Bizarrely Secretary of State John Kerry just dropped in on Iraq to ask their Shiite-dominated government to stop allowing through weapons shipments for Syria’s government while Obama Inc. is overseeing the smuggling of huge amounts of weapons to Sunni Jihadists in Syria.
With help from the C.I.A., Arab governments and Turkey have sharply increased their military aid to Syria’s opposition fighters in recent months, expanding a secret airlift of arms and equipment for the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, according to air traffic data, interviews with officials in several countries and the accounts of rebel commanders.
The airlift, which began on a small scale in early 2012 and continued intermittently through last fall, expanded into a steady and much heavier flow late last year, the data shows. It has grown to include more than 160 military cargo flights by Jordanian, Saudi and Qatari military-style cargo planes landing at Esenboga Airport near Ankara, and, to a lesser degree, at other Turkish and Jordanian airports.
From offices at secret locations, American intelligence officers have helped the Arab governments shop for weapons, including a large procurement from Croatia…
Secretary of State John Kerry pressed Iraq on Sunday to do more to halt Iranian arms shipments through its airspace; he did so even as the most recent military cargo flight from Qatar for the rebels landed at Esenboga early Sunday night.
And it’s no wonder that the Iraqi government laughed in Kerry’s face. Why should Iraq respect an arms embargo when Obama Inc helps Qatar violate it, just as it did in Libya?
Most of the cargo flights have occurred since November, after the presidential election in the United States
This is Obama’s new lame duck status showing us who he really is.
via CIA Helping Turkey and Qatar Shop for Arms for Syrian Jihadists.
Concerns that Syria’s stockpile of chemical weapons could reach militant groups bordering Israel and Turkey was the motivating factor in restoring relations with Ankara after a three year rift, Israel’s prime minister said.
Benjamin Netanyahu wrote on his Facebook page Saturday that Israel and Turkey, which border Syria, need to communicate with each other over the Syrian crisis.
“The fact that the crisis in Syria intensifies from moment to moment was the main consideration in my view,” Netanyahu wrote.
Netanyahu phoned his Turkish counterpart Friday and apologized for a botched raid on a Gaza bound flotilla in 2010 that left eight Turks and one Turkish-American dead. Turkey demanded an apology as a condition for restoring ties. Netanyahu had until now refused to apologize, saying Israeli soldiers acted in self-defense after being attacked by activists.
Turkey and Israel were once strong allies but relations began decline after Erdogan, whose party has roots in Turkey’s Islamist movement, became prime minister in 2003. Erdogan has embarked on a campaign to make Turkey a regional powerhouse in an attempt to become the leading voice in the Muslim world, distanced from Israel.
Animosity increased after the flotilla incident and ambassadors were later withdrawn.
Spillover from fighting in Syria’s civil war reaches Israeli communities in the Golan Heights from time to time. Errant mortar shells and machine gun fire have caused damage, sparked fires and spread panic but lead to no injuries so far.
Israel has expressed concern that Syria’s chemical arsenal could fall into the hands of militants like Lebanon’s Hezbollah, an Assad ally, or an al-Qaida-linked group fighting with the rebels.
Netanyahu’s national security adviser, Yaakov Amidror, said the timing was right for reconciling with Turkey. “Between us and Turkey is a country that is falling apart and that has chemical weapons,” he said.
Last week, Syrian rebels and Assad’s government blamed each other for a chemical attack on a village. The U.S. said there was no evidence chemical weapons were used.
The use of such weapons would be a nightmare scenario in the two-year-old conflict that has killed an estimated 70,000 people.
President Barack Obama helped broker the Israeli apology to Turkey. Obama has declared the use, deployment or transfer of the weapons a “red line” for possible military intervention by the U.S. in the Syrian conflict.
via Israel Says Syria Reason for Restoring Turkey Ties – ABC News.
