Syria - Please Do What You Can Now to Halt this Rush to War

[Independent]

I can; peace in Syria. All this is just a carefully arranged diversion

Obviously peace would be better but that's above and beyond the chemical weapons issue and whether or not the US should intervene. Can you imagine a better outcome to the chemical weapons issue specifically?

Not sure how anyone except Russia and Iran could make peace happen - but everyone wastes time talking about America, a minor player in this crisis with no plausible means at their disposal to bring peace.

I find it staggeringly unlikely that the chemical weapons attacks, followed by this diplomacy, were planned from the start. Events have unfolded in a far from predictable way and the US/UK might easily have gone to war before the Russian deal was ever put on the table. Imagine sitting down a year ago and planning all that - no one would dream that such a complex chain of events could be predicted.

Also, if this is a US plan, why have they made themselves look so bad? Where's the political advantage?

 

[Independent]

Independent, if I haven't made myself clear by now, I've apparently lost all ability to communicate whatsoever

Ok, I just read further back at your earlier posts. You question whether it really was a chemical weapons attack - however, events have moved on and even Assad and Russia seem to accept it was now (they just say it was the rebels).

More importantly you suggest that this is a US conspiracy in order to build an oil pipeline. You offer no evidence except referring to Royal Dutch Shell's interest in the region. I guess you might try to refer to Afghanistan - which of course is another non existent pipeline of which not one metre was ever laid, or ever attempted.

How you can manage to make this idea work with the course of the Syrian war over the last 2 years I can't imagine. As usual, it requires truly divine levels of control and influence over countries and populations where the Us seems to have minimal presence and leverage.

Contrary to what you think, I'm not opposed to conspiracy theories in principle. I don't care if it's true. Why should I? If there really is a secret elite controlling the world, then that means there's a chance they will be overthrown, so the world will be a better place. What's not to like about that? It would mean the world is capable of a huge leap forward in justice and quality of life in a way i never previously imagined. Why should I refuse to accept that, when it's to my advantage?

My issue is I just don't believe the evidence put forward, which is way beyond credibility. I wish it were true, but i can't just pretend. All these theories pick bits and pieces of hsitory and ignore the rest.

So far the US has been notable by its absence in Syria. Yet everyone obsesses about the details of their non activity, whilst ignoring the central and negative role of Russia and Iran. America has been a minor player throughout this crisis and, after the disarmament offer, may well remain so.

Isn't that a good thing? Isn't it a good thing that the use of chemical weapons is being abandoned? What's not to like about this development? If you think the US wants to invade Syria, how does this make that more likely?

 

[IAmZamzam]

You see? There you go--lumping me in with people who believe in a secret elite controlling the world. It's all or nothing. You simply cannot differentiate in your mind between "conspiracy theorists" and the merely distrustful who recognize that the government has a tendency to lie. Did I or did I not say, "I don't claim to know whether or not the video is true"? I was throwing it out there. I wouldn't have needed to had so many people not made such an irritatingly huge issue out of acting like it was more relevant than it was who was behind the attack. I didn't care then and I don't care now. I wasn't proposing control over the course of the whole conflict then and I'm not proposing it now. (Not to mention that you completely ignored half of the points in my original post, making it look like everything hinges on that pipeline. Or would anyone deny that the world's oil is getting extremely limited? I wasn't aware that sources were necessary at this point.)

Profitability. Taking advantage of a good thing. Looking out for number one. This is the name of the game, and it always has been. The recent enormous pressure from Congress and from the American people has forced the situation to cool off a bit when before Obama and Kerry were both flip-flopping like crazy but still overall dropping unreasonable deadlines and belligerent words like there was no tomorrow (of which I gave one of the worst and clearest examples, which you shrugged off with a "who cares" before having the gall to speak of people ignoring evidence), and you somehow twist this around and use it as a sign that the government truly does want peace after all. Is there any point in speaking to you??

P.S. I said that the situation has cooled off a bit. I didn't say that we were in the clear. It disturbs me just how much optimism is beginning to emerge around the net. Including from you.

 

[Independent]

I wasn't proposing control over the course of the whole conflict then and I'm not proposing it now.

Good - but it's hard to tell from what you've posted.

you shrugged off with a "who cares"

i was principally making a comment about chemical weapons disarmament - not the conflict in general, or possible wider motivations. The consequence of Kerry's remark has been to spur Russia into proposing a disarmament deal which, with luck, could actually go through. In this context it truly does not matter what Kerry was thinking or what he wanted, which neither of us can tell anyway - the result is what matters, in a conflict where very few positive things happen.

somehow twist this around and use it as a sign that the government truly does want peace after all

You'd certainly have to twist it a long way to suggest the opposite.

Profitability. Taking advantage of a good thing. Looking out for number one. This is the name of the game, and it always has been.

As this is the same for absolutely everyone involved it doesn't get us very far as an insight.

For once something good is about to happen. I don't care if Assad is just trying to get himself off the hook, it's still good. Entirely unexpectedly, it looks like the use of chemical weapons could be on the retreat not just in Syria but worldwide. This is a big issue, isn't it?

 

[IAmZamzam]

I don't get it, Independent. If you're willing to acknowledge that it's all about profitability, taking advantage of a good thing and looking out for number one for all of these people, including the American politicians, what's so farcical and fantastical about the notion about them having had militant and ulterior motives from the start? Or were you intending to play the old "take the other guy's own words and turn them around to mean the opposite of what he intends" game? It's more profitable for them to do what you think they're doing et cetera? Should I have gone for a less potentially ambiguous choice of words on the spur of the moment than "taking advantage of a good thing"?

