Where Was the 3rd World While Americans Armed & Supplied Terrorists To Destroy  Syria?

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Syria is largely destroyed, and landscapes like these are becoming the norm. This is the US empire signature, wherever it goes. True to their 24/7 brainwash most Americans remain clueless or indifferent.

Description:
The title question is directed to people in nations that have been invaded and bombed by Americans or Europeans in uniform. Article points to an inevitable thunderous awakening of voices from this overwhelming majority of Humanity.

The title question is asked in dedication to the more than half million Syrians who have perished or been maimed in the so called civil war arranged by the American led colonial or neocolonial powers for the profit and power of wealthy investors speculating in death, terror and destruction.

The title question is directed to people in nations that have been invaded and bombed by Americans or Europeans in uniform. Why was majority humanity basically silent while Americans armed and supplied ‘Islamic’ terrorists to destroy enough of Syria and kill enough Syrians to overthrow its elected government? We know the great majority of people in the First World (nations of majority Caucasian population plus Japan), always either side with Americans and NATO, or are indifferent to slaughter of their former colonial subjects. (Every single nation of Caucasian population, even tiny Andorra and Monaco has been part of the murdering coalition in Afghanistan.) Where has the 7 to 1 numerically superior Third World been while Americans and their allies practiced genocide in Syria for seven years? The heavens await a redeeming solidarity from the majority humankind that is the Third World. 
 

Third World audiences, captivated by CIA fed American mainstream media telecasting by satellite, need not have doubted that Americans had been arming and supplying ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) and many other terrorist groups fighting to conquer Syria, such as: Al-Nusra (al Qaida in Syria); Tahir alSham; Guardians of Religion Organization; Soldiers of the Caucasus; Katiba Abd Ar-Rahman; Soldiers of the Mahdi; Caucasus Emirate; Islamic Dawn Movement of the Levant; Turkistan Islamic Party in Syria; Ansar ut-Turkistan; Katibat al-Ghruaba al-Turkistan; Ansar al-Islam splinter faction; Jamaat Bayt al-Maqdis al-Islamiya; Malhama Tactical; Soldiers of the Levant; Ghuraba al-Sham; Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan; Fatah al-Islam; Muhajirin wa-Ansar Alliance and Liwaa al-Umama. Some of these groups are quite small and joining and rejoining with the larger organizations, but notice the international nature of most of these groups. Makes one recall how President Carter’s National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski headed up the first use of ‘Islamic’ terrorists for the US foreign policy goal of overthrowing a popular socialist women liberating government in Kabul in 1979 and meant to  draw the Soviets into the trap of facing afterward an international array of extremist Muslim terror invited and supplied by CIA and secret services of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. [watch Zbigniew Brzezinski to the Mujahideen: "Your cause is right and God … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9RCFZnWGE0 and read Brzezinski bragging about it in Brzezinski Interview | David N. Gibbs ] 

Hillary greeting the imaginary "moderate" rebels used in the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi. A shameless imperialist and a real and present danger to everything living, but still very much a darling of the establishment and the servile liberaloid media.

[dropcap]I[/dropcap]n 2011, US and NATO missiles destroyed prosperous Libya, using Islamic terrorists posing for CNN and al Jazeera as ordinary citizens in rebellion. CNN and al Jazeera never reported pro Gaddafi wild demonstrations of a near million Libyans, even while British and French warplanes bombed Tripoli. In the same year, 2011, came Syria’s turn, and for six years Americans, claimed yet another popular leader of yet another prosperous but independent nation, this time, the President of Syria, was “killing his own people.” Americans arranged for ‘Islamic’ terrorists to pour into Syria through Turkey, well supplied with heavy weaponry by US allies Saudi Arabia and Qatar and indirectly by Americans themselves arming largely fictitious Syrians rebels. 

 
Where have people in the Third World been during this latest American produced genocide? Are they silently awaiting a similar fate one country after another? Yes, revolutionary governments like Venezuela have spoken out in solidarity with Syrians fighting for their lives and country, but it is majority humankind or the people themselves of the Third World that must and will surely eventually condemn the First World for its five centuries of plundering genocide, and the sooner the better for their own protection and saving of millions in Third World from a future of bombs and starvation.
 
Has the great multitude of voices within the six-sevenths of Humanity remained silent for being taken in by Western media, impressed by its entertainment power and prestige, tacitly accepting  of the claims of officials of the US government, and shy of alignment with America’s designated enemy, President Assad - as apart from the compassion felt for the decimated Syrian people? 
 
