Fatwa from Qom endorses fighting alongside Assad

Grand Ayatollah Kazim al-Haeri (above) and Saudi Prince Turki al Faisal (top)

“First ever fatwa from Qom endorses fighting alongside Assad,” Saudi Arabia’s newspaper of records, Asharq Alawsat, banners on its front page today.

The paper was referring to the first public religious edict issued by a leading Shiite Muslim cleric widely followed by Iraqi militants permitting Shiites to fight in Syria’s war alongside President Bashar Assad’s forces.

The fatwa by Iran-based Grand Ayatollah Kazim al-Haeri, one of the mentors of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, comes as thousands of Shiite fighters mostly from Iraq and Lebanon play a major role in the battles.

The call likely will increase the sectarian tones of the war, which pits overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim rebels against members of Assad’s Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam.

Al-Haeri is based in the holy city of Qom, Iran’s religious capital. Among his followers, according to The Associated Press, are many fighters with the feared Shiite militia, Asa’eb Ahl al-Haq, or Band of the Righteous, an Iranian-backed group that repeatedly attacked U.S. forces in Iraq and says it is sending fighters to Syria. That militia is headed by white-turbaned Shiite cleric Qais al-Khazali, who spent years in U.S. detention but was released after he was handed over to the Iraqi government.

Many Shiite gunmen already fight around the holy shrine of Sayyidah Zaynab just south of Damascus. The shrine is named after the Prophet Muhammad’s granddaughter and is popular with Iranian worshippers and tourists.

Asharq Alawsat says the fatwa sanctions the participation of Iraqi fighters in the protection of Sayyidah Zaynab shrine as well as in the defense of Assad’s regime.

Asked by a follower whether it is legitimate to travel to Syria to fight, al-Haeri replied: “The battle in Syria is not for the defense of the shrine of Sayyidah Zaynab but it is a battle of infidels against Islam and Islam should be defended.”

“Fighting in Syria is legitimate and those who die are martyrs,” al-Haeri said in comments posted on his official website. An official at his office confirmed that the comments are authentic.

Asa’eb Ahl al-Haq currently has about 1,000 fighters in Syria and many others were volunteering to go join the war, said Ashtar al-Kaabi, an Asa’eb Ahl al-Haq member who organizes sending Shiite fighters from Iraq to Syria. Asked whether the increase is related to al-Haeri’s fatwa, al-Kaabi said: “Yes. This fatwa has had wide effect.”

The rebels are mainly backed by Saudi Arabia and Turkey, Sunni powerhouses in the Middle East.

The main Western-backed Syrian opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, claimed recently that Shiite fighters from 14 different factions are fighting alongside Assad forces in Syria. The coalition said those fighters are brought to Syria with the help of Iraq’s Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, another Iranian pawn.

Lebanon’s Iran-backed Shiite Hezbollah also openly joined Assad’s forces in May after hiding its participation for months. Since then, the group has helped Assad forces recapture a string of towns and villages from rebels.

Separately, an influential Saudi Arabian prince said on Saturday Assad’s opponents have been at an impossible disadvantage since the start of the Syrian conflict because the United States and Britain refused to help them.

The United States and Britain suspended non-lethal aid to northern Syria last Thursday after reports that Islamic Front -- a union of six major rebel groups -- had taken buildings belonging to the Free Syrian Army's (FSA) Syrian Military Council on the border with Turkey.

Former Saudi intelligence chief Prince Turki al-Faisal criticized the decision, saying the two countries had left the moderate FSA to fend for itself.

"What's more damaging is that since the beginning of this conflict, since the FSA arose as a response to Assad's impunity, Britain and the U.S. did not come forward and provide the necessary aid to allow it to defend itself and the Syrian people from Assad's killing machine," Prince Turki told Reuters on the sidelines of the World Policy Conference in Monaco.

"You have a situation where one side is lopsided with weapons like the Assad regime is, with tanks and missiles -- you name it, he is getting it -- and the other side is screaming out to get defensive weapons against these lethal weapons that Assad has," Turki said. "Why should he stop the killing?"

"That to me is why the FSA is in not as prominent position as it should be today, because of the lack of international support for it. The fighting is going to continue and the killing is going to continue."

