"The communiqué issued by the London 11 reiterated that a transitional government should be established as part of a political settlement and said that when it was formed President Bashar Assad and his close associates “will have no role in Syria.”
That is coming straight from the top man of AmeriKan diplomacy.
That's why peace talks go nowhere and why the war goes on:
"The battlefield tilt in favor of Assad’s forces coincides with efforts to rekindle talks in Geneva toward a political settlement."
NEXT DAY UPDATE: Rebels are struggling to reverse government gains
"As fighting flares, Syrians take cover in Lebanon; Thousands flee as clashes intensify in mountain area" by Ryan Lucas | Associated Press, November 18, 2013
BEIRUT — The clashes in Qalamoun, an area that stretches from north of the Syrian capital along the Lebanese frontier, appeared to be part of a long-anticipated government offensive aimed at cutting a key rebel supply route and cementing President Bashar Assad’s hold on the strategic corridor from the capital to the coast.
Over the past month, Assad’s forces have made headway against the rebels on two key fronts, capturing a string of opposition-held suburbs south of Damascus and taking two towns and a military base outside the northern city of Aleppo.
A government victory in the battle for Qalamoun would deal a severe blow to the already beleaguered rebels on the doorsteps of Damascus.
Despite the recent setbacks on the capital’s southern periphery, the opposition remains firmly entrenched in other areas around Damascus and capable of carrying out large attacks.
A massive explosion late Sunday targeting an administrative office in the northeastern suburb of Harasta killed at least 31 government troops, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. There was no immediate confirmation from government officials or state media....
--more--"
"Syrian troops hit rebels near Lebanon border; Attack appears aimed at closing supply route" by Bassem Mroue and Diaa Hadid | Associated Press, November 17, 2013
BEIRUT — Syrian troops clashed with rebels in a mountainous western region Saturday in what appeared to be an offensive to cut an opposition supply route from Lebanon, forcing hundreds to flee for safety across the border, activists and officials said.
Don't they mean insurgent?
The fighting was concentrated in the rugged Qalamoun region around the towns of Qara, Rima, and Nabak, activists and state media said. The battle has been expected for weeks as troops and opposition fighters reinforced their positions ahead of winter, when much of the area is covered with snow....
Isn't Syria located on the equator?
Syria’s state-run news agency said troops had killed ‘‘tens of terrorists’’ in attacks on rebel hide-outs in areas including Nabak and Rima. The government refers to rebels fighting to overthrow President Bashar Assad as terrorists.
The agenda-pushing jewsmedia does not.
The Qalamoun region is a main rebel supply route for weapons and fighters from neighboring Lebanon. Government forces appear to be trying to regain control of the whole border with the country....
The battle around Qara began Friday, said a rebel activist near the town who goes by the name Abu Yazan. Activists rarely give their real names, fearing identification by Syrian security forces or extremists.
If government troops gain the upper hand, they will be able to cut supplies that flow from Lebanon to rebel-held areas around Damascus, said the Observatory’s Rami Abdurrahman....
In eastern Syria, rebel groups seized one of the country’s main gas plants in Deir al-Zour, which supplies power stations feeding much of the country’s east, two activists said.
Yup, they are winning even though they are not!
Abdurrahman and an Aleppo-based activist who is originally from the city said an alliance of Islamic rebel groups took the facility late Friday. The group is dominated by the Al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front, Abdurrahman said.
Otherwise known as "Al-CIA-Duh."
The Aleppo-based activist, who requested anonymity for fear of reprisals, sent the Associated Press a statement he said was from the alliance, confirming they had seized the plant. He said other activists in the city also confirmed the incident.
And who could doubt that?
The facility was previously in the hands of tribal gunmen allied with Assad forces.
--more--"
Related:
"On Wednesday, state news media showed government troops entering Hujeira, the latest in a string of suburbs south of Damascus where the government has made inroads in recent days, trying to sever supply lines between rebel-held towns that form an arc around the capital. Despite rebel claims to be tightening a noose around the seat of power, and government claims that the army will soon push rebels out of the suburbs, the front lines around the capital have changed little during the past year, with rebel and government forces dug in within a few hundred yards of each other in many places. The war has also frequently threatened to draw in Syria’s neighbors. The latest such episode came Thursday when security officials told Associated Press that at least seven rockets fired from Syria landed in a Hezbollah stronghold in eastern Lebanon. Syrian military helicopters were also in action in the border area, the report said."
I think we all know who fired the rockets.
"Families mourn victims slain in Syria school attack; Mortar shelling killed 4 children and bus driver" by Albert Aji and Zeina Karam | Associated Press, November 13, 2013
DAMASCUS — Families in a central neighborhood of the Syrian capital wept quietly Tuesday as they retrieved the bodies of four children and their bus driver killed in a mortar attack on their school in a predominantly Christian area a day earlier.
Oh, it was Christian kids killed?
The strike was the latest rebel reprisal to hit Damascus as government troops press ahead with a crushing weekslong advance into opposition-held suburbs, often relying on indiscriminate artillery fire themselves. Such mortar attacks by rebels seeking to overthrow President Bashar Assad have been on the rise.
‘‘Those children were angels,’’ said Marwan Qabalan, a family friend picking up the body of 9-year-old Vaniciya Mekho from the morgue. He said the girl’s parents could not bear to see her, still dressed in a school uniform and covered with blood.
Often-random rebel mortar fire has hit shops, churches, homes, and embassies in the capital this year, killing dozens of civilians. But Monday’s shelling of Risaleh school in the Bab Sharqi neighborhood shocked residents in particular because the casualties were children.
Government is indiscriminate, insurgents are random. Regardless of what you think, the ax-grinding agenda-pushing of AmeriKa's whoreporate jewsmedia sucks.
A fifth pupil died early Tuesday. Four other children and two supervisors were also wounded in the strike, and another mortar attack the same day on nearby John of Damascus school wounded 11.
Also Tuesday, Kurds announced a transitional autonomous administration to run day-to-day affairs in regions they dominate in Syria’s northeast. Nawaf Khalil, a spokesman for the Kurdish Democratic Union Party, or PYD, said the announcement was made in the city of Qamishli.
The Kurdish move could be a first step toward setting up an autonomous region similar to one they administer in northern Iraq. It was not immediately clear however if other groups supported the announcement by the PYD and a few other small groups.
Related: Syrian Kurdish rebels seize border crossing with Iraq
In Damascus, the morgue visit was organized for journalists by Syrian officials who otherwise typically restrict reporters’ access to events. All victims were Christians.
