“The Game of Nations” is defunct

This is the weekly think piece penned in Arabic by Saudi mass media celebrity Jamal Khashoggi for pan-Arab daily al-Hayat

Better stop being haunted by the 1950s and 1960s mentality. And better cast aside “The Game of Nations” book written by the famed ex-spy Miles Copeland.

Local or international intelligence operatives can no more change the course of history, build nation-states, demarcate borders or create national leaders.

Yes, they can sabotage a course of events or stop that course in its tracks, but they cannot reignite it or change its direction on a whim.

Some people are slow learners and persist in being obsessed by grand bargains.

Vast segments of the public still consider themselves “pawns on a chessboard” – another “book” that people should stop reading – and sit idly by waiting for whatever is decided for them. They would thoughtlessly subscribe to what columnists and political analysts propagate about plans in world capitals for “a grand political bargain” with Iran.

The grand bargain with Iran would see her reconciling with the West, putting her nuclear ambitions on hold (albeit temporarily), and sufficing with nuclear power production.

The deal would leave Syria, after its regime’s rehabilitation in one way or another, in Iran’s sphere of influence. In return, Saudi Arabia would get Lebanon as a consolation prize. A Lebanese government acceptable to Riyadh and amenable to Hezbollah would be set up.

Those with a 1960s mindset continue to redraw the map of the Middle East without installing “The Power of the Peoples” update on “The Game of Nations.”

After the Arab Spring’s defeats and setbacks, “The Power of the Peoples” is still alive and kicking. It will surely affect the outcome of events despite all the agreements that could be reached in Geneva-2 or at the public and hush-hush meetings being held around the globe to discuss the New Arab World, which is still in the making.

True, the Middle East is on fire and in a state of flux. The borders set in the Sykes-Picot Agreement are still in place, but the flow of people and across these so-called artificial borders has been ceaseless. Seeping through these porous frontiers too where these peoples’ pan-Arab problems.

All Middle East files have been opened concomitantly. It’s as though the world and history want to solve them all at the same time: the perennial Arab-Israeli dispute; chronic unemployment and underdevelopment; crises of democracy and freedoms; and even the Sunni-Shiite faceoff.

That’s what makes proponents of deal-making insist on the existence of “The Grand Bargain.”

When drawing a geopolitical map of the Middle East today, we find it leads off with the 5+1 talks in Geneva between Iran and the West. The negotiations have “temporarily” failed to yield an agreement for Tehran to suspend nuclear enrichment and for the West to temporarily lift some economic sanctions; and for the Islamic Republic to normalize relations with the West, ending its 34-year-old cold war with the United States.

Sitting on the sidelines are Saudi Arabia and her Gulf partners. Israel is close by. All of them are faithfully watching what’s going on with interest.

Only Israel is outspoken about her concern, fuming and threatening at times that any agreement reached will not stop her from acting alone to protect her national security.

In fact, Israel is the prime mover of Western and American interest in Iran’s nuclear program, which it perceives as an existential threat.

The Arab Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, don’t see it that way. They deem it as a threat liable to tilt the regional balance of power in favor of Iran, which is eagerly striving to become the region’s hegemon.

The Gulf Arabs are more concerned than Israel because the Geneva negotiations revolve around Iran’s nuclear ambitions and let pass Iranian interventionism and regional hegemony designs. The Geneva negotiations close the eyes to Iran’s obstruction of national reconciliation in Bahrain, her smuggling of arms to the Houthis in Yemen and what Prince Saud al-Feisal described as her occupation of Syria.

At best, the United States would tell us a solution of the nuclear problem would be crowned by a historic reconciliation bound to solve the other issues.

Such U.S. promises are empty words.

Washington won’t be bothered with what it describes as “local Middle Eastern” matters that don’t threaten her or Israel’s security – matters it does not understand or wish to understand in the first place.

Here we turn to the Syrian square on the Great Bargain’s chessboard.

Saudi Arabia wants the conflict to come to an end because the Syria crisis is taxing her and her partners in the region by virtue of the overflow of demographic changes and the threats made by al-Qaeda to turn Syria into its homestead. Al-Qaeda is already exploiting sayings of the prophet to sign up new recruits, chiefly from Saudi Arabia.

The United States for its part is not in a rush to resolve the Syria conflict. And herein comes the “Grand Bargain” theorists and their aforesaid talk of “Syria for Iran and Lebanon for Saudi Arabia.”