The U.S. gave us the impression that they were going to do things in Syria that they finally didn't," Prince Turki said outside the World Policy Conference in Monaco. "The aid they're giving to the Free Syrian Army is irrelevant. Now they say they're going to stop the aid: OK, stop it. It's not doing anything anyway."

Saudi Arabia and Qatar are the main backers of the main opposition Syrian National Coalition and the FSA.

Assad is backed by Iran, which struck a preliminary deal on with world powers in November to limit sanctions relief for more international oversight of its nuclear program.

Western countries have held back from giving heavy weapons such as anti-tank and missile launchers for fear they could fall into the wrong hands.

"For me ... (to bring a) successful end to this conflict would be to bring an end to the Assad regime. It is because of the Assad regime that everything is happening," Prince Turki said.

Commanders from the Islamic Front are due to hold talks with U.S. officials in Turkey in coming days, rebel and opposition sources said on Saturday, reflecting the extent to which the Islamic Front alliance has eclipsed the FSA brigades.

A rebel fighter with the Islamic Front said he expected the talks to discuss whether the United States would help arm the front and assign to it responsibility for maintaining order in the rebel-held areas of northern Syria.

Prince Turki told Reuters while he hoped Iran was serious with regard its interim nuclear deal, it needed to provide some confidence-building measures with its Gulf Arab neighbors, beginning in Syria.

"Iran is coming at us with a broad smile. Let's hope they are serious about that. We would like to see Iran first of all get out of Syria," he said.

Reporting in context for yesterday’s New York Times, Steven Erlanger wrote in part:

…The Saudis have been particularly shaken by Mr. Obama’s refusal to intervene forcefully in the Syrian civil war, especially his recent decision not to punish President Bashar al-Assad of Syria with military strikes even after evidence emerged that Mr. Assad’s government used chemical weapons on its own citizens.

Instead, Mr. Obama chose to seek congressional authorization for a strike, and when that proved difficult to obtain, he cooperated with Russia to get Syria to agree to give up its chemical weapons. Prince Turki and Israeli officials have argued that the agreement merely legitimized Mr. Assad, and on Sunday, the prince called the world’s failure to stop the conflict in Syria “almost a criminal negligence.”

Syria, Iran, nuclear issues and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict were the main focus for Prince Turki, who spoke at the World Policy Conference, a gathering of officials and intellectuals largely drawn from Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.

Saudi unhappiness with Iran’s growing power in the region is no secret, and the Saudis, who themselves engage with Iran, have no problem with the United States trying to do the same, the prince said. But he complained that bilateral talks between Iranian and American officials had been kept secret from American allies, sowing further mistrust.

The prince said Iran must give up its ambitions for a nuclear weapons program — Iran says its nuclear program is only for civilian purposes — and stop using its own troops and those of Shiite allies like the Lebanese organization Hezbollah to fight in neighboring countries, like Syria and Iraq. “The game of hegemony toward the Arab countries is not acceptable,” the prince said. Just as Arabs will not dress as Westerners do, he said, “we won’t accept to wear Iranian clothes, either.”

A prevalent theme at the conference was the waning of American influence in the Middle East. Laurent Fabius, the French foreign minister, said: “Today we live in a zero-polar, or a-polar, world. No one power or group of powers can solve all the problems.”The United States, Mr. Fabius said, was often criticized for being “overpresent, but now it is being criticized for not being present enough.” While “it is perfectly understandable” that Mr. Obama would refrain from new military engagements in the Middle East, he said, “it creates a certain vacuum” that has allowed Russia “to make a comeback on the world scene” and has encouraged France to intervene in the Central African Republic, Libya and Mali…

“Greater Syria: From Dagestan to Xinjiang”

Al-Qaeda offshoots are set to declare an Islamist state in Syria’s north on Eid al-Fitr (August 8), according to Saudi Arabia’s leading daily Asharq Alawsat quoting a Free Syrian Army (FSA) top dog.

The paper quotes him saying the al-Qaeda-linked groups hope by then to have wrested control from the FSA of the two border crossings into Turkey: Bab al-Hawa and Harem.