Your archival research peoples' historian with a simple google ‘US Supplied ISIS,’ brought up pages of the following expose articles on the Internet. The reader might scroll down the first of these Internet pages just to see how commonplace knowledge of American provided genocide has been over the past seven years.
 
 
Jun 3, 2015 - For the past year, US, British and other western forces have been back in Iraq, supposedly in the cause of destroying the hyper-sectarian terror group Islamic State (formerly known as al-Qaida in Iraq). This was after Isis overran huge chunks of Iraqi and Syrian territory and proclaimed a self-styled Islamic ...
 
Dec 12, 2017 - Spleeters is a field investigator for Conflict Armament Research (CAR), an international organization funded by the European Union that documents weapons trafficking in war zones. He is 31 years old, with a 1980s Freddie Mercury mustache and tattoos covering thin arms that tan quickly in the desert sun.
 
Jun 18, 2017 - No matter: President Trump, captivated by Saudi royalty, sides with the Saudis — even though the United States has two important bases in Qatar. Baffling, right? But here is one clear bottom line: The biggest loser in all this may turn out to be the fight against the Islamic State. Nobody likes ISIS. Yet the idea ...
 
Jun 7, 2017 - Perhaps the most powerful indication of Saudi's financial links with ISIS can be seen in the cache of emails leaked from the office of Hillary Clinton, who was US Secretary of State from 2009 to 2013. The messages, published by Wikileaks, contain an unambiguous statement by her campaign chairman, ...
 
Mar 3, 2017 - The role of Turkey in not only turning a blind eye to ISIS's takeover of vast swaths of northern Syria but also exacerbating the refugee crisis by its callous ... Tahrir al-Sham consists of rebel factions that include Nour al-Din al-Zinki (recipients of US funding as recently as 2015), which gained worldwide ...
 
Nov 3, 2017 - ISIS was state-sponsored by US allies, says former government intelligence analyst (EXCLUSIVE). By Nafeez Ahmed. Source: Wikipedia Commons. Published by INSURGE INTELLIGENCE, a crowdfunded investigative journalism project for people and planet. Support us to keep digging where others fear ...
 
Feb 26, 2017 - (AntiMedia) Democratic Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, the lawmaker who accused the U.S. government of funding and arming ISIS and introduced a bill to prevent it from happening in future, recently disclosed that she met with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during her recent trip to Syria. The move ...
 
https://www.independent.co.uk › News › World › Middle East
Jun 13, 2017 - Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has blamed the United States for instability in the Middle East and said Washington's fight against Isis was "a lie". "You [the United States] and your ... The Iranian leader has accused the US and Saudi Arabia of funding hardline Sunni militants, including Isis.
 
Claim: E-mails released by WikiLeaks confirm Hillary Clinton sold weapons to ISIS.
 
Mar 10, 2017 - Background: The Stop Arming Terrorists Act prohibits U.S. government funds from being used to support al-Qaeda, ISIS or other terrorist groups. In the same way that Congress passed the Boland Amendment to prohibit the funding and support to CIA backed-Nicaraguan Contras during the 1980's, this bill …
 
tarpley.net/usa-reportedly-ends-failed-cia-program-to-arm-and-train-non-existent-mo...
Jul 20, 2017 - U.S. Reportedly Ends Failed CIA Program to Arm and Train Non-Existent “Moderate Rebels” of Syria; Similar Pentagon Program Already Junked as Ineffective …
 
Let those of us who would think this is not everyone’s problem remember that Martin Luther King famously quoted from Dante’s L’Inferno, “The hottest fires in Hell are reserved for those, who in times of moral crisis, maintained neutrality.” For the victimized, murdered and plundered within the 6/7ths of humankind we call the Third World, the fires have been spewed down upon them in this lifetime in the form of napalm, high altitude carpet bombing and live fire from American armed and supplied terrorists.
 