They stretch their imagination further, talking of a second deal with Egypt as the top prize and a third involving Libya. They might even dismember Syria as in the wake of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles with total disregard of the historical transformations that occurred in the region since the Arab Spring.

The most important of these shifts were “peoples’ power,” “cross border information” and the influence of “social media” and “organized political movement.”

These changes put a stop to underhand deals. Strong leaders who descend on their people “from the sky” are a thing of the past. And so are the “Secret Police” and the likes of the “Securitate” and the “Stasi.”

It is wrong to resist the power of history under the illusion that the powerful can strike deals and plan the future independently of the peoples whose divisions were caused by a lack of experience in democracy. These peoples are still in a state of flux and at times furious. They know what they want but are bewildered by it.

They will certainly not accept a new conqueror showing up on a white horse to lead them to a bright new dawn.

The era of one-man rule is dead and gone.

Syria’s DAESH and the Emir of Peshawar

Balakot after the October 2005 earthquake (top).  Below is a DAESH poster

This is the weekly think piece penned in Arabic by Saudi mass media celebrity Jamal Khashoggi for pan-Arab daily al-Hayat

Balakot is a strange Pakistani town and the gateway to the Kaghan Valley.

The river Kunhar runs through the town, which is still a famous dwindling tourist destination in the region.

Balakot also falls within the Pakistani Taliban region where inhabitants have yet to reconcile with the Pakistani army. When they don’t attack a Pakistani army convoy, they suffice to torch a few pirated video movies in a shop.

The people of Balakot cherish Saudi Arabia, which helped rebuild their town when it was completely destroyed in the massive earthquake of October 8, 2005.

Syed Ahmad Shaheed (1786-1831), a Muslim activist from India against the Sikhs in the Punjab, is buried in the town.

He set up an Islamic state there in the 1830s that British Intelligence described at the time as being “Wahhabi.”

Syed Ahmad Shaheed was influenced by the teachings of Shah Waliullah (1703-1762), an Islamic reformer and founder of modern Islamic thought in India. He was credited with propagating the Madrassa (religious school) of Hadith (account of the Prophet’s deeds and sayings) and Tawhid (oneness of God).

Waliullah arrived in the Hijaz on a pilgrimage in 1724 and stayed there for eight years studying Hadith and Fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence).

In Medina, he became a schoolmate of Sheikh Muhammad bin Abdul Wahhab. The pair studied under Sheikh Muhammad Hayat al-Sindi, a prominent Muslim scholar, chancellor of al-Masjid al-Nabawi and Chief Justice of Medina, who instilled in them the principles of Tawhid (oneness of God), shunning fads, following the Salaf (first generation of Muslims, including the Prophet’s companions) and the establishment of God’s Sharia on earth through Da’wah (preaching of Islam) and Jihad.

Each returned to his country to change the course of history.

Waliullah’s disciples did not only spread the concept of monotheism in Islam, but they turned out to be a thorn in the side of the British for decades by preaching Jihad.

It seems British Intelligence officers in Basra and Bombay compared their respective reports and ended labeling followers of Waliullah and his disciple Syed Ahmad “Wahhabis” because they shared the adherence of their counterparts in the Arabian Peninsula to the purity of Islam and their passion for Jihad.

But great ideas are often trashed by overzealous followers lacking experience and wisdom.

After Syed Ahmad succeeded in turning the Pashtun tribes into Mujahideen, he endeared to them an Islam, which is unadulterated by fads and myths. He had them uphold Sharia instead of Pashtuwali, which the non-written ethical code and traditional lifestyle that the indigenous Pashtun people follow.

At the same time, he set up in that remote part of India an Islamic state after defeating the Sikhs and their army there. He thus entered Peshawar victorious in 1830 amid a warm welcome from its people and tribal elders.

Syed Ahmad did not stay there long.

After spending a few celebratory weeks, he appointed a deputy leader, Mullah Mazhar Ali, and retreated to his mountain stronghold among the Pashtun tribes. Inside two months, Mazhar Ali squandered all what Syed Ahmad achieved over a decade by antagonizing the Peshawar region’s population.

For several months in 1830, Syed Ahmad tried to conciliate established power hierarchies, but before the end of 1830 an organized uprising occurred and his close aides in Peshawar and plain villages were murdered and his Islamic movement retreated to the hills.

Syed Ahmad was killed in Balakot by the Sikh army in 1831.

Thus a genuine liberation and religious reform movement was defeated because of a few follies.

History always repeats itself.