Bab al-Hawa links Turkish and Syrian highways between the cities of Iskenderun and Aleppo. The closest town to Bab al-Hawa on the Turkish side of the border is Reyhanli in Hatay province, and the nearest town on the Syrian side is al-Dana.

Harem is right by the Turkish frontier in Syria’s northern Idlib Province.

The FSA official speaking to Asharq Alawsat linked plans to declare an Islamic state in Syria’s north to recent killings by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant of two senior FSA officers – namely, Fadi al-Qish, a local FSA commander in the village of al-Dana and Kamal Hamami (aka Abu Baseer al-Ladkani), member of the FSA Supreme Military Council.

Asharq Alawsat’s FSA source said the FSA was deploying units and checkpoints in areas targeted by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant to prevent them falling into its fighters’ hands.

Tariq Alhomayed, Asharq Alawsat’s former editor-in-chief, writes in his daily column for the newspaper:

Irrespective of the accuracy of reports about armed clashes between al-Qaeda and the FSA, and the attempt to assassinate the latter’s overall commander Gen. Salim Idriss, this is what is in the cards, whether now or later on.

The confrontation between al-Qaeda and the Syrians is inevitable because al-Qaeda is the fleeting anomaly while Syrian moderation is the established rule.

The danger in the Syrian scene today is that the FSA is now facing Bashar al-Assad’s regime, fighters from Iran, (Lebanese) Hezbollah and Iraqi Shiite militias, and al-Qaeda...

The irony is that the FSA is still being deprived of qualitative arms and left to face this array of forces singlehanded.

Gen. Idriss has accused David Cameron of betrayal after the British Prime Minister abandoned plans to arm the Syrian opposition.

He said the decision would "leave us alone to be killed" by Assad, and pave the way for al-Qaeda to dominate rebel ranks.

Gen. Idriss hit out in an interview with The Daily Telegraph after Downing Street confirmed Cameron had ruled out arming the opposition on advise from the British military. The government had previously hinted that it was strongly considering it, successfully lobbying two months ago for an end to the European Union arms embargo.

But military chiefs at Britain's National Security Council are understood to have warned Downing Street the conflict was now too advanced for basic weapons supplies to make much difference.

They said that could only be achieved by a much-larger scale intervention, involving jet strikes on regime air defenses and bases, which Britain has already ruled out.

Instead, Britain will draw up plans to train moderate rebel units and continue supplying "non-lethal" items like body armor and communications equipment.

Idriss greeted the British change of heart with fury. The FSA has spent much of the last two years trying to persuade the West to give it military backing.

"The West promises and promises. This is a joke now," Idriss said, the anger clear in his voice. "I have not had the opportunity to ask David Cameron personally if he will leave us alone to be killed. On behalf of all the Syrians, thank you very much."

"What are our friends in the West waiting for?" asked Idriss. "For Iran and Hezbollah to kill all the Syrian people?"

He also warned the West’s refusal to arm the more moderate elements of the insurgency would hand Syria's revolution to extremist groups, who already have better access to weapons.

"Soon there will be no FSA to arm," he said. "The Islamic groups will take control of everything, and this is not in the interests of Britain."

The British refusal will be seen as a particular blow to rebel morale given that recent signals suggested the government was planning the very opposite tack.

Only last month, William Hague, the Foreign Secretary, insisted Britain "shouldn't rule any option out," claiming that concerns about arms earmarked for secular rebel groups falling into jihadist hands were exaggerated.

“Greater Syria: From Dagestan to Xinjiang” is the title of a related and enlightening think piece by veteran Lebanese political analyst Jihad el-Zein for today’s edition of the Beirut daily an-Nahar.

The gist of Zein’s opinion:

The Syria crisis is into a third “jihadist” phase, having already gone through “civil” then “militarized” chapters.

The “jihadist” phase currently underway elicits greater commitment by Russia and China because it touches on their home front concerns.

Earlier this month, for instance, Chinese state media blamed Syrians for unrest in Xinjiang, which is home to the minority Muslim Uighur population.

China has traditionally blamed violence in Xinjiang on Islamic separatists who want to establish an independent state of “East Turkestan.”