Ghassan Hitto, the Syrian opposition’s newly elected interim prime minister, center right, and head of the Syrian National Coalition for Opposition and Revolutionary Forces Mouaz al-Khatib, center left, and other members seen during a meeting in Istanbul, Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/19/3295208/rebels-pick-us-citizen-as-syrian.html#storylink=cpy
ISTANBUL — The man chosen to head the Syrian opposition’s new interim government is a Syrian-born American citizen who has spent decades in the United States working for technology companies and advocating for various Muslim causes.
Members of the opposition Syrian National Coalition elected Ghassan Hitto in a vote early Tuesday to head an administration they hope will provide an alternative to President Bashar Assad’s regime and help coordinate the fight against his forces.
“The new government will work from the starting point of complete national sovereignty and the unity of the Syrian land and people, which can only by achieved through continued determination to topple Bashar Assad, his regime and all its pillars,” he said in a speech in Istanbul.
Much remains unknown about the body that Hitto will lead, including how many ministers it will have and if it will receive enough support to project its authority inside Syria, where it is supposed to set up operations.
The head of the coalition, Mouaz al-Khatib, threw his support behind the new body, and the head of the coalition’s military leadership, Gen. Salim Idris, did the same Monday before the results were announced.
But the new government could find it difficult to become the top rebel authority in Syria. A patchwork of rebel brigades and local councils has sprung up in areas seized from government forces, many of them struggling to provide services and running their own security, prisons and courts.
Hundreds of loosely affiliated rebels groups are involved in the civil war against government forces, and they are unlikely to submit to an outside authority unless it can provide them with aid such as arms and ammunition.
Due to his many years in the United States, Hitto is little known inside Syria and even among some members of the mostly exile coalition.
Coalition member Salah al-Hamwi, who is in charge of the coalition’s local councils in Hama province, said he had worked with Hitto to deliver aid and was impressed that he had left his life in the U.S. to use his skills for Syria.
“He has the mind of an accountant, not an emotional mind, so he is very good at analyzing what needs to be done,” he said.
Others in the coalition complained of his selection.
Veteran opposition figure Kamal al-Labwani said he suspected Hitto had been put in place by larger political powers, like Qatar, which has heavily financed the opposition, and the Muslim Brotherhood.
He also said he as a coalition member never got to meet or question Hitto before his election.
“I wanted to ask him what the women in Daraya wear and what’s the population of Homs?” he said, suggesting that Hitto was out of touch with Syria.
“I wanted to ask him how many years he’s lived in Syria,” he said. “He left when he was young.”
Hitto won 35 of the 48 votes cast by the coalition’s 63 active members.
In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland welcomed Hitto’s election, saying the U.S. was aware of his aid work.
“This is an individual who, out of concern for the Syrian people, left a very successful life in Texas to go and work on humanitarian relief for the people of his home country,” she said.
She added: “We’re very hopeful that his election will foster unity and cohesion among the opposition.”
Hitto’s many years abroad and fluent English could facilitate his efforts to win international support for his government. He called on the international community on Tuesday to grant his government Syria’s seats at the Arab League and the United Nations.
Hitto was born in Syria’s capital of Damascus in 1963 and moved to the United States as a young man, where he earned double bachelors’ degrees from Purdue University and an MBA from Indiana Wesleyan University, according to the coalition.
He worked for IT companies and advocated for a number of Muslim causes. After 9/11, he helped found the Muslim Legal Fund of America, which provides legal support to Arabs, Muslims and Asians. He also helped run an Islamic private school in Garland, Texas. Its website describes it as a place “where knowledge, faith, academics and character meet!”
Hitto is a member of Syria’s Kurdish ethnic minority, though he is not considered a representative of the community, which has not joined the coalition.
He is married to a teacher and has four children.
In a speech to a rally in Fort Worth, Texas, in 2012, he spoke of his son, Obaida, who was applying to law school when “he made up his mind … to help the people of Syria.” His son has since been in the embattled city of Deir al-Zour, shooting videos to post online.
