Tag Archives: Syria

Arab Politics, Donald Trump, Europe, Hezbollah, Middle East, NATO

This Week: Ashoura and Hezbollah Missiles, Trump to Raid the UN, F Troop to Man a Fort Trump in Poland……

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking

“On Thursday, Nasrallah claimed Israeli strikes in Syria to prevent Hizbollah from acquiring precise missiles were ineffective.”I tell (Israel) no matter what it did to cut the route, it is over. It has already been achieved,” he said, adding that Hizbollah “now possesses precision missiles and non-precision and weapons capabilities.” Nasrallah was speaking during a traditional televised speech at the end of Ashoura, a top religious holy day for Shia Muslims that lasts for 10 days. He told supporters to be confident and Israelis to be concerned of Hizbollah’s capabilities. Nasrallah said the balance of power in the region has changed…..”
Normally Nasrallah, whatever you think of him, is not known as a boaster, not much anyway (unlike you know who). Even the Israelis especially know that and now seem to plan and act/react accordingly.

But I am not sure about his claim that “the balance of power in the region had changed“. I am not completely sold on this one. Although it is probably true that in the war of July 2006 Hezbollah had a few thousand limited-range missiles, and now they are reported to have close to 150,000 longer-range precision missiles. In spite of occasional bombing (and other) attempts to stop the flow. Besides, they are very likely to have developed their own domestic know-how over the years.

Jerusalem Post headlined what it called Breaking News! “Trump to hold meeting with Netanyahu, other leaders at UN General Assembly“…
To which I tweeted: Breaking! Shocker Indeed: Amazing development! Trump and Netanyahu! Trump to meet his chief cheerleader at UN General Assembly!

Poland‘s slick President Duda suggested in Washington a permanent American base in his country be named Fort Trump. To be manned by a force called F Troop. I almost expected him to turn to his host and call him “The Duke”.
I commented that this President Duda sure knows how to kiss it!

Middle East/Arab social media are making fun of the Russian reaction to the Ilyushin shootdown near Latakia, in which Israeli warplanes hid behind the Russian Ilyushin to bomb a Syrian airbase. Many Russian military personnel died. They recall that Arab governments always threatened the same “severe reaction” to Israeli violations, which usually meant: they won’t do nada. Although a few claimed that Netanyahu’s freedom to bomb wherever he wants in Syria in support of the Islamist groups may be nearing an end after this.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Arabian Peninsula, China, Humor, Iran, Iraq, Middle East

Middle East Roundup: From China to Iran, Iraq, West Bank Exile, and Suggestive Saudi Potato Chips…….

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking

Round-up of recent Middle East news and some comments:

In Iraq, it looks like Muqtada Al Sadr has abandoned his near-alliance with caretaker PM Haidar Al Abadi. He has now called for Abadi to resign.
My comment? If it holds up, that will seal the fate of the incompetent PM. Alliance with Muqtada was Abadi’s only route to remaining in power, after he threw his Iranian and PMU allies under the bus to appease Donald Trump.

Israeli and other media report Israel has banned teenage Palestinian protester Ahed al-Tamimi of the Occupied West Bank from traveling abroad.
My comment? That’s freedom for you, in the “only democracy” in the Middle East. But it’s done all over the Middle East, banning travel of dissidents From Tehran to Riyadh to Cairo and Algeria and beyond. It is a form of internal exile, to be locked up within the borders. Probably better than a prison or a dungeon. Unless you can escape into external exile before it is too late.

Saw an article in Foreign Policy to the effect that: China’s Continent-Spanning Trains Are Running Half-Empty. Beijing’s funding dozens of new rail routes as part of its global ambitions — and losing money on every one. So what’s the long game?
My comment? That is China. Meanwhile, back in the USA, Mr. Trump’s Infrastructure non-plan is still just hot air, unexplained and likely misunderstood by Trump, opposed by a small-minded miserly short-sighted Congress.

Reports that the US administration has warned Syria not to attack the Jihadists holed up in Idlib. Some US sources even claimed the Syrian regime is preparing to use chemical weapons against the rebels in the region. Idlib is the last major outpost of the Al Qaeda-led Salafist terrorists in Syria.
My comment? Who would have thunk it! That a day would come when the USA (Trump Admin) is allied to an Al Qaeda Salafist branch in Syria.
September 11, 2001 forgotten, buried in Wahhabi oil money. And how do they know the Syrian regime will use WMD? Did the Jihadis tell them, directly or through Israeli or Arab sources?

