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Syria Reconsiders Support For Terrorists
May 26, 2005; Syria says it ordered police to pick up foreigners along the Iraq border and send them home. Some 1,200 people were removed in the past few weeks. Syria insists that this was the latest effort to help the United States fight terrorism. But Syria plays it both ways. There is much evidence, largely from tourists and residents in Syria, that the government tolerated considerable terrorist activity. The United States has continued to pressure Syria to cut support for terrorism, and now Syria says it will stop it's anti-terrorist efforts, the ones that the U.S. calls inadequate and a smokescreen that hides continued support for terrorists. Syria's problem is that it is a police state run by the Assad family and the Baath Party. Since the 1960s, the Syrian Baath Party feuded with the Iraqi Baath Party (run by the Hussein family). With the fall of the Baath Party in Iraq, the Syrian Baath Party has made up with their fellow party members in Iraq and supported efforts by the Iraqi Baath Party to get back into power. But this had to be done secretly, or at least denied publicly, as the United States was fighting a war on terror, and to publicly admit support for terrorists was to invite attack. But Syria has supported terrorist organizations, often openly, for decades. This was done as a cheap way to attack enemies (mainly Israel and Iraq, but Western nations as well.) The Syrian Baath Party is holding a major meeting soon, to decide its future. Apparently it comes down to continued support for terrorists, and the possibility of war with America, or some alternative. Democracy is not considered an option, because the Syrian Baath Party is dominated by the Alawite Moslem minority, which fears retribution from the Sunni Moslem majority if the police state were dismantled. Thus, while the Syrian Baath Party fiddles, Syria begins to burn down. Posted by: Steve 2005-05-26 |
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