This time Beijing laid the blame squarely on terrorists in Syria, of which the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra Front is the most notorious, but the charge of a Syria connection still comports with a common government narrative of portraying Xinjiang’s violence as coming from other countries, such as Pakistan and Afghanistan, rather than homegrown agitation.

While about 90 per cent of China is ethnic Han, more than 40 per cent of Xinjiang’s 22 million people are Uighurs.

The Global Times, a tabloid owned by the Communist Party mouthpiece, the People's Daily, said some members of the East Turkestan faction had moved from Turkey into Syria.

The rise of Salafist militancy in Syrian rebel groups is a tremendous concern for Russia too.

Moscow fears the numbers and efficacy of forces such as al-Nusra Front will one day turn their attention to oppressed Muslim regions in Russia such as Dagestan and Chechnya.

Dagestan, the region where the brothers who bombed this year's Boston Marathon once lived, borders on the Caspian Sea, Azerbaijan, Chechnya and Georgia.

President Vladimir Putin has dismissed the leader of Dagestan, where an Islamist insurgency is raging. The region has taken over from neighboring Chechnya as Russia's most volatile province.

Salafist fighters, including some from al-Qaeda, fought in Chechnya in the 1990s; they may do so again. Syria and Chechnya are only five hundred miles apart.

If you looked at a map of Russia, you would see Dagestan’s seaports on the Caspian Sea can easily ferry arms and everything else to neighboring Iran and from there across the “Shiite Crescent” to Syria via Iraq.

The struggle for Syria is thus strategic, not tactical, for Russia and less so China. Both have a bigger stake now in the “jihadist” chapter of the Syria crisis as it impacts their respective home fronts.

That’s why the “Greater Syria” – i.e. an international and regional struggle with the following coordinates:

-- Longitude from Dagestan to Xinjiang via Peshawar, covering the Jihadist stretch

-- Latitude from South Lebanon’s Naqoura to Tehran, taking in the Shiite spread.

“I saw al-Qaeda kill my FSA commander”

The al-Qaeda-linked "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant"

Free Syrian Army (FSA) Lt.-Col. Abu Ahmad was by the side of Kamal Hamami -- aka Abu Baseer al-Ladkani -- when the FSA Supreme Military Council member was gunned down by militants linked to al-Qaeda in Latakia’s rural area Thursday dusk time.

Speaking live last night from an FSA outpost near the Turkey-Syria border, Abu Ahmad gave this witness account of the killing in a long-distance interview with Aljazeera TV news channel:

Q. Lt.-Col. Abu Ahmad, since you were accompanying Kamal Hamami, put us in the picture of the circumstances surrounding his killing.

A. The late Abu Baseer had deployed his al-Izz bin Abdessalam Brigade in the midmost of Naba’ al-Murr (in Latakia province’s north).

I was alongside Commander Abu Baseer, God bless his soul, on his frequent inspection visits to his brigade.

Yesterday (Thursday) afternoon, we chose to return there to break our (Ramadan) fast together with members of al-Izz bin Abdessalam Brigade.

While heading there, we were stopped at a checkpoint sign reading the (al-Qaeda-linked) “Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.”

The man in charge of the checkpoint said, “No entry.”

Abu Baseer told him, “Why are you denying us access? We are sons of this area, of Syria and of this township.”

The man in charge said, “These are the orders of the (Islamic State’s) Emir.”

Abu Baseer: “We would like to meet this Emir. Where is your Emir?”

Abu Baseer is a leading figure in Syria’s coastal region. He doesn’t need an introduction. All (opposition) brigades deployed in Syria’s coastal area since the start of the revolution know him.

We waited for the Emir to make his way from the easternmost part of Latakia’s rural area to its westernmost, where the checkpoint is situated.

The whole thing was premeditated.

Q. You said, “Premeditated”?

A. Yes, because they had us wait for their Emir, who goes by the name of Abu Ayman (al-Baghdadi), for over one-and-a-half-hours.

During the one-and-a-half-hour wait we were conversing with the fighters manning the checkpoint.

One of them was Moroccan.