A piece sponsored by the Atlantic Council suggested that “Iran and the US Should Use the UN to Reopen a Channel for Dialogue”.
My comment? To start with: Trump has just reneged on the UN-adopted JCPOA Nuclear Deal. As a rule, US Iran policy (and Middle East policy) should be formulated in the United States, in Washington DC, as it was in the past, not in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem (or Las Vegas or Evangelical-LalaLand). And it should not be based on the whims and purchasing power of a few Persian Gulf absolute princes and potentates with money to burn.

The Washington Post reports from the Democratic Kingdom of Saudi Arabia that a man was detained in Saudi Arabia for eating potato chips with a woman — and then posting the video.
My comment? Sharing a bag of potato chips with a woman in Saudi Arabia can be very suggestive. Especially if her whole face is completely covered with a burqa/niqab, which makes it even more suggestive, even if nobody can tell who she/he/it is.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Arab Politics, Donald Trump, Genocide, Middle East, Saudi Arabia, Syria, U.S. Foreign Policy, WMD

Tweets on GroupThink: Alleged Syrian Chemical Red Lines and the Push for a ‘Trump’ Quagmire……….

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking

It is not clear what happened in Douma, Syria yesterday. US media and many politicians are accepting the rebel Islamist narrative that the regime used chemical weapons in Douma, just as the regime was about to take control of Douma anyway (without use of chemicals). I don’t know what happened, but I carry a bag of salt over my shoulder. Some of my (modified) tweets about the recent alleged chemical attacks in Syria:

Sen. Graham (former desk-bound lawyer for USAF- US Air Force): “he’s going to look weak in the eyes of Russia and Iran“
He sure knows how to rile up the dotard…..
But Graham also has never seen a Middle East war he didn’t like….

I: He can punish Syria by having USAF carpet-bomb Damascus with millions of his inaugural photos…….

Hey, @realDonaldTrump, this is still valid —-> Donald Trump in Syria: Not Beau Geste, not Dien Bien Phu, not Khe Sanh, not Desert Storm……. 

US main media is urging “an attack” against Syria…
Saudi Arabian princes urging a war against Iran….
Israeli Likud urging war against Iran….
John Bolton acting as a Fifth Column for all of the above….

UN Security Council to meet today about Syrian chemical attack. Will not discus Israeli “illegal” air attack on Syria. Will not discuss US supported genocide in Yemen.

Russians claim they are in Douma now, see no chemical weapons effects. Call it a fabrication.

Most US GroupThink media are afraid to question all allegations….

All this obsession with “Red Lines“….. All this macho crap….
Democrats whining about Trump “abandoning” Syria ……

No mention of Obama….
Yet when when the quagmire materializes, they will scream a “Trump Quagmire!”

Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Arab Revolutions, Donald Trump, Levant, Middle East, Muslim Wars, Syria, U.S. Foreign Policy, Vietnam War

Donald Trump in Syria: Not Beau Geste, not Dien Bien Phu, not Khe Sanh, not Desert Storm……

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking

President Trump has been flip-flopping on a Syrian  withdrawal again. But he was quoted Monday that he might keep the (uninvited) troops in IF the Saudis pay him (as they pay mercenaries?). Now his staff say he might keep some forces in Syria for a ‘short time’. Such alleged intentions have often led to prolonged wars of attrition (Vietnam, latest iteration of the Afghanistan War).

But nobody has asked Syria’s government or people if they want American troops in their country (funded with Saudi money and hence beholden to the potentates’ unrealistic goals in Syria).

The advice Trump will get, is getting, from his advisers and from self-serving Arab potentates seems to be to keep a ‘substantial’ small force in Syria. Under the guise of mopping up the remnants of ISIS. But many believe that this has nothing to do with ISIS anymore. And this force will be isolated in the ‘desert’. Besieged by unreliables and hostiles/potential hostiles: disgruntled former Turkish allies, Arab Jihadists, Kurdish factions, Syrian regime forces, Hezbollah, Iraqi PMU, Brigadier Qassem Soleimani & his men, et al. Their access will depend on cooperation from some highly unreliable players in a highly unreliable region.

This is not like a repeat of the first Persian Gulf War to liberate Kuwait, when all sides were identifiable, lined up behind clear and visible battle lines. When the goal was clear.