Associated Press TV footage showed pallbearers placing a small white coffin with a gold cross on the lid into the back of a hearse. Three men carried out another coffin, as women dressed in black cried out: ‘‘What a waste, what a shame!’’
--more--"
Related: Syrian rebels accused of war crimes
"Syrian government forces consolidated control over yet another northern town, part of a steadily advancing offensive that has reversed rebel gains in recent weeks.... Government forces took over the town of Tel Aran and other positions in the northern province of Aleppo, state media said, a day after they consolidated control of a key military base held by rebels since February."
WOW!
Two days earlier: Syrian rebels recapture base in Aleppo
And they wonder why I don't believe a word.
"Regime forces are fighting Sunni rebels in the Hama area in an attempt to keep them from advancing on villages inhabited by Alawites, members of Assad’s minority sect, an offshoot of Shi’ite Islam."
Related: Syrian Army retakes road to key city
"On Wednesday, rebels overran a military post near the city of Daraa, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights activist group. Opposition fighters late last month also captured a nearby military base that previously served as the customs office on the outskirts of Daraa."
The last paragraph of my print copy didn't make the web:
"Also Wednesday, two mortar shells from Syria struck an Israeli military post on the Golan Heights, lightly wounding an Israeli soldier. Israel's military said it struck back, hitting the source of fire, but did not specify if the mortars came from a rebel or government position."
I smell a false flag (if it ever happened at all).
Syrian military claims more ground in attack
I was told the "rebels" are winning.
"Also Friday, Syria’s main Western-backed opposition group warned that the expanding influence of Al Qaeda-linked militants in the rebel movement is undermining its struggle for a free Syria.
The warning came as a cease-fire ended fighting near the Turkish border between the mainstream rebels and fighters belonging to the Al Qaeda offshoot known as the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. During the battle, the jihadis overran the town of Azaz.
The infighting was some of the worst in recent months between forces seeking to bring down Assad, and it threatened to further fragment an opposition movement outgunned by the regime.
--more--"
Related:
"Most of Syrian foreign minister Walid al-Moallem’s speech amounted to a point-by-point rejection of the West’s version of the conflict in Syria. In a reference to a group of Western and Arab countries that support the opposition, Moallem said, “They are the ones supporting terrorism in my country, in contradiction of all United Nations resolutions and all human and moral values.”
He's right, and the whole world knows it.
So what, oh what, can the AmeriKan War Press use to get you to get all gung-ho for war against Syria?
"Relief agency warns of mass starvation in Syria; Regime’s siege on rebel targets cuts off supplies" by Bassem Mroue | Associated Press, September 25, 2013
With all due respect, my jewspaper doesn't seem all that concerned about Palestinians suffer the same thing.
BEIRUT — Syrian opposition groups and international relief organizations are warning of the risk of mass starvation across the country, especially in the besieged Damascus suburbs where a gas attack killed hundreds last month.
With the world’s attention focused on the regime’s chemical weapons, activists said six people — including an 18-month-old girl — have died for lack of food in one of the stricken suburbs in recent weeks.
Gotta invade now, huh?
Save the Children said in an appeal Monday that some 4 million Syrians, more than half of them children, do not have enough to eat. Food shortages have been compounded by an explosion in prices.
‘‘The world has stood and watched as the children of Syria have been shot, shelled, and traumatized by the horror of war,’’ said Roger Hearn, Save the Children’s regional director for the Middle East. ‘‘The conflict has already left thousands of children dead, and is now threatening their means of staying alive.’’
Thank Al-CIA-Duh!
Thousands of people are believed trapped in suburbs east and west of the capital that have been held for months by rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Assad. Regime troops are besieging the areas, and residents say food is increasingly had to find. Rebels say they are trying to break the blockade....
In some hard-hit areas such as the western suburb of Moadamiyeh, people are running out of food and are mostly relying on lentils, olives, and dried figs, according to residents and activists.
‘‘We have no food, no milk, and no medicine,’’ said a woman from Moadamiyeh, who identified herself by her nickname Um Lujain for fear of government reprisals. ‘‘We are surviving on one meal a day.”
Then you are like most of the world, me included.
Um Lujain said her 18-month-old daughter has lost half her weight and spends most of her days sleeping. The woman said her daughter’s diet is based on the liquid she makes by boiling lentils.
‘‘There has been no children formula or bread for about a year,’’ the woman said. She added that sometimes rebels find expired boxes of powdered milk in abandoned shops or pharmacies, and people still give it to their children for lack of food.
According to the Moadamiyeh Media Center, six people have died of starvation over the past 20 days: two women and four children ages 18 months to 7 years. It added that 15 other children are in intensive care in clinics, suffering from malnutrition.
On Monday, the opposition Syrian National Coalition accused government forces of tightening their months-long siege. ‘‘Assad’s forces are starving people to death in those areas,’’ the coalition claimed. ‘‘Famine looms in the horizon.’’
Rana Obeid, the 18-month-old girl, was the latest to die on Monday. An amateur video showed her lying on a bed, her ribs visible, and her stomach bloated.
If true a tragedy; however, there are Africans and other children across this Globe that are like that and no big deal is made. This shameless use of suffering people caused by the policies promoted by the same mouthpiece is disgusting.
The video appeared genuine and corresponded to other AP reporting on the events depicted.
And who could ever doubt that?
Mahmoud Abu Ali, an activist in Moadamiyeh, said the suburb has been under siege for 307 days.
It's been 70 years for Palestinians.
He added that most of the cows, sheep, and goats in the area died as a result of shelling or lack of feed, and people cannot plant their land because of daily bombardment.
Now you know how an Iraqi, Afghan, or Pakistani farmer feel.
‘‘People wake up in the morning and there is no food to have breakfast. At noon there is no food for people to have lunch,’’ Abu Ali said.
That's AmeriKa!
"Syrian military attacks an isolated coastal town" by Albert Aji | Associated Press, October 06, 2013
DAMASCUS — Syrian government forces shelled a vulnerable Sunni community in a coastal province dominated by President Bashar Assad’s Alawite sect on Saturday, activists said, raising fears that residents of the isolated town could face mass killings by pro-Damascus militias.
Well, the hunger, polio, and chemical weapons concoctions wouldn't work, so we are back to mass graves and mass killings.
Two Syrian rights groups said....
‘‘this is an isolated area and crimes can be covered up quickly.’’
Yeah, no kidding.
************************
Syria’s civil war has cleaved along the country’s sectarian patchwork. Sunnis dominate the revolt, while Christians and other Muslim sects have mostly stood behind the regime.
Confirming the foreign-supported coup effort.
Another Syrian activist who goes by the name of Abu al-Waleed said negotiations were underway to hand over rebel fighters in exchange for regime forces promising to protect civilians.
