What if Assad is telling the truth?

Truely disgusting actions by residents of a pro Assad town trying to block UN monitors.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/9327071/Syria-UN-monitors-blocked-from-reaching-Al-Haffe.html

What we are seeing in Syria is as bad as it was in Bosnia when the Bosnian-Serbs committed atrocities against the Muslims.

This thread is just as divided as the Syrian people are...

Again, I am only speaking for the people I know; a good number are against the regime and want to see a change without Blood. An equal number are worried that this will only spill Blood and our future is deemed to be ruled by chaos. Very few people I know are what you can call 'hardcore rebels' that have this simple idea of "All we want is for them to go, anything is better than them!" I can assure you that they're losing support within the Syrian society.

As a Syrian, I am completely ashamed by the atrocious actions that have been carried out by some of my fellow Syrians. I cannot believe how stupid some of them are, sighting hate and dragging the country into a vicious sectarian war.

If that is the change that they want, I don't want any part of it and I will oppose and fight it.

I have said this time and time again, Yes; we have issues with the Ba'ath party, Yes, we have suffered under their 'reign' BUT ripping the country apart by applying a similar ideology to that used by the Bush administration 10 years ago - "If you're not with us, you're against us!" - to overthrow the current government or resolve the conflict just plain stupid and will not work.

Have we forgot about America's soap opera on Iraq's WMD? can't anyone see similar patterns working here??

'Assad is a blood thirsty lunatic, murderer and war criminal...and so on' We didn't hear such words until 8 months ago. First of all, Bashar is not as bad as the media is trying to portray him to be, and still to this day he has big support of many Syrians, regardless of their sect. With a population of 24 million, how many have risen against the government? A million? three million?
Why haven't the remaining 21 million made their voice heard? the lack of freedom of speech? or is it Fear? ...Political fear is long dead in Syria; young people at cafes, taxi drivers and grocery shop owners have voiced their political (for & against) opinions publicly. It's your actions that is likely to get you killed or kidnaped.

But what about Syria during Bashar's 11 years in power?

Well, ...Syria was fine! Yes... I am confidently stating this:

Syria was fine and going very well, why deny it? We're free and don't have a national debt, our GDP growth was healthy with promising EU treaties and free trade relationships. Our infrastructure was developing rapidly and we had unbelievable security. What we lacked was a democratic government true, but our political scene was heading toward it at a healthy pace. Bashar had publicly acknowledge the mistakes of the last government (his father's Gov) and promised to correct them, and this he did by introducing reforms, and many legislations to replace the old 'Ba'ath laws that promised a better political future for the country. If you think that you can bestow, apply democracy with a click of a button or by removing a government you're clearly naive.

However, anyone who have been interested or have followed the region's political history would know that Syria's growing relationship with Iran, Russia and China didn't sit well with America and its allies. This resulted in a Media war on Syria back in 2001; 9/11 - Iraq's WMD (2003), Lebanon (2005 - 2006) and the current campaign of 2011 -2012.

A military intervention like the one applied on Iraq is out of the question, and what a better way to get the job done without getting your hands dirty? - Get them to fight each other!

Syrian Rebels are Foreign-backed Terrorists:
Link 1

Disagreements Among Syrian Rebels Over Foreign Arms:
Link 2

Now, we have these armed forces and militias - FSA (which I don't acknowledge to be a Syrian Army) fighting the National Syrian Army. And, of course the regime's answer is to fight back, they don't want to lose their power over Syria and surely we'll see them fight till the end. My fears that it'll be the end of Syria and not the regime.

To summarise; Do I want Assad to go? ...Yes, but not like this.

I am not usually a fan of conspiracy theories, but they make more sense than what we have seen and heard out of the mainstream media. The following link does give an 'interesting' analogy to the current situation in Syria. Link 3

JustinDee wrote: »

Syria has always been the centre of a cold war theatre in the Middle East and has been extremely active along with Hizbullah and Iran in operations theree. Who backs them? Everyone is backed. Each and every country or faction involved.

