
Accordingly, whatever the anecdote of persecution, it typically fits under a specific theme, including hatred for churches and other Christian symbols; sexual abuse of Christian women; forced conversions to Islam; apostasy and blasphemy laws that criminalize and punish with death those who "offend" Islam; theft and plunder in lieu of jizya (financial tribute expected from non-Muslims); overall expectations for Christians to behave like dhimmis, or second-class, "tolerated" citizens; and simple violence and murder. Sometimes it is a combination.
Because these accounts of persecution span different ethnicities, languages, and locales—from Morocco in the West, to India in the East, and throughout the West wherever there are Muslims—it should be clear that one thing alone binds them: Islam—whether the strict application of Islamic Sharia law, or the supremacist culture born of it.
**Raymond Ibrahim is author of Crucified Again: Exposing Islam's New War in Christians (published by Regnery in cooperation with Gatestone Institute, April 2013). He is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an associate fellow at the Middle East Forum.

The Post-Assad Opportunity
By: Yousef Al-Dayni/Asharq Alawsat
Syria is not Iraq. This is demonstrated by the fact that moderate Arab states, particularly the Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia, are today being presented with a historic opportunity.
The problem lies in viewing present-day Syria through the prism of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The Iraq war is one of the major crises of Arab politics, particularly when viewed from an ideological standpoint. Here, I am talking about when Iraq is viewed as a sacred historical ideal that influences everything that came after, or when it is viewed from a purely religious standpoint whereby any discussions will entail takfirism and other accusations.
Politics in the real world is filled with paradoxes, objections, and deceit, depending on the circumstances and facts. Thus, viewing the Syrian crisis as a repeat of the Iraqi scenario is simply wrong.
By its very nature, history, as a series of political events, never repeats itself. The situation in Syria is completely different to Iraq for a variety of reasons incorporating, but not limited to, the differences between the forms of Ba’athism in the two countries, as well as different geographical borders, political arenas, and opposition forces. In addition to this, we have new developments on the Syrian scene, including the presence of “fighting groups” who have no affiliation to politics.
In addition to this, the nature, size, and timing of any potential strikes against the Syrian regime will also be completely different to that of Iraq, not to mention the geopolitical arena and the destruction and death toll that has befallen Syria after more than two and a half years of civil war.
Furthermore, the media’s close reporting of the Syrian crisis has also affected the international decision-making process on Syria, with all sides maneuvering and gambling on public outrage.
Those who view the Syrian crisis through the lens of the Iraq war are missing out on the fact that Bashar Al-Assad’s allies all come from outside the Arab world. None of his allies can be said to be moderate or neutral Arab states, or even post-Arab Spring countries.
It is for this reason that the Iranian axis is made up of proxy states or dissatisfied groups or movements that do not respect the concept of national sovereignty, instead prioritizing their own narrow interests over that of the national interest. Therefore, the moderate Arab states, led by the Gulf, are now facing a historic opportunity regarding the Syrian crisis, in the same way that Egypt is facing a historic opportunity following the collapse of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Gulf states’ opportunity is to rearrange regional balances following the collapse of the Assad regime according to a new Arab political identity built on interest-based alliances rather than pan-Arab slogans. Behind the amiable façade of such slogans, the reality is dominated by political struggles and ineffective alliances based on shared ideologies, rather than national interest. In this case, Ankara’s seeming move towards the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, backed by some Gulf states, can be viewed as an even worse repetition of the grander Arab Spring scenario. This could be viewed as Turkey, utilizing its political and economic influence, attempting to reproduce a similar scenario in Syria and empower the Brotherhood there. This post-Assad scenario must be confronted by the moderate Arab states, particularly the Gulf states and Egypt.
The moderate axis’s historic opportunity requires that they go beyond overthrowing the Assad regime. These moderate states must work to rearrange Syria’s domestic situation, removing the groups that have emerged during the civil war whose objectives are not necessarily in line with Syria’s stability and recovery. The post-Assad scene must also not only center on regional alliances, particularly as this is contingent upon foreign policies and geopolitical considerations. The real issue, however, lies in the potential influence of external parties such as Hezbollah, particularly as such groups could escalate the situation on the ground and cause even more bloodshed following Assad’s fall. Thus, post-Assad Syria could be steered towards open war, even raising the possibility of long-term foreign intervention to protect Israel.
One clear difference between the post-Saddam political scene and the likely post-Assad scene is the religious and sectarian considerations. In our region, even in the political arena, we are steered by our religious affiliations, even if this is concealed by political slogans. In the Syrian case, the regime has a dual Ba’athist and Alawite nature that does not overlap. At the same time, the Alawite sect does not possess the power to dilute Sunni domination of Syria’s cultural and social identity. In fact, despite the Ba’athist Assad regime’s appetite for power, it never resorted to sectarianism, being keen to guarantee the loyalty of its Sunni partners in the Ba’athist party.
Herein lies the paradox of inserting religion into the Syrian struggle or of claiming that it is a religious war. Therefore, the Syrian and Iraqi scenarios are completely at odds in this case. We must also take the diversity of the Shi’ite sect’s presence in Iraq into account. This consists of disparate Khomeinist velayat-e faqih trends and reformative schools like that of Ayatollah Muhammad Mahdi Shamseddine and Ayatollah Muhammad Hussein Fadlullah. This is not to mention the presence of regional Shi’ite political entities such as Hezbollah and others.
Indeed, influencing these groups that do not seem to believe in the concept of state sovereignty, like Hezbollah, is not impossible, for nothing is impossible in politics. Yet, it is hard to be optimistic about this, particularly in light of the different views and opinions among members of the same group. The Jordanian Brotherhood, for example, opposes the ouster of Assad or foreign intervention in Syria, without regard for the view of their Syrian Brotherhood counterparts. Thus, in many ways, the region is nothing more than an arena for political dissension, splits and divisions, in addition to earthly political struggles that shift into religious and sectarian wars.