A 2011 article by this author describes the very beginning of the attack on Syria and is followed by an obviously concocted 2011 CBS News report as an example of devious unsourced ‘reporting’
 
Syria: CIA, M16, French, Mossad, Saudi, Turkish Involvement Unreported In Imperialist Media www.countercurrents.org/janson270611.htm by jay janson

What is unfolding in Syria is an armed insurrection supported covertly by foreign powers including the US, Turkey and Israel. Armed insurgents belonging to Islamist organizations have crossed the border from Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan. The US State Department has confirmed that it is supporting the insurgency. A monolithic unified slant media cartel restricts reports to indiscriminate killing of civilian protesters by Syrian government. Countercurrents.org, 27 June, 2011

Here by contrast is CBS News with its 2011 first report citing anonymous sources.
Even more amazing is a 2016 New Yorker magazine’s preposterous article. Bashar al-Assad's War Crimes, Exposed - The New Yorker
 
The above two examples of articles of faked or false news seems to be enough for the majority of First World readers to give their blanket support, disinterested acceptance or indifference to genocidal action by Americans, but when the less sophisticated and less gullible great populations of economically struggling and financially suffering majority humanity in Third World arrive to having the time and media to inform themselves, the obvious lies of the First World justifying profitable genocide will not be believed nor the genocide tolerated.
 
This tract has focused on Syria, only one area of the ongoing genocide taking place as well in Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan, Libya, South Sudan and Haiti that awaits the thunderous awakening of voices from majority Humankind.
 

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
 JAY JANSON, Resident Historian, Distinguished Collaborator •  Jay Janson is an archival research peoples historian activist, musician and writer; has lived and worked on all continents; articles on media published in China, Italy, UK, India and in the US by Dissident Voice, Global Research; Information Clearing House; Counter Currents and others; now resides in NYC; First effort was a series of articles on deadly cultural pollution endangering seven areas of life emanating from Western corporate owned commercial media published in Hong Kong's Window Magazine 1993; Howard Zinn lent his name to various projects of his; Weekly column, South China Morning Post, 1986-87; reviews for Ta Kung Bao; article China Daily, 1989. Is coordinator of the Howard Zinn co-founded King Condemned US Wars International Awareness Campaign, and website historian of the Ramsey Clark co-founded Prosecute US Crimes Against Humanity Now Campaign, which Dissident Voice supports with link at the end of each issue of its newsletter.

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While our media prostitutes, many Hollywood celebs, and politicians and opinion shapers make so much noise about the still to be demonstrated damage done by the Russkies to our nonexistent democracy, this is what the sanctimonious US government has done overseas just since the close of World War 2. And this is what we know about. Many other misdeeds are yet to be revealed or documented.

Parting shot—a word from the editors
The Best Definition of Donald Trump We Have Found

In his zeal to prove to his antagonists in the War Party that he is as bloodthirsty as their champion, Hillary Clinton, and more manly than Barack Obama, Trump seems to have gone “play-crazy” — acting like an unpredictable maniac in order to terrorize the Russians into forcing some kind of dramatic concessions from their Syrian allies, or risk Armageddon.However, the “play-crazy” gambit can only work when the leader is, in real life, a disciplined and intelligent actor, who knows precisely what actual boundaries must not be crossed. That ain’t Donald Trump — a pitifully shallow and ill-disciplined man, emotionally handicapped by obscene privilege and cognitively crippled by white American chauvinism. By pushing Trump into a corner and demanding that he display his most bellicose self, or be ceaselessly mocked as a “puppet” and minion of Russia, a lesser power, the War Party and its media and clandestine services have created a perfect storm of mayhem that may consume us all.— Glen Ford, Editor in Chief, Black Agenda Report

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Syrian ambassador says it all in just one paragraph.

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Syria's UNO ambassador, Bashar Jaafari: Speaking truth to power, but can sociopaths really listen?

If published in the New York Times, which daily dedicates acres of newsprint to fluff and outrageous warmongering lies of utility only to the world plutocracy it serves (later amplified by the rest of the prostituted mainstream media), statements like Amb. Jaafari's would go a long way to restore sanity and honesty in the affairs of nations. It would take less than one inch in any of the broadsheet's pages. Yes, the truth is simple, direct and concise. It does not require tons of artifice and embellishment. But it won't happen. For the simple reason the New York Times—as we all know so well— and its fellow capitalist media are not really news media but —in regard to all topics of vital interests to humanity—propaganda platforms in the west's Ministry of Truth.