The elder Hitto left Texas late last year to move to Turkey, where he helped run the coalition’s aid program to Syria.
In the video of the Fort Worth rally, posted online in September, Hitto criticized Assad’s regime for deploying its army to suppress political protests while not sending it to take back the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in 1967 and later annexed.
“They were faced with live bullets, with tanks, with soldiers, an army that did not bother to fire a single bullet to claim or to attempt to reclaim its own occupied land for 42 years,” he said.
Associated Press writer Bradley Klapper contributed reporting from Washington.
via ISTANBUL: Rebels pick US citizen as Syrian prime minister – World Wires – MiamiHerald.com.
By: Mohammad Noureddine Translated from As-Safir (Lebanon)
Demonstrators shout slogans during a protest against the government of Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad, in Istanbul, March 15, 2013. (photo by REUTERS/Osman Orsal )
The Syrian crisis, since its outbreak two years ago, has formed a testbed for Turkey’s foreign policy, in light of all the headlines and theories concerning the relationship between the two countries brought forth during the few years that preceded the crisis.
About This Article
Summary :
Since the beginning of the Syrian crisis, Turkey has sought to topple a regime standing in the way of its own regional hegemony, writes Mohammad Noureddine.
Publisher: As-Safir (Lebanon)
Original Title:
Turkey ‘Losing’ Even if the Syrian Regime Fell
Author: Mohammad Noureddine
First Published: March 15, 2013
Posted on: March 15 2013
Translated by: Kamal Fayad
While initial indications pointed to a change in Ankara’s relationship with Damascus early on in the crisis, the last two years have clearly demonstrated the nature of this transformation. They have revealed the new direction chosen by the Turks, as well as their biases and goals.
One can postulate the following, without any systematic order to the information given:
1. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu reiterated that his country adopted its stance against the Syrian regime only after dozens of visits and many consultations, the last of which occurred in August of 2011. However, Ankara was, in parallel and less than a month after the crisis erupted, working to provide the Syrian political opposition with support, which was transformed later on into military support, as reflected in the formation of the Free Syrian Army (FSA).
2. Regardless of any distances and deadlines, Turkey chose to become a spearhead in the attempt to overthrow the Syrian regime, and served as headquarters for the FSA’s command. The first opposition council, the Syrian National Council (SNC), was also formed in Istanbul. Turkish territory was transformed into a corridor for all types of extremist militants, and a military supply and logistics base to those headed for Syria, according to all documented western reports and press articles.
3. Turkey also became the mastermind behind regional and international efforts to overthrow the Syrian regime; an example of which is Ankara’s brainchild, the Friends of Syria Conference. Furthermore, Turkey fully coordinated with the Arab League in order to isolate Syria and suspend its membership in the group. Turkish diplomacy also expanded great effort in international forums to obtain a Security Council resolution imposing a buffer zone, allowing foreign military intervention, and pressuring Russia and China to change their stance.
4. Turkey put its full weight behind efforts to remove the Syrian regime from both Syrian and regional maps. It raised the slogan of “all or nothing,” and wagered on the Syrian regime quickly falling, as was the case in Egypt, Tunisia and later on Libya. Ankara thus became the timekeeper, setting deadlines for the toppling of the regime, in a psychological attempt to bolster the chances of it actually falling. This one way bet, which did not take into account the possibility of failure, led Turkish diplomacy into an impasse, which drove it to espouse even more extremist views instead of reassessing its calculations.
5. It has become clear that one of the biggest mistakes in Ankara’s policy failure toward Syria was due to a lack of foresight by Turkish foreign policy theorists, and their inability to correctly read the state of Syrian internal affairs and the country’s balance of power. Ankara also failed to properly take into consideration Syria’s regional position and role, as well as Russia and China’s foreign policy leanings, the battle to shape the balance of the new world order, and Syria’s importance in that battle. The strength of the regime’s position both internally and abroad thus slipped Turkish leaders’ minds.