‘‘The fear is that they are trying to clean this area of rebel supporters — that is, the Sunni community,’’ he said in a Skype call.
In an interview to be published Sunday, a German magazine quoted Assad as saying he has made mistakes and no side in the civil war is entirely free of blame.
Der Spiegel also quoted Assad as saying he doesn’t believe in a negotiated peace with armed opposition groups.
Assad reportedly told the weekly that he hadn’t yet decided whether to run for the presidency again when his term ends in August.
In the interview, Assad reiterated his insistence that government forces were not responsible for the Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack near Damascus.
I do not believe they were.
Also in Syria, the government raised the price of gasoline and transportation in its latest wartime austerity move, a step likely to increase hardship for many Syrians already suffering from the economic consequences of the war....
Americans have had 12 years of it.
The consequences of a gasoline price rise are likely to be most punishing for Syrians living in rebel-held regions, where fuel is smuggled in or rushed through unsafe roads. It can be up to three times as expensive as in the government zones.
The increase will also affect the price of food due to increased transportation costs. International groups say that rising prices have made it difficult for Syrians to afford food, and activists have reported pockets of malnutrition in rebel enclaves, including the suburbs of Damascus.
Any increases are expected to also raise heating costs for many city households, which use gasoline-powered generators to cope with frequent outages.
Syria has been importing gasoline to make up for a shortfall in local production, interrupted by the 2 ½-year conflict. It last raised the price of gasoline in May.
The Syrian conflict began in March 2011 as protests against Assad’s regime evolved into a civil war. The war has shattered Syria’s economy and killed more than 100,000 people.
--more--"
"Chemical arms inspectors visit 3 Syrian sites; Amid civil war, team looks to destroy stockpile" by Diaa Hadid | Associated Press, October 11, 2013
BEIRUT — Underscoring the complexity of the mission, a regime warplane bombed the rebel-held town of Safira, an activist group said. A regime-controlled military complex believed to include chemical weapons facilities is located near the town....
On Thursday, a regime warplane struck the town of Safira, killing at least 16 people, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which obtains its information through a network of activists on the ground. The group did not know what was hit.
Amateur video said to show the aftermath of the Safira airstrike was posted online later Thursday. The video showed men and boys hauling a blanket filled with body parts onto a jeep where another two charred bodies already lay.
‘‘Who is this?’’ one man can be heard asking. ‘‘By God, we don’t know brother,’’ another responded. The video also showed twisted metal, blood splattered on the floor, and smashed concrete in the area of the strike.
Safira is southeast of the heavily contested city of Aleppo, Syria’s largest. The military complex near the town is believed to include an underground facility for chemical weapons production and storage, said Amy Smithson, a chemical weapons expert at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, a US-based think tank....
In Aleppo, six people were killed by rebel fire, the official Syrian news agency SANA said.
Clashes also broke out between Al Qaeda fighters from a group called the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant and Kurdish rebels in the northern border town of Azaz, the Observatory reported.
In Beirut on Thursday, a lucky few Syrians left to fly to Germany, where they were accepted for temporary resettlement.
Men and women sobbed and hugged as relatives said goodbye to each other, helping them haul suitcases onto a bus heading to the airport.
They were 106 of the 4,000 refugees Germany has accepted on two-year visas, said Roberta Russo of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
They remain a tiny minority of 2 million Syrians now registered as refugees. Another 5 million Syrians are displaced within their country because of the conflict, which has killed more than 100,000.
Russo called on donor countries to provide more aid to Syria’s neighbors, who are hosting over 97 percent of refugees.
She says they’ve received one-third of the $1.7 billion in aid the UN is asking for refugees, particularly in Lebanon.
My jewspaper so concerned about Arab refugees!
Meanwhile, the UN Security Council met behind closed doors Thursday afternoon to discuss an 11-page letter from Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon with recommendations on how to destroy Syria’s chemical weapons by the target date.
"2 Al Qaeda affiliates gain foothold in Syria; Groups carving out fiefdoms" by Loveday Morris | Washington Post, October 27, 2013
GAZIANTEP, Turkey — Shortly before its operatives killed 14 Iraqi Shi’ite children in a school bombing this month, the group once known as Al Qaeda in Iraq sent guerrillas into northern Syrian villages with orders to reopen local Sunni classrooms.
In a series of early fall visits, the militants handed out religious textbooks along with backpacks bearing the group’s new name: the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
A four-hour drive to the east, a rival Al Qaeda faction called Jabhat al-Nusra was busy setting up a jobs program in Ash-Shaddadi, a desert town it has held since February.
Related: Sunday Globe Specials: US Lost Iraq War
The Islamists restarted production in an oil field that had been idled by fighting, and fired up a town’s natural gas plant, now a source of income for the town and its new rulers.
The two rebel groups, with their distinct lineages to the terrorist network founded by Osama bin Laden, have concentrated Western fears of rising jihadist influences within Syria’s rebel movement. Two and a half years after the start of the country’s uprising, Islamists are carving out fiefdoms....
The prominence of the two groups — as fighters, as recruiters, and, more recently, as local administrators — appears to have accelerated even as the US administration seeks to boost moderate and secularist rebels with new arms and training.
Multiple independent studies as well as Western and Middle Eastern intelligence officials show the hard-line Islamists surging ahead by almost every measure, undermining Western efforts to find a democratic alternative to Syrian President Bashar Assad.
The Al Qaeda affiliates have clashed with other rebels, and occasionally with each other, and their heavy use of foreign fighters and attempts to impose an ultraconservative ideology have alienated some Syrianse.
‘‘The situation is so bad,’’ said Mohammed Abdelaziz, an activist in the city of Raqqa who said the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria — known as ISIS — criminalized tobacco use and carried out public executions. ‘‘A lot of people have just escaped the city.’’
But other Syrians have embraced the jihadists and welcomed the return of order in towns hit by months of war. A Syrian fighter who called himself Abu Bahri said about 100 people from his town of Azaz joined ISIS after becoming frustrated with the inefficiency of the moderate brigade, which was in charge of the town.
US and Mideast officials say the two Qaeda groups are a magnet for much of the foreign cash and most of the foreign fighters streaming into Syria.
Are you tired of the double game and bull shit narrative?
--more--"
"Syria submits plan to destroy chemical munitions; It’s not known if regime’s listing of sites is complete" by Nick Cumming-Bruce and Michael R. Gordon | New York Times, October 28, 2013
GENEVA — The Obama administration is counting on the Russians....
The initiative to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons program came from the Russians....
I was told it was Obama's idea, and the Russians are already complained that this is not a Russia-only operation.
