Syria

[mids2019]

Has Syria been forgotten and who is to blame for civilian deaths in this region. It is Assad or rebel groups?

(Its a conflict in the middle East with huge civilian casualties but doesn't involve Israel so I guess this thread will for a death)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_civil_war#:~:text=The%20Syrian%20civil%20war%20(Arabic,sponsored%20and%20non%2Dstate%20actors.

Muslim on Muslim deaths appear to be generally ignored as they slaughter

Ignored by who? There are sanctions and trade restrictions on Syria. There has been huge amounts of help and resettlement programmes for refugees. Huge amounts of aid. What would people be protesting for? Governments are acting when it comes to Syria.

Argh me too. I'm interested in the Syria conflict and potential repercussions/ what it indicates globally.
Can't we park Israel and Gaza for a minute and think about that?

Syria conflict is a proxy war between USA and Russia. This latest development is being done as a prep for a possible Iran attack. If Assad is not in control of Syria then Russia and Iran will lose an important ally. The Islamic terrorist organizations are funded and supported by USA and Israel intelligence agencies (I bet UK is also involved), mostly Turkey is in control of them and this was and still the case since USA and Turkey cooperated in attacks against Syria during Obama administration. I am originally from Turkey and can tell you that most people in Turkey are clueless and very against these radical Islamic terrorist groups being supported by the government, they are afraid that they can turn Turkey into another Afghanistan. I believe the government wouldn't hesitate to use them against its own civilians in case of an uprising against itself. So, Israel government is not directly involved in latest developments in Syria but very much the (biggest) benefactor and supporter of it.

Holy moly. I didn't expect that - how do you know all this? Why would Biden/uk do all this when Islamic State et al is such a threat to Western democracy?
Very relieved to hear they dont have wide support in Turkey though.

twitter is saying Iraqi militias are entering Syria. Russians and Syrian government are conducting airstrikes in aleppo. There are escalating attacks on Kurds by Turkish backed fighter, theres a video on twitter going around of SNA fighters rounding up Kurdish women (it’s twitter so don’t know how reliable that is).

It’s going to be a bloodbath, I’m very fearful for whats going to happen to minority groups and kurds. The USA has bases in some Kurdish regions, I really really hope they don’t get ditched by the USA.

My understanding is that they were trying to fund an anti ISIS group? The attacks were mainly targeting them. I don’t think Israel funded any jihadi groups and this funding by the USA stopped in 2017 under Trump.

Israel conducted strikes against IRCG and Hezbollah in Syria which would have definitely weakened Assad but thats not the same as funding them. Israel doesn’t benefit from either Jihadis next door or Iran/russia/ backed Assad next door.

Thats roughly my understanding, that Israel obviously doesn't want a base for Hezbollah and Palestinian groups in Syria so have carried out air strikes but not massively involved. They were heavily involved in humanitarian relief too. What a nightmare and a tragedy it is.

I would also point out that the rebel groups are basically backed by Turkey, SNA is virulently anti kurd, there is a turkey backed group made up for central asians, afghans, pakistanis etc etc -they seem to hate everyone who isn’t one of them, HTS is backed by turkey but Jolani their leader has a streak of not liking being told what to do by supra national bodies (he’s got a target on his back from Isis, distanced himself from Al-Qaeda) so I wonder if he manages to wrest control of Syria how long Turkey’s influence will really last.

It is actually a bit insane how often people manage to blame Israel. All their activities in Syria have been about eroding weapons supply or ability to attack Israel. They are probably not pro anyone in Syria except possibly the kurds, druze and other minority groups who pose no threat to them.

I would also point out that Israel has a population of just under 10 million people and does not have limitless funds to be funding jihadi groups all over the middle east. Funding comes primarily from donors and criminal activity and in the case of Al-qaeda gold mines in Afghanistan. Hamas has property investments in turkey for example.

Right now it’s a fight between Turkey and Iran. Those are the proxies backers. This has little to do with the USA or Israel except for tangentially where they have pursued their own interests.