Abu Baseer told him, “Since you hail from Morocco and are now in Syria, the checkpoint sign should read Syrian Arab Republic. This is Syrian territory and no one else’s.

“If you want to be on our side and help us, you are welcome. But to come here with alien ideas you wish to impose on this land is something we cannot let happen -- not while we are here.”

Abu Ayman launched into provocative remarks as soon as he arrived.

Our retinue wanted to intervene, but Abu Baseer, God bless his soul, ordered them to put away and lock up their arms in the car. He then turned to Abu Ayman and said, “I wouldn’t point my weapon at a fellow Muslim.”

Abu Ayman didn’t seem to be all ears. He gave no heed to the remark. He simply told Abu Baseer, “We won’t allow the FSA to operate here.”

Abu Ayman then turned to us and said we were all Takfiris.

“I am killing Abu Baseer,” he blurted out as he shot him dead.

Three members of our escort were also wounded.

Q. Was Abu Baseer’s a targeted killing or was the plan to assassinate any FSA commander and thus send a message to the whole FSA command?

A. The specific target in this instance was Abu Baseer, yes.

Abu Ayman told me in the face, “We shall wipe out all the FSA leaders. None of them will be spared.” That’s what he said.

In truth, we don’t want these aliens in our midst. We don’t need them. We don’t want fighters from outside Syria.

If properly armed, the Syrian people are able to liberate their country without outside help. Had the international community given us the required weapons and ammunitions, we would have brought down the regime long ago.

Q. The FSA says the assassination was a “declaration of war.” The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant has specifically shut out the FSA from all over the Latakia region – and perhaps from throughout northern Syria. How does this affect you and the Syrian revolution?

A. What operations did these people ever mount in Syria’s coastal region? Abu Baseer was among the first officers and revolutionaries to establish a presence there. He liberated the Jabal al-Kurd and the Turkmen Mountains.

These people came into the liberated areas but nowhere else. Did you ever see them in Qusayr, Tel Kalakh, Deraa or Homs? They only turn up in liberated areas, bringing with them alien ideologies that they want to impose on the Syrian people.

Q. What do you intend doing after Abu Baseer’s assassination?

A. We want these people out. We don’t want them in the Syrian people’s areas.

If they wish to fight for the objectives of the Syrian people’s revolution, fine. But if they came to serve their own agendas and be a thorn in our flesh and a torn in the side of the revolution, then we won’t give them any chance whatsoever.

Al-Qaeda turns against the FSA in Syria

The FSA's late Kamal Hamami, known by his nom de guerre Abu Baseer al-Ladkani

The Free Syrian Army (FSA) Supreme Military Council will meet shortly to discuss the “treacherous assassination” of one of its 30 members by Islamist militants linked to al-Qaeda.

The announcement was made on air this afternoon by Louay al-Mekdad, the FSA’s political and media coordinator.

In remarks to Alarabiya TV news channel, Mekdad confirmed militants from the “Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant,” a hardline Islamist group, killed Kamal Hamami in Latakia port city’s rural area yesterday after luring him to a meeting to discuss battle plans.

Kamal Hamami -- better known by his nom de guerre, Abu Baseer al-Ladkani – was in charge of a key brigade within the FSA, namely the al-Izz bin Abdessalam Brigade.

Mekdad said “mercenaries” belonging to the “Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant did not suffice to assassinate Abu Baseer only, but also attacked FSA fighters trying to retrieve his body and detained some of them.”

Reuters later this afternoon quoted Mekdad saying Abu Ayman al-Baghdadi, the Islamic State's Emir of the coastal region, personally shot dead Hamami and his brother at the roadblock.

He said a fighter who was travelling with them was set free to relay the message that the Islamic State considers the FSA heretics and that the Supreme Command is now an al-Qaeda target.

"If these people came to defend the Syrian revolution and not help the Assad regime, then they have to hand over the killers," Mekdad said, adding that the bodies of the two men were still with the al-Qaeda affiliate.

While FSA units sometimes fight alongside Islamist militant groups such as the “Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant,” rivalries have increased and al-Qaeda-linked groups have been blamed for several assassinations of commanders of moderate rebel units.