And what is this about how "the use of chemical weapons could be on the retreat not just in Syria but worldwide"? Perhaps someday some event will trigger that, but I fail to see the connection with this, even if the event is what it appears to be. Besides...

http://www.jpost.com/Defense/Report-CIA-believes-Israel-acquired-chemical-weapons-decades-ago-325706

Mind you, I can't necessarily vouch for the factuality of that either but I'm interested in how (not quite so much if) you'll argue to the contrary. Is it not true? Is it somehow not relevant again? I hope you'll believe me when I say that I respect you more than it probably looks at the moment. You're often willing to stick up for the little guy when someone's being discrimated against and you seem to have an open mind in most respects, I think. But every now and then we run into a curious roadblock, and I'd like to know what's at the root of it.

 

[Independent]

If you're willing to acknowledge that it's all about profitability, taking advantage of a good thing and looking out for number one for all of these people, including the American politicians, what's so farcical and fantastical about the notion about them having had militant and ulterior motives from the start?

it would depend on each situation - but the most common reason that makes me sceptical is simple practicality. Very often, these interpretations require the most fantastic prior insight, together with control not just of individuals who are often enemies not allies, but also entire populations. Yet mysteriously, there are many other situations abroad and at home where they seem to have no control whatsoever. If they can magic up an uprising in Egypt, why not Afghanistan? Why is American domestic politics so chaotic?

THIS IS JUST TOO HARD. Only a divine being could exercise that kind of control.

My whole experience of life working with innumerable large companies and organisations screams at me that such perfect control is absolutely impossible. I have seen that incompetence and error is at least as powerful a determinant of events as skill and perfection of execution. I see companies credited with clever strategies, or feared for their control, when I know from the inside that it was a complete cock up from beginning to end.

It absolutely cannot be done in the way that many conspiracy theories or other accounts describe. And if if they were lucky enough to pull it off once, they could never do it time after time.

I fail to see the connection with this, even if the event is what it appears to be. Besides...

http://www.jpost.com/Defense/Report-CIA-believes-Israel-acquired-chemical-weapons-decades-ago-325706

Mind you, I can't necessarily vouch for the factuality of that either but I'm interested in how (not quite so much if) you'll argue to the contrary. Is it not true?

I don't know anything about this possible Israeli weapons facility, as described in your link. But i certainly think it could be true and would entirely fit with israel's need for a ultimate deterrent, in the time before they had nuclear weapons.

And what is this about how "the use of chemical weapons could be on the retreat not just in Syria but worldwide"?

There are several reasons I say this. Firstly, Syria itself is less likely to use such weapons once it has signed the Treaty and begins to destroy its stockpiles. But the significance is wider than that because it says to the world that the use of such weapons can turn the world against you and bring retribution. Assad very nearly turned a war he was winning into a losing situation. And for what - killing a few hundred civilians with minimal military benefit. Self interest, as you describe, would argue against using such weapons in the future.

A precedent has been set whereby the use of chemical weapons did not pay. This is the first time that's happened. In the past, when chemical weapons were used by Saddam, or further back in WW!, they did pay.

For that reason I think it could contribute to a decline in chemical weapons worldwide, especially since most countries have already long since rejected them.

 

[سيف الله]

Salaam

A fast moving situation. I didn't expect the Assad to give up his chemical weapons. After all nothing will stop the USA from bombing Syria in the future (they'll just dream up another pretext) and they'll be sure that there will be no credible response.

This video will help you get up to speed with current events.

Another comment piece, focusing on the liberal ideology that is constructed to justify Western 'interventions'. There is an interesting editorial in the Guardian International Order: drifting without an anchor. They realise that 'democracy promotion' and 'state building' are 'debased currencies' so they have to construct a new ideology to justify western interventionism. Old wine new bottles as they say.

This time it's Syria, last time it was Iraq

John Pilger, 10 September 2013.

Obama chose to accept the entire Pentagon of the Bush era: its wars and war crimes.

On my wall is the Daily Express front page of September 5 1945 and the words: "I write this as a warning to the world." So began Wilfred Burchett's report from Hiroshima. It was the scoop of the century. For his lone, perilous journey that defied the US occupation authorities, Burchett was pilloried, not least by his embedded colleagues. He warned that an act of premeditated mass murder on an epic scale had launched a new era of terror.

Almost every day now, he is vindicated. The intrinsic criminality of the atomic bombing is borne out in the US National Archives and by the subsequent decades of militarism camouflaged as democracy. The Syria psychodrama exemplifies this. Yet again we are held hostage by the prospect of a terrorism whose nature and history even the most liberal critics still deny. The great unmentionable is that humanity's most dangerous enemy resides across the Atlantic.

John Kerry's farce and Barack Obama's pirouettes are temporary. Russia's peace deal over chemical weapons will, in time, be treated with the contempt that all militarists reserve for diplomacy. With al-Qaida now among its allies, and US-armed coupmasters secure in Cairo, the US intends to crush the last independent states in the Middle East: Syria first, then Iran. "This operation [in Syria]," said the former French foreign minister Roland Dumas in June, "goes way back. It was prepared, pre-conceived and planned."

When the public is "psychologically scarred", as the Channel 4 reporter Jonathan Rugman described the British people's overwhelming hostility to an attack on Syria, suppressing the truth is made urgent. Whether or not Bashar al-Assad or the "rebels" used gas in the suburbs of Damascus, it is the US, not Syria, that is the world's most prolific user of these terrible weapons.

