What Syrian opposition members fail to understand, and some
of them may not even want to understand, is that speaking of a political
solution at this stage is not an attempt at circumventing the revolution: for
the revolution has already succeeded, it has already toppled the regime, by
reducing it into sectarian militias enacting a purely sectarian agenda and
serving interests that are intrinsically un-Syrian. As a result, the regime
took its revenge against the state and tore it apart. We now need to think of
ways to put the state back together, for failure on this front makes us as Un-Syrian
as the fallen regime.
Video Highlights
Wednesday
November 07, 2012
Today’s
Death Toll: 168.
The Breakdown: Toll includes
4 women and 16 children: 73 in Damascus and suburbs (including 25 in Beit Sahem),
32 in Aleppo, 25 in Idlib, 8 in Raqqah, 6 in Homs, 4 in Lattakia, 4 in Deir
Ezzor, 4 in Daraa and 3 in Hama. Other Developments:
The LCC also documented 176 instances of random shelling by regime forces, including
22 instances of aerial shelling and 4 instances of bombing with explosive barrels.
Rebels clashed with regime forces in 57 points, and was able to repel a number
of regime attempts to storm Eastern Ghoutah Region in Damascus Suburbs (LCC).
News
Resolving
Syria crisis is first foreign policy priority, David Cameron tells Barack Obama
David Cameron has urged Barack Obama to join Britain in a new effort to
"solve" Syria's crisis as world leaders queued up to refer global
problems to America's newly re-elected president.
Syria seizing foreign aid while patients die, medical NGO says "When the regime attacks one of our medical facilities, whether it's a hospital or something else, they load up everything they can carry, and they burn the rest," said Tawfik Chamaa, a Geneva-based doctor and spokesman for the Union of Syrian Medical Relief Organizations (UOSSM). "They take as much as they can, and that just depends on how many soldiers they have, but most of the time they resell it on the black market," he told a news briefing in Geneva.
Syria seizing foreign aid while patients die, medical NGO says "When the regime attacks one of our medical facilities, whether it's a hospital or something else, they load up everything they can carry, and they burn the rest," said Tawfik Chamaa, a Geneva-based doctor and spokesman for the Union of Syrian Medical Relief Organizations (UOSSM). "They take as much as they can, and that just depends on how many soldiers they have, but most of the time they resell it on the black market," he told a news briefing in Geneva.
Special
Reports
Hobbled by a lack of supplies and a
confused chain of command, rebels here said Wednesday that they feared they might
lose the city without reinforcements and ammunition.
Before the unrest in Syria began last
year, there was a lively art scene in Damascus, and many galleries showcased
contemporary painters. The departure of artists from Syria has caught the
attention of gallery owners and collectors in Lebanon. “It was a way for us to
discover that Syria has so many great young artists,” said Alia Noueihed Nohra,
the owner of the Art Circle gallery in the bustling Hamra neighborhood of west
Beirut.
With Syrian forces and Arab rebels
entangled in fighting to their west, a Syrian Kurdish party tied to Turkish
Kurd separatists has exploited a vacuum to start Kurdish schools, cultural
centers, police stations and armed militias. But the growing influence of the
Democratic Union Party (PYD) is concerning not only Turkey, which is worried
that border areas will become a foothold for Turkish Kurd PKK rebels, but also
Syrian Arab fighters who see the Kurdish militias as a threat.
After the election, the administration
may be emboldened to take more aggressive action on Syria. At least that's what
the rebels hope for.
Turkey
May Deploy Patriot Missiles Near Syria The development, coming only
hours after President Obama had won re-election, raised speculation that the
United States and its allies were working on a more robust plan to deal with
the 20-month-old conflict in Syria during the second Obama administration term.
Further reinforcing that speculation, Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain
said he was prepared to open direct lines of communication with Syrian rebel
commanders.
Bombings and assassinations seem to be
less about holding territory than making guerrilla-style strikes, some of which
have caused civilian casualties.
President Obama's re-election ensures
continuity in US foreign policy, he now faces the governments of Iran, Syria,
and possibly China.
There's some hope for a faster end to
the fighting – with British Prime Minister Cameron hinting at safe passage for
Assad if he decides to quit the fight. But the outlook is grim.
Long-oppressed, Syria’s Kurds see the
conflict ravaging their country as an opportunity to win the kind of liberty
enjoyed by their ethnic kin in Iraq who live autonomously from the federal
capital in Baghdad.