The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the conflict, said the FSA and the Islamic State have had violent exchanges in several areas of Syria over the past few weeks, showing growing antagonism between President Bashar al-Assad’s foes.

“Last Friday, the Islamic State killed an FSA rebel in Idlib province and cut his head off. There have been attacks in many provinces,” the Observatory’s leader Rami Abdurrahman said.

Two of Hamami’s men were wounded in yesterday’s attack, he said by telephone.

Saud’s tough talk on Syria and Kerry’s inshallah

John Kerry and Saud al-Faisal meet the press after their talks in Jeddah

As far as I can recall, yesterday was the first time I see Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal so spirited in public.

He was speaking at a joint news conference with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry after their talks on Syria in Jeddah.

The pair’s body language was also telling.

Showing no sign of his debilitating back pain, Prince Saud was blunt and passionate about the state of play in Syria. His words read like sheer exasperation.

Kerry on the other hand sounded listless and downcast.

Prince Saud’s tough language:

• Saudi Arabia cannot be silent at Hezbollah crossing from Lebanon to back regime forces in Syria.
• Syria is facing a double-edged attack by Hezbollah and Iranian Revolutionary Guards with unlimited military support from Russia. Along with the regime's genocide against its own people, this adds an even deadlier element in the form of an all-out foreign invasion.
• Syria now can only be considered an occupied land. This requires resolute and swift action by the international community.
• There no longer is rhyme or reason to let pass Russia’s blatant and incessant arms supplies to the Syrian regime… Meantime, we are still failing to secure international protection for the Syrian people, or at least provide some sort of military assistance to help them defend themselves against abhorrent crimes being committed against them with nary an excuse.
• The kingdom demands a clear, unequivocal international resolution that bans any sort of weapons’ support for the Syrian regime and declares null and void the regime’s legitimacy.
• The illegitimate regime cannot possibly be part of any arrangement or play any role whatsoever in shaping the present and future of Syria.

Kerry’s inshallah:

• This is a situation that’s been made far more difficult and complicated by Assad’s invitation to Iran and to Hezbollah, Iran’s surrogate, to cross lines – international lines – and to become engaged on the ground in Syria. It is the Assad regime that has internationalized the violence on the ground in the worst of ways.
• We believe the best solution is a political solution in which the people of Syria have an opportunity to be able to make a choice about their future. And we believe that every minority can be respected, that there could be diversity and pluralism, and that people could do so in a climate of peace in the absence of oppression and violence or the involvement of foreign fighters, providing the Assad regime is prepared to live by the framework that was created in the Geneva communiqué for a transition government with full executive powers chosen by mutual consent of all the parties, which really has the best chance of bringing about peace in Syria.
• We continue to believe Geneva-2 offers the best opportunity to be able to try to bring that about.

Syria's Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem told a news conference in Damascus on Monday regime representatives will attend Geneva-2 -- but “not to hand over power to the other side.”

As Prince Saud and Kerry were speaking in Jeddah, Syria troubleshooter Lakhdar Brahimi was telling reporters in Geneva ahead of talks with American and Russian officials that Geneva-2 was unlikely to take place in July as he had hoped.

"I very, very much hope governments in the region and the Big Powers -- in particular the United States and Russia -- will act to contain this situation that is getting out of hand, not only in Syria but also in the region."

Brahimi voiced deep concern at the deadliest outbreak of violence in Lebanon since the start of the Syrian conflict in 2011.

“Events in the city of Sidon in Lebanon yesterday, where over 50 people were killed, are a stern reminder to all of the risks of the conflict in Syria spreading across borders to neighboring countries,” he said.

Editorially, Saudi daily Asharq Alawsat’s former editor-in-chief Tariq Alhomayed writes:

Foreign fighters – whether from Iran’s Revolutionary Guard or Quds Force, or Hezbollah, or Iraqi Shiite militias, or regrettably other regional Shiites – swarmed into Syria at Bashar Assad’s invitation to save his regime. Even the security of Damascus is in the hands of Qassem Soleimani who hardly leaves the capital city.

Hezbollah rules Syria’s borders with Lebanon.