Why this long story?

The reason is none other than the “Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant” organization, better known by its Arabic acronym DAESH, and what it is doing to the Syrian revolution now passing through its darkest moments since its outbreak two-and-a-half years ago.

As soon as it joined the fray, DAESH looked down at all the other rebel organizations. It haughtily asked all of them to obey its Emir, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, who insists on remaining incognito and never received a pledge of allegiance in a public place.

Let no one believe that DAESH’s use of the word “state” in the organization’s name or the designation of its leader as “Emir al-Mu’minin” (leader of the faithful) express a whim or a lust for power.

In effect, it is an abbreviation contrived by DAESH to win recognition of its juridical rule. In other words, a “victorious sect” is demanding the loyalty of every Muslim who is aware of its existence and is mindful of the designation of its Emir by its faithful.

Accordingly, the group’s argument goes, the Muslim should pay allegiance or obedience to DAESH or be sentenced to death as an alien breaking away from the congregation.

From Egypt to Syria, it is the season of Fatwas (or legal judgments) concerning Takfir (the practice of one Muslim declaring another an unbeliever) and murder.

While rebel commanders have been forced to accommodate DAESH on the ground, having been starved of cash and weapons, and now that people realize the alternative to DAESH is the Syrian regime, voices criticizing the group are growing louder by the day.

One preacher called DAESH fighters “outsiders” who needed to be eradicated before retractin, saying his words were taken out of context.

The preacher in question can’t be blamed. DAESH’s reach is long and rough. It also has links to hardliners living in our midst who often justify its actions and intimidate its critics.

Time is bound change all that. A few months ago the media was describing Jabhat al-Nusra as a prototype of extremism and an offshoot of al-Qaeda. Politicians were warning against it and the Americans were using it as a scarecrow not to arm the rebels.

Today, Jabhat al-Nusra looks like a guardian angel compared to DAESH.

Jabhat al-Nusa has even consolidated its relations with moderate Islamist rebel groups such as the Tawheed and Ahrar al-Sham brigades, which since their inception opposed suicide operations and the targeting of minorities.

It is only a matter of time before DAESH takes on these moderate Islamist organizations.

DAESH is akin to the Emir of Peshawar, who squandered years of hard work with his follies and Fatwas.

DAESH is the group that will bring nothing but ruin to Syria’s people and neighbors. It will bring nothing but ruin wherever it roosts, including Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, the sub-Saharan desert, Yemen and Somalia.

Could an apolitical religious summit bring together the Islamic nation’s God-fearing scholars to blackball DAESH and its Khawarij (outsiders) and rebuild the true moral code and religious law of Islam?

I doubt!

Obama flees Syria, but what with Saudi Arabia?

File picture of U.S. President Barack Obama and Saudi King Abdullah

By Saudi media star Jamal Khashoggi, writing for al-Hayat

There are many reasons for the Saudi-U.S. crackup.

The breach is mostly over Syria, where U.S. doublespeak has repeatedly been used to hide negativity. Incessant American statements denouncing the Assad regime are totally irreconcilable with happenings on the ground.

What infuriated the Saudis, who want a quick end to the Syria crisis, is what they believe to be America’s laid-back and indifferent attitude liable to prolong the crisis regardless of its consequences and its spillovers into regional countries.

The most conspicuous inconsistency in the American position is in the matter of arming the opposition.

America covertly bumps heads with its Saudi ally over the latter’s desire to raise the quality of arms supplied to the Syrian opposition, and even prevents its Saudi ally from delivering quality weapons by invoking bilateral arms sales agreements banning such transfers to a third party. At the same time, the U.S. does nothing about the shipments of Russian arms to the Syrian regime via Iran and Iraq.

The only time Washington intervened was to back Israel’s objection to Russia delivering game changing S-300 air defense systems to Syria.

The U.S. did not even try to thwart the participation in the Syria war of tens of thousands of Hezbollah and Iraqi Shiite militiamen although Washington has ample details about the role Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard and its Commander General Qasim Suleimani are playing in the war.

Unquestionably, the Americans’ answers – such as they cannot shut out Hezbollah or Iran’s Revolutionary Guard from Syria – are far from having convinced Saudi Arabia.

Riyadh is fully familiar with every aspect of America’s influence in Iraq, which has become the primary conduit for Iranian arm shipments and volunteers to Syria.

Israel did not hesitate to hit Hezbollah and Revolutionary Guard targets inside Syria when she felt they threatened her national security.

It did so without Syria or any of its allies reacting. If Israel can do this, so can America -- especially that Jordan paved the way for Washington, having offered the Obama Administration the chance to use Jordanian bases to deploy its armed drones against Syrian regime targets.

The U.S. Administration declined the Jordanian offer, which was repeated on several occasions in coordination with the Saudis, according to an informed source.

Paradoxically, the U.S. fully concurs with Saudi Arabia that the biggest threat to the security of the Arabian Peninsula comes from al-Qaeda, which is already active in Yemen. Both Washington and Riyadh are working hand-in-hand to fight it.

But at the same time, Washington is indifferent to the threat posed by al-Qaeda in Syria, which mushroomed with the arrival there of the original version of the terrorist group – namely, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which Saudi Arabia perceives as a serious menace to her security. And so do Jordan and Turkey.

By sinking roots in Syria, ISIL, which is also known by its Arabic acronym DAESH, would have set up a network of human ballistic missiles there capable of reaching all regional countries.

It would be in a position to send suicides to all regional cities.

The group has already moved against the Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government by sending suicide car-bombers to Erbil in retaliation to KRG President Masoud Barzani’s avowed readiness to help Syria’s Kurds against terrorists in Syria’s north.

The Erbil bombings shocked regional capitals particularly that the enclave was calm for years and has a strong security network.

Experts claim that intercepting a surface-to-surface missile with a network of Patriots is easier than intercepting a lone, cross-border suicide who gets his explosives delivered to him via another route. Once the suicide receives his explosives the chance of foiling his terrorist bombing becomes negligible.

By nesting in northern Syria and welcoming foreign fighters, DAESH will become a magnet for young Saudis outraged by the abuses in Syria.

Such young Saudis have been swayed by calls for Jihad still ringing across the Kingdom, but mostly underground.

Estimates putting the number of Saudi “mujahideen” in Syria at 4,000 are probably inflated, as happened earlier in Afghanistan and Bosnia. But even if the figure were one-fourth of the estimate, the number is substantial enough to reinvigorate al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia after the Kingdom breathed a sigh of relief when its security forces succeeded in stamping out its activities.

Riyadh still has reason for concern. Young Saudis in Syria deliberately conceal their true numbers and shun the media.

They do not emulate al-Qaeda, which is always keen to boost its recruitment campaigns by uploading propaganda videos about the heroism of its members on YouTube.

One expert in Syria who works for the United Nations puts it this way: “You see video clips of Chechens or Libyans much more than of Saudis. But they are by far the more numerous. I believe the Saudis constitute the third largest group of fighters in Syria after the Jordanians and Palestinians. Their shunning the media is worrying.”

This is probably because they know fighting in Syria violates their government’s instructions. They also realize Saudi security is aware as to who left the country to fight in Syria and will surely apprehend the lot on their return.

Al-Qaeda in turn knows this very well and exploits the fact to build a recruitment reservoir for future underground action in the post-Syria stage. Al-Qaeda-watchers know there is always a post-Syria, post-Afghanistan and post-Iraq.

All these Saudi concerns won’t dissipate except with a settlement of the Syria crisis that ends the war that is currently serving as fertile ground for al-Qaeda and Iran to spread their respective influences, each in its own way and in keeping with its own purposes.

 And although neither al-Qaeda nor Iran is a friend of Saudi Arabia, recent leaks in the American press reveal the Obama Administration is not only unconcerned, but wants the Syria crisis to persist.

This is bound to deepen the Saudi American rift.

The hurtful surprise came in a recent New York Times quoting White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough as questioning how much it was in America’s interest to tamp down the violence in Syria.

He argued the status quo in Syria could keep Iran pinned down for years.

In later discussions, McDonough suggested a fight in Syria between Hezbollah and al-Qaeda would work to America’s advantage.

His words evoke memories of “imperialist” statements made in the 1950s when the interests of arms dealers and oil companies determined American foreign policy with total disregard of peoples’ rights and interests.

We are not angels ourselves, but we cannot possibly be as wicked.

The price of such a policy will be paid by the Syrian people and by the whole region. The war between al-Qaeda and Hezbollah will drag in the region’s countries and armies.

U.S. President Obama considers U.S. health care reform more important than what he dubbed Syria’s inferno.

However, for us Saudis, Syria could be our heaven or our inferno.

So let us do something, albeit alone.

No matter what the cost turns out to be today, it would surely be less than what we would have to pay in three of four years.

Adawiya afterthoughts of a young Muslim Brother

Habiba's last photo (posted on Facebook by Mohamed Osama)

By Jamal Khashoggi, Saudi Arabia’s authoritative political analyst and author, writing today for pan-Arab al-Hayat

In front of me is a picture of Habiba Ahmed Abd Elaziz, an ambitious young woman primed for a bright future.

She was known as a serious journalist from an early age and was well versed in Arabic and English.

All this came to an abrupt end in Cairo last Wednesday, when Habiba was felled by a deadly bullet at one of the entrances to the Rabaa al-Adawiya protest camp.

Search the social media for her last poignant picture showing a militant believer sitting resolutely while being surrounded by debris and destruction and engulfed in tear gas.

All men had gone their way while she stayed put doing what she was asked to do.

In her right hand is a small tin bowl she was using to bank a metal drum. Her ration is a bottle of water.

A hijab covering her head is wrapped around her shoulders.

The gas mask she held to cover her nose and mouth did not fend off the bullet that took her away in the springtime of life.

Who fired the bullet is immaterial.

It was most probably an Egyptian policeman or a sniper hiding on a nearby rooftop and rejoicing at killing “the other Egyptians” he hates and perceives as enemies.

I wouldn’t go into blaming the army, state security and the police.

Like their Arab counterparts, that’s what they have been training to do for decades – namely, to protect the regime and the state. Their mantra is to secure the state at any cost.

“The regime, the state, the leader” is what Egyptian media outlets are now trumpeting – much as they were doing on June 6, 1967. No freedom or dignity to freedom’s enemies, not even to a co-citizen, a cousin or schoolmate.

But I do blame, and call for holding to account, the Muslim Brotherhood leaders for promoting the illusion of steadfastness at the sit-ins in Nahda Square and Rabaa al-Adawiya as a means of political pressure.

They managed the sit-ins lightly and with total disregard for the blood of believers in the cause.

Martyrdom is a duty in defense of justice, but not to improve bargaining positions or score political gains.

Habiba and thousands of other victims were promised total victory the next day. They say victory is an hour’s patience away. That’s what they were promised.

They gave them the instructions: You build a berm; you bring some water and vinegar to treat tear-gas sufferers; you, Habiba, forewarn your brethren by banging this metal drum.

Even a 10-year-old would have expected the crackdown on the protest camps and that casualties would be in the hundreds. Watching the talkshows on Egypt’s official and “private” TV news channels for one hour would have sufficed to realize the buzzword was “terror and terrorist.”

And everyone, the 10-year-old included, knew the terrorist would be killed.

So what happened in the early hours of Black Wednesday was not surprising. No Brotherhood leader ought to come forward and accuse the army or police of treachery. He was told of their intent to take decisive action.

How many times did Brotherhood leaders say, “We should not be drawn into the (army and police’s) violence arena”? But Brotherhood leaders were nevertheless drawn into the arena, where they lost their trump card, namely: demands, competitiveness and politics.

The Brotherhood will henceforward be capitalizing on its victims.

It will use thousands of casualty images showing men and women in the springtime of life, elders with piety manifest on their faces and veiled women to appear as the scapegoat and win the battle for public opinion.

But it will be a losing battle. The gory images will only elicit verbal condemnations and suppressed anger from those who lost loves ones.

The January 25 revolution is over. Its most important values – freedom, dignity and the right to life – have fallen by the wayside. The majority cannot bear freedom abuses so long as their own freedom is not stake. The majority is unmoved by the sight of martyrs when they belong to the other side.

There is one advantage though in reviewing images of the dead, which is accountability.

This has more to do with self-accountability than with holding the army and police accountable.

A courageous young man from Rabaa al-Adawiya has to come forward and declare openly, “We don’t need salutes to the martyrs or acclaim for a couple ascending to paradise. Ours was an absurd battle that we could have avoided.”

Let someone come forward and enumerate the Brotherhood’s losses since holding the reins in Egypt 18 months ago.

It lost sitting at the helm after winning what it described as a divine mandate to move forward society and the nation.

It lost a massive segment of Egyptian society.

It lost its nationalist orientation and replaced its moderate jurisprudence by a narrow-minded one, which it cajoled for electioneering purposes.

It lost martyrs. It lost its revolution allies. And it lost its regional relationships.

Told by his leaders that the Brotherhood was brought down by innumerable conspiracies, I can imagine the angry young man retorting, “This does not absolve you of responsibility. Where was your wisdom and savoir faire?”

I can also imagine the young man returning home last Wednesday night. He is exhausted and bloodied. He weeps for his dead brethren. He searches the social media for reassurances his other friends are safe.

A knock at the door frightens him. He is a wanted man now. He does not wish to become a fugitive. He forswears violence and is aware the leadership has lost control, or almost.

He catches a glimpse on the TV screen of a church going up in flames.  On hearing a leader trying to justify the arson, he fumes.

And when the leader speaks of the Mubarak regime making a comeback, the young man says out loud, “Don’t you recall state security refusing to protect Mubarak at al-Ittihadiya Palace?”

Before going to bed after Thursday’s dawn prayers, the young man murmurs to himself: “The revolution is not over yet. Recourse to the people is still mandatory. There will be new and transparent elections. Political Islam and revolutionary forces have to reconnect. A new generation has to take the lead and look to the future, not the past.

“But accountability should come first. Those responsible for the failure and successive losses of the battles of governance and sit-ins have to be brought to account.

“Accountability is the sine qua non of victory. Losers have no place in leadership.”

Russia, U.S. and “Friends” get SNC slap in the face

The Syrian National Coalition, the country’s opposition umbrella group, has finally given Russia, the United States and the so-called “Friends of Syria” group a kick in the teeth.

The Syrian National Coalition of Revolutionary and Opposition Forces said it was turning down invitations to visit Moscow and Washington and suspending participation in the “Friends of Syria” conference due in Rome next month.

In a statement posted on its Facebook page late Friday night, the National Coalition described the deathlike “silence of the international community over daily crimes committed against our people” as “complicity in the slaughter of Syrians throughout the past two years.”

The statement said, “Hundreds of defenseless civilians are being killed by Scud missiles.

“Aleppo, the city of history and civilization, is being systematically destroyed.

“Add to this millions of refugees and displaced and hundreds of thousands of detainees, wounded and orphans.

"In protest against such shameless international stance, the coalition leadership decided to suspend its participation in the ‘Friends of Syria’ conference in Rome and to turn down invitations to visit Russia and the United States.

“We hold the Russian leadership ethically and politically responsible for the most part because they continue to back the (Damascus) regime with arms.

“We also urge people around the world to regard the week of March 15-22, which marks the Syrian revolution’s second anniversary, as a week of mourning and protest.”

Kuwait’s Muslim scholar Dr. Ghazi al-Tawbah, writing for Aljazeera.net last week, wondered if “Friends of Syria” conferences were not in reality meetings of “enemies.”

The Syrian opposition, he said, has been telling its “friends” for two years -- at successive meetings in Tunis, Istanbul, Paris and Marrakesh -- what it needs to protect the Syrian people.

All the Syrian opposition got in return was “hollow promises.”

Dr. Tawbah wrote, “Opposition leaders told their hosts opposition forces needed some qualitative weapons to face tanks and warplanes. They said setting up an interim government needed safe zones and a budget of $500 million to meet the Syrian people’s needs. They explained the Syrian people suffered 60,000 fatalities, 140,000 wounded, 60,000 disappeared, 140,000 detainees, 720,000 refugees, two million displaced and four million in need of humanitarian aid.”

The “friends” having offered zilch, “we are justified to ask: Were these ‘Friends of Syria’ conferences in the past two years meant to be meetings with the friends or enemies of Syria?”

Friends, Dr. Tawbah opined, “are supposed to answer their friends’ pleas. But why is that not so with Syria of all the Arab Spring countries?”

Jamal Khashoggi, Saudi Arabia’s analyst, author and kingpin of the impending Al Arab TV news channel writing today for pan-Arab al-Hayat, says, “Raising funds nowadays is tough, given the global economic slowdown.

“At the (January 30) Kuwait conference, the United Nations sought to raise $1,2 billion in humanitarian aid for Syrian refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs). Since then, it received not more than 20% of the pledges made.

“So who is going to come up with the billions needed to rebuild Syria?

“Even if Bashar (al-Assad) were to succeed in putting down his people’s revolution, the region’s states and leaders won’t rehabilitate him or return him to their fold. Nor will they bear the cost of seeing him survive without victory or defeat.

“Accordingly, it is time to focus on the benefits of seeing him out and the establishment of a friendly, democratic and popular regime. All regional countries will draw benefit from this happening, except Iran.

“If truth were told though, losing Syria is better for Iran long-term. Losing Syria would bring Iran down to reality instead of continuing to live its pipedream of reversing 1,400 years of history. Iran would revert to its regional size, concentrating on its people’s wellbeing.”

With Assad’s exit, Khashoggi continues, “Jordan would be relieved of its northern neighbor’s plots and resultant security and intelligence costs. It would have a neighborly country complementing its economy and agriculture. Jordan and the new Syria would connect with Lebanon in a Bilad al-Sham economic triumvirate without border or regime change.

“Saudi Arabia would also be relieved of security strains the Baathist regime posed on and off in Lebanon or in connivance with Iran – this, without Saudi Arabia being able to isolate, or dissociate from, Syria.

“After all, Syria represents Saudi Arabia’s strategic and economic expanse and its doorway to Turkey and Europe.

“A free, democratic Syria with a market economy would certainly be good news for Saudi Arabia.”

Khashoggi says if Turkey and the Arabs choose to boost their support of the Syrian people, they could induce U.S. President Barack Obama not to wait any longer and to put his weight behind the Syrian revolution independently of the UN Security Council.

“Precedents of ‘Special Operations’ behind the Security Council’s back are many,” Khashoggi remarks.

Syrians “choke” after last U.S. presidential debate

Romney and Obama debating last night ( Photo from denverpost.com) 

Two sets of insightful Arab messages on Twitter caught my eye after last night’s third and final U.S. presidential debate on foreign policy, in which Barack Obama and Mitt Romney tangled over Syria as well as the Arab Spring, Iran, Israel and China.

This first set of two was tweeted in Arabic by Saudi media celebrity Jamal Khashoggi (@JKhashoggi), who attended the debate at Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida:

1. "Neither of them (candidates) said something to assuage Syrians or make them feel he’d do something to end the killer regime."
2. "Opinion outside the hall is that Obama beat Romney by a mile… But the choking in Syria stays."

The following second set of three was tweeted by The 47^th (@THE_47th), who has predicted several Syria developments in the past:

1. "The emphasis is always the word 'moderate'. It seems the U.S. does not like what it thinks are the alternatives to Assad."
2. "When the topic is Israel, everyone is a black belt foreign policy ninja all of a sudden."
3. "The winner today was clearly Twitter."

The debate at Lynn University between Democratic President Obama and his Republican challenger Romney was moderated by veteran CBS News presenter Bob Schieffer.

This transcript of the Syria part of the debate allows readers to form their own opinions of the two candidates positions’ on America's current and future Syria policy:

SCHIEFFER: Let me interject the second topic question in this segment about the Middle East and so on, and that is, you both mentioned -- alluded to this, and that is Syria.

The war in Syria has now spilled over into Lebanon. We have, what, more than 100 people that were killed there in a bomb. There were demonstrations there, eight people dead.

Mr. President, it's been more than a year since you saw -- you told Assad he had to go. Since then, 30,000 Syrians have died. We've had 300,000 refugees.

The war goes on. He's still there. Should we reassess our policy and see if we can find a better way to influence events there? Or is that even possible?

And you go first, sir.

OBAMA: What we've done is organize the international community, saying Assad has to go. We've mobilized sanctions against that government. We have made sure that they are isolated. We have provided humanitarian assistance and we are helping the opposition organize, and we're particularly interested in making sure that we're mobilizing the moderate forces inside of Syria.

But ultimately, Syrians are going to have to determine their own future. And so everything we're doing, we're doing in consultation with our partners in the region, including Israel which obviously has a huge interest in seeing what happens in Syria; coordinating with Turkey and other countries in the region that have a great interest in this.

This -- what we're seeing taking place in Syria is heartbreaking, and that's why we are going to do everything we can to make sure that we are helping the opposition. But we also have to recognize that, you know, for us to get more entangled militarily in Syria is a serious step, and we have to do so making absolutely certain that we know who we are helping; that we're not putting arms in the hands of folks who eventually could turn them against us or allies in the region.

And I am confident that Assad's days are numbered. But what we can't do is to simply suggest that, as Governor Romney at times has suggested, that giving heavy weapons, for example, to the Syrian opposition is a simple proposition that would lead us to be safer over the long term.

SCHIEFFER: Governor?

ROMNEY: Well, let's step back and talk about what's happening in Syria and how important it is. First of all, 30,000 people being killed by their government is a humanitarian disaster. Secondly, Syria is an opportunity for us because Syria plays an important role in the Middle East, particularly right now.

Syria is Iran's only ally in the Arab world. It's their route to the sea. It's the route for them to arm Hezbollah in Lebanon, which threatens, of course, our ally, Israel. And so seeing Syria remove Assad is a very high priority for us. Number two, seeing a -- a replacement government being responsible people is critical for us. And finally, we don't want to have military involvement there. We don't want to get drawn into a military conflict.

And so the right course for us, is working through our partners and with our own resources, to identify responsible parties within Syria, organize them, bring them together in a -- in a form of -- if not government, a form of -- of -- of council that can take the lead in Syria. And then make sure they have the arms necessary to defend themselves. We do need to make sure that they don't have arms that get into the -- the wrong hands. Those arms could be used to hurt us down the road. We need to make sure as well that we coordinate this effort with our allies, and particularly with -- with Israel.

But the Saudis and the Qataris, and -- and the Turks are all very concerned about this. They're willing to work with us. We need to have a very effective leadership effort in Syria, making sure the insurgents there are armed and that the insurgents that become armed, are people who will be the responsible parties. Recognize -- I believe that Assad must go. I believe he will go. But I believe -- we want to make sure that we have the relationships of friendship with the people that take his place, steps that in the years to come we see Syria as a -- as a friend, and Syria as a responsible party in the Middle East.

This -- this is a critical opportunity for America. And what I'm afraid of is we've watched over the past year or so, first the president saying, well we'll let the U.N. deal with it. And Assad -- excuse me, Kofi Annan came in and said we're going to try to have a ceasefire. That didn't work. Then it went to the Russians and said, let's see if you can do something. We should be playing the leadership role there, not on the ground with military.

SCHIEFFER: All right.

ROMNEY: ...by the leadership role.

OBAMA: We are playing the leadership role. We organized the Friends of Syria. We are mobilizing humanitarian support, and support for the opposition. And we are making sure that those we help are those who will be friends of ours in the long term and friends of our allies in the region over the long term. But going back to Libya -- because this is an example of how we make choices. When we went in to Libya, and we were able to immediately stop the massacre there, because of the unique circumstances and the coalition that we had helped to organize. We also had to make sure that Moammar Gadhafi didn't stay there.

And to the governor's credit, you supported us going into Libya and the coalition that we organized. But when it came time to making sure that Gadhafi did not stay in power, that he was captured, Governor, your suggestion was that this was mission creep, that this was mission muddle.

Imagine if we had pulled out at that point. You know, Moammar Gaddafi had more American blood on his hands than any individual other than Osama bin Laden. And so we were going to make sure that we finished the job. That's part of the reason why the Libyans stand with us.

But we did so in a careful, thoughtful way, making certain that we knew who we were dealing with, that those forces of moderation on the ground were ones that we could work with, and we have to take the same kind of steady, thoughtful leadership when it comes to Syria. That's exactly what we're doing.

SCHIEFFER: Governor, can I just ask you, would you go beyond what the administration would do, like for example, would you put in no-fly zones over Syria?

ROMNEY: I don't want to have our military involved in Syria. I don't think there is a necessity to put our military in Syria at this stage. I don't anticipate that in the future.

As I indicated, our objectives are to replace Assad and to have in place a new government, which is friendly to us, a responsible government, if possible. And I want to make sure they get armed and they have the arms necessary to defend themselves, but also to remove -- to remove Assad.

But I do not want to see a military involvement on the part of our -- of our troops.

SCHIEFFER: Well --

ROMNEY: And this isn't -- this isn't going to be necessary.

We -- we have, with our partners in the region, we have sufficient resources to support those groups. But look, this has been going on for a year. This is a time -- this should have been a time for American leadership. We should have taken a leading role, not militarily, but a leading role organizationally, governmentally to bring together the parties, to find responsible parties.

As you hear from intelligence sources even today, the -- the insurgents are highly disparate. They haven't come together. They haven't formed a unity group, a council of some kind. That needs to happen. America can help that happen. And we need to make sure they have the arms they need to carry out the very important role, which is getting rid of Assad.

SCHIEFFER: Can we get a quick response, Mr. President, because I want to...

(CROSSTALK)

OBAMA: Well, I'll -- I'll be very quick. What you just heard Governor Romney said is he doesn't have different ideas. And that's because we're doing exactly what we should be doing to try to promote a moderate Syrian leadership and a -- an effective transition so that we get Assad out. That's the kind of leadership we've shown. That's the kind of leadership we'll continue to show.

You can read a full transcript of the final presidential debate here.