Ammar Abdulhamid & Khawla
Yusuf: The
Shredded Tapestry: The State of Syria Today
Are the British PM and Turkish Foreign Minister seeking
to pile up some pressure on President Obama in order to get him to adopt a more
proactive policy on Syria, or do their statements reflect an already agreed new
course of action involving, at the very least, the creation of a limited no-fly
zone over northern Syria? My take: it’s all about pressure at this stage because
there is nothing that is agreed, in fact, I doubt if any serious high level
conversation on Syria has taken place between the great powers in quite a
while, beyond a simple exchange of platitudes. I believe that, at least for the
near future, President Obama will continue to pursue a policy of minimal
intervention in Syrian Conflict, one that goes little beyond increasing
nonlethal aid to rebels and activists while contending with having other
regional and international players pursue their own policies in this
regard, including supplying funds and
more advanced weapons to the rebels.
The impact of this policy will be to encourage the further fracturing
of Syria and a further devolution of powers to the provinces and right into the
hands of rebels and pro-Assad militias, and whatever political forces end up
coalescing around them.
At this stage, this trend cannot be reversed, not without massive
intervention which, even in the best of cases, was never on the table. So, devolution,
followed by regional stabilization and eventually, launching a political process
to put the pieces back together, this is what we should expect over the next
few years. We may not be here as a result of an intentional policy,
irrespective of what the conspiracy-minded in our midst believe, but this is
where we find ourselves now anyway, and this might be the only viable way
forward.
In this light, the initiative proposed by Riad Seif and backed by the
Americans was meant to create a pragmatic enough political body that can take
charge of the processes ahead, processes that will involve not only negotiating
with the regime over the specific mechanisms of power transfer, but also much
negotiations and mediation between the different groups in their regional,
confessional and national diversity. The effort will likely fail, scuttled by
an overambitious and further radicalized and Islamized SNC. But ultimately that
will have little effect on developments on the ground where rebels are the real
decision-makers. Given a foothold to representatives of rebel groups in the SNC
or any new body will not make them embrace either beyond using them as
temporary conduits for interacting with the wider world.
In other words, whatever comes out of Doha will be meaningless. Guns
will continue to speak louder than words, especially when the words are uttered
in favor of self-serving agendas by people who long lost their moral relevance
and legitimacy, and people close to the ground and reality will eventually pull
the carpet from under the feet of those reaching for imaginary stars and gains.
What Syrian opposition members fail to understand, and some of them may
not even want to understand, is that speaking of a political solution at this
stage is not an attempt at circumventing the revolution: for the
revolution has already succeeded, it has already toppled the regime, by
reducing it into sectarian militias enacting a purely sectarian agenda and
serving interests that are intrinsically un-Syrian. As a result, the regime
took its revenge against the state and tore it apart. We now need to think of
ways to put the state back together, for failure on this front makes us as
Un-Syrian as the fallen regime.
Saving Syria as an independent state requires talking to all
stakeholders in it, including members of the ancien régime and their
supporters. There is no circumventing that. We might be able to storm the
presidential palace soon, but attempting to storm Alawite strongholds or
Kurdish regions, or any loyalist base will be disastrous. We need to plan ahead.
We need a vision for how the country will be ruled in the future, and that
vision, in order to be legitimate and acceptable to all different segments of
the population, has to come as a result of negotiations with all parties,
including regime supporters. Embarking on this political process is not a
betrayal of the revolution, but an acknowledgement of its success. More
importantly, there is no contradiction between the ongoing armed struggle and
such a process: it’s not an either/or situation. In fact, military operations
by all sides might intensify when the political process acquires more relevance
as each side seeks to increase its stake.
Video Highlights
A Syrian girl urges Michelle Obama to ask her husband to intervene in
Syria during Mrs. Obama’s stop in Ohio on November 6 http://youtu.be/2DD8Z4D02G4
The Great Mosque of Douma in Damascus Suburbs gets consumed by
fire as a result of pounding by pro-Assad militias http://youtu.be/YKCKJQd6JvQ , http://youtu.be/TyDmllyp9wI Elsewhere in
the suburb, people rush to pull bodies from under the rubble following an
aerial raid http://youtu.be/pk1p0VU30kE
, http://youtu.be/BGQkXCTctzg This is
how intense the pounding was http://youtu.be/hghI7vCReNw
Nearby Kafar Batna was also pounded http://youtu.be/7UDW5jcpLfM
The aftermath http://youtu.be/s_xrDYnkDIY
In Beit Sahem, aerial bombardments leaves dozens dead http://youtu.be/Yd5Vv5w1YQE
The remains of the car that exploded in Al-Qadam Neighborhood in
Damascus City http://youtu.be/Be3kort27ZU
More pounding in Damascus City http://youtu.be/MzpbNobkk5o
People pull bodies from under the rubble in Khan Al-Subul in
Idlib Province http://youtu.be/VmU_dZDriZk
Nothing but body parts remain following an aerial raid on a village near Ma’arrat
Al-Nouman, Idlib http://youtu.be/qjjP_naWS_I
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