BONUS FEATURES

UNSC meets to discuss reports of chemical attack in Syria

 

Russia and U.K. clash at United Nations Security Council

 

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ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

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Parting shot—a word from the editors
The Best Definition of Donald Trump We Have Found

In his zeal to prove to his antagonists in the War Party that he is as bloodthirsty as their champion, Hillary Clinton, and more manly than Barack Obama, Trump seems to have gone “play-crazy” — acting like an unpredictable maniac in order to terrorize the Russians into forcing some kind of dramatic concessions from their Syrian allies, or risk Armageddon.However, the “play-crazy” gambit can only work when the leader is, in real life, a disciplined and intelligent actor, who knows precisely what actual boundaries must not be crossed. That ain’t Donald Trump — a pitifully shallow and ill-disciplined man, emotionally handicapped by obscene privilege and cognitively crippled by white American chauvinism. By pushing Trump into a corner and demanding that he display his most bellicose self, or be ceaselessly mocked as a “puppet” and minion of Russia, a lesser power, the War Party and its media and clandestine services have created a perfect storm of mayhem that may consume us all.— Glen Ford, Editor in Chief, Black Agenda Report

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Why Israel’s Bombing of Syria May Backfire

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by PATRICK COCKBURN

 

Ali Khameini, Iran's supreme leader.

It is likely that Israel launched the missile attack in Syria that killed at least 26 pro-government fighters, many of them Iranians, late on Sunday night. The targets included a ground-to-ground missile depot that exploded with the seismic impact of a small earthquake.

Iranian news outlets first confirmed and then denied that Iranian facilities had been destroyed, suggesting that Tehran wants to deny that the incident took place because it does not intend to retaliate against Israel at this time.

Israel has not confirmed officially that it was responsible for the airstrikes, but the Israeli media is reporting them as if there was no doubt that Israel was behind them.

Iran may feel that retaliatory military action against Israel is not in its interests in the days leading up to Donald Trump’s likely withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal on 12 May.

The Iranian leadership will want to avoid providing Mr Trump with an excuse for his actions, thus enabling them to put as much blame as possible on the US for pulling out of the 2015 agreement.

Israel may calculate that it can expect to benefit from Iranian restraint in Syria for the next few weeks or even months, even if Israel escalates its airstrikes against Iran-related targets.

Play VideoIt is a risky strategy: much depends on the extent of Israeli ambitions in Syria. It can expect strong support from the US and the new, hawkish US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had just left Israel when the missile attacks took place.

But if the Israeli air war in Syria continues and begins to affect the balance of power in the seven-year civil war, then Iran will certainly retaliate. Iranian reaction to developments affecting its interests in the Middle East – such as the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 and the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 – have tended in the past to be long delayed but effective.

Sustained Israeli military action in Syria could not single out Iranian targets. It would draw in Russia which does not want to see the military successes of it ally, Bashar al-Assad, reversed by Israel. Relations between Israel and Russia are deteriorating: previously Israel informed the Russians about impending Israeli attacks, but this liaison is reported to have lapsed.

Israeli strikes in Syria have increased this year, primarily focusing on facilities where Iranian fighters and equipped were alleged to be based. Serious incidents include an Israeli warplane shot down returning from a bombing raid in Syria on 9 February and an Israeli attack on the Syrian government’s T4 airbase between Homs and Palmyra on 9 April that killed seven Iranians.

Israel is certainly capable of inflicting losses on Iran in Syria, but would not be able to force them out of the country. Trying to do so might well provoke a wider war. US policy in Syria is contradictory, with Mr Trump demonising Iran as the source of all evil which must be opposed, but also saying that he wants to pull US forces out of the country.

An Israeli-Iranian confrontation in Syria, would add yet another battle front to the conflict there that already has multiple fronts.

If sustained, it could draw in Hezbollah in Lebanon which has been an important ally of Assad. The US may back a more aggressive Israeli posture in Syria, but the single-minded obsession of the Trump administration with Iran as the source of all instability in the Middle East is dangerously simple-minded and injects more instability into a region already deeply unstable.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
 Patrick Cockburn is the author of  The Rise of Islamic State: ISIS and the New Sunni Revolution. 

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Parting shot—a word from the editors
The Best Definition of Donald Trump We Have Found

In his zeal to prove to his antagonists in the War Party that he is as bloodthirsty as their champion, Hillary Clinton, and more manly than Barack Obama, Trump seems to have gone “play-crazy” — acting like an unpredictable maniac in order to terrorize the Russians into forcing some kind of dramatic concessions from their Syrian allies, or risk Armageddon.However, the “play-crazy” gambit can only work when the leader is, in real life, a disciplined and intelligent actor, who knows precisely what actual boundaries must not be crossed. That ain’t Donald Trump — a pitifully shallow and ill-disciplined man, emotionally handicapped by obscene privilege and cognitively crippled by white American chauvinism. By pushing Trump into a corner and demanding that he display his most bellicose self, or be ceaselessly mocked as a “puppet” and minion of Russia, a lesser power, the War Party and its media and clandestine services have created a perfect storm of mayhem that may consume us all.— Glen Ford, Editor in Chief, Black Agenda Report

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Israel’s Legislature Votes War Against Syria

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Artist's conception of what Netanyahu is really up to. Not as far fetched as the image suggests. Unfortunately.