Is somebody setting these American troops up as sitting ducks in the desert for their own agenda? A more isolated, unwinnable version of Khe Sanh? But the brave fighters at that Vietnamese outpost were not nearly as isolated as the strip of Syria that is relevant here. Besides, Khe Sanh, although not a Dien Bien Phu, was apparently just a diversionary battle that preceded the Tet Offensive.

Unless Mr. Bolton and all those pushing for this dubious project are willing to suit up, go to contested eastern Syria.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Arab Politics, Assad, Iraq, Middle East, Migrant labor, Saudi Arabia, Syria, US Foreign Policy

New Western Dreamers of Syria: Build the Wall, Build the Assad Wall…….

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking text

State Department Spokeswoman Heather Nauert (@statedeptspox) commented on USAID Mark Green’s visit to Syria with US Central Command Chief General Votel. She tweeted:
“@USAIDMarkGreen’s visit to #Syria with General Votel of @CENTCOM….”

I guess Syria now also needs a #BuildTheWall movement…….
After the first illegal cross border entry by a gaggle of US senators (McCain, Graham, et al), some Syrians could have been marching in the streets of Damascus, chanting: Build the Wall, BuildTheWall………
They did not at the time because the term Build The Wall was still unknown, the idea confined to Israel and the Palestinian and Occupied Territories. And some parts in the USA.

Yet no country has needed to build a wall as much as Syria in the past six years. Illegal infiltrators, without so much as a visa request, or a tour guide, have been sneaking in through Jordan, Iraq, Israel and especially Turkey. Arabs, Africans, Europeans, Chechens, and others along, with their concubines, converted on Syria, seeking to liberate it for the joys of pious Sunni fundamentalism.
They originally formed the backbone of Al Qaeda (or Nusra) and the ISIS (DAESH) cutthroat entities. Then we had a gaggle of US senators sneak in without an invite or a visa request, no doubt accompanied by Jihadi coyotes in civilian garb. The liberators all in ignorant bliss that they were fraternizing with Jihadis. The senators were hailed by US media of all stripes as they posed with Jihadi terrorists dedicated to the liberation of Syria from its secular (if repressive one party) path.

Now we have US forces and commanders sneaking into Syria, also without visa formalities. And these gentlemen apparently need no coyotes to guide them. They have drones and satellites. They were supposed to leave the premise within hours, before the Al Assad ICE agents descended on them and sent them back to some Turkish or Jordanian Tijuana or Ciudad Juarez.

But Secretary of State Rex Tillerson asserts that many more, many American troops, perhaps thousands, will remain illegally in Syria for years. Perhaps as unofficial sitting ducks among various warring local and foreign factions bearing down on several sides. Perhaps with the eventual goal of becoming a sort of Syrian Dreamers, mostly dreaming of the day they could come back home to the USA.

Ditto for Iraq since 2003.

Then there is Israel, which sends warplanes and missiles and almost certainly infiltrators into Syria to blow up whatever the Likud does not like the look of. Even Donald Trump, the man who does nothing that does not pay off in cold cash, tossed a missile or two into an abandoned Syrian military base last year.

Saudi Arabia’s nearly-demented foreign minister Adle Al Jubeir every week insists that regime change is the path for Syria (but not for his own democratically elected Kingdom of Free Speech).

It is a wonder the Syrians did not start clamoring to “Build The Wall” all around their country. After all, Kim Jong Un of North Korea has built a stout wall, if only mainly to keep his people inside the nuclear paradise.

This story will continue…..

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Arab Revolutions, Migrant labor, Muslim Wars, Syria, U.S. Foreign Policy, U.S. State Department

Western Fun and Travel in Liberated Muslim and Arab Lands……..

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking

“The 52 most incredible places to visit in 2018….. New year, new travel goals. Traveling is one of the most common New Year’s resolutions and since 2017 was found to be the safest year on record for commercial air travel, now may be a good time to plan your next trip. It also helps that January tends to be the best time of year to find cheap flights. If you’re looking for some travel inspiration, here are 52 of the best travel destinations for 2018, according to The New York Times. Keep scrolling for destination inspiration……”

Also sprach the periodical Business Insider.
I also have some destination inspiration for it readers. I have my suggestion for many of the traveling Western elites (the individualists, not the gawking sardine-can-cruise types).

