My prediction is it will be a pincer move with the Israel moving on down from the Golan Heights while taking a chunk of Lebanon.
This is it, folks. This is the plan they have worked so hard to advance. You think they are going to call it off because they are worried about proving some "conspiracy" blogger wrong?
Read between the lines, and never forget I love you, readers:
"Syrian troops opened fire on people throwing stones to stop a convoy from advancing toward an eastern oil hub, killing as many as three people yesterday, activists said, as government forces intensified a crackdown against protests calling for President Bashar Assad’s ouster.
Behaving like Israelis now?
Activists have predicted that demonstrations will escalate during Ramadan, which begins tomorrow, as both sides try to tip the balance in the more than four-month uprising.
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Related: Syrian Tipping Point
"Syrian military and security forces assaulted Hama and other restive cities before dawn yesterday, killing at least 70 people in what activists and residents called the broadest and fiercest crackdown yet by the government of President Bashar Assad on the 4-month-old uprising against his rule....
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Related: The Hama Hammer
"Syria steps up attacks, seeking to crush revolt in city of Hama; Nine more die as month of fasting begins; Western nations deplore violence" August 02, 2011|By Liz Sly and Joby Warrick, Washington Post
BEIRUT - Syrian forces launched a renewed assault yesterday on the city of Hama, extending their effort to crush a four-month-old rebellion into the first day of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, despite growing world condemnation....
The offensive suggests that Assad’s government has not been swayed by sensitivities surrounding deaths in the holy month, during which observant Muslims fast between sunrise and sunset.
Troops did not penetrate the center of the city, which has effectively been under the control of protesters since early June, turning Hama into a beacon of hope for other areas in the country struggling to stage antigovernment demonstrations in the face of harsh suppression.
Hama is also considered uniquely sensitive because it is the site of an infamous massacre in 1982 in which at least 10,000 people died when Assad’s father, Hafez el-Assad, crushed an uprising there.
Activist Omar Habbal, also contacted by telephone, said unarmed residents were continuing to stand at barricades erected to keep troops out and would remain there despite the renewed bombardment.
“They are showing the military that we will defend our city to the last child,’’ he said. “We will never give up.’’
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Although world governments lined up to condemn the escalating violence in Syria, there was little indication of any imminent concrete action to increase pressure on Assad. There are concerns within the international community that his departure could trigger regionwide instability and civil war.
President Obama called the latest attacks on demonstrators “outrageous.’’ He said America stood solidly behind the Syrian people and supported their demands for universal rights and a transition to democratic rule....
Three senators repeated their call that Obama take much tougher action, including to call outright for Assad’s departure, a step that US officials fear would commit them to escalating involvement in an internal conflict: Senators John McCain, Republican of Arizona; Joe Lieberman, independent of Connecticut, and Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina....
Those guys are joined at the hip.
Germany formally requested an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council to address the situation in Syria, but objections by Russia and China to international intervention in a country with which they have warm ties have forestalled any action at the UN....
Britain’s foreign secretary, William Hague, cautioned that military action was “not a remote possibility.’’
Meaning it is a REAL POSSIBILITY?
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"The mounting international outcry has had no apparent effect so far in Syria, an autocratic country that relies on Iran as a main ally in the region.
The top U.S. military officer said Washington wants to pressure the Syrian regime. But he added there was no immediate prospect of a Libya-style military intervention.
Nothing IMMEDIATE, but LATER.... !!!!
"There's no indication whatsoever that the Americans, that we would get involved directly with respect to this," Joint Chiefs chairman Adm. Mike Mullen said Tuesday....
Yeah, that's going to be Israel's turf.
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Related: Syrian military intensifies siege in Hama (By Liz Sly and Mary Beth Sheridan, Washington Post)
Syrian troops cut off power as the tanks roll into Hama (By Nada Bakri, New York Times)
"Syrian troops press crackdown in Hama" August 05, 2011|By Liz Sly, Washington Post
BEIRUT - Syrian security forces are summarily executing people on the streets of Hama, a human rights group said yesterday, raising fears that bloodshed could escalate dramatically in the besieged city even as world condemnation of the violence continues to mount....
Maybe it is true; however, given the history of my agenda-pushing paper....
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton accused the Syrian government yesterday of killing more than 2,000 of its own citizens during its crackdown on the 5-month-old uprising. The Obama administration moved to further isolate Assad and his inner circle by imposing more sanctions....
Reports filtering out from residents with satellite phones and people who managed to flee painted a grim picture of a city under siege, with tanks deployed at every major intersection, bodies lying uncollected on the streets, and people burying the dead in gardens....
Clinton repeated the administration’s position yesterday that “Assad has lost his legitimacy to govern the Syrian people.’’