The key decision now will be made by Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

On May 1st, Al Masdar News headlined “Netanyahu is granted the ability to wage war without the Knesset”, and reported that Israel’s Knesset or legislature had voted late on Monday night April 30th, to hand entirely to the far-right Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and to his extremely far-right Minister of Defense Avigdor Liberman the decision as to whether or when to invade any country — the main actual target is Syria, but Iran and Lebanon are also in Israel’s gunsights.

Israel’s newspaper Haaretz reported about this on April 30th, while explaining that this legislation was “transferring responsibility for declaring war from the full cabinet to the smaller security cabinet. The joint committee of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee and the Constitution, Law and Justice Committee rejected his request but it was later voted for by the Knesset plenum.”

The real change that the new law introduces is to transfer Israel’s war-making decisions away from both the Knesset and the less-invasion-prone members of Israel’s Cabinet, to only the two most invasion-seeking officials: Netanyahu and Lieberman — in other words, actually, to Netanyahu alone.

On April 17th, Zero Hedge bannered “Trump Is Assembling An Arab Army To Replace US Troops In Syria” and reported that U.S. President Donald Trump was trying to arrange a Sunni Arab army from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt and UAE to invade Syria so that U.S. allies will take over the country — or at least the areas that now are controlled by U.S.-allied forces in Syria. Israel might participate in the invasion, but Trump’s team knows that for Syrians to be controlled by Jews would be a nonstarter, whereas a significant percentage (though still only a minority) of Syrians would be willing to be ruled by Saudi Arabia and other Sunni-led regimes. Trump then would withdraw American forces, because Syrians would be almost as opposed to an imposed Christian regime as to an imposed Jewish one. Placing Syria under the effective control by the Saud family would be still placing it effectively under the control of the U.S. regime, though only indirectly, via the Saudi-selected stand-ins.

Consequently, the Knesset vote on Monday, to place Israel’s invasion-decision totally under the control of Netanyahu and Lieberman, without participation from the Knesset nor from other members of Netanyahu’s Cabinet, opens the door to an invasion anytime that Netanyahu, Trump, and whatever Sunni Arab leaders that Trump can muster, decide to do it. This is a gateway opened, to facilitate such an invasion, whenever those leaders might agree on the date to do it. 

About the author

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity. Besides TGP, his reports and historical analyses are published on many leading current events and political sites, including The Saker, Huffpost, Oped News, and others.

 

horiz-long grey
What will it take to bring America to live according to its own self image?

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Syria Attack: ‘Nobody Looking for War, But Things Could Spiral Out of Control’

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An Israeli jet. Israel has and designs advanced aircraft, but the US supplies many of their war equipment, taxpayer courtesy. This is unique, but par for the course with Israel, the "other" exceptional nation.

OPINION

Sputnik interview with Mark Heller
Israel is reportedly behind the missile strikes against several Syrian military bases Sunday night. Israeli media claims the attack's targets included an Iranian base. Radio Sputnik discussed the strikes with Mark Heller, principal research associate at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.

Sputnik: Israel warned earlier this month that it could hit Iranian bases in Syria if tensions between Tehran and Tel Aviv were to escalate. What prompted the attack now?

Mark Heller: Tensions with Iran have been escalating largely because of an apparent ongoing Iranian effort to stockpile more advanced equipment in what is essentially a forward Iranian base in Syria and Israel's refusal to allow the Iranians to turn Syria into a base from which Israel could be attack.

Smoke rises after airstrikes targeting different parts of the Syrian capital Damascus, Syria, early Saturday, April 14, 2018
© AP PHOTO / HASSAN AMMAR
WATCH: Video of Alleged Missile Strike on Syrian Military Bases in Hama

Sputnik: Haaretz has cited Israeli defense minister Avigdor Lieberman saying that Tel Aviv would continue to declare that it had freedom to operate in Syria. What's your take on that statement?Mark Heller: I think that Israel over almost the entire course of the Syrian civil war has been operating in Syrian airspace in order to prevent developments which impact very negatively on Israeli security –in particular, the transfer of advanced weaponry and what is sometimes called 'equation-changing' equipment to Hezbollah.