6. As a result, risks materialized that Turkey did not expect; first among them being the rise of sectarian tensions between Sunnis and Alawites inside Turkey, the increase in military confrontations with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), in addition to the emergence of a new Kurdish dynamic in the north of Syria, which formed the basis for Turkish threats to militarily enter Syrian territory in order to neutralize the Kurdish menace.
7. One of the most earth-shattering results was the rapid disintegration of Davutoglu’s “Zero Problems” policy, which was adopted by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and barely lasted a few years. Turkey’s stance vis-à-vis Syria led to a deterioration of its relations with all neighboring countries, starting with Syria, Iraq, Iran, some Lebanese factions, and all the way to Russia.
8. The Syrian crisis revealed the presence of double standards within Turkey. Ankara subsequently explained its Zero Problems slogan as having to do with peoples and not regimes; yet this slogan was never raised in support of the Bahraini people’s revolt.
9. It has become evident that Turkey’s foreign policy aimed, through its desire to topple the Syrian regime, to kill several birds with one stone. The first aim was to transform Turkey into the preeminent player on the regional scene. Ankara believed that overthrowing the Syrian regime would pave the way toward weakening the Iraqi regime in preparation for it also being toppled, which would be followed by a strike against Hezbollah in Lebanon, after which the Iranian Islamic revolution would be more easily contained and the Iranian regional role greatly reduced. Davutoglu’s speech in front of the Turkish Parliament on Apr. 27, 2012, was very important to understanding Ankara’s desire to monopolize power in the region at the expense of all Arab partners.
The second aim behind toppling the Syrian regime was to pave the way toward the reestablishment of the Ottoman-Seljuk empire that Erdogan never stops talking about, and cannot deny because his speeches were documented in sight and sound on a large number of occasions.
10. Ankara committed an unforgivable sin when it painted itself as part of the Sunni axis in the region, thus negating all the slogans characterizing the Turkish political model as being secular and democratic. The ideological, ethnic and sectarian motives behind the Turkish role also came to light in its differentiation between factions of the Syrian opposition. It embraced the Islamic movements affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, while shunning secular and Kurdish factions inside and outside Syria.
11. The Syrian crisis also drove Turkey closer to NATO, giving the latter an opportunity to deploy its missile defense system and then the Patriot system on Turkish soil. Turkish officials began considering their country’s border to be an extension of the borders of other NATO countries. Turkey unprecedentedly began favoring its affiliation with NATO over any other consideration, including the fact that it is an Eastern, Muslim country. This, in itself, was an important and dangerous transformation that no other Turkish regime in history ever attained.
12. Turkey sacrificed all previous relationships with its neighbors and destroyed the trust upon which these neighboring countries relied to accept past Turkish policies of openness towards the Syrian crisis. Turkey thus took on the guise of a country that interfered in the internal affairs of others, by demanding the resignation of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, and effectively participating in efforts to overthrow the Syrian regime.
The Zero Problems policy was therefore transformed into the policy of overthrowing any regime with which Turkey did not agree. This too was a dangerous development in the Turkish role, which, in the past, drove it to be contented with allying itself with the West and Israel, only to now become a party to the internal conflicts of all nations.
13. The Syrian regime’s survival will be deemed an abject failure of the policies espoused by the ruling Turkish Justice and Development Party. This is the reason for the latter’s unprecedented intensity in trying to prevent any compromise being reached with the regime and inciting against dialogue and for the continuation and intensification of military confrontations.
Despite that, the regime’s overthrow, if it did occur, would not be viewed as a victory for Turkey. For the matter goes beyond the survival of this or that regime to encompass the relationship and future of Turkey vis-à-vis the social, religious, sectarian, and ethnic components of society in the region. This relationship cannot be restored when one takes into account the events that transpired and the continued rule of the Justice and Development Party. The loss of confidence and the return of suspicion between Turkey and its immediate environs (as a result of the Syrian crisis), and between it and the outlying Arab world (Saudi, Emirati and other nations’ resentment for Turkey’s support to the Muslim Brotherhood regimes in Egypt and Tunisia) will form the biggest obstacle to Turkey recovering its natural place in the Orient.