I agree, but to simply state the current situation as a civil revolt against a dictator is silly. There are two forces at war here, and Syria is the battle ground.

cyberhog wrote: »

Suppose Assad is right and terrorists do in fact bare most of the responsibililty for the civilian massacre, and it turns out that they killed those children in the hope it would trigger a NATO intervention then I think it would be unconscionable if the West continued to support the anti-government side because it would be virtually impossible to prevent that support from reaching those terrorists aswell.

Why would people slaughter their own mother and fathers brothers,sisters,sons and daughters!! the Free Syrian Army operates in their own towns and villages,the only terrorists in the country are Al Qaeda who are suicide bombing the capital and they don't have the numbers to go into a village and kill everyone.Hezbollah and Iran's special forces are working with the Syrian state army to kill the supporters of the FSA they are the ones that are doing this along with the thugs called shabeeha.the FSA dose not have the artillery we see every day being used to soften up the towns and villages before they go in and go house to house.(as soon as Gaddafi said that NATO were bombing every building with a green flag on it but in Syria we are watching it happen every day house by house killing and arresting).

If the world dose not do something we will have thousands of people going on Jihad and some will be used by Al Qaeda to establish a base like in Yemen and Somalia with Al Shabab who announced recently they are part of Al Qaeda.

We saw in Libya people going on Jihad and being turned away if they were not Libyan or if they thought it was Al Qaeda whose ally Ansar ud-Dine stole thousands of weapons from Libya and took control of 2/3 of Mali with the MNLA,that war only lasted less than a year and look how much damage was caused.This and much worse will happen Syria if nothing is done to save it!

Can you imagine Al Qaeda with a base in the Med on the back door to Europe!

The one thing that is certain is that Assad has ruined Syria.

He could have handed the country over to a democratic government and he had plenty of time to organize credible elections including credible presidential elections. The fact that he wouldn't allow anyone to run against him in the presidential elections tells its own stories, he knew he would lose if he did.

He must take much of the blame for destroying Syria.

plasmaguy wrote: »

He must take much of the blame for destroying Syria.

No one is denying that, but also the SFA has a lot to answer for.

Suff wrote: »

Redwolf,

I doubt that you'll have Al Qaeda base in Syria. the country has been secular state for many years, since its independent from the Ottoman and later the French mandate. Islamists fundamentalists have no supporters in syria, largely due to the bombings in the early 80's by the Muslim brotherhood.

the FSA is well armed and capable to fight and hold off the National Syrian Army. Otherwise, the regime would have wiped them out months ago.

What country dose support people like Al Qaeda??the majority of Tuareg's in Mali or Azawad don't and they are having Wahhabi law being enforced on them its the same in southern Yemen were thousands are leaving their homes in Abbyan province and in Somalia they are hated but they controlled almost the whole country at one point,they brainwash people into believing in their Saudi supported religion of Wahhabism.
Everyone from the FSA to the UN know Al Qaeda is in the country and it will be very easy for them to recruit with all the sectarian violence that's growing day by day,they will target the Alawis and Christians and once they have enough people they will take whole towns.

The FSA are being given machine guns and a few million here and there but the Syrian army is constantly being given weapons tanks and helicopters by Russia and troops by Iran an Hezbollah.I don't remember the IRA taking the north with the money and guns they got from some of the people around then.

The quicker Assad goes and a new government is created to establish law and order and start reconciliation the better.

Suff wrote: »

Your idea of the FSA is that they're defending themselves and the people from Assad is ludicrous... The FSA have kidnaped and killed civilians and this has been documented and witnessed by many observers and Syrians.

Source about this?

Claiming you are from Syria will only get you so far around here, you have to actually post your sources as opposed to saying you know its happening.

The French Resistance were an armed militia who often killed civilians. George Washington lead a militia. The IRA pre 1922 were an armed militia.

Stop being so naive. You know full well you can't freedom from regimes like Assad's without using weapons and forming a militia.

Again you have no right to lecture the Syrian people as you don't live there and while you might think Syria under Assad was ok, clearly millions of Syrians disagree with you.

Suff wrote: »

If only... foreign intervention is visible and have worsened the situation.But Muslims aren't the only sect in Syria, Christians have played a major role in the past, hopefully they'll start to voice their opinion soon.