The United States has proposed shipping part of Syria’s chemical stocks for destruction to other countries and has approached a number of governments....
No one wants them, what a surprise.
See:
Norway says it won’t help destroy Syria’s weapons
Albania declines to host Syria poison gas disposal
Might have to bring them back to the U.S. for disposal.
The announcement from the Hague chemical weapons group came among renewed fighting in Syria. Al Qaeda-linked rebels battled government troops Sunday for control of the Christian town of Sadad north of Damascus, the Associated Press quoted activists as saying.
The rebels have been trying to seize the town for the past week, and residents in the rebel-held western neighborhoods of Sadad are trapped in homes, said Rami Abdurrahman of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory of Human Rights.
The rebels appear to have targeted Sadad because of its strategic location near the main highway north from Damascus rather than because it is inhabited primarily by Christians. But extremists among the rebels are hostile to Syria’s Christian minority, which has largely backed Assad during the conflict.
As have most Syrians. Bombing schools, shops, and hospitals doesn't win people over.
--more--"
Also see:
Assad blasts foreign support for rebels
GOP senators press on Obama’s Syria strategy
Obama’s calculated ‘weakness’
Diplomats unable to set date for Syrian peace session
Syria rebel video claims new split in opposition
Syria’s main opposition refuses to attend meeting
Syrian rebel groups break with coalition
Syrian opposition group to attend Geneva talks
"That announcement highlighted the growing irrelevance of the coalition and its military arm headed by Gen. Salim Idris, who leads the Supreme Military Council supported by the West. The group is seen by many as being out of touch and a puppet of the West and Gulf Arab states."
"Bombings kill 16 in Syria" by Diaa Hadid | Associated Press, November 07, 2013
BEIRUT — Bombs targeting the entrance of a landmark Ottoman railway building in Damascus and a feared security agency in Syria’s southeast killed at least 16 people on Wednesday, activists reported.
There was no claim of responsibility for the attacks, but rebels tied to Al Qaeda have previously claimed bombings of security institutions and have also targeted the center of the capital, trying to take the war to the heart of President Bashar Assad’s power....
Also Wednesday, a suicide car bomb smashed into the entrance of the air force intelligence agency in the southeast city of Sweida, killing eight people, said activists....
The blast in Sweida was a rare attack targeting a city dominated by Druse, a small, secretive Muslim sect who have mostly stayed on the sidelines of the Syrian war.
Syria’s 23 million people belong to a startling patchwork of different religious groups, and the three-year conflict has taken increasingly sectarian overtones in the past year.
I no longer believe the war-promoting Zionist narrative of sectarianism when it comes to people who have for the most part peacefully coexisted and intermarried for centuries. Sorry. Too many agenda-pushing lies for too long.
Syrian rebels are overwhelmingly Sunni and some of the strongest fighting brigades are formed of Al Qaeda loyalists. Assad’s security services are dominated by Alawites, a sect of Shi’ite Islam....
Syria’s minority Christians and Shi’ites have been targeted because Sunni rebels perceive them as siding with Assad.
The Syrian railways authority is housed in a structure was built during the rule of Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II, according to a plaque affixed to the building. It was part of the Hijaz train line that once stretched from the Ottoman Empire’s capital of Istanbul to the holy Muslim city of Medina in what is now Saudi Arabia. It began running through Damascus in 1908, the plaque said. The Hijaz line was halted years after it was created.
It wouldn't be the first time insurgents have destroyed historic places.
But Syria’s internal railway system — partly built off the old Ottoman lines — was only halted during this uprising after rebels attacked part of the railway lines.
--more--"
"Rebel leader dies after Syrian forces attack" by Anne Barnard and Karam Shoumali | New York Times, November 19, 2013
BEIRUT — A Syrian rebel leader who brought together one of the most effective factions fighting President Bashar Assad in the country’s civil war has died of wounds from a Thursday government attack on a meeting of rebel leaders outside Aleppo, his followers said Monday.
His death was seen as a serious blow to the rebels amid a gathering government offensive as diplomats pursue efforts to convene international peace talks.
The leader, Abdul-Qadir Saleh, commanded the Tawhid Brigade and was also known as Hajji Marea. He was taken to Gaziantep over the Turkish border after he was wounded in the attack at the rebel-held infantry school.
Another rebel commander was wounded and a third was killed in the attack, which was described in varying reports as an airstrike or a government raid on the building.
Saleh had been seen as an exemplar of the kind of antigovernment leadership emerging from Syria’s civil war and as one of the government’s most wanted men. His death provoked outpourings of mourning on his followers’ social media sites and on YouTube....
--more--"
Related: Syrian general killed in clash; regime pushes peace talks
"While the relatively rapid pace of dismantling chemical weapons facilities has drawn headlines, the civil war, which has claimed more than 110,000 lives since March 2011, has continued relentlessly with conventional weapons, exacting a daily toll. According to the United Nations, 6.5 million Syrians have been driven from their homes inside the country and millions more have sought refuge across its borders in neighboring lands. The next deadline facing the Syrian authorities is Nov. 15, when they are supposed to produce a plan for the destruction of their stockpile of chemical weapons."
"International inspection teams overseeing the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons will have to negotiate cease-fires between government and rebel forces to gain access to some sites, officials closely involved with the mission said Wednesday. The revelation is an indication of the difficulties of the unprecedented disarmament plan, and suggests that effort to rid Damascus of its poison gas stockpile may have a hard time meeting its mid-2014 deadline."
See:
Inspectors enter Syria to begin dismantling of weapons
Inspectors report progress in Syria
They also reported no evidence of sarin gas!
Chemical arms inspectors in Syria miss deadline
2d chemical weapons team heading for Syria
Syrian rebels told to let inspectors visit chemical sites
Syria disabled chemical sites on schedule, inspectors say
Nothing about the Israeli strike on Syria in my printed paper?
Related:
"Most of Syrian foreign minister Walid al-Moallem’s speech amounted to a point-by-point rejection of the West’s version of the conflict in Syria. In a reference to a group of Western and Arab countries that support the opposition, Moallem said, “They are the ones supporting terrorism in my country, in contradiction of all United Nations resolutions and all human and moral values.”
He's right, and the whole world knows it.
So what, oh what, can the AmeriKan War Press use to get you to get all gung-ho for war against Syria?
"Relief agency warns of mass starvation in Syria; Regime’s siege on rebel targets cuts off supplies" by Bassem Mroue | Associated Press, September 25, 2013
With all due respect, my jewspaper doesn't seem all that concerned about Palestinians suffer the same thing.
