Iran
Unprecedented maneuvers in Strait of Hormuz
With two US warships headed for Libya, 25 nations led by the US are converging on the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz for naval maneuvers on an unprecedented scale.
Tag: Syria
North Africa
The left and the jihad: love-hate relationship?
"Leftists" in the West are waxing paranoid about how the Syrian revolutionaries are a bunch of jihadists. But if the West intervenes in Mali, they will likely be rooting for jihadists—again.
Iran
Syria: flashpoint for war with Iran?
With Tehran revealed to be supplying Damascus with arms through Iraqi airspace, events in Syria could be propelling the US towards unprecedented military commitments.
Greater Middle East
Syria: 1.2 million displaced, 3 million face hunger
Aid workers protest that while media reports on Syria focus on the political stalemate, a humanitarian crisis grows, with over a million displaced and 3 million facing hunger.
Greater Middle East
Aleppo archbishop flees as Syria slips towards sectarian war
The Melkite Catholic archbishop of Aleppo flees Syria after his offices are sacked by jihadists—as the US State Department establishes an Istanbul office to aid the Syrian rebels.
Greater Middle East
Syrian anarchist speaks
The British anarcho-syndicalist website Solidarity Federation runs a statement from a representative of a “group of young Syrian anarchists and anti-authoritarians from Aleppo.”
Greater Middle East
UN: Syria government has committed war crimes
Syrian forces and their supporting Shabbiha fighters have committed “war crimes and gross violations of international human rights and humanitarian law,” a UN report finds.
Greater Middle East
Syria moves towards sectarian war; Turkey next?
As urban warfare rages in Damascus and Aleppo, rebel gunmen abducted 47 Iranian pilgrims outside the capital—and a mob attack on Alawites was reported in Turkey.
Greater Middle East
AI: Syria forces guilty of crimes against humanity
Amnesty International published a report holding the Syrian government responsible for human rights violations in Aleppo that AI claims amount to crimes against humanity.
Palestine
Syria: Palestinians caught between both sides
Palestinian refugees at the Yarmouk camp in Damascus have joined the Syrian uprising. But Palestinian militants backed by the regime are targeted by the rebels for assassination.
Greater Middle East
mosque147
Talk about strange bedfellows! This week witnessed the surreal spectacle of US National Security Adviser John Bolton, the most bellicose neoconservative in the Trump administration, visiting Turkey to try to forestall an Ankara attack radical-left, anarchist-leaning Kurdish fighters that the Pentagon has been backing to fight ISIS in Syria. "We don't think the Turks ought to undertake military action that's not fully coordinated with and agreed to by the United States," Bolton told reporters. Refering to the Kurdish YPG militia, a Turkish presidential spokesman responded: "That a terror organization cannot be allied with the US is self-evident." Bolton left Turkey without meeting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who then publicly dissed the National Security Adviser's stance as a "serious mistake." YPG spokesman Nuri Mahmud, in turn, shot back: "Turkey, which has been a jihadist safe-haven and passage route to Syria since the beginning of the conflict, has plans to invade the region end destroy the democracy created by blood of sons and daughters of this people." (Photo: ANF)
Greater Middle East
mosque110
US officials say the timetable for Donald Trump's withdrawal of all 2,000 troops from Syria has been extended from 30 days to four months. The statements came a day after Trump met with his ally Sen. Lindsay Graham, a critic of the withdrawal order, who was apparently instrumental in getting the president to blink—amid the predictable irruption of blustering and face-saving tweets. This may apply some brakes to Turkish preparations to cross the border to expunge the revolutionary Kurdish forces in northern Syria's autonomous zone of Rojava. Residents of the Rojava town of Kobane, near the border, have launched a "human shield" encampment to block any incursion by Turkish forces. At the border village of Qeremox, the unarmed encampment was organized by Kobane's autonomous administration, and has been joined by international supporters. (Photo of Kobani women at the Qeremox encampment via ANF)