It’s a miserable shithshow in any case. The best you can hope for is HTS isn’t as mad as their origins would suggest they may be. They have sent messages to their fighters to not mess with minorities and are emphasising Syrian unity. So thats some small comfort. However Kurds have withdrawn from some areas and are under attack by the SNA so I’m not sure what they are expecting to happen. Fucking SNA as well, thats how much they hate kurds, HTS is pushing back against the assad government and they prioritise attacking kurdish people. Utter bastards.

I swear to god the kurds are the most ignored yet most valuable and moderate allies in the region.

🤣

How I know all this? From independent media. As a Turkish citizen it is not unknown to us that Cia was involved with the 1980 military coup in Turkey and groomed Islamists as an opposition to leftists. The ruling party in Turkey, Akp is a product of that grooming. The first action Akp did was to topple the military that supported secularism and opposed to getting involved in conflicts within Middle East. The western media pushed Akp as the champion of democracy and here we are today.

For the latest developments, here is a youtube video, I don't know about the guy that much but his explanations make sense:

When you say Kurds, it is technically wrong. You are referring to YPG which is the Syrian branch of PKK, the separatist terrorist group in Turkey. They are being backed and placed in a positive light in western media because they are against Assad government and they were instrumental in fighting against Isis. From Turkey's perspective, it is unacceptable to have YPG take control of northern Syria which is border to Turkey.

Turkey's ruling party, Akp is on very good terms with Barzani, the president of the Kurdistan region in Iraq. Akp's foreign minister Hakan Fidan is Kurdish. I, myself have Kurdish heritage as well as Turkish as many other Turkish citizens. Istanbul has the largest Kurdish population in the world. So, Ypg is not really a representative of all Kurds of the area.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/11/30/syria-war-live-rebels-take-control-of-aleppo-igniting-new-phase-of-war

"The United States said it “has nothing to do” with the rebel offensive but blamed al-Assad’s reliance on Russia and Iran for the renewed violence."

Best to keep out of it. Get involved and it will be all the fault of the US. Not get involved and it will be awful West not helping the people. Both sides seem as bad as each other

Best to keep out of it.

Yes militarily but the civilians can't be abandoned and peace deals and negotiations need to be supported. Just saw footage of the strikes on Aleppo on C4 news, hospitals, civilians on the street getting hit. Completely indiscriminate. I just hope it can be deescalated before civilians have to suffer another war.

I was wrong to jump to jump to conclusion yesterday that Turkey was behind the jihadist groups that invaded parts of Syria recently. Turkey foreign minister stated that they did not permit nor supported these rebel operations in Syria:

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/syrian-government-needs-reconcile-with-its-people-opposition-turkey-says-2024-12-02/

https://www.voanews.com/a/turkey-calls-for-reconciliation-between-syria-government-and-opposition-to-end-conflict-/7884256.html

They very much are linked. All those Turkish flags are probably a clue.

And the 200’000 kirds fleeing, are they all PKK and YPG? Or are they civilians who are terrified of being attacked by turkish backed thugs? They are nonetheless kurds even if they are not aligned with Iraqi kurds. I understand the peshmerga reject their ethos but it doesn’t make it ok to kill them.

Turkey finances the SNA which seems primarily to be concerning itself with kurds rather than assad

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_involvement_in_the_Syrian_civil_war

So yes turkey is very much involved and backing some of the worst rebels, HYS has taken to arresting some because of looting.

Assad and Russia caused thousands upon thousands of deaths I think.

@User37482

"So yes turkey is very much involved and backing some of the worst rebels"

I agree that Turkey has been backing some of the worst rebels in their ongoing war against the Kurds. But I don't think they were involved in the recent attack on Aleppo, but they were certainly aware of the plan along with other intelligence services.

The problem with supplying weapons and support to rebel groups because they are your enemy's enemy is that later on they can become your enemy.

In any event Turkey is most definitely making a bad situation worse with their interference in Syria.

Well that it's Assad has gone.
The prime minister has announced he is ready for a peaceful handover.

Interesting article about what this might mean here. I hope

www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8j99447gj1o.amp

He might have gone to Iran.

I think he's gone to Russia.

Our guess is Russia too. Iran gave up on him