BEIRUT — Syrian opposition groups and international relief organizations are warning of the risk of mass starvation across the country, especially in the besieged Damascus suburbs where a gas attack killed hundreds last month.
With the world’s attention focused on the regime’s chemical weapons, activists said six people — including an 18-month-old girl — have died for lack of food in one of the stricken suburbs in recent weeks.
Gotta invade now, huh?
Save the Children said in an appeal Monday that some 4 million Syrians, more than half of them children, do not have enough to eat. Food shortages have been compounded by an explosion in prices.
‘‘The world has stood and watched as the children of Syria have been shot, shelled, and traumatized by the horror of war,’’ said Roger Hearn, Save the Children’s regional director for the Middle East. ‘‘The conflict has already left thousands of children dead, and is now threatening their means of staying alive.’’
Thank Al-CIA-Duh!
Thousands of people are believed trapped in suburbs east and west of the capital that have been held for months by rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Assad. Regime troops are besieging the areas, and residents say food is increasingly had to find. Rebels say they are trying to break the blockade....
In some hard-hit areas such as the western suburb of Moadamiyeh, people are running out of food and are mostly relying on lentils, olives, and dried figs, according to residents and activists.
‘‘We have no food, no milk, and no medicine,’’ said a woman from Moadamiyeh, who identified herself by her nickname Um Lujain for fear of government reprisals. ‘‘We are surviving on one meal a day.”
Then you are like most of the world, me included.
Um Lujain said her 18-month-old daughter has lost half her weight and spends most of her days sleeping. The woman said her daughter’s diet is based on the liquid she makes by boiling lentils.
‘‘There has been no children formula or bread for about a year,’’ the woman said. She added that sometimes rebels find expired boxes of powdered milk in abandoned shops or pharmacies, and people still give it to their children for lack of food.
According to the Moadamiyeh Media Center, six people have died of starvation over the past 20 days: two women and four children ages 18 months to 7 years. It added that 15 other children are in intensive care in clinics, suffering from malnutrition.
On Monday, the opposition Syrian National Coalition accused government forces of tightening their months-long siege. ‘‘Assad’s forces are starving people to death in those areas,’’ the coalition claimed. ‘‘Famine looms in the horizon.’’
Rana Obeid, the 18-month-old girl, was the latest to die on Monday. An amateur video showed her lying on a bed, her ribs visible, and her stomach bloated.
If true a tragedy; however, there are Africans and other children across this Globe that are like that and no big deal is made. This shameless use of suffering people caused by the policies promoted by the same mouthpiece is disgusting.
The video appeared genuine and corresponded to other AP reporting on the events depicted.
And who could ever doubt that?
Mahmoud Abu Ali, an activist in Moadamiyeh, said the suburb has been under siege for 307 days.
It's been 70 years for Palestinians.
He added that most of the cows, sheep, and goats in the area died as a result of shelling or lack of feed, and people cannot plant their land because of daily bombardment.
Now you know how an Iraqi, Afghan, or Pakistani farmer feel.
‘‘People wake up in the morning and there is no food to have breakfast. At noon there is no food for people to have lunch,’’ Abu Ali said.
That's AmeriKa!
--more--"
Related:
Syrians trapped in suburb plead for food
UN calls on Syria to allow urgent humanitarian aid
Group makes plea to aid Syrians
Deal reached to let food into blockaded Syrian town
If the starvation doesn't make you hungry to invade, maybe this will:
Polio outbreak in Syria raises fears in region
The dreaded return of polio
Syria vows to help antipolio effort
Related: If Native Pakistani Polio Virus Is Spreading In Syria, Was It Carried By Pak Terrorists?
It came with the Al-CIA-Duh infiltration.
Syrian crisis prompts bid by faithful to ease suffering
Yeah, you gotta have faith!
"Al Qaeda militants battled fighters linked to the Western-backed opposition along with Kurdish gunmen in Syrian towns along the Turkish border on Friday, in clashes that killed at least 19 people, activists said. In an interview with Turkey’s private Halk TV late Thursday, was the latest given to foreign media by Syrian President Bashar Assad as part of a charm offensive. Infighting between rebels and the increasingly domineering role played by foreign fighters in the civil war have played into the government’s line that it is fighting extremists, not a popular uprising."
It's the truth, but just a line to my war-promoting jewsmedia.
Deal reached on UN resolution for Syria weapons
UN ends stalemate, votes to rid Syria of chemical weapons
"Assad told Chinese state TV that Damascus is dedicated to implementing a US-Russian agreement to surrender its chemical weapons to international control, submitting last week what was supposedly the full list of its chemical weapons and production facilities. The revelations of Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal became public after an Aug. 21 attack near Damascus that a UN report found included the use of the nerve agent sarin. The United States and its Western allies say 1,400 people were killed in the attack in eastern Ghouta that brought Washington to the brink of military intervention. Activist groups say the death toll was significantly lower but in the hundreds. The regime’s agreement to surrender its chemical weapons stock has dealt a blow to the rebels, who had hoped a US military strike would turn the tide of the fighting in their favor after months of setbacks."
But I was told.... never f***ing mind!
Now about those inspections:
"Syria offers anything but an easy work environment. The civil war has laid waste to the country’s cities, shattered its economy, killed around 100,000 people, and driven more than 2 million people to seek shelter abroad. Another nearly 5 million people have been displaced within the country, which has become a patchwork of rebel- and regime-held territory. Underscoring the physical perils the inspectors face, four mortar shells landed Sunday in the Christian quarter of al-Qasaa, killing at least eight people, according to Syria’s state news agency. It was unclear whether any inspectors were close to the explosions."
Who would want to fire mortar shells into a Christian area, huh?
Related:
Syrians trapped in suburb plead for food
UN calls on Syria to allow urgent humanitarian aid
Group makes plea to aid Syrians
Deal reached to let food into blockaded Syrian town
If the starvation doesn't make you hungry to invade, maybe this will:
Polio outbreak in Syria raises fears in region
The dreaded return of polio
Syria vows to help antipolio effort
Related: If Native Pakistani Polio Virus Is Spreading In Syria, Was It Carried By Pak Terrorists?
It came with the Al-CIA-Duh infiltration.
Syrian crisis prompts bid by faithful to ease suffering
Yeah, you gotta have faith!
"Al Qaeda militants battled fighters linked to the Western-backed opposition along with Kurdish gunmen in Syrian towns along the Turkish border on Friday, in clashes that killed at least 19 people, activists said. In an interview with Turkey’s private Halk TV late Thursday, was the latest given to foreign media by Syrian President Bashar Assad as part of a charm offensive. Infighting between rebels and the increasingly domineering role played by foreign fighters in the civil war have played into the government’s line that it is fighting extremists, not a popular uprising."