FYI; A campaign was launched last year on Facebook among Syrians to unite the people against sectarian divisions:

Q; Are you Sunni, She'it, Alawi, Durzi, Catholic, Antiochian Orthodox, Greek Catholic, Assyrian-Church, Armenian Orthodox, Protestants....???

A; I'm Syrian!

That sounds like the line peddled by Assad.

All united, under Assad.

It wears thin after a while.

A lot of people have prospered under Assad, including some Sunnis, but it's the Alwites that have really prospered hence their desperation to hold onto power. It was the same under Gadaffi and his supporters. The vast majority suffered, while some prospered.

It's hard to blame the people of Syria for having enough. If it was a dictatorship that had widespread support fair enough, but it doesn't and like all dictatorships, it survives by pitting one group against another and when there is a chance of the dictatorship falling, the dictator arms one side and sets them against the other, which is exactly what Assad did.

The crimes of the FSA are miniscule in comparison to the monstrous crimes against humanity perpetrated by Assad.

AlekSmart wrote: »

Nope.

I never bought into the demolish Banghazi line at all,and still don't.

The bould Colonel did very forcibly,and with typically demonically sounding threats warn the then emerging rebel faction of his intent to hunt them down.

However,the fact remains that Gadaffi's very specific threats were successfully massaged and managed until they could be marketed to the civilized cultured world as a threat to randomly Scorch his entire country.

Threatening to use Anti-Aircraft weapons against the civilian population was another highly colourful wording ascribed to Gadaffi also,with little supporting evidence produced either then or now to verify it.

One significant reason for the dearth of UN/NATO interest in Syria is the lack of any real grandstanding from Bashir al-Assad in a situation which would have seen Gadaffi harranguing all and sundry at maximum volume.

Al-Assad's apparent mundane appearance and behaviour makes a media-job somewhat harder to do on him as he has not risen to the bait in media terms.

Well luckily the Arab League and UNSC disagreed with you and action against Gadaffi was supported by both these organisations.

Gadaffi is dead thankfully and goodriddance to the scumbag.

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung confirms it's report on the Houla massacre
http://wsws.org/articles/2012/jun2012/houl-j16.shtml
It is patently absurd to take as good coin the torrent of misinformation on Syria posing as news reporting.

It is not possible to understand the events in Syria except as the next step in the plans of Imperialism to get the planet in it's militaristic grip. The world economic crisis of capitalism leaves no other option for the ruling class but savage austerity; and war amongst themselves.

The seizure of resources in the region is also coupled with the military encroachment on China and the Russian federation. The realpolitik of the pressure of events dictates the ditching of former allies.

This is very suspicious... if you recall Erdogan had announced back in April that Turkey could resort to the fifth section of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to protect its border with Syria after the Syrian forces launched a fire inside Turkish territory. Section five of the Treaty states that in the event that any member of the NATO faces an aggression or any form of an attack, all members will be forced to consider this attack against them, and consequently they must take the necessary measures to help the country against the attack. hence; a cheap attempt to get NATO involved.

Link Here's another report stating that Saudi is funding the FSA.

excerpt:
'The move, which has been discussed between Riyadh and senior officials in the US and Arab world, is believed to be gaining momentum as a recent flush of weapons sent to rebel forces by Saudi Arabia and Qatar starts to make an impact on battlefields in Syria. Officials in the Saudi capital embraced the idea when it was put to them by Arab officials in May, according to sources in three Arab states, around the same time that weapons started to flow across the southern Turkish border into the hands of Free Syria Army leaders.

The Guardian witnessed the transfer of weapons in early June near the Turkish frontier. Five men dressed in the style of Gulf Arabs arrived in a police station in the border village of Altima in Syria and finalised a transfer from the Turkish town of Reyhanli of around 50 boxes of rifles and ammunition, as well as a large shipment of medicines.

The men were treated with deference by local FSA leaders and were carrying large bundles of cash. They also received two prisoners held by rebels, who were allegedly members of the pro-regime militia, the Shabiha.

The influx of weapons has reinvigorated the insurrection in northern Syria, which less than six weeks ago was on the verge of being crushed.'

This is an organised foreign attack on Syria.

As for the FSA; I think they need to re-arrange their name to SFA - Saudi Funded Army. ...bastards.

Let's see who will fund the Saudi opposition, its only a matter of time.