An interesting piece from TNR, of all places, that tries to educate the Left (without success, I'll wager) on what we at the Burg already know. Why does Syria harbor terrorists? Because it's in their interests as they see it. Assad is not irrational, he's a thug, and this is what modern thugs do. Read on:
Why does Syria insist on harboring terrorists?
by Lee Smith
The Bush administration has quietly authorized U.S. forces to attack Al-Qaeda bases around the Middle East—an escalation in the war on terror that Eli Lake first revealed two weeks ago in The New Republic and that The New York Times reported on this week. One of the administration's most recent targets was Syria, where it struck Al-Qaeda leader Badran Turki Hishan al Mazidih last month.
Though Syrian officials feigned ignorance at Al-Qaeda's encampment within its borders, the reality is that the country not only tolerates the presence of terrorists, but encourages them to use the country as a safe-haven, headquarters, and transit point. Why does Syria continue to harbor terrorists, knowing that it places the country squarely in the crosshairs of the Bush administration? Particularly in light of Syria's historical problems with its own Islamist groups, why would it welcome radicals from across the region? Finding the answer to these questions is crucial in trying to defeat one of the Middle East's most prolific boosters of terrorism.
To better understand Syria's motivations, I visited Abdel Halim Khaddam, Syria's former vice president, in Brussels, where he was leading a meeting of the National Salvation Front (NSF), a Syrian opposition group. Having served under both Hafez al-Assad and his son Bashar, Khaddam is well-acquainted with the strategic and political exigencies driving the regime's support for terror. "Fighting the Americans in Iraq is very dangerous," he tells me. "But it also makes Bashar popular. Under the banner of resistance, anything is popular."
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/14/2008 11:33 ||
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Lee Smith has apparently moved on from Slate. But it sounds like he's talking to that fascist retread of an ex-Syrian-vice-president as if the guy is anything other than an out-of-favor Baathist pining for his lost industrial paper-shredder.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
11/14/2008 15:34 Comments ||
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This article ignores the high likelyhood that the Syrians fingered the Al Qaeda operatives for the US and just went through the motions of protesting the raid.
It is entirely possible the Syrians wouldn't have even mentioned it if not for the film clip that made it on the internet.
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
11/14/2008 16:27 Comments ||
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VARIOUS MSM-NET OPEDS > the next IRAQ-STYLE INSURGENCY "QUAGMIRE" FOR THE US-ALLIES MAY BE INDIA [e.g. ASSAM/Hindu-Christian anti-Foreigner Violence]???
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/14/2008 00:00 ||
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Today's event also underscores the importance of the recent deployment of a U.S. X-band radar to Israel. Capable of detecting missile launches at long range, the radar will give Israeli officials an additional 60-70 seconds of warning time, critical in any "surprise attack scenario.
The strategic assumption here is the incoming missiles will be identified as coming from Iran and assumed to be nuclear, which essentially means the IDF has 70 seconds to launch their own. Should indeed be quite a "Storm."
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"The strategic assumption here is the incoming missiles will be identified as coming from Iran and assumed to be nuclear, which essentially means the IDF has 70 seconds to launch their own. Should indeed be quite a "Storm."
Not quite. Israel's second strike capacity relies on submarines so I doubt they would launch their own nuclear missiles before the first Iranian one hit ground.
The "Samson Option" would still work.
Posted by: European Conservative ||
11/14/2008 20:16 Comments ||
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TRIPOLI, LEBANON - Ten kilos of explosives were found during a raid on a home in a Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon on Thursday, a Palestinian official said. "Ten kilos of explosives, six modern timer systems, 10 remote controls... and a large number of grenades were found in an apartment in Beddawi," the official said on the condition of anonymity.
Ten kilos of explosives? Since when is that newsworthy for a Paleo camp?
Beddawi is one of 12 Palestinian camps in Lebanon and home to an estimated 16,000 refugees.
The official said security forces stormed the apartment on information from a Palestinian arrested last week in a raid that turned deadly when a passerby was killed in a shootout between security forces and the wanted men. The Lebanese army does not enter the camps, leaving responsibility for security to Palestinian factions, but extremists believed to have links with Al-Qaeda have settled in some of the shantytowns.
Beddawi's population is thought to have swelled after an influx of refugees from the nearby Nahr al-Bared camp which was almost completely destroyed after a 15-week battle last year between the Lebanese army and an Al-Qaeda inspired militant group.
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Posted by: Steve White ||
11/14/2008 00:00 ||
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Iran's U.N. envoy on Thursday accused Israel of abusing a Saudi-sponsored U.N. interfaith conference for political purposes and suggested the Jewish state had no right to take part.
Speaking on the second day of the meeting, which earlier heard U.S. President George W. Bush call for worldwide religious freedom, Iranian Ambassador Mohammad Khazaee did not name Israel, but left no doubt what country he had in mind. "The representative of a regime (whose) short history is marked with ... aggression, occupation, assassination, state terrorism and torture against the Palestinian people, under the pretext of a false interpretation of a divine religion, has tried to abuse this meeting for its narrow political purposes," he said.
Khazaee was referring to Israeli President Shimon Peres, who took the rare opportunity of being in the same room as Saudi King Abdullah on Wednesday to praise a Saudi peace initiative that he said brought hope to the Middle East.
"The participation of such a regime not only has no benefit to our common purpose, but, as proved in this very meeting, will give them a chance to try to disrupt the current process to divert our attention from our mandate" to improve dialogue between different religions, Khazaee said.
Iran believes the Jewish state has no right to exist and opposes peace talks. Israel considers Iran a threat to its existence and, along with the United States and other countries, accuses it of developing nuclear weapons. Tehran denies the charge.
Khazaee's speech stood out at the two-day meeting of the U.N. General Assembly, convened at the request of the Saudi monarch, not only because of its accusatory language, but because it failed to praise Abdullah.
Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal reacted coolly to Peres' remarks. "The disappointing side of President Peres' comment is that he chose parts of the Arab peace plan and left other parts untouched," he told reporters.
Earlier Bush, in what was almost certainly his last U.N. address, proclaimed religious freedom as the foundation of a healthy society and defended the U.S. record in protecting Muslims caught up in foreign conflicts.
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
The U.N. meeting, attended by leaders and diplomats from some 75 countries, was opened by King Abdullah, who on Wednesday denounced terrorism as the enemy of all religions.
In a closing statement, participants "affirmed their rejection of the use of religion to justify the killing of innocent people and actions of terrorism, violence and coercion." U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told a news conference that was "a strong message to the world."
Bush, a Methodist who said faith sustained him through his presidency, which ends in January, praised Abdullah for initiating the meeting but also implicitly criticized countries that restrict religious practice. Saudi Arabia forbids public non-Muslim worship.
Noting that the United States had been founded by people fleeing religious persecution, Bush said that "Freedom is God's gift to every man, woman, and child -- and that freedom includes the right of all people to worship as they see fit."
He was speaking a short way from the site of New York's former World Trade Centre, destroyed in 2001 by planes piloted by Islamist al Qaeda militants. Some Muslim critics have called his subsequent "war on terror" a crusade against Islam.
"Our nation has helped defend the religious liberty of others, from liberating the (World War Two) concentration camps of Europe to protecting Muslims in places like Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq," Bush said.
"Religious freedom is the foundation of a healthy and hopeful society. We're not afraid to stand with religious dissidents and believers who practice their faith even where it is unwelcome."
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