It's the truth, but just a line to my war-promoting jewsmedia.
Deal reached on UN resolution for Syria weapons
UN ends stalemate, votes to rid Syria of chemical weapons
"Assad told Chinese state TV that Damascus is dedicated to implementing a US-Russian agreement to surrender its chemical weapons to international control, submitting last week what was supposedly the full list of its chemical weapons and production facilities. The revelations of Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal became public after an Aug. 21 attack near Damascus that a UN report found included the use of the nerve agent sarin. The United States and its Western allies say 1,400 people were killed in the attack in eastern Ghouta that brought Washington to the brink of military intervention. Activist groups say the death toll was significantly lower but in the hundreds. The regime’s agreement to surrender its chemical weapons stock has dealt a blow to the rebels, who had hoped a US military strike would turn the tide of the fighting in their favor after months of setbacks."
But I was told.... never f***ing mind!
Now about those inspections:
"Syria offers anything but an easy work environment. The civil war has laid waste to the country’s cities, shattered its economy, killed around 100,000 people, and driven more than 2 million people to seek shelter abroad. Another nearly 5 million people have been displaced within the country, which has become a patchwork of rebel- and regime-held territory. Underscoring the physical perils the inspectors face, four mortar shells landed Sunday in the Christian quarter of al-Qasaa, killing at least eight people, according to Syria’s state news agency. It was unclear whether any inspectors were close to the explosions."
Who would want to fire mortar shells into a Christian area, huh?
"Syrian military attacks an isolated coastal town" by Albert Aji | Associated Press, October 06, 2013
DAMASCUS — Syrian government forces shelled a vulnerable Sunni community in a coastal province dominated by President Bashar Assad’s Alawite sect on Saturday, activists said, raising fears that residents of the isolated town could face mass killings by pro-Damascus militias.
Well, the hunger, polio, and chemical weapons concoctions wouldn't work, so we are back to mass graves and mass killings.
Two Syrian rights groups said....
‘‘this is an isolated area and crimes can be covered up quickly.’’
Yeah, no kidding.
************************
Syria’s civil war has cleaved along the country’s sectarian patchwork. Sunnis dominate the revolt, while Christians and other Muslim sects have mostly stood behind the regime.
Confirming the foreign-supported coup effort.
Another Syrian activist who goes by the name of Abu al-Waleed said negotiations were underway to hand over rebel fighters in exchange for regime forces promising to protect civilians.
‘‘The fear is that they are trying to clean this area of rebel supporters — that is, the Sunni community,’’ he said in a Skype call.
In an interview to be published Sunday, a German magazine quoted Assad as saying he has made mistakes and no side in the civil war is entirely free of blame.
Der Spiegel also quoted Assad as saying he doesn’t believe in a negotiated peace with armed opposition groups.
Assad reportedly told the weekly that he hadn’t yet decided whether to run for the presidency again when his term ends in August.
In the interview, Assad reiterated his insistence that government forces were not responsible for the Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack near Damascus.
I do not believe they were.
Also in Syria, the government raised the price of gasoline and transportation in its latest wartime austerity move, a step likely to increase hardship for many Syrians already suffering from the economic consequences of the war....
Americans have had 12 years of it.
The consequences of a gasoline price rise are likely to be most punishing for Syrians living in rebel-held regions, where fuel is smuggled in or rushed through unsafe roads. It can be up to three times as expensive as in the government zones.
The increase will also affect the price of food due to increased transportation costs. International groups say that rising prices have made it difficult for Syrians to afford food, and activists have reported pockets of malnutrition in rebel enclaves, including the suburbs of Damascus.
Any increases are expected to also raise heating costs for many city households, which use gasoline-powered generators to cope with frequent outages.
Syria has been importing gasoline to make up for a shortfall in local production, interrupted by the 2 ½-year conflict. It last raised the price of gasoline in May.
The Syrian conflict began in March 2011 as protests against Assad’s regime evolved into a civil war. The war has shattered Syria’s economy and killed more than 100,000 people.
--more--"
"Chemical arms inspectors visit 3 Syrian sites; Amid civil war, team looks to destroy stockpile" by Diaa Hadid | Associated Press, October 11, 2013
BEIRUT — Underscoring the complexity of the mission, a regime warplane bombed the rebel-held town of Safira, an activist group said. A regime-controlled military complex believed to include chemical weapons facilities is located near the town....
On Thursday, a regime warplane struck the town of Safira, killing at least 16 people, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which obtains its information through a network of activists on the ground. The group did not know what was hit.
Amateur video said to show the aftermath of the Safira airstrike was posted online later Thursday. The video showed men and boys hauling a blanket filled with body parts onto a jeep where another two charred bodies already lay.
‘‘Who is this?’’ one man can be heard asking. ‘‘By God, we don’t know brother,’’ another responded. The video also showed twisted metal, blood splattered on the floor, and smashed concrete in the area of the strike.
Safira is southeast of the heavily contested city of Aleppo, Syria’s largest. The military complex near the town is believed to include an underground facility for chemical weapons production and storage, said Amy Smithson, a chemical weapons expert at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, a US-based think tank....
In Aleppo, six people were killed by rebel fire, the official Syrian news agency SANA said.
Clashes also broke out between Al Qaeda fighters from a group called the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant and Kurdish rebels in the northern border town of Azaz, the Observatory reported.
In Beirut on Thursday, a lucky few Syrians left to fly to Germany, where they were accepted for temporary resettlement.
Men and women sobbed and hugged as relatives said goodbye to each other, helping them haul suitcases onto a bus heading to the airport.
They were 106 of the 4,000 refugees Germany has accepted on two-year visas, said Roberta Russo of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
They remain a tiny minority of 2 million Syrians now registered as refugees. Another 5 million Syrians are displaced within their country because of the conflict, which has killed more than 100,000.
Russo called on donor countries to provide more aid to Syria’s neighbors, who are hosting over 97 percent of refugees.
She says they’ve received one-third of the $1.7 billion in aid the UN is asking for refugees, particularly in Lebanon.
My jewspaper so concerned about Arab refugees!
Meanwhile, the UN Security Council met behind closed doors Thursday afternoon to discuss an 11-page letter from Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon with recommendations on how to destroy Syria’s chemical weapons by the target date.
--more--"
"Gunmen kidnap 7 aid workers in Syria; Red Cross team was working on medical services" by Ryan Lucas | Associated Press, October 14, 2013
BEIRUT — Gunmen abducted six Red Cross workers and a Syrian Red Crescent volunteer after stopping their convoy early Sunday in northwestern Syria, a spokesman said, in the latest high-profile kidnapping in the country’s civil war.