The Baghdad government controls Syria’s border with Iraq and directs its forces and the Iraqi Shiite militiamen to back Assad and stifle the Free Syrian Army (FSA).

Israel occupies the Golan and allows Assad’s army to deploy tanks on the Heights to shut out FSA fighters from the Quneitra crossing.

Russian warships are off Syria’s Mediterranean waters.

All this shows Syria is splintered and occupied after Assad killed about 100,000 of his own people.

Prince Saud al-Faisal’s remarks mean Saudi Arabia does not accept a political solution in Syria that keeps Assad in office. This is the kingdom’s underlying position vis-à-vis current or future political initiatives that aim to save Assad, including the unlikely Geneva-2.

Prince Saud al-Faisal’s remarks were pivotal and conclusive. He called things by their name and gave the Syrian opposition a shot in the arm.

His remarks mean Riyadh is proceeding with propping up the FSA so it can defend peoples’ lives and land.

Putin-Assad twosome comes out on top

G8 Superstar Vladimir Putin

The Vladimir Putin-Bashar al-Assad alliance emphatically won yesterday’s G8 summit finals in Northern Ireland, according to Abdelbari Atwan.

The publisher/editor-in-chief of the London-based pan-Arab newspaper al-Quds al-Arabi writes in Arabic this morning:

Proof the Russian president came out on top at the G8 meeting is corroborated by three peculiarities in the summit’s final statement on Syria, namely:

1. Absence of any explicit and unambiguous call on his partner Assad to stand down as the sine qua non of a political solution to the Syria crisis.
2. Strong endorsement of Geneva-2, where the Syrian regime will be represented by Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem. This translates into recognition of the regime’s legitimacy.
3. A commitment by the G8 leaders to fight and destroy Islamic extremist groups affiliated to al-Qaeda or other Muslim Jihadist organizations.

Thus, after a 26-month uprising and over 100,000 chiefly innocent Syrian fatalities, G8 leaders agree with Assad that he is fighting armed gangs.

This conclusion must have shocked and shaken the armed Syrian opposition, its supporters and its sponsors, especially the Gulf Arab states.

Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron, one of the most ardent Western advocates of arming the Syrian opposition, said, “Yes, there are elements of the Syrian opposition that are deeply unsavory, that are very dangerous, very extremist, and I want nothing to do with them.

“I'd like them driven out of Syria; they're linked to al-Qaeda. But there are elements of the Syrian opposition who want to see a free, democratic, pluralistic Syria that respects the rights of minorities, including Christians, and we should be working with them...

“We have to learn the lessons of Iraq by ensuring the key institutions of the state are maintained through the transition and there is no vacuum.”

Cameron used two very indicative expressions – drive out Islamic extremists and avoid a political vacuum.

The question that begs an answer is this: Who would drive out the extremists and how? The Free Syrian Army under the command of Chief of Staff Gen. Salim Idriss, who was picked by the U.S, and the West as sole conduit of arms aid to opposition forces? Given the arms and funds, the man is presumably prepared to do the job. Gulf countries can chip in and provide both.

Cameron’s suggestion of ridding Syria of extremists is easier said than done, if not impossible in the foreseeable future. The Jihadists groups already have a pervasive presence in Syrian opposition ranks.

Assad told the German premier daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in an interview published on the eve of the G8 summit: “My current term ends in 2014. When the country is in a crisis, the president is expected to shoulder the burden of responsibility and resolve the situation, not abandon his duties and leave.

“I often use the analogy of a captain navigating a ship hit by a storm; just imagine the captain jumping ship and escaping in a lifeboat!

“If I decide to leave now, I would be committing treason. If on the other hand, the public decided I should step down, that would be another issue. And this can only be determined through elections or a referendum.”

A Russian president like Putin, who keeps saying he won’t allow a no-fly zone over Syria and he will continue arms shipment to Damascus, backs Assad.

An American president with trembling knees, who was stung by two defeats in Iraq and Afghanistan and half or quarter of a victory in Libya, backs the Syrian opposition.

Isn’t Assad justified to relax and stretch his legs?

For the nth time, their Western and Arab “friends” have duped the Syrian people.