Try some of the many Muslim places recently that some believe have been liberated in the Middle East or North Africa (MENA). Places the alleged current leader of the free world has talked about a lot, mostly in negative terms:


Try anywhere in Libya, which was liberated by NATO in 2011 at the behest of absolute elected Arab kings and potentates. The dictator Gaddafi was tortured (along with one f his sons) and killed extra-judicially (the way many others are killed in our region). In liberated post-Gaddafi Libya, you may be lucky enough to witness a few internecine skirmishes between rival armies, or even catch a rarity: a slave auction in (North) Africa. You can also get a front raw look at the migration disaster unleashed by the Western wars of regime change in our mis-ruled region of MENA.

You might also notice that those famous would be vocal liberators (only of Muslim lands): John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Joe Lieberman, Bernard-Henri Levy, James Woolsey, Joe Lieberman, et al, all stay away from Libya now. Not even a hint of a Trump Hotel or Tower in Benghazi or Tripoli.

Or try Mosul in Iraq, or Raqqa in Syria.
In Iraq in 2014, right after the fall of Mosul, Baghdad was saved from the clutches of ISIS Jihadi terrorists only through the efforts of local popular militias and with Iranian help and advice. They gave the Iraqi military and the supporting American military effort enough time to push back the menace that threatened Baghdad.

Syria was almost liberated for the joys of public beheadings and mayhem by Jihadi cutthroat fighters, Arab Salafi money & volunteers, and misplaced American weapons. In Syria you could witness the end-game of Western and allied Arab regime efforts: weapons and money inflow to the Jihadi cause. They came close to establishing their joyful Caliphate in Damascus.
Or, if you are more into more graphic ongoing action, try any hospital that still stands in Sanaa (capital of tormented Yemen) or in Aden. Get a first-hand view of Western attempts to put an incompetent Yemenite general back in power.

How about the wild territory of Northern Sinai, the expanding no-mans-land of ISIS and her terrorist sisters? Almost slipping out of the hands of Generalissimo Al Sisi.

Or you can try doing AirBnB in a rundown Bahrain Shi’s village besieged by the regime’s imported mercenary forces. You might get your first experience of teargas and broken down doors during dawn raids. Might remind you of your younger days if you are of the right age and were at the right place.

The list goes on, and it will go on as long as the Western powers seek foreign places to try their new weapons (or so most people in the Middle East believe; something their regimes and their controlled media never tell you)…..

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

America, Arab Revolutions, Human Right, MAGA, Missing, Poverty, Syria, War

Party of Personal Choice: From Syria’s War Missing to America’s Homeless…….

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking

Senator John McCain tweeted today that this article in the Wall Street Journal is “important”. It is about the estimated 100,000 people missing in Syria. It is of course important…

Then this hardly-noticed news item was published today about a study on homelessness in the USA:
“More than 500,000 people – a quarter of them children – were homeless in the United States this year amid scarce affordable housing across much of the nation, according to a study released on Thursday……Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland, Oregon and Hawaii have all recently declared emergencies over the rise of homelessness, and on Thursday Seattle’s mayor toured a new encampment for his city’s dispossessed…….”

I have not seen any comment or tweet on this from McCain or other Republican politicians yet. Nor do I expect to see any comment from the “Party of Choice”. They usually ascribe any misfortune or sickness (including children’s sickness) or other tragedy to “a matter of personal choice”. That was the case even before this new Wild West era of MAGA.

FYI: Democrats did only marginally better when they were in power….

Cheers

M Haider Ghuloum

Arab Revolutions, Assad, ISIS, Jihadists, Middle East, Syria, U.S. Foreign Policy

Confusing Rex Tillerson: Iraqi Militias Must Leave Iraq, Assad Must Leave Syria, No Pasaran in Arabic…….

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking

Almost everybody has been after Bashar Al Assad to leave Syria since well before 2011. But the open calls for his departure came soon after the early uprising of the spring of 2011. That Syrian uprising was quickly bought and hijacked by the Salafists and Muslim Brotherhood of the Arab World, mainly the Wahhabi money bags of a couple of the Persian Gulf states. Jihadis poured into Syria from Arab states and Europe, seeking plunder, free women, and Shi’as/Christians/Others to abuse and kill. Eventually the Jihadist international brigades of ISIS and Al Qaeda inherited most of what was left of the active Syrian opposition. Here are some of the calls:


Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (2009-2011): “Assad Must Go. His days are numbered“.
Secretary of State John Kerry (2012…): “Assad Must Go“.
Various Arab absolute Kings & their Ministers and their media: “Assad Must Go. Assad will go soon, Inshallah“.