Simon Schorno, a spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross in Damascus, said the assailants snatched the seven aid workers from their convoy near the town of Saraqeb in Idlib province around 11:30 a.m. local time as the team was returning to Damascus.
He said it was not clear who was behind the attack.
One doesn't need to be clairvoyant to figure it out.
Syria’s state news agency blamed ‘‘terrorists.’’
**************************
Schorno said the team of seven had been in the field since Oct. 10 to assess the medical situation in the area and to look at how to provide medical aid. He said the part of northern Syria where they were seized ‘‘by definition is a difficult area to go in,’’ and the team was traveling with armed guards.
Much of the countryside in Idlib province, as well as the rest of northern Syria, has fallen over the past year into the hands of rebels, many of them Islamist extremists, and kidnappings have become rife, particularly of aid workers and foreign journalists.
Press freedom advocate Reporters without Borders calls Syria ‘‘the most dangerous country in the world’’ for journalists, with 25 reporters killed and at least 33 imprisoned since the anti-Assad uprising began in March 2011.
The conflict also has taken a toll on the aid community....
Syria’s bloody conflict has killed more than 100,000 people, forced more than 2 million Syrians to flee the country, and caused untold suffering — psychological, emotional and physical — across the nation.
In Damascus on Sunday, a double car bombing targeted the state TV building in central Umayyad Square, Syria’s official news agency said. The blast caused minor damage to the building, the agency said....
Also Sunday, Islamist extremists blew up a shrine of a mystic Muslim saint, Issa Abdul-Qader al-Rafai, in the northern town of Busaira, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. A shrine belonging to the mystic’s brother was destroyed in September.
In the Damascus suburb of Moadamiyeh, hundreds of civilians, some carried on stretchers, fled the rebel-held town on Saturday and Sunday after a temporary cease-fire in the area, activists and officials said.
--more--"
Related: Suicide blast kills dozens at Syrian forces’ checkpoint
Newspaper all worried about Al-CIA-Duh?
"Gunmen kidnap 7 aid workers in Syria; Red Cross team was working on medical services" by Ryan Lucas | Associated Press, October 14, 2013
BEIRUT — Gunmen abducted six Red Cross workers and a Syrian Red Crescent volunteer after stopping their convoy early Sunday in northwestern Syria, a spokesman said, in the latest high-profile kidnapping in the country’s civil war.
Simon Schorno, a spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross in Damascus, said the assailants snatched the seven aid workers from their convoy near the town of Saraqeb in Idlib province around 11:30 a.m. local time as the team was returning to Damascus.
He said it was not clear who was behind the attack.
One doesn't need to be clairvoyant to figure it out.
Syria’s state news agency blamed ‘‘terrorists.’’
**************************
Schorno said the team of seven had been in the field since Oct. 10 to assess the medical situation in the area and to look at how to provide medical aid. He said the part of northern Syria where they were seized ‘‘by definition is a difficult area to go in,’’ and the team was traveling with armed guards.
Much of the countryside in Idlib province, as well as the rest of northern Syria, has fallen over the past year into the hands of rebels, many of them Islamist extremists, and kidnappings have become rife, particularly of aid workers and foreign journalists.
Press freedom advocate Reporters without Borders calls Syria ‘‘the most dangerous country in the world’’ for journalists, with 25 reporters killed and at least 33 imprisoned since the anti-Assad uprising began in March 2011.
The conflict also has taken a toll on the aid community....
Syria’s bloody conflict has killed more than 100,000 people, forced more than 2 million Syrians to flee the country, and caused untold suffering — psychological, emotional and physical — across the nation.
In Damascus on Sunday, a double car bombing targeted the state TV building in central Umayyad Square, Syria’s official news agency said. The blast caused minor damage to the building, the agency said....
Also Sunday, Islamist extremists blew up a shrine of a mystic Muslim saint, Issa Abdul-Qader al-Rafai, in the northern town of Busaira, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. A shrine belonging to the mystic’s brother was destroyed in September.
In the Damascus suburb of Moadamiyeh, hundreds of civilians, some carried on stretchers, fled the rebel-held town on Saturday and Sunday after a temporary cease-fire in the area, activists and officials said.
--more--"
Related: Suicide blast kills dozens at Syrian forces’ checkpoint
Newspaper all worried about Al-CIA-Duh?
"2 Al Qaeda affiliates gain foothold in Syria; Groups carving out fiefdoms" by Loveday Morris | Washington Post, October 27, 2013
GAZIANTEP, Turkey — Shortly before its operatives killed 14 Iraqi Shi’ite children in a school bombing this month, the group once known as Al Qaeda in Iraq sent guerrillas into northern Syrian villages with orders to reopen local Sunni classrooms.
In a series of early fall visits, the militants handed out religious textbooks along with backpacks bearing the group’s new name: the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
A four-hour drive to the east, a rival Al Qaeda faction called Jabhat al-Nusra was busy setting up a jobs program in Ash-Shaddadi, a desert town it has held since February.
Related: Sunday Globe Specials: US Lost Iraq War
The Islamists restarted production in an oil field that had been idled by fighting, and fired up a town’s natural gas plant, now a source of income for the town and its new rulers.
The two rebel groups, with their distinct lineages to the terrorist network founded by Osama bin Laden, have concentrated Western fears of rising jihadist influences within Syria’s rebel movement. Two and a half years after the start of the country’s uprising, Islamists are carving out fiefdoms....
The prominence of the two groups — as fighters, as recruiters, and, more recently, as local administrators — appears to have accelerated even as the US administration seeks to boost moderate and secularist rebels with new arms and training.
Multiple independent studies as well as Western and Middle Eastern intelligence officials show the hard-line Islamists surging ahead by almost every measure, undermining Western efforts to find a democratic alternative to Syrian President Bashar Assad.
The Al Qaeda affiliates have clashed with other rebels, and occasionally with each other, and their heavy use of foreign fighters and attempts to impose an ultraconservative ideology have alienated some Syrianse.
‘‘The situation is so bad,’’ said Mohammed Abdelaziz, an activist in the city of Raqqa who said the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria — known as ISIS — criminalized tobacco use and carried out public executions. ‘‘A lot of people have just escaped the city.’’
But other Syrians have embraced the jihadists and welcomed the return of order in towns hit by months of war. A Syrian fighter who called himself Abu Bahri said about 100 people from his town of Azaz joined ISIS after becoming frustrated with the inefficiency of the moderate brigade, which was in charge of the town.