She spoke a news conference with the visiting Foreign Minister of Canada, John Baird, just hours after White House press secretary Jay Carney said that Assad is “on his way out’’ and that the administration targeted a prominent proregime businessman and his firm with sanctions.
I smell REGIME CHANGE!!
“The actions that he has taken … are reprehensible and appalling,’’ Carney told reporters. “And we believe that country will be better off without him.’’
Earlier, the Treasury Department announced that it had imposed sanctions on Assad family confidant Muhammad Hamsho and his firm, Hamsho International Group, that freeze any assets they may have in US jurisdictions and bar Americans from doing business with them.
The penalties did not target Syria’s energy sector, something administration officials had repeatedly suggested was coming. Officials said those sanctions - which are expected to hit state-owned and state-affiliated oil and gas companies that are a leading revenue source for the government - are still in the works.
In its statement Wednesday, the UN Security Council gave the Syrian government seven days to halt the violence or face further action, perhaps a full-scale resolution. The UN has been slow to respond to the crisis in Syria in part because of opposition by Syria’s allies Russia and China.
But yesterday, President Dmitry Medvedev of Russia indicated his country was toughening its stance. If Assad fails to open negotiations with the opposition and adopt reforms, “he will face a sad fate,’’ Medvedev said in comments quoted by the Russian press. “And in the end we will also have to make some decisions. We are watching how the situation is developing. It’s changing, and our approach is changing as well.’’
The Russians have abandoned Syria.
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"Syria broadcasts scenes of destruction in Hama; Locals report new assault by military forces" August 06, 2011|By Nada Bakri and Anthony Shadid, New York Times
BEIRUT - Syria’s state news media broadcast stark images of the destruction in the besieged city of Hama for the first time yesterday, showing burned buildings, makeshift barricades, and deserted streets strewn with rubble, in footage that appeared designed to show that government forces had put down a rebellion in the city....
Syrians elsewhere took to the streets after the first Friday noon prayer of the holy month of Ramadan, in another bold challenge to the government’s crackdown. Activists reported tens of thousands of protesters joining marches in the streets of several cities, including Daraa in the south and Homs, Syria’s second-largest city....
Yesterday’s reports by Syrian television and SANA, the official news agency, portrayed the army as the savior of Hama.
AmeriKa's corporate media does the same thing.
The news appeared aimed at reinforcing the leadership’s message to internal opponents that they are regarded as armed insurrectionist gangs inspired by hostile foreign powers and will be dealt with accordingly.
That's my newspaper!
But the television footage of the wreckage in Hama also implicitly acknowledged that the violence there was far more serious than Assad’s government had until now been willing to publicly admit.
It also underlined a legacy of the assault: Hama was remarkably peaceful after security forces withdrew in June. Violence erupted only when the government, fearing the momentum the city might provide the uprising, began its ferocious assault on Sunday.
I'm so sick of the lies and distortions. Five years is enough.
Although government officials insist the protesters were armed, not a single weapon was seen in the streets on a recent visit, an account confirmed by diplomats in their trips there. Barricades were set up, but only to block the return of the military and security forces....
If a liar keeps telling you things.... (blog editor frowns)
Government officials offered an altogether different version of events there, in reports from Damascus, the capital, that appeared more and more to defy reality....
Oh, like the government and media version of 9/11? Or global warming? Or the economy? Or damn near anything else. If they say the sky is blue I'm going out and checking.
As the government pressed its crackdown on Hama, military and security forces appeared to prepare for another assault on Deir al-Zour, a city in eastern Syria knitted by the loyalties of extended clans where protests had gathered force for the past month. Those forces shelled the city Thursday night into yesterday morning, residents said.
Activists reported a new round of shelling in Hama overnight that they said was preventing food and medical supplies from entering residential areas.
Hama has gotten more press in a weak than Gaza in a year.
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"Syria promises elections as siege on city continues; At least 100 dead in Hama, human rights groups say" by Zeina Karam, Associated Press / August 7, 2011
BEIRUT - The Syrian military tightened its suffocating siege on the city of Hama yesterday in its drive to crush the main center of the antigovernment uprising in the country, even as the foreign minister promised that free parliamentary elections would be held by the end of the year in a gesture of reform.
Like previous reform promises, the new announcement is unlikely to have much resonance with Syria’s opposition, which says it has lost all confidence in President Bashar Assad’s overtures....
Yesterday, Gulf Arab countries broke their silence on the bloodshed, calling for an immediate end to the violence and for implementation of serious reforms in Syria....
In a sign that at least the United States was expecting things to get worse, the State Department urged Americans on Friday to leave the country immediately....
We MAY NOT MAKE IT TO SEPTEMBER, readers.
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