That I think now extends as well to the transfer of equipment into Syria itself. My understanding is that Israel considers that to be an unacceptably dangerous development.

Sputnik: We've heard in recent times a lot of rhetoric in both countries being ratcheted up. What are the chances that this recent development will translate into something more serious? Or is it just continued rhetoric do you believe?

Mark Heller: I don't think anyone is looking for war, of course. But I think that the rhetoric, as well as the actions on the ground can include a risk of things spiraling out of control and escalating to a point that nobody intends to begin with.

Smoke rises after an air strike during fighting between members of the Syrian Democratic Forces and Islamic State militants in Raqqa, Syria August 15, 2017
© REUTERS / ZOHRA BENSEMRA/FILE PHOTO
Reported Missile Strikes on Syrian Army Arms Depots Kill 26 - Monitoring Group

But I think it's important to stress that Israel is not threatening Iran, and not trying to use Syria as a base from which it might attack Iran, directly or using proxies. But it is true that Iranian rhetoric over the last few months has been stepped up against what it considers to be the Israeli enemy.Sputnik: What international reaction are you expecting in regard to the reported strike? What do you expect the US to say in regard to that, or Russia?

Mark Heller: Well, Israel of course wants to do two things. It wants to be closely coordinated with the United States, and is making every effort to do that I think with some considerable degree of success. Secondly, it wants to avoid a direct military confrontation with Russia, and I think thus far at least it's also been fairly successful in doing that.

Sputnik: What's your hope for the future with regard to the region?

Mark Heller: My hope is that the totally undesirable things you're describing do not actually transpire. But I'm not sure I share a confidence that that will be the case so long as Iran continues on its present course, which is threatening to bring it into confrontation not only with Israel, but also with a large number of actors throughout the Middle East. In fact the whole region throughout the last couple of years looks like it's turning into a total confrontation between an Iranian-backed and Iranian-managed axis on the one hand and just about everybody else on the other with the possible exception of Russia.

Newly inaugurated U.S. President Donald Trump (in red tie), first lady Melania (L), Vice President Mike Pence and his wife Karen (R) preside over a military parade during Trump's swearing ceremony in Washington, U.S., January 20, 2017
© REUTERS / MIKE SEGAR
Paper Tiger: US No Longer Has Resources to Start Full-Scale War Against Iran - Prof

We've seen that the United States as well as Britain and France have taken actions against the Syrian regime. We've seen that the Saudis and the Emiratis are also trying to line up support for what they consider to be the need to oppose Iranian expansionism in that part of the Middle East.I guess 'clash of civilizations' is perhaps too extreme a term to use here, but there is very much a broad overall tension between the Iranian-led, largely Shiite camp and just about everyone else.

The views and opinions expressed by Mark Heller are those of the expert and do not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik. 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mark Heller, is a principal research associate at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.  We take his opinions with a huge lump of salt, and completely reject his insinuations and attitudes toward  the Syrian government (government, not "regime") and Iran's role in the region. 

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Things to ponder

While our media prostitutes, many Hollywood celebs, and politicians and opinion shapers make so much noise about the still to be demonstrated damage done by the Russkies to our nonexistent democracy, this is what the sanctimonious US government has done overseas just since the close of World War 2. And this is what we know about. Many other misdeeds are yet to be revealed or documented.

Parting shot—a word from the editors
The Best Definition of Donald Trump We Have Found

In his zeal to prove to his antagonists in the War Party that he is as bloodthirsty as their champion, Hillary Clinton, and more manly than Barack Obama, Trump seems to have gone “play-crazy” — acting like an unpredictable maniac in order to terrorize the Russians into forcing some kind of dramatic concessions from their Syrian allies, or risk Armageddon.However, the “play-crazy” gambit can only work when the leader is, in real life, a disciplined and intelligent actor, who knows precisely what actual boundaries must not be crossed. That ain’t Donald Trump — a pitifully shallow and ill-disciplined man, emotionally handicapped by obscene privilege and cognitively crippled by white American chauvinism. By pushing Trump into a corner and demanding that he display his most bellicose self, or be ceaselessly mocked as a “puppet” and minion of Russia, a lesser power, the War Party and its media and clandestine services have created a perfect storm of mayhem that may consume us all.— Glen Ford, Editor in Chief, Black Agenda Report

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