AIPAC and Syria: Whose Foreign Policy is it anyway?..............
“Here in the United States, media and official portrayals of Syria are often clouded by sparsely informed and harshly ideological views, often actively propagated by AIPAC and its pro-Israel allies, that portray the Asad government in a one-dimensional way as allied only to such U.S. foes as Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran. It is true that Damascus has good ties to all those parties. But two other aspects of its policy are also relevant. One is that not all three other parties are irredeemable opponents of the U.S. -- and that President Asad has worked hard over the years to help bridge the gaps that some of them have with Washington…….. In mid-April, Israeli President Shimon Peres publicly accused Syria of supplying Scud missiles to Hezbollah. U.S. officials never directly confirmed those accusations and neither Washington nor Israel ever produced any evidence whatever to substantiate the accusation. But Washington was so coy in its pronouncements -- saying it "could not confirm"………..”
It is not just US media and self-serving nervous politicians who portray the Assad regime as a tool of Iran. Media tools of some Arab oligarchs, especially absolute monarchs, often stress that Syria is an Iranian satrapy, something it has not been since Alexander the Great swooped down and pushed them back eastward. They all know that is not true, that the alliance is not as one-sided as they claim, but they do it because it sells in the West, especially in the United States where many ears are willing to listen. So these autocrats who are opening their lands to Western bases even as I write point the finger at Syria as a tool.
This is not to deny that Syria is a dictatorship in the usual Arab mold, with the usual Arab restrictions on freedom of speech and expression. Although they do respect the freedom of religion, unlike one or two other regional states.
Cheers
mhg
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