tabatha
tabatha's JournalResponses
The "six generals" are never actually identified?Because they are fearful for their families, etc.
Scud missiles used for local bombardment? Not when mortars, howitzers, and tank gunnery as well as Katyusha type rockets will do.
"Syria is known to possess Scud-B, Frog-7 and two hundred SS-21 (120km/480kg) missiles purchased from the Soviet Union."
Lieutenant Omar Al-Homsy from Farouk Battalion explaining the reasons for withdrawing and talking about how the Assad Army used Scud missiles in their attacks against Baba Amr.
And Sunni al-Qaeda is unrelated to Shiite Iran and Allawite Syrian governments. It is Saudi Arabian and Egyptian in origin!
Where was that stated? All that was stated was that Iran supported Al Qaeda in Iraq. It did.
"Al Qaeda and its affiliate, al Qaeda in Iraq, are among the terrorist groups supported by the MOIS, which is Iran's chief intelligence agency."
"A terrorist in Iraq linked to Al-Qaeda has also admitted that Iran is supporting Al-Qaeda with weapons and money, and says that he personally has dispatched terrorists to Iraq via Syria, also implicating that country (which is an ally of Iran)."
Check your claims first before posting.
Syrian Army 'Bombed Bridges Used By Refugees Fleeing Into Lebanon'
The Syrian government has bombed bridges as they were being crossed by wounded refugees fleeing from Homs to Lebanon, activists have reported. According to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), the al-Qusayr bridge in Homs was bombed on Tuesday.
"[The bridge] is used by refugees and the wounded fleeing to Lebanon," said Rami Abdel Rahman of SOHR, to the AFP news agency.
The Avaaz activist network quoted an activist known a Ahmed in the town of Alqaseer as saying another bridge near to the Lebanese border had been bombed. He said: "Snipers are shooting at anyone they see. The military is tightening its hold over the city.
"Two days ago they bombed a bridge that connects the Alqaseer areas with other western areas. The army also shelled another bridges in the village of Rabla. "All access is blocked off and more checkpoints are being erected. Any person is arrested and movement is increasingly difficult."
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/03/06/syria-refugees-bombed-crossing-into-lebanon_n_1323290.html?just_reloaded=1
English Speakers to Help The Syrian Revolution
Whichever way this ends.... the tens of thousands of men who started out as criminals and turned from sociopaths to psychopaths... revealed in the horrors perpetrated every day, are a massive problem for the future Syrian Government and society. Psychologically there are now dangerously damaged 'people' .... as is seen to this day in Germany, with communities which still have very high levels of rape that can be traced back through decades... and the massively high murder, rape and crime rates seen in South Africa. That this needed to be ended months ago, back in July and August is an indictment on the International Community for lack of action over months.... the increasing trail of destruction was completely predictable from this barbarous government response that has no basis in humanity and constantly bases itself on lies, with little reference to reality, ..... beware all those countries that think stability is autocratic dictatorship....check the murder rates, particularly of girl babies, in China.... The lessons of Syria that must be learned date a long way back, and early warning signals must be seen and acted on by the international community if we are ever to get to NEVER AGAIN. Sadly, two prime candidates for this collapse of humanity are permanent members of the UNSC.
http://www.facebook.com/ENGSPK
Libya is not a failed state in-waiting
As it happens, knowing that fellow Libyans intervened to stop these men from causing further damage, and recognising just how strongly people in Libya will feel about this incident (the chief mufti has already appeared on television condemning the attacks and declaring them in contravention of Islam) it is not inconceivable that the perpetrators will be caught and brought to justice.
...
Having spent a fortnight in the country last month, I can say with some certainty that Libya is not collapsing. On the contrary, for a country less than six months on from the end of a war that ended one of the most regressive and eccentric dictatorships in recent memory, Libya is doing very well indeed.
...
It is important to recognise just how widespread the desire of Libya’s people to see their revolution succeed actually is. Not only that, but this desire is accompanied by a strong sense of collective ownership that is compelling Libyans to take responsibility for the success or otherwise of their country’s transition to democratic rule. This country has just fought a war for its freedom and there is virtually no desire to start another one, amongst militia or anybody else.
http://tweepforum.ly/featured/libya-is-not-a-failed-state-in-waiting/
BP settles while Macondo 'seeps'
New Orleans, LA - As BP settles out of court for the first phase of thousands of lawsuits that could cost the company tens of billions of dollars, Al Jazeera has spotted a large oil sheen near the infamous Macondo 252 well.