Turkish soldiers block a road to Cilvegozu border gate near the town of Reyhanli on the Turkish-Syrian border in Hatay province, Feb. 11, 2013. (photo by REUTERS/Umit Bektas)
The legend goes that the Prophet Muhammad came all the way to the walls of Damascus, saw the luscious landscape and refused to enter the city, uttering “you can only enter paradise once.” Once you make a decision to intervene in another country, it is a game changer. This applies to Turkey’s Syria policy.
About This Article
Summary :
Turkey needs an exit strategy from Syria, writes Pinar Tremblay.
Author: Pinar Tremblay
Posted on : March 14 2013
The easiest answer to the question of what Turkey wants in Syria would be what any country wants from another:to cooperate with it and the region in a stable manner. Turkey and Syria already had a mutually beneficial friendship, to the point that Turks have decided to demand more benefits from this relationship. I am convinced that Turks want a Syria which would produce not more, but different benefits. Turkey is struggling to undo the damages of the Iraq war, hoping that if Iraq could be reversed from Sunni-minority rule to a Shia-dominant rule strong influence from Iran in the post-US pullout, Syria could evolve from Alawite-minority rule to a Sunni-majority rule with a deep Turkish influence.
Put bluntly, the conditions for Turkish objectives to be realized in Syria are the elimination of the Assad regime, its replacement by an Ikhwan (Syrian Muslim Brotherhood)-dominated government, good separation if not a total break from Iranian influence and a commitment to an alliance with Turkish leadership in the region, which will make certain demands on not only Israel but also Iran. If these objectives are achieved, Turkish power will expand well into Syria. As promising as this may sound, it gets messy as soon as we start questioning the meaning of certain terms.
Let’s start with the first condition, the removal of al-Assad regime. For the anti-Assad coalition, we can include the EU, the US, Jordan, Israel, Lebanon’s March 14 Bloc and GCC countries, mostly Saudi and Qatar. Going into the third year of civil war, the regime has been much more persistent than many pundits predicted. A few crucial factors contribute to this: a strong and still-loyal army, the regime’s much ignored expertise in puppeteering different armed and non-armed groups, multiple countries involved with different goals and different degrees of support to the many factions. The Syrian regime still seems to have a better handle on intelligence gathering and analysis than others. I utilize the concept of factionalism, rather than sectarianism, for the opposition groups because divisions go beyond sectarian lines in Syria. Hence, overlooking these factions may indeed invite further escalation of the conflict. Hazem al-Amine has highlighted the fragility of the relationship between anti-Assad coalition and Syrian opposition very eloquently.
The next condition, breaking Syrian dependence on Iran — or curtailing Iranian influence on Syrian politics — also has some allure to the anti-Assad coalition. Yet the devil is indeed in details. While wishing for a Syria not imbued with Hezbollah and Iranian policies, the US would prefer not to see Syria fall into the hands of jihadists. Who would want Sinaization of the Golan Heights, especially when there is no central government to keep it in check? Here, Turkey proves to be a wild card.
So far, Turkey has deepened its relations with Hamas and many of the other Islamists groups in Gaza. Should we expect to see further fighting between Ikhwani and jihadi groups? Would a Syria under Ikhwan be a land more welcoming to armed groups? Would they be allowed to generate trouble on the Israeli border? If this scenario unfolds, wouldn’t Turkey and Israel clash in the power vacuum left behind the civil war?
Hence, leading from behind, the US government has to ensure all involved parties, particularly neighbors of Syria, continue to cooperate with the mission of UN Special Representative Lakhdar Brahimi. The question of what shade of Sunni power under the vague umbrella of the “Friends of Syria” Turkey would like to see in Syria is a tricky one. Semih Idiz explained the intricacies of this quandary in his piece for al Monitor on March 12.
Right now, we can provide the generic answer of Ikhwan. Yet it is hard to gauge whether the post-civil war Syrian Ikhwan would be still in admiration of the Turkish Justice and Deveopment Party. The longer the civil war lasts, the more difficult it will be to predict the evolution of Ikhwan and other groups in Syria. Turkey has taken some missteps, making a re-evaluation of policy is essential. Andrew Parasiliti warned about some of these wrong steps as early as October. There is no guarantee that a Sunni or Arab government would not fall under the influence of Iran, with Hamas being one of the examples. With such a fragmented opposition, the quest for stability will be challenging.
Taking all these into consideration, here are a couple of steps the Turkish government may take for damage control:
Find ways to shorten the civil war. For example, lessen the anti-Assad rhetoric for a smoother transition period in Syria. A civil war is not a winner-take-all game if the players can negotiate a credible cease-fire. Keeping communication channels open with Iran and Russia and encouraging the opposition to compromise with the regime can help.
Strengthen Turkish-Syrian border security. Such a porous border can produce several layers of vulnerability. If penetrations from Syria to Turkey are not better scrutinized, major attacks will be inevitable in the near future. Careful vetting of the rebels is crucial, but insufficient with that high-risk border. I would not suggest a buffer zone, due to lack of international support for the idea and the Israeli experience in Lebanon between 1985 and 1990.
Accept and adapt to the recent condition of having another “weak state” on the border. Although a “weak state” might initially sound advantageous in realpolitik, it serves as an additional liability. Turkey needs to understand that it cannot solve Syria’s civil war alone. Therefore, Turkey must accept the undesirable task of managing the Syrian civil war with a focus on fragmented factions, rather than sectarian concerns. At the end of the civil war, Ikhwan might not be what Turkey prefers.
Prepare an exit plan. Turkey may never enter Syria with an official army, but the proxy war requires an end as well. An ambiguous Turkish presence in Syria cannot be sustained for long without serious payback. For example, a jihadist group may turn into a strategic issue for the southern border a decade later. Best to avoid grand words and grand approaches, which will most likely backfire.
In sum, Turkey has taken a major leap of faith in its foreign policy toward Syria. If its objective is to establish a regime that can cooperate smoothly, Turkey must first actively evaluate its own objectives. A well-managed crisis always presents good opportunities. The legend of Damascus says that you can only enter paradise once, yet it is wise to assume hell has wide-open gates.
Pinar Tremblay is a PhD candidate at UCLA in political science and an adjunct faculty member at Cal Poly Pomona. She has previously been published in the Hurriyet Daily News and Today’s Zaman. Follow her on Twitter: @pinartremblay.
Turkey’s interior minister blamed Syria’s intelligence agencies and its army for involvement in a car bombing at a border crossing last month that killed 14 people, after he announced Monday that police detained five suspects.
Four Syrians and a Turk are in custody in connection with the Feb. 11 attack at the Bab al-Hawa frontier post. No one has claimed responsibility, but a Syrian opposition faction accused the Syrian government of the bombing, saying it narrowly missed 13 leaders of the group.
Interior Minister Muammer Guler told reporters two of the detained, including a woman, are suspected of having carried out the attack, while a third is believed to have organized the bombing. The other suspects are thought to have “aided and abetted” the bombers. One other suspect is still at large, Guler said.
Guler said the suspects were linked to Syria’s intelligence agencies and its army.
“We have determined that they were in contact with the Syrian intelligence and army,” Guler said. “But of course, this will come to light during the trial.”
The detained were to be questioned by a court to face formal arrest and charges. Guler said three other people were also quizzed by police but released after questioning.
Guler said two of the suspects had escaped to Syria and were “brought” to Turkey. He did not say if Syrian rebels, backed by Turkey, were involved in their return.
The frontier area has seen heavy fighting between Syrian rebels and government forces during the nearly two-year-old civil war.
via Turkey Links Syria to Deadly Car Bombing at Border – ABC News.