US and Mideast officials say the two Qaeda groups are a magnet for much of the foreign cash and most of the foreign fighters streaming into Syria.
Are you tired of the double game and bull shit narrative?
--more--"
"Syria submits plan to destroy chemical munitions; It’s not known if regime’s listing of sites is complete" by Nick Cumming-Bruce and Michael R. Gordon | New York Times, October 28, 2013
GENEVA — The Obama administration is counting on the Russians....
The initiative to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons program came from the Russians....
I was told it was Obama's idea, and the Russians are already complained that this is not a Russia-only operation.
The United States has proposed shipping part of Syria’s chemical stocks for destruction to other countries and has approached a number of governments....
No one wants them, what a surprise.
See:
Norway says it won’t help destroy Syria’s weapons
Albania declines to host Syria poison gas disposal
Might have to bring them back to the U.S. for disposal.
The announcement from the Hague chemical weapons group came among renewed fighting in Syria. Al Qaeda-linked rebels battled government troops Sunday for control of the Christian town of Sadad north of Damascus, the Associated Press quoted activists as saying.
The rebels have been trying to seize the town for the past week, and residents in the rebel-held western neighborhoods of Sadad are trapped in homes, said Rami Abdurrahman of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory of Human Rights.
The rebels appear to have targeted Sadad because of its strategic location near the main highway north from Damascus rather than because it is inhabited primarily by Christians. But extremists among the rebels are hostile to Syria’s Christian minority, which has largely backed Assad during the conflict.
As have most Syrians. Bombing schools, shops, and hospitals doesn't win people over.
--more--"
Also see:
Assad blasts foreign support for rebels
GOP senators press on Obama’s Syria strategy
Obama’s calculated ‘weakness’
Diplomats unable to set date for Syrian peace session
Syria rebel video claims new split in opposition
Syria’s main opposition refuses to attend meeting
Syrian rebel groups break with coalition
Syrian opposition group to attend Geneva talks
"That announcement highlighted the growing irrelevance of the coalition and its military arm headed by Gen. Salim Idris, who leads the Supreme Military Council supported by the West. The group is seen by many as being out of touch and a puppet of the West and Gulf Arab states."
"Bombings kill 16 in Syria" by Diaa Hadid | Associated Press, November 07, 2013
BEIRUT — Bombs targeting the entrance of a landmark Ottoman railway building in Damascus and a feared security agency in Syria’s southeast killed at least 16 people on Wednesday, activists reported.
There was no claim of responsibility for the attacks, but rebels tied to Al Qaeda have previously claimed bombings of security institutions and have also targeted the center of the capital, trying to take the war to the heart of President Bashar Assad’s power....
Also Wednesday, a suicide car bomb smashed into the entrance of the air force intelligence agency in the southeast city of Sweida, killing eight people, said activists....
The blast in Sweida was a rare attack targeting a city dominated by Druse, a small, secretive Muslim sect who have mostly stayed on the sidelines of the Syrian war.
Syria’s 23 million people belong to a startling patchwork of different religious groups, and the three-year conflict has taken increasingly sectarian overtones in the past year.
I no longer believe the war-promoting Zionist narrative of sectarianism when it comes to people who have for the most part peacefully coexisted and intermarried for centuries. Sorry. Too many agenda-pushing lies for too long.
Syrian rebels are overwhelmingly Sunni and some of the strongest fighting brigades are formed of Al Qaeda loyalists. Assad’s security services are dominated by Alawites, a sect of Shi’ite Islam....
Syria’s minority Christians and Shi’ites have been targeted because Sunni rebels perceive them as siding with Assad.
The Syrian railways authority is housed in a structure was built during the rule of Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II, according to a plaque affixed to the building. It was part of the Hijaz train line that once stretched from the Ottoman Empire’s capital of Istanbul to the holy Muslim city of Medina in what is now Saudi Arabia. It began running through Damascus in 1908, the plaque said. The Hijaz line was halted years after it was created.
It wouldn't be the first time insurgents have destroyed historic places.
But Syria’s internal railway system — partly built off the old Ottoman lines — was only halted during this uprising after rebels attacked part of the railway lines.
--more--"
"Rebel leader dies after Syrian forces attack" by Anne Barnard and Karam Shoumali | New York Times, November 19, 2013
BEIRUT — A Syrian rebel leader who brought together one of the most effective factions fighting President Bashar Assad in the country’s civil war has died of wounds from a Thursday government attack on a meeting of rebel leaders outside Aleppo, his followers said Monday.
His death was seen as a serious blow to the rebels amid a gathering government offensive as diplomats pursue efforts to convene international peace talks.
The leader, Abdul-Qadir Saleh, commanded the Tawhid Brigade and was also known as Hajji Marea. He was taken to Gaziantep over the Turkish border after he was wounded in the attack at the rebel-held infantry school.
Another rebel commander was wounded and a third was killed in the attack, which was described in varying reports as an airstrike or a government raid on the building.
Saleh had been seen as an exemplar of the kind of antigovernment leadership emerging from Syria’s civil war and as one of the government’s most wanted men. His death provoked outpourings of mourning on his followers’ social media sites and on YouTube....
--more--"
Related: Syrian general killed in clash; regime pushes peace talks
"While the relatively rapid pace of dismantling chemical weapons facilities has drawn headlines, the civil war, which has claimed more than 110,000 lives since March 2011, has continued relentlessly with conventional weapons, exacting a daily toll. According to the United Nations, 6.5 million Syrians have been driven from their homes inside the country and millions more have sought refuge across its borders in neighboring lands. The next deadline facing the Syrian authorities is Nov. 15, when they are supposed to produce a plan for the destruction of their stockpile of chemical weapons."
"International inspection teams overseeing the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons will have to negotiate cease-fires between government and rebel forces to gain access to some sites, officials closely involved with the mission said Wednesday. The revelation is an indication of the difficulties of the unprecedented disarmament plan, and suggests that effort to rid Damascus of its poison gas stockpile may have a hard time meeting its mid-2014 deadline."
See:
Inspectors enter Syria to begin dismantling of weapons
Inspectors report progress in Syria
They also reported no evidence of sarin gas!
Chemical arms inspectors in Syria miss deadline
2d chemical weapons team heading for Syria
Syrian rebels told to let inspectors visit chemical sites
Syria disabled chemical sites on schedule, inspectors say
Nothing about the Israeli strike on Syria in my printed paper?
On a positive note:
"West Texas Intermediate will probably decline this week after a US-Russian accord reduced the risk of an American attack on Syria and speculation that Middle East shipments will be curbed, a Bloomberg survey showed."
Related: Gas Prices Going Down
Down to $3.35 now.