In September 2011, Al Jazeera spotted a large swath of silvery oil sheen located roughly 19km northeast of the now-capped well.
But now, on February 29, Al Jazeera conducted another over-flight of the area and found a larger area of sea covered in oil sheen in the same location.
"This is the same crescent shaped area of oil and sheen I've been seeing here since the middle of last August," Bonny Schumaker, president and pilot of On Wings of Care, told Al Jazeera while flying over the oil.
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2012/03/20123313318459762.html
It was ordered by Gaddafi. There are documents to prove it.
Libya rebel leader: I have evidence Gaddafi ordered Lockerbie
The former Libya justice minister says he has documents that implicate Colonel Gaddafi personally in the Lockerbie bombing.
n an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the head of the provisional rebel government in Benghazi and Libya’s former justice minister, said he had evidence of Gaddafi's involvement in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie.
"The orders were given by Gaddafi himself," he told Rob Crilly.
Mr Abel Jalil claimed he had evidence that convicted bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi worked for Gaddafi.
"This evidence is in our hands and we have documents that prove what I have said and we are ready to hand them over to the international criminal court," he added.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/8380133/Libya-rebel-leader-I-have-evidence-Gaddafi-ordered-Lockerbie.html
Gaddafi was happy to have someone else be the scapegoat.
'HORRIFIED' BY SON-IN-LAW BASHAR AL ASSAD
THE LONDON-based father-in-law of Syrian President Bashar al Assad last night begged him to make democratic changes to his strife-torn country “before it’s too late”.
Harley Street cardiologist Dr Fawaz Akhras, says he is “horrified” by his son-in-law’s savage suppression of the uprising in Syria which has cost the lives of at least 7,000 ordinary civilians. As Syrian troops renewed their ferocious bombardment of the city of Homs he revealed for the first time that he has been quietly pushing for reform since before the revolution began last March.
Dr Akhras, admits he is also fearful for the safety of his British-born daughter Asma, 36, who married Assad 12 years ago. There are rumours that she is being kept under virtual house arrest in Damascus by the president’s henchmen who fear she might attempt to leave the country – a move that would severely damage the regime.
Dr Fawaz refuses to discuss the worsening situation in public, but he has told friends in the British Syrian Society he is now in an “impossible position”, caught between family loyalty and worldwide condemnation of the increasing brutality of his son-in-law’s regime.
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/305864/-Horrified-by-son-in-law-Bashar-al-Assad
U.S. officials: Iran is stepping up lethal aid to Syria
Posted on March 3, 2012 by t2994
By: Joby Warrick and Liz Sly
U.S. officials say they see Iran’s hand in the increasingly brutal crackdown on opposition strongholds in Syria, including evidence of Iranian military and intelligence support for government troops accused of mass executions and other atrocities in the past week.
Three U.S. officials with access to intelligence reports from the region described a spike in Iranian-supplied arms and other aid for Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad at a time when the regime is mounting an unprecedented offensive to crush resistance in the key city of Homs.
“The aid from Iran is increasing, and is increasingly focused on lethal assistance,” said one of the officials, insisting on anonymity to discuss intelligence reports from the region.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-officials-iran-is-stepping-up-lethal-aid-to-syria/2012/03/02/gIQAGR9XpR_story.html
Assad Threatens Israel With Missiles if Syria is Attacked
Syrian President Bashar Assad has ordered the heads of his military to hit Israel with a barrage of missiles should there be any foreign intervention in Syria, a Jordanian news website reported on Saturday.
According to the site, Our Country’s News, Assad gave the order in a secret meeting with the heads of the Syrian army last Thursday, in light of his fear of a U.S. military strike in Syria.
The report said that Assad ordered that if any military action is started against Syria, the Syrian army should respond by firing missiles in Israel, with a particular emphasis on Israeli military airports.
The report added that an operations room has been opened in Damascus and that it is continuously manned by officers from Syria and Iran, as well as by Hizbullah terrorists, all of whom coordinate their military operations in the event of external military intervention in Syria.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/153392#.T1LdEIcgeQl
What Russia taught Syria: When you destroy a city, make sure no one -- not even the story - gets out
I made my call. It was short. Then the commander made a call; he quickly hung up and handed me back the phone. "Enough," he said, motioning for me to remove the battery.
As we walked briskly back to the safe house, it was exactly 10 minutes before the cascade of double wa-whumps announced the Grad rocket batteries pounding the vacant neighborhood we had just left.