Saudi Foreign Minister Al Jubeir, who made a career out of it, even regularly specified in an odd weekly rant: “Assad will go soon, if not peacefully then by force” (For a while I was almost convinced he knew something I did’t).
Barack Obama: “Look, fact is that: Assad Must Go“.
Francois Hollande: “Assad Doit Partir. He Must Go (2011-2016). ”
David Cameron: “Assad Must Go”
Turkey’s strongman Erdogan (once a major enabler of Jihadists in Syria until about 2016): “Assad Yok! Assad Must Go (2011-2015)“

Many others, opinion-ators, pundits, journalists, American hawks, and European cafe men-about-town: “Assad has a few weeks left in Damascus. His top officers are defecting to the joys of Salafism and Wahhabism“.


Donald Trump: “Maybe Assad can Stay. Or maybe not. We must defeat ISIS“.
UN Ambassador Nikki Haley: “Assad Must Go“.

Finally, this covering-all-bases doozy from U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson: “Assad Must Go. Also as a bonus: Iraqi Militias that saved Baghdad from DAESH in 2014 and fought ISIS must leave Iraq. (But he didn’t specify go where? Definitely he doesn’t want them in Yemen)”

“Assad must go” became the battle cry of the West and many Arab despots and leaders. Sort of like “No Pasaran” during the Spanish civil war. Except that it now looks like it was the Assad side that made sure the refrain of “No Pasaran” applied to the other side.

And the rest of the Middle East is all run by popular elected democratic men and clans and families and oligarchs and kleptocrats of the people.
And that is where it stands, but Assad is still with us, for now. Eventually he will go, but then so does everyone else, even Arab leaders, eventually……..

Inshallah….. God Willing…….

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Al-Qaeda, Arab Politics, Donald Trump, Middle East, Terrorism, Terrorist Lists

Just Who Are the Terrorists? Playing the Field in the Middle East……..

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking

“Syria: Israel coordinated attack with Islamist militants, giving air support to Nusra assault on Quneitra…… The Syrian army claimed that the Israeli airstrikes coincided with an attack by Islamist militants on the same positions. The Syrian army said it seemed the two attacks were coordinated and that the attack by Israeli military helicopters supported the Nusra Front’s assault on a Quneitra suburb………”  Haaretz (a very lonely Israeli newspaper)

Middle East wars used to be simple clear-cut affairs (with one particular side persistently led by simpletons). Arabs against Israelis. Iraqis against Iranians. Americans against Iraqi Baathists. Saudis against Yemenis.
Now things have become confused and confusing: various parties and regimes and groups two-time or three-time each other. Everybody plays the field now.

Now we have Al Nusra, the local franchise of Al Qaeda reportedly getting some cover from Israeli forces (Arab media and pro-Syrian media have been noting that for months now). Yes, that same Al Qaeda, the one that attacked the USA and killed about 3,000 Americans, to start with (most of the perpetrators were Saudis terrorists). The same Wahhabis that perpetrated the Boston attack, San Bernardino, and Orlando, as well as Paris, Nice, London, Brussels. And the daily attacks in Iraq, Pakistan, and the bombings in Kuwait and Tehran. And more. The same Wahhabis whose clerics have often claimed that Jews are “descendants of apes and pigs“.

Mr. Trump, of course, has a different view of history. He stood in the capital of Wahhabism and pointed his greedy fat finger across the Persian Gulf and declared that the mullahs on Iran are responsible for terrorism in the world.

Like I said, anything is possible in the Middle East these days. Just look at the predicament of Qatar and the GCC.

Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Arab Revolutions, Middle East, Syria, Turkey, U.S. Foreign Policy

Old Slogan, New Slogan: Assad Hasn’t Gone Yet, but Erdogan Must Go…….

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KuwaitCox2 Hiking

Remember when the common slogan in Turkey (and in Washington and among Wahhabi potentates) was: Assad must go?

It has been revived with a lot of Saudi money given to Donald Trump. A few weeks ago Trump discarded the old Assad slogan, but that was before he discovered the joys of Saudi money.


Maybe Assad will go, eventually. Everybody does, something which gives the American people some hope.

But there is a new maniac roaming the Middle East now, repressing his own people, stifling freedom in Turkey. A better slogan now would be: Erdogan Must Go.

Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum