“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.

The unmaking of the Arab world

Fahmi Howeidi is a leading Egyptian political and social scholar and author, and one of the Arab world’s most prominent columnists. Following is my abridgment of his syndicated think piece this week:

There is a sort of overlap in tuning in on the revolution and the government in Egypt.

That’s caused either by incessant media campaigns denigrating the revolution in the public eye or by the torrent of government crises news, which make people lose sight of the revolution’s achievements.

In effect, the Egypt revolution ended a reign of corruption and tyranny and returned the country to its people. It brought a Pharaonic era to a close, restored civil liberties, ended minority rule and empowered the masses to have the final say on their government.

But why did Egypt’s post-revolution administration stumble?

One explanation is that decade-long tyranny not only destroyed Egypt’s political and economic present, but its future as well.

The other explanation is the preclusion of all and sundry from Egyptian politics save for a restricted group of loyalists handpicked by the former president.

As a result, the political class was neither coached in managing state affairs nor shown the ropes of state administration.

This political class was also shut out from any communal endeavor to promote the national interest through state institutions.

Egypt’s post-revolution administration crisis can thus be blamed on a host of factors, including:

• The classic tension that dawns each time a revolution brings down a regime and tries to replace it
• The heavy legacy left by the deposed regime, such as the ruination of politics, the economy, state institutions and society.
• Mismanagement of state affairs by President Mohamed Morsi and his team and their reneging of election promises.
• Immaturity of opposition figures
• The tug-of-war among some nationalist camp components
• Lawlessness, which also undermines economic activity
• External pressures.

Everyone in Egypt is now aware that although it made good progress over the years in running its own business, the Muslim Brotherhood did not make the grade in reigning over and managing society.

That is the root cause of the current crisis, which led to the political stalemate in Egypt.

Overcoming the political deadlock requires a lot of wisdom, courage and foresight, all of which seem lacking – at least for the foreseeable future.

(2)

In the case of all four or five Arab Spring countries, revolt proved much more profound and far-reaching than actual or prospective regime change.

The new manifestations that are kept in the public eye day and night by the media touch only the surface of the spirit of rebellion, which drove ordinary citizens to protest loudly against oppression, corruption and social injustice.

The discrepancy made me distinguish between what I call the “tumultuous spring” and the “silent” variety.

“Tumultuous spring” came out in the open and called for regime change in some countries.

By contrast, the “silent spring” chose to express itself calmly through the social media.

Its aim is regime reform, but not regime change. It falls in the category of “reformist spring” as opposed to “revolutionary spring.”

The open letter calling for reform, which Saudi cleric Salman al-Odah posted last month on Facebook and Twitter falls in the latter category. Odah specifically called for ending the practice of media control, information censorship and the release of political prisoners.

Other reformists made similar appeals elsewhere in the Gulf.

(3)

From this perspective, I believe the pan-Arab nation is meanwhile facing an existential impasse that needs addressing.

While historic change looms on the horizon, a vacuum hangs on the Arab arena.

Observers fail to spot a leader or a plan the Arabs can rally around or defend.

When focusing on the Arab arena, all they spot are three endeavors: the Turks are expanding economically, the Iranian politically and the Israelis through land grabs to build settlements.

Moreover, changes on the ground suggest the region’s maps are being reconfigured and a new Sykes-Picot Agreement is being contemplated.

The pointers:

• Iraq faces partition after having been steamrolled by the United States invasion. Iraqi Kurdistan has almost seceded, and nothing keeps the lid on its independence other than the absence of a public declaration of self-determination preceded by a ban on hoisting the Iraqi national flag on its territory. A forceful call is also being made to divide Iraq into three regions – one for Kurds, another for Shiites and the third for Sunnis.
• Syria is poised to follow suit, especially that its regime seems on its last legs so far. Should the Assad regime fall, contingency plans are already in place to declare an Alawite state along the country’s coastline. In anticipation, Syria’s central bank reserves have reportedly been moved to Latakia, whose seaport and airport are being upgraded.
• The side-effects of the Syrian regime’s collapse would allow for (a) a shift in the balance of power in Lebanon at Hezbollah’s expense (b) a shot in the arm to the Sunni uprising in Iraq (c) a rekindling of the Kurdish issue, which explains Turkey’s recent preemptive peace deal with PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, and (d) rethinking and re-planning in Tehran, particularly that a blitz by Israel on its nuclear facilities is not off the table yet.
• The Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza Strip remain in limbo and the risks of a third Intifada erupting mount.
• Sudan’s South has broken away from its North.
• In Yemen, calls are growing louder all the time for the secession of the South.
• Morocco is grappling with the Tamazight movement’s political demands shortly after recognizing the Tamazight language in its new constitution.
• Over and above the widening schism between its Sunnis and Shiites, the Arab world finds itself riven by rifts between the Salafi movement and Ennahda Movement in Tunisia, between Salafis and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and between Salafis and seculars in Algeria.

These are ample indicators of how the Arab world is liable to break up. The process of restructuring it is quietly moving ahead while it remains unfazed or unaware. 

Syria coalition and Clinton’s no-show in Marrakesh

A stomach virus is forcing U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to cancel her trip to the “Friends of Syria” meeting in Morocco that will focus on ratcheting up support for the Syrian opposition.

 On reading the news this morning, my subconscious instantly murmured, “Diplomatic illness.”

I guess the reason is that she was expected to announce there the Obama administration’s plain recognition of the newly formed Syrian National Coalition of Revolutionary and Opposition Forces as “the legitimate representative of the Syrian people.”

Clinton was to announce that step in Marrakech on Wednesday.

Deputy Secretary of State William Burns will take her place, but sober thinking makes me wonder if he will still make the declaration or circumvent it.

Since the proof of the pudding is in the eating, tomorrow’s denouement will show whether Clinton’s illness is physical or diplomatic.

At yesterday’s daily press briefing, a reporter asked State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland, “So where do we stand now on the [Syrian] opposition, recognizing the opposition?”

While Clinton’s trip to Morocco was still on, Ms Nuland gave a muddled answer, saying: “Well, you know that we have, as the Secretary said, been looking at ways that we can deepen and broaden our support. We will be in Marrakesh on Wednesday – the Secretary will be – for the Friends of the Syrian People. I think we want to talk there about more support that we can give them along the lines of what she foreshadowed last week, but I don’t want to get ahead of announcements that we might make.

“I think, among other things, she’ll want to meet with them, she’ll want to hear from them both in her own meeting and in the broader meeting about how they see things going forward, both in terms of their own internal organization, about their connectivity with Syrians inside Syria, about their transitional planning, about the needs that they see for external support, how they would have us best direct the nonlethal support and humanitarian support that we are providing. So she’ll want to hear about all of those things. But she’s been clear that we’d like to offer them more support, and I think you’ll see some of that at Marrakesh on Wednesday.”

Other than Nuland’s nuanced answer and Clinton’s no-show in Marrakesh, there is a third downer for the Syrian opposition.

It’s a think piece titled “Don’t Let the Syrian Rebels Win” appearing in the new edition of the authoritative U.S. bimonthly newsmagazine Foreign Policy.

The author, Glenn E. Robinson, a specialist in Middle East political and security matters, suggests that “an outright victory by Assad’s enemies would be a disaster.”

Egypt’s brilliant columnist and talk show host Imad Adeeb, writing today for the Saudi newspaper of record Asharq Alawsat, says he met yesterday in Cairo with Rob Malley, a former Special Assistant to President Bill Clinton who is currently Program Director for Middle East and North Africa at the International Crisis Group in Washington, D.C.

Dialogue with Rob Malley, says Adeeb, is a fascinating eye-opener – chiefly that “the United States has no decisive or conclusive policies. At times, it acts like a Third World country that deals with events piecemeal and on a daily basis, depending on the changes hour by hour. There is no logic governing U.S. policy except to reap benefits and maximize interests, regardless of victims falling in the process. That’s the lesson we need to learn”

Why Morsi is the fitting Israel-Hamas pacifier

Clockwise from L.: Gaza victims, Egypt's Morsi and Iran's Supreme Leader

International efforts to wrest a cease-fire from Israel and the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip are gathering momentum.

The two sides are putting forth widely divergent demands to halt five days of violence. The violence saw Israel launch ceaseless air, tank and warship strikes on the Strip and Hamas fire a stream of rockets into Israel, including into the Tel Aviv and Jerusalem areas.

By this writing, 84 Palestinians, most of them civilians, have been killed and 720 have been wounded. Three Israeli civilians have died from Hamas rocket fire and a dozen have been wounded.

President Barack Obama said he was in touch with players across the region in hopes of halting the fighting. While defending Israel's right to defend itself against the rocket fire, he also warned of the risks Israel would take if it were to expand its air assault into a ground war.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Sunday afternoon he would head to the region and "appeal personally for ending the violence." French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu earlier in the day, and an Israeli representative was in Egypt earlier in an attempt to negotiate a peaceful settlement.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu is expected to pay a snap visit to Gaza as part of an Arab League delegation to express support and solidarity.

Morocco’s King Mohammed VI has meantime ordered the immediate setting up of a Moroccan field hospital in the Gaza Strip.

The hospital will comprise specialized medical units of the Royal Moroccan Armed Forces, as well as Moroccan civilian physicians and paramedics. The multidisciplinary medical-surgical hospital will reinforce existing medical facilities there.

According to a senior State Department official, Egypt has an important leadership role to play in brokering a cessation of the violence between Hamas and Israel.

Egypt, the official said, “has the relationships in Gaza; Prime Minister Qandil travelled there yesterday and had the opportunity to meet with (Ismail) Haniyeh, and other leaders in Hamas. So we believe that they have the stature, the credibility, and the relationships to be able to persuade Hamas and its allies to stop… There are other actors involved like the Turks and the Qataris and others who also have a role to play. But Egypt’s role is absolutely pivotal.”

Ghassan Charbel, editor-in-chief of pan-Arab daily al-Hayat, believes post-Mubarak Egypt under President Mohamed Morsi, a former leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, “simply can’t cut loose from Gaza’s destiny.”

Charbel explains in a leader comment penned in Arabic:

Other than the rationales of geographic contiguity, security, stability and role, Egypt now has a regime begotten by the revolution and entrusted to the Muslim Brothers by the ballot box.

Consequently, Hamas neither can nor wishes to deal with Morsi’s Egypt the way it dealt with Egypt under Hosni Mubarak.

Israel’s onslaught on Gaza showed the Arab Spring did not let the Palestinian cause fall from its list of priorities. The offensive gave Arab Spring countries the chance to reiterate that injustice to the Palestinians is in their hearts and minds and will have pride of place in their priorities.

The region has changed. More exactly, it is changing.

Despite lingering uncertainties, apprehensions and machinations, the Arab Spring is probably the most important regional event since the 1979 Iranian Revolution.

From this perspective, let’s ponder conditions in the two countries that initiated the Axis of Resistance.

Iran is buckling under the weight of economic sanctions. Her role in the region is melting away after colliding with the Arab Spring, specifically in Syria. Her nuclear program is closely monitored by Western powers.

Syria, the Arab partner in the Axis of Resistance, sees her regime loosing control on the ground and becoming an Arab, Islamic and international pariah.

The Hamas movement, whose leadership resided in Syria, was the Sunnite link in the Axis of Resistance grouping Iran, Syria and Hezbollah. It was also the golden link in the chain because it introduced the Axis’ missiles and modus operandi to the heart of Palestinian territory.

Consisting of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, the Palestinian offshoot of the Axis of Resistance played a key role over the past two 20-odd years. Hamas and Islamic Jihad helped exasperate hopes pinned on the Oslo Accords, militarize the Second Intifada, and undermine the successive clout and authority of Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas. Their suicide attacks shored up Israeli hardliners.

With the two Palestinian groups tagging along, Iran and Syria were able to gain veto power on any idea of Palestinian-Israeli or Arab-Israeli peace.

The Arab Spring was a bolt from the blue for Syria. But it allowed Hamas leaders residing in Damascus to nose out the Arab Spring’s Muslim Brotherhood scent.

Although Hamas initially refused to take a stand for or against the Syrian uprising, it was against the grain of its political chief Khaled Meshaal to follow in Hezbollah’s suit and take orders from Iran’s Supreme Leader. Hamas consequently elected to emigrate from Damascus and align itself with the Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide based in Egypt.

Israel’s blitz on Gaza came on the heels of such momentous changes. Israeli warplanes pummeled the Strip while Hamas and Islamic Jihad hit back with rockets targeting Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

Remarkably, Hamas hastened to tell everyone trying to broker de-escalation that the address for negotiations is Egypt.

Morsi’s telephone hasn’t stopped ringing. Morsi has no choice but to seek a quick return to calm and normalcy. He cannot see Hamas crushed in Gaza. And he cannot gamble away Egypt’s international ties and financial aid either. He would not risk the Brotherhood’s credentials for running Egypt. 

Call for post-Arab Spring "Marshall Plan”

Jamal Khashoggi

Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi journalist now heading Saudi billionaire Prince Walid bin Talal’s new Arabic news channel Al Arab launching at year’s end with a 300-strong staff, is calling for an Arab Marshall Plan to put Arab Spring countries back on their feet.

The United States launched its five-year Marshall Plan, also known as the European Recovery Program (ERP), in 1947 to rebuild European economies after the end of World War II.

The Arab Spring upheaval cost its worst affected countries at least $56 billion in lost GDP in 2011, according to a report by consultancy group Geopolicity. The figure is approximate and does not take into account losses to human life, infrastructure or business and foreign direct investments.

“We Arabs won’t let down Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco or any of the Arab Spring countries. Better we worked as partners for an Economic Arab Spring,” Khashoggi writes in an op-ed piece today for pan-Arab al-Hayat. Stable Arab states would devise “an Arab Recovery Program akin to the Marshall Plan for all countries affected by the Arab Spring.” The Gulf Cooperation Council would fund the ARP via the Arab League.

Khashoggi says the program would “dwarf Saudi money going to Egypt or Tunisia and evaporating there, or an Abu Dhabi disbursement to build a road in Morocco, or Kuwait earmarking a sum to rebuild a school destroyed in Homs.”

Much as postwar Europe, says Khashoggi, the Arab World needs an Arab Marshall Plan after going through “60-years equivalent to a world war caused by the Baath Party, Nasser, Gaddafi, Saddam and the Assads” – an era marked by “economic disarray, social disintegration, military debacles and the loss of a homeland and its holy sites.”

“Fasten your seatbelts for 2012”

Abdul Rahman al-Rashed, general manager of Saudi AlArabiya TV, believes that after the 2011 Arab Spring unrest in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Syria, the year 2012 will prove to be tough for all Arab countries. Consequently, he writes for the Saudi daily Asharq Alawsat, “All of us -- the countries rocked by revolts and the countries fearful of revolts – need to tightly fasten our seatbelts because 2012, I think, will prove to be the most hazardous of all.”

Where Syria is concerned, Qatar’s Aljazeera portal says there was no let-up in violence there on Monday, when security forces killed 24 civilians in the Damascus suburbs, Homs and Hama.

But Arab print and electronic media have different readings of Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby’s take on the League’s observer mission in Syria.

Elaraby, speaking at a news conference in Cairo on Monday, said persistent shooting in Syria must cease, warning that snipers remain a threat. “Yes, there is still shooting and, yes, there are still snipers,” he said. But heavy weapons, including tanks and artillery, have been removed from residential areas. Elaraby also vouched for Sudanese Gen. M. al-Dabi, the controversial head of the monitoring team.

A sample of Syrian press headlines on Elaraby’s remarks:

Al-Watan – “Elaraby confirms the end of armed presence in cities and the release of 3,484 detainees”

Al-Baath – “Elaraby: Some criticisms are misplaced”

Tishreen – “Elaraby: Mission is making progress and the media need not prejudge”

Champress – “Elaraby: Damascus gave free access to 130 media outlets and barred three TV networks” (presumably Aljazeera, AlArabiya and France24).

Saudi Alawsat, however, prefers to underscore on its front page the following remark by the Arab League secretary-general: “We were asking for the Palestinians’ protection, we’re now asking for the Syrians’ protection.”

In his leader comment, Alawsat’s chief editor Tariq Alhomayed sounds unconvinced by Elaraby’s words. He still wants Gen. al-Dabi replaced and the mission of “Arab League spectators” restructured “with the help of a ranking international organization and a number of competent and respectable figures.”

Better still, Alhomayed writes, “it’s time to start handing over the Syria file to the UN Security Council – not necessarily by the Arab League, but by a distinct committee comprising Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, Kuwait, Libya, Morocco, Turkey and whoever else wants to put an end to the killings in Syria. The committee would lobby Russia, the U.S. and Europe for a UN resolution providing the Syrians with buffer and no-fly zones.”

Abdelbari Atwan, publisher/editor of the pan-Arab daily al-Quds al-Arabi, says Arab governments have only themselves to blame for choosing al-Dabi, an army general accused of overlooking atrocities during the Darfur genocide, to lead the Syria observer mission.

“Gen. al-Dabi is not a Swede. Like most of his fellow Arab army generals, he belongs to institutions that usurped power through military coups. He was not an American or international nominee to the post. His selection was purely Arab and was made by a task force of foreign ministers belonging to the Arab League. If choosing him was wrong, the blame should not fall on him or his country, but on those who named him for the job in the first place,” Atwan suggests.

Eye-opening reads:

Syrian assassinated in Germany

Banking fallout from Arab Spring

Eye-opening videos:

Arab League observer hugs Syrian child on New Year’s Day

Tanks crush protesters’ mopeds in Idlib