It was December 1999, and the Russian assault on Grozny was unfolding in all its gruesome detail. After the dissolution of so much of the former Soviet empire, Chechnya was one country that the newly minted prime minister, Vladimir Putin, refused to let go of. His boss, Boris Yeltsin, and the Russian army had been defeated and then humiliated in the media by Chechen forces in the first war. Five years later, Russia was back. And Putin's new strategy was unbending: silence, encircle, pulverize, and "cleanse." It was a combination of brutal tactics -- a Stalinist purge of fighting-age males plus Orwellian propaganda that fed Russians a narrative wherein Chechen freedom fighters were transformed into Islamist mercenaries and terrorists. More than 200,000 civilians were to die in this war, the echoes of which continue to this day.
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Russia has spent a long time perfecting these techniques. On April 21, 1996, Chechnya's breakaway president, Dzhokhar Dudayev, was speaking on a satellite phone with Russian envoy Konstantin Borovoi about setting peace talks with Yeltsin. During the phone call, he was killed by a signal-guided missile fired from a Russian jet fighter. The warplane had received Dudayev's coordinates from a Russian ELINT (electronic intelligence) plane that had picked up and locked on to the signal emitted by the satellite phone. It was Russian deception and brutality at its finest.
... Flash forward to Syria today.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/03/02/kill_the_messenger?page=full
London Review of Books - Syrian Notebooks - Jonathan Littell
I would pass the town hall many times, a large four-storey building in the Soviet style, its windows smashed, sandbags on its roof to protect sniper nests. Until recently, the snipers fired regularly into the streets, especially at night. After an assault the FSA managed to enter it and signed an agreement with the commander; his men have remained quiet since then. In fact, the FSA travelled freely throughout the town, sometimes in pick-up trucks armed with heavy machine guns, with the insignia of the al-Faruk katiba, the unit in charge of the zone, on their doors. Every night, when civilians gathered in the street to protest against the regime, dozens of armed FSA soldiers positioned themselves at the crossroads to protect them. ‘We rarely intervene,’ an officer I met the next day, with a dozen of his men in a farm outside the hamlet, explained. ‘The checkpoints stay in place, and they don’t bother us. We only attack when the regular army attempts an operation.’
...
What is especially striking is the political intelligence of ordinary Syrians involved in the revolt. Abu Abdo, one of our drivers, asked us, ‘So, have you seen the Salafi here, as Bashar says?’ ‘That depends,’ Mani replied. ‘What do you mean by “Salafi”?’ ‘Exactly. The word means two things. The Muslims of Syria follow the way of moderation, and to live correctly they have to follow the example of a pious ancestor. That is the original meaning of the word. The other, which implies the Takfiri, jihadist, terrorist movement, is a creation of the Americans and Israelis. That has nothing to do with us.’ Later on, during a long break at a farm, he would show himself to be very critical of the opposition parties: ‘Today, unlike Hama in 1982, it’s the people that’s rising up. The Muslim Brotherhood, the Communists, the Salafi and the other political movements are running to catch up with it and climb up on its shoulders. But the Syrians in the street refuse the politicisation of the movement. They accept help from wherever it comes, but that help can’t have strings attached. The streets reacted to reaction to oppression and humiliation; they didn’t demand any particular political option. The Syrian people were raised as if in a hen house: you have the right to eat, sleep, lay eggs, and that’s it. There’s no room for thought. It’s the North Korea of the Middle East.’
...
At the end of the demonstration, dozens of young people surrounded me, trying out their four words of English. They all showed me their scars, their bruises, their electrical burns, or where bullets or shrapnel had struck. The brother of one of them had been killed by a sniper as he was crossing the street, the mother of another by a shell; everyone wanted to tell everything, right away. They were waving their mobile phones: ‘Shouf, shouf, look!’ A corpse mottled with torture marks, another with its skull smashed in, in yet another the camera lingered on each wound, gaping holes in the groin, the leg, the chest, the throat. Wherever we went, it was the same. In an emergency clinic in al-Khaldiye, in the northern part of the city, the smartphone of a young nurse appeared even before tea did: on the screen, a man is dying in the hands of a doctor who is trying to intubate him on the ground, at the foot of the sofa I was sitting on. He was a taxi driver; he was hit in the face by a bullet and is lying in an immense pool of blood, his brain pouring onto the floor. ‘You see the hands, there?’ the nurse said. ‘That’s me.’ She went on to the next video, the tea arrived, I drank it without taking my eyes off the little screen. Every mobile phone in Homs is a museum of horrors.
http://www.lrb.co.uk/2012/03/01/jonathan-littell/syrian-notebooks
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