In 1970 the Senate reported: "The US has dumped on Vietnam a quantity of toxic chemical (dioxin) amounting to six pounds per head of population." This was Operation Hades, later renamed the friendlier Operation Ranch Hand – the source of what Vietnamese doctors call a "cycle of foetal catastrophe". I have seen generations of children with their familiar, monstrous deformities. John Kerry, with his own blood-soaked war record, will remember them. I have seen them in Iraq too, where the US used depleted uranium and white phosphorus, as did the Israelis in Gaza. No Obama "red line" for them. No showdown psychodrama for them.

The sterile repetitive debate about whether "we" should "take action" against selected dictators (ie cheer on the US and its acolytes in yet another aerial killing spree) is part of our brainwashing. Richard Falk, professor emeritus of international law and UN special rapporteur on Palestine, describes it as "a self-righteous, one-way, legal/moral screen [with] positive images of western values and innocence portrayed as threatened, validating a campaign of unrestricted political violence". This "is so widely accepted as to be virtually unchallengeable".

It is the biggest lie: the product of "liberal realists" in Anglo-American politics, scholarship and media who ordain themselves as the world's crisis managers, rather than the cause of a crisis. Stripping humanity from the study of nations and congealing it with jargon that serves western power designs, they mark "failed", "rogue" or "evil" states for "humanitarian intervention".

An attack on Syria or Iran or any other US "demon" would draw on a fashionable variant, "Responsibility to Protect", or R2P – whose lectern-trotting zealot is the former Australian foreign minister Gareth Evans, co-chair of a "global centre" based in New York. Evans and his generously funded lobbyists play a vital propaganda role in urging the "international community" to attack countries where "the security council rejects a proposal or fails to deal with it in a reasonable time".

Evans has form. He appeared in my 1994 film Death of a Nation, which revealed the scale of genocide in East Timor. Canberra's smiling man is raising his champagne glass in a toast to his Indonesian equivalent as they fly over East Timor in an Australian aircraft, having signed a treaty to pirate the oil and gas of the stricken country where the tyrant Suharto killed or starved a third of the population.

Under the "weak" Obama, militarism has risen perhaps as never before. With not a single tank on the White House lawn, a military coup has taken place in Washington. In 2008, while his liberal devotees dried their eyes, Obama accepted the entire Pentagon of his predecessor, George Bush: its wars and war crimes. As the constitution is replaced by an emerging police state, those who destroyed Iraq with shock and awe, piled up the rubble in Afghanistan and reduced Libya to a Hobbesian nightmare, are ascendant across the US administration. Behind their beribboned facade, more former US soldiers are killing themselves than are dying on battlefields. Last year 6,500 veterans took their own lives. Put out more flags.

The historian Norman Pollack calls this "liberal fascism": "For goose-steppers substitute the seemingly more innocuous militarisation of the total culture. And for the bombastic leader, we have the reformer manqué, blithely at work, planning and executing assassination, smiling all the while." Every Tuesday the "humanitarian" Obama personally oversees a worldwide terror network of drones that "bugsplat" people, their rescuers and mourners. In the west's comfort zones, the first black leader of the land of slavery still feels good, as if his very existence represents a social advance, regardless of his trail of blood. This obeisance to a symbol has all but destroyed the US anti-war movement – Obama's singular achievement.

In Britain, the distractions of the fakery of image and identity politics have not quite succeeded. A stirring has begun, though people of conscience should hurry. The judges at Nuremberg were succinct: "Individual citizens have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity." The ordinary people of Syria, and countless others, and our own self-respect, deserve nothing less now.

http://www.stopwar.org.uk/news/john-pilger-this-time-it-s-syria-last-time-it-was-iraq

 

[IAmZamzam]

it would depend on each situation - but the most common reason that makes me sceptical is simple practicality. Very often, these interpretations require the most fantastic prior insight, together with control not just of individuals who are often enemies not allies, but also entire populations. Yet mysteriously, there are many other situations abroad and at home where they seem to have no control whatsoever. If they can magic up an uprising in Egypt, why not Afghanistan? Why is American domestic politics so chaotic?

THIS IS JUST TOO HARD. Only a divine being could exercise that kind of control.

My whole experience of life working with innumerable large companies and organisations screams at me that such perfect control is absolutely impossible. I have seen that incompetence and error is at least as powerful a determinant of events as skill and perfection of execution. I see companies credited with clever strategies, or feared for their control, when I know from the inside that it was a complete cock up from beginning to end.

It absolutely cannot be done in the way that many conspiracy theories or other accounts describe. And if if they were lucky enough to pull it off once, they could never do it time after time.

Thank you for again proving my allegation.

You see what I mean, guys? WHAT IS THIS NONSENSE??? This guy absolutely cannot separate mere cynicism about the motives and words of politicians from wild-eyed conspiracy theorist loons. Sooner or later we always snap back to square one. There is no difference between the two, nor between the concepts of taking advantage of a lucky opportunity when it comes and meticulously manipulating every single factor from the very start with a downright psychic degree of understanding like Emperor Palpatine himself. The wheat and the chaff are one. Either/or. Black and white. Whence this pro-government/anti-norm bias comes I have no clue, and I'm a freaking Social Democrat.

I guess I'm just going to have to give up. I'm talking into a dead phone.

 

[Karl]

So, if Assad is clever enough to know chemical weapons are useless against the 'Zionists', why does he have them? Who did he intend to use them against?

They are a deterrent to neighbouring nations attacking. They are useless now as the Zionists have targeted Syria for takeover. If Assad does not flee Syria he will be destroyed. The US plan of taking control of nations across North Africa through the Middle East and right across to Indonesia has been planned since the 1950s. The Soviets spread Marxism around the world also but the Muslims and Hindus would not swallow it, so it has left it open to the Western Empire. Now that Russia is Capitalist and also China they can now divvy up the world. The only problem is the West especially the USA is drunk on power and with it's myopic delusions of grandeur and megalomania things could get very messy. Napoleon comes to mind, lots of life, liberty and fraternity rhetoric but he was just an evil man that the English and Germans sorted out. Who's going to sort out the Zionists?

 

[~Zaria~]

Please continue to make duaa and take every means possible to support for our brothers and sisters in Syria (and all other parts of the world as well).

While we continue to debate on the agendas of this war, and try (often in vain) to direct some of our members to a deeper understanding, and to be able to distinguish truth from falsehood......there are actual people, like you and me, who are enduring some of the most in-humane and sadistic forms of torture as we speak.
The types of stories that have emerged from this war are so heart-wrenching - that often the mind does not even want to believe it ;'(
SubhanAllah, may Allah save our brothers and sisters and grant victory to the believers. Ameen ya Rabb.

 

[Independent]

You see what I mean, guys? WHAT IS THIS NONSENSE??? This guy absolutely cannot separate mere cynicism about the motives and words of politicians from wild-eyed conspiracy theorist loons.

I'm sorry to disappoint you but I'm finding it difficult to know which question you want an answer to. I am explaining why I am sceptical about any political analysis which flies in the face of practicality. Many popular notions are simply too hard and improbable to execute.

There is no difference between the two, nor between the concepts of taking advantage of a lucky opportunity when it comes and meticulously manipulating every single factor from the very start

Of course, it follows from what I say that opportunism is perfectly practical and possible. Far from rejecting it, I think it plays a role in almost every conflict. I don't know why you think I would reject it.

In the case of Syria particularly, I think that the US has certainly seen this as a possible opportunity to depose Assad. Assad and his father have been enemies of US interests for most of the last 40 years and strong allies of Russia/Iran. In this the US is just like any other state - they have allies and enemies, and a predisposition to support or oppose.

But this doesn't mean the US started the rebellion or that they have played anything but a relatively minor role so far (by supplying support via third party Muslim states).

As events have unfolded the US will also have begun to consider whether Assad may be 'better the devil you know than the one you don't', and that removing him may simply lead to a worse government or just chaos, which would be worse still. Different members of the administration will have different views (eg Kerry may be more belligerent, Obama less so) so the government may not act entirely with one voice.

So with regard to Syria and events as they have unfolded so far, I don't think that the US has had much of an influence - certainly nothing in comparison to Russia, iran, Hezbollah and the Gulf states. The US is essentially reacting to events in Syria, not controlling or directing them. The US is no friend of Assad and, at the start, may have celebrated his problems. But that doesn't mean they've managed to contribute much to events so far.

At a more general level, the focus by many people on US motivations is obscuring the real issue which is Assad's brutality, as endorsed by Russia and Iran. No one ever seems to criticise Russia, even when they are the major players. US intervention might have brought about Assad's defeat - US absence certainly favours his survival and the continuation of the civil war. However, without unequivocal support from the Muslim world, I personally would be strongly against US intervention.

 

[~Zaria~]

it would depend on each situation - but the most common reason that makes me sceptical is simple practicality. Very often, these interpretations require the most fantastic prior insight, together with control not just of individuals who are often enemies not allies, but also entire populations. Yet mysteriously, there are many other situations abroad and at home where they seem to have no control whatsoever. If they can magic up an uprising in Egypt, why not Afghanistan? Why is American domestic politics so chaotic?

THIS IS JUST TOO HARD. Only a divine being could exercise that kind of control.

My whole experience of life working with innumerable large companies and organisations screams at me that such perfect control is absolutely impossible. I have seen that incompetence and error is at least as powerful a determinant of events as skill and perfection of execution. I see companies credited with clever strategies, or feared for their control, when I know from the inside that it was a complete cock up from beginning to end.

It absolutely cannot be done in the way that many conspiracy theories or other accounts describe. And if if they were lucky enough to pull it off once, they could never do it time after time.

Greetings,

We have had this discussion with you now, in soo many threads.
We have provided so many evidences (not conspiracy theories - but factual proof) linking our current world events to its actual agenda.
Still you continue to ignore these, and try to convince us to do so in a similar manner - based on your concept of 'practicality'.

Please watch the 3 videos in the following thread: http://www.islamicboard.com/general/134319562-road-world-war-iii.html

The best that we can do, is to provide you with the information.
If you still wish to live your life in denial - despite all evidences (brought forward by non-muslims in the far majority of cases) and reasoning - then, this is your choice.

For the rest of us - muslims and non-muslims alike - the world is certainly waking up.
Alhamdulillah.

 

[Independent]

Greetings Zaria, I hope you are well.

I guess universal agreement is not very likely either in this forum or anywhere else. But I shall play your video later today, hopefully.

 

[سيف الله]

Salaam

A report on the use of depleted uranium in Iraq. Just compare and contrast with the hysteria generated in western maintstream media over the use of chemical weapons in Syria.

‘****ing Evidence’ Becomes ‘No Clear Evidence’: Much-Delayed Report On Congenital Birth Defects In Iraq

In a 2010 alert, 'Beyond Hiroshima – The Non-Reporting Of Fallujah's Cancer Catastrophe', we noted the almost non-existent media response to the publication of a new study that had found high rates of infant mortality, cancer and leukaemia in the Iraqi city. The dramatic increases in these rates exceeded even those found in survivors of the atomic bombs dropped by the United States on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The Independent's Patrick Cockburn was a lone exception in reporting these awful findings.

As many readers will recall, Fallujah was subjected to US military attacks in March 2004 and an even larger assault in November 2004 which also involved UK forces. Our media alerts at the time highlighted the abysmal lack of media coverage of Western war crimes in Fallujah, including the use of chemical weapons and depleted uranium. Media Lens paid particular attention to the appalling performance of BBC News ('Doubt Cast on BBC Claims Regarding Fallujah', 'BBC Silent On Fallujah', 'BBC Still Ignoring Evidence Of War Crimes').

And it is not just Fallujah that has suffered appallingly. Mozhgan Savabieasfahani, an environmental toxicologist at the University of Michigan's School of Public Health and author of the book Pollution and Reproductive Damage, notes that increasing numbers of birth defects have also been seen in Mosul, Najaf, Basra, Hawijah, Nineveh and Baghdad. In some provinces, adds Dr Savabieasfahani, the rate of cancers is also increasing. She says:

'Sterility, repeated miscarriages, stillbirths and severe birth defects - some never described in any medical books - are weighing heavily on Iraqi families.'

In Basra, attacked and occupied by UK troops, childhood leukaemia rates more than doubled between 1993 and 2007, the year that UK troops withdrew from the city.

Dr Savabieasfahani describes 'an epidemic of birth defects in Iraq' and says that what is 'most urgently needed' is:

'comprehensive large-scale environmental testing of the cities where cancer and birth defects are rising. Food, water, air, and soil must be tested to isolate sources of public exposure to war contaminants. This is a necessity to discover the source, extent, and types of contaminants in the area followed by appropriate remediation projects to prevent further public exposure to toxic war contaminants.'

In 2012, the World Health Organization (WHO), after being pressured by public health experts for a decade, belatedly instigated a study in conjunction with the Iraqi Ministry of Health (MOH) to investigate 'prevalence and factors associated with congenital birth defects' in Iraq. But although the study is extensive in scale, with 10,800 Iraq households selected as the sample size, Dr Savabieasfahani describes the scope of the research as 'severely handicapped'. Why? Because of the controversial decision not to investigate the possible causes of birth defects and cancer; in particular, depleted uranium (DU), white phosphorus and other dangerous residues of the war, notably lead and mercury.

DU is a by-product of the process of enriching uranium. Because of its very high density, it is often used in weapons designed to penetrate buildings and armoured tanks. Dr Keith Baverstock, a former health and radiation adviser to WHO, says that:

'There is absolutely no doubt that DU is toxic if it becomes systemic and gets into the bloodstream.'

The decision by WHO and MOH not to consider uranium in their study 'is an important omission', says Dr Baverstock, and he 'believes that WHO has miserably failed to assess risks posed by DU... There is no doubt in my mind that the upper management of WHO failed to fulfil their obligations to examine the public health implications of DU.'

In 2004, Dr Baverstock was the lead author of a WHO report linking the US and UK use of depleted uranium in Iraq with long-term health risks. But the report was declared 'secret' and never published. Dr Baverstock said that the report was 'deliberately suppressed', pointing the finger of suspicion at the powerful pro-nuclear UN body, the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The War Is Responsible – 'No Other Explanation'

The new WHO/MOH report was originally due to be published in November 2012, but it was indefinitely postponed with no satisfactory reason given. Months passed. Meanwhile, in March 2013, the BBC included a report on its World News channel about birth defects and cancer in Iraq. BBC reporter Yalda Hakim interviewed Dr Mushin Sabbak at Basra Maternity Hospital. He told her that he believed that 'mercury, lead, uranium' from the war were responsible for a 60 per cent increase in birth defects there since 2003. 'We have no other explanation than this,' he added. (An edited version of the World News segment appeared here on BBC News.)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-21873892

Dr Chaseb Ali, a senior MOH official in Baghdad, told Hakim that:

'All studies done by the Ministry of Health prove with ****ing evidence that there has been a rise in birth defects and cancer, since the substances in question cause birth defects if the mother was exposed to them, or cancer, or in some cases, both.' (English subtitles)

The BBC journalist said in the report's voiceover:

'Dr Chaseb says there could be many factors, including the use of depleted uranium, and the looting and destruction of Saddam Hussein's laboratories.'

Tellingly, when the journalist asked the senior Iraqi health official whether, given the extensive findings of increased birth defects and cancer, the Iraq government would call for action, he smiled uncomfortably and said:

'I'll keep my thoughts to myself.'

Switching to English, he stated directly:

'I have no answer. I know the fact, but I cannot say anything.'

Hakim then spoke with two Iraqi Ministry of Health doctors working on the WHO/MOH study. These researchers discussed the increase in Iraqi birth defects, and blamed the increase on the war. The BBC reporter was told that the report had been repeatedly delayed but that:

'They confirm that the report will show a rise in birth defects in areas which show heavy fighting.'

There is no shortage of ****ing testimony of the awful Western legacy suffered by the people of Iraq. Donna Mulhearn is an Australian antiwar activist who has travelled repeatedly to Fallujah, talking with Iraqi doctors as well as affected families. She told journalist Kelley Vlahos:

'I believe the Iraqi government is responding to pressure from the US to keep the issue under the radar.'

The physical horrors reported by Mulhearn and others include:

'babies born with parts of their skulls missing, various tumors, missing genitalia, limbs and eyes, severe brain damage, unusual rates of paralyzing spina bifida (marked by the gruesome holes found in the tiny infants' backs), Encephalocele (a neural tube defect marked by swollen sac-like protrusions from the head), and more.'

Mulhearn said:

'When I was in Iraq earlier this year there was a definite feeling of fear and intimidation among doctors who felt pressure from the Government to stay quiet about increasing levels of cancer and birth defects.'

She added:

'One cancer specialist in Basra was removed from his senior position in a hospital because he has been outspoken on the issue of radiation caused by depleted uranium pollution and what he believes is its terrible impact of the health of Iraqis in the Basra region. He was nervous about giving us an on-camera interview because of possible ramifications.'

'We Worry That This Is Now Politics, Not Science'

In May 2013, with still no sign of the joint WHO/MOH report, a call was issued by a number of public health and medical experts, together with around 50 others including Noam Chomsky, asking for the immediate release of the report. A petition on Change.org, initiated by Dr Samira Alaani, a pediatrician working in Fallujah General Hospital, attracted almost 50,000 signatures. Dr Alaani wrote:

'I have worked in Fallujah as a Pediatrician since 1997 but began to notice something was wrong in 2006 and began logging the cases; we have determined that 144 babies are now born with a deformity for every 1000 live births. We believe it has to be related to contamination caused by the fighting in our city, even now, nearly 10 years later. It is not unique to Fallujah; hospitals throughout the Anbar Governorate and many other regions of Iraq are recording increases. Every day I see the strain this fear puts on expectant mothers and their families. The first question I am asked when a child is born is not "is it a boy or a girl?" but "is my child healthy?"' (Emphasis in original.)

She added:

'The research is now complete and we were promised that it would be published at the beginning of 2013, yet six months later the WHO has announced more delays. We worry that this is now politics, not science. We have already waited years for the truth and my patients cannot wait any longer. [...] My patients need to know the truth, they need to know why they miscarried, they need to know why their babies are so ill but, most importantly, they need to know that something is being done about it.'

When UN sanctions were imposed on Iraq in the 1990s, the British oncologist Karol Sikora, who was then chief of WHO's cancer programme, wrote that:

'Requested radiotherapy equipment, chemotherapy drugs and analgesics [were] consistently blocked by United States and British advisers [to the Iraq sanctions committee].

Dr Sikora told John Pilger:

'We were specifically told [by the WHO] not to talk about the whole Iraq business. The WHO is not an Organization that likes to get involved in politics.'

But it's even worse than that. WHO is an organization that seemingly bends to the will of powerful Western governments. Hans von Sponeck was the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq before he resigned in 2000 in protest at the appalling level of deaths caused by the sanctions (his predecessor, Denis Halliday, resigned in 1998 for the same reason). Von Sponeck noted that:

'The US government sought to prevent WHO from surveying areas in southern Iraq where depleted uranium had been used and caused serious health and environmental dangers.'

Halliday said:

'The World Health Organisation (WHO) has categorically refused in defiance of its own mandate to share evidence uncovered in Iraq that US military use of Depleted Uranium and other weapons have not only killed many civilians, but continue to result in the birth of deformed babies.'

In July 2013, around 50 medical experts and other concerned people, wrote a second time to WHO:

'The joint WHO and Iraqi Ministry of Health Report on cancers and birth defect in Iraq was originally due to be released in November 2012. It has been delayed repeatedly and now has no release date whatsoever. [...] we are baffled and alarmed at the WHO's inability to release any of its findings, despite our urgent request of May 2013, for the WHO to release its report.

'The Iraqi birth defects epidemic, by itself, would outrage anyone with the simplest understanding of population health and disease. Who could justify blocking the release of information from a long-completed investigation of that epidemic?

'Why have our inquiries failed to break the WHO's apparent filibuster against releasing that data? WHO has a staff of thousands, including medical doctors, public health specialists, scientists, and sophisticated epidemiologists. They are certainly capable of presenting that data to the public by now.' (Mozhgan Savabieasfahani, via email, July 26, 2013)

rest here

http://www.medialens.org/index.php/alerts/alert-archive/alerts-2013/741-****ing-evidence-becomes-no-clear-evidence-much-delayed-report-on-congenital-birth-defects-in-iraq.html

 

[~Zaria~]

Thousands of Syrian children flee conlict zone unaccompanied

Agencies | 23 September 2013/17 Dhul Qa’dah 1434

Over 4,000 Syrian children have fled the troubled Middle Eastern nation without any adult supervision, a United Nations agency said, stressing that children are extremely vulnerable to abuse and exploitation when they do not have a guardian.

The UN’s Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said Friday that aid workers have identified and registered 4,150 Syrian child refugees. Spokesperson Marixie Mercado said that many fled into Syria’s neighboring countries. “We’re working to provide income back to families, and we’re desperate to get [the children] back to school.”

At least 1,698 of the children are located in Lebanon, where many have been used for cheap agricultural labor. They have no choice but to work in order to receive food, water, and shelter. Many are also responsible for younger brothers and sisters, with hundreds pulled out of school to work for their family’s survival.

“Families are poor and destitute after two and a half years of war…Often, in order to continue living here, they have a lot of expenses they need to pay and the result is that kids have to work,” UNICEF’s regional director for the Middle East and North Africa, Maria Calivias, told Reuters.

Another 1,170 children, many under 10 years old, now call Jordan home. They have taken refuge in the Za’atari camp, a makeshift home for fleeing Syrians that has grown to a population of 120,000 – making it the fourth largest population center in Jordan.

“Each of those children has witnessed or been the victim of horrific levels of violence,” Mercado said.

The Jordanian government announced Thursday that it plans to open another camp to house the thousands of Syrians, young and old, who continue to cross the border.

Lebanon, unlike Jordan, does not allow permanent encampments – partly because of the nation’s experience with Palestinian refugee camps that were overcome by militants during the Lebanese Civil War between 1975 and 1990.

“We can’t have permanent tents,” Calivis told Reuters. “Every night, we take the tents down, and every morning they have to be put back up. So imagine, that is 365 days, take tents up and down, for 300,000 refugee students.”

The horror and displacement so many children have endured is a consequence of the Syrian internal conflict between the government of Bashar Assad and over 1,000 opposition groups dedicated to his removal from power.

The conflict which began over two years ago, has claimed more than 100,000 lives, and has recently seen the US threaten to deploy a missile strike against the Assad government for its reported use of chemical weapons. Yet many have complained that, as world powers posture, the plight of the Syrian people has been lost in the conversation.

“These are the humanitarian issues and the human rights issues that are really spiraling out of control inside Syria – we need our political leaders to address those as well,” UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Valerie Amos said Friday.

As many as one million of the two million people who have fled Syria are children, according to UN numbers.

Education has traditionally been one of UNICEF’s top objectives and is especially important in the Syrian culture, as demonstrated by the lengths that people have gone to in order to receive schooling.

“When we visited places inside Syria, we would see in the middle of the shelling, parents holding their kids by the hand and accompanying them to nearby schools,” Calivis said. “That is how crucial they saw their children’s education. Education is a passport for their future when they’ve lost everything else.”

But as the war has continued and the sudden influx of refugees has overwhelmed host countries, education has fallen behind survival on the list of priorities.

“Absorbing them in the current school system is impossible, but starting new schools that can accommodate such numbers and finding qualified teachers, funding, and facilities has proved to be extremely difficult,” wrote Aziz Abu Sarah, a journalist for National Geographic who traveled to various refugee camps.

“There is barely any monitoring to guarantee the schools’ quality, and in its absence, radical ideas can easily become part of the curriculum…Five years from now, due to this lack of foresight, the world will have to deal with an uneducated and very possibly disenfranchised generation that is ripe for radicalization.”


http://www.ciibroadcasting.com/2013...ian-children-free-conlict-zone-unaccompanied/

 

[سيف الله]

Salaam

insightful comment piece.


Syria: the strategy has backfired

The Gulf states' plans to undermine Iran and Syria are in tatters. But a new relationship may now emerge




What a curious turn of events: from the very brink of a military intervention in Syria that might have precipitated a wider regional conflagration, we have moved to one of those rare "points of inflection" over Iran which seems fecund with potential possibilities, including a solution in Syria. Of course, such tipping points can tip either toward new solutions, or into a new phase of conflict.

Why should the possibility of US talks with Iran hold out such potential? It is because an earlier such point of inflection over Iran, a decade ago, tipped toward conflict, into the "axis of evil" versus the western-backed "moderates". It was the fierce push-back by Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and (at that time) Hamas against this attempt to impose a "hegemony of moderation" across the region, that caused regime change in Syria to become such a priority for the Sunni monarchies of the Gulf.

After the 2006 Lebanon war, Saudi Arabia took further fright at the mounting popularity of Iran and Hezbollah within its own Sunni streets. Revolutionary Islam seemed to be gaining the upper hand. And – finally, the straw that broke the camel's back for the Gulf states: the outbreak of Arab upheaval of 2011, with its evident disdain for established authority. Gulf states decided to do whatever it takes to halt Iran and the new currents of thinking (such as a rising Muslim Brotherhood). Their very survival, it seemed, hinged on it. Overthrowing President Bashar al-Assad became the explicit cornerstone of this strategy of confronting Iran.

But this Gulf containment strategy of igniting a Sunni "intifada" against Shia influence seems to have collapsed, as the Gulf monarchs absorb the significance of Barack Obama's U-turn on Syria, and the opening to Iran. What made it so traumatic was that not just Obama but the US system itself had buckled (public and Congress together). It represented rather a strategic lurch. President Assad would stay, and Iran would not be dismantled but emerge strengthened.

We have seen much sabre-rattling from Gulf leaders as a consequence. They threaten to stand steadfast to the cause – in spite of US "weakness" – determined to remake the Middle East in their authoritarian image. But this is evidently fanciful (in spite of their possibly pyrrhic victory in Egypt). What is emerging (just as it did three decades ago in Afghanistan) from their firing-up of Sunni Islam, is extremism rather than moderation – and inter-Sunni strife.

The Gulf strategy in Syria is also in tatters: its aspirations are not succeeding in the field, and – paradoxically – it seems that the imminent prospect of US military intervention in Syria created a schism within the Syrian opposition. So apprehensive were the jihadist groups that they would be the prime object of US attacks – as a prelude to the west setting up the Free Syria Army as a copy of the Sunni awakening councils in Iraq – that several days of bloody inter-factional fighting among the opposition ensued. Its perverse outcome has been a further radicalisation of Syria's jihadist groups, so that 13 of the most powerful, led by al-Nusra Front, now flatly reject the western-backed opposition group's leadership, and have committed instead to Sharia. Who now can be said to represent the opposition?

In the Gulf, anger and resentment at this turn of events is to be expected, but how far realistically can these monarchs step out of the western orbit, to which they are tied in so many ways? Ultimately this point of inflection offers the chance to undo that earlier tip towards conflict. Iran is already signalling its readiness to help Saudi Arabia make the necessary transition, as the latest appointment of Rear Admiral Ali Shamkhani – well known to King Abdullah for his earlier mediation – as national security adviser clearly signals. In undoing the axis of evil and moderation, a political solution in Syria becomes possible. As one ex-diplomat notes: "The Persians and the Sunni sheikhs quarrel all the time, but also can patch up without outsiders' help." If this initiative bears fruit, Syria is likely to be a key part of this.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/29/syria-brink-of-solution

 

[Independent]

^^ Very interesting article and genuinely challenging. The Gulf States are hard to read because they back so many horses at the same time.

I think there is another possible 'point of inflexion' going on, and this one is between the US and Iran. US/Iranian relations fell apart not so much in the 1979 revolution, but in the Teheran Embassy hostage siege a couple of years later. This is the seminal event that turned out to prefigure the style of the next 3 decades of US/Muslim relations. It's also the point at which the modern image of the Muslim world in the west (ie terrorism, suicide bombings, hostages, scary mobs) begins. There are any number of other complicated factors going on, but this is the event that defines the current era of US/Muslim relations, and it's gone on for long enough that many people assume that it's always been like that.

The 'accidental diplomacy' around Syria's commitment to surrendering chemical weapons has the potential to take the heat out of the US/iranian relationship. Rouhani is clever enough to have worked out what North Korea cannot - that developing nuclear weapons is not a guarantee of security, but the exact opposite. It's a guarantee of intervention. If Iran really does draw back from the nuclear option, it will not only remove the single factor most likely to draw an attack on themselves, but it will also reverse the whole direction of relations. These things tend to have momentum one way or the other. There is a real prospect of rapprochement between the US and Iran which will change everything about the region.

Of course there are many things that can get in the way. Will Rouhani be permitted to have his way by the Ayatollah? Will the Sunni Gulf States hold the US back behind the scenes? And there's always the Israel random factor, which can mess up everything else no matter how much sense it makes.

But with Afghanistan winding down and other US regional commitments already over, a restoration of relations with Iran after 30 years of hostility could change everything for US/Muslim relations, although it will do nothing to solve the growing problem of sectarianism, except perhaps showing it more clearly for what it really is.

 

[سيف الله]

Salaam

David Cameron was keen to bomb Syria in the name of 'humanity'. Alas actually giving meaningful help to the Syrians is beyond his capabilities.

Amnesty: Europe has 'miserably failed' to help Syrian refugees

Britain has offered no spaces for Syrian refugees fleeing from civil war, according to the human rights group

European leaders should "hang their heads with shame" over their treatment of Syrian refugees fleeing the country's brutal conflict, Amnesty International said on Friday.

In a briefing entitled; "An international failure: The Syrian refugee crisis", the charity states that EU member states have only offered around 12,000 places to Syrian refugees as part of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees' goal of securing 30,000 places.

"The EU has miserably failed to play its part in providing a safe haven to the refugees who have lost all but their lives," said Salil Shetty, Amnesty's secretary general .

"The number of those it's prepared to resettle is truly pitiful," he added.

He called upon EU leaders to open their borders, provide safe passage to those seeking refuge, and refrain from "unlawful push-back operations" currently being employed to stop refugees entering the continent.

Only 10 EU member states offered resettlement or humanitarian admission places to refugees from Syria, according to the report.

Of the 12,000 places offered, 10,000 have been pledged by Germany. France has offered 500 places and Spain 30.

Eighteen EU member states - including the UK and Italy - have pledged no places, said the London-based charity.

Amnesty claims that the low chance of being granted asylum is forcing refugees to risk their life by undertaking dangerous boat and land crossings.

The report contains an account given by Awad, a 17-year-old from Damascus, whose boat loaded with around 400 asylum seekers sank in the Mediterranean while on its way to Italy.

Awad, whose mother died in the accident, escaped through a window, but described how he saw people clinging to dead bodies and boat wreckage to stay afloat.

"I have no idea where my family are," he said.

"I used to have ambition but now I have lost my mother, I don't want anything, I just want stability, everything else is second to that."

The report claims that those who make it to Europe are often mistreated.

"In two of the main gateways to the EU, Bulgaria and Greece, refugees from Syria are met with deplorable treatment, including life threatening push-back operations along the Greek coast, and detention for weeks in poor conditions in Bulgaria," it said.

One refugee described how he and his group were abused by the Greek coastguard near the island of Samos in October.

"They put all the men lying on the boat; they stepped on us and hit us with their weapons for three hours," he explained.

"Then at around 10 in the morning, after removing the motor, they put us back to our plastic boat and drove us back to the Turkish waters and left us in the middle of the sea."

In Bulgaria, Amnesty said it had found refugees "living in squalid conditions in containers, a dilapidated building and in tents."

"It is deplorable that many of those that who have risked life and limb to get here, are either forced back or detained in truly squalid conditions with insufficient food, water or medical care," said Shetty.

Around 55,000 Syrian refugees have managed to get through and seek asylum in the EU, said the report.

Some 97 percent of Syria's refugees - estimated by Amnesty to be 2.3 million in total - have fled to five neighbouring countries: Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq and Egypt since fighting began.

The conflict, which has killed an estimated 126,000 people and driven millions from their homes, was sparked when the regime of President Bashar al-Assad launched a crackdown after a series of pro-democracy protests in March 2011.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/10515120/Amnesty-Europe-has-miserably-failed-to-help-Syrian-refugees.html

 

[جوري]

They secretly want Sunni Muslims to die out and the free army not to come into any weapons because it wouls spell disaster for the Alawite regime and the rest of the kaffir regimes in the region. So you don't actually need articles on their failure.. we know they want to fail on purpose

 

[observer]

They secretly want Sunni Muslims to die out and the free army not to come into any weapons because it wouls spell disaster for the Alawite regime and the rest of the kaffir regimes in the region. So you don't actually need articles on their failure.. we know that want to fail on purpose

What would you like to see the west do here? Looking at it, it seems that anything the west did would be seen in a negative light, so what would you like to see happen?