Now what? Former British diplomat Alastair Crooke discusses the ramifications of a 55-year dynasty in Syria coming to an end.
By Chris Hedges
The Chris Hedges Report
The fall of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, ending a 55-year dynasty begun by his father, dramatically shifts the pieces on the chessboard of the Middle East. The rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), led by Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, is armed and backed by Turkey and was once allied with Al Qaeda. It is sanctioned as a terrorist group.
Turkey’s primary goal is to prevent an independent Kurdish state in northern Syria where Kurds have formed an autonomous enclave. But it may not only be Turkey that is behind the overthrow of Assad. It may also be Israel. Israel has long sought to topple the Syrian regime which is the transit point for weapons and aid sent from Iran to the Lebanese militia group Hezbollah.
The Syrian regime was backed by Russia and Iran, indeed Russian warplanes routinely bombed Syrian rebel targets. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has gloated about the ousting of Assad calling it an “historic day” and said it was a direct result of Israel’s actions against Hezbollah and Iran. But at the same time, Israel will soon have an Islamic state on its border.
Syria, a country of 23 million, is geopolitically important. It links Iraq’s oil to the Mediterranean; the Shia of Iraq and Iran to Lebanon; and Turkey, a NATO ally, to Jordan’s deserts.
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Assad’s decision to brutally crush a pro-democracy movement triggered a 14-year-long civil war in 2011 that led to 500,000 people being killed and more than 14 million displaced.
Now What? Will Hayat Tahrir al-Sham seek to renew relations with Iran? Will it impose an Islamic state, given its jihadist roots? Will Syria’s many minority groups, Alawite, Druze, Circassian, Armenian, Chechen, Assyrian, Christian and Turkoman, be persecuted, especially the Alawites, a heterodox offshoot of Shiite Islam comprising around 10 percent of the population, which Assad and the ruling elites were members of?
How will it affect the U.S.-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, which holds the Syrian oil-rich territory in north and east Syria? Why are the U.S. and Israel bombing targets in Syria following the ouster of Assad? Will the new regime be able to convince the U.S. and Europe to lift sanctions and return the occupied oil fields? What does this portend for the wider Middle East, especially in Lebanon and the Israeli occupied territories?
Joining Chris Hedges to discuss the overthrow of the Assad regime and its ramifications is former British diplomat Alastair Crooke. He served for many years in the Middle East working as a security advisor to the EU special envoy to the Middle East, as well as helping lead efforts to set up negotiations and truces among Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian resistant groups with Israel. He was instrumental in establishing the 2002 ceasefire between Hamas and Israel. He is also the author of Resistance: The Essence of the Islamist Revolution, which analyzes the ascendancy of Islamic movements in the Middle East.
Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for 15 years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East bureau chief and Balkan bureau chief for the paper. He previously worked overseas for The Dallas Morning News, The Christian Science Monitor and NPR. He is the host of show “The Chris Hedges Report.”
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Views expressed in this interview may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
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“Assad’s decision to brutally crush a pro-democracy movement triggered a 14-year-long civil war” is a NYT narrative about the genesis of the destruction of Syria. As Robert Parry himself said, there were never any moderate rebels.
This is the most lucid, informative and far reaching analysis of the situation in Syria and the Middle East I’ve heard to date.
Once again facebook removed 2 of my posts this time by Chris Hedges. I offered no opinions above the posts by Hedges and yet I was accused of being mis-leading; only posting this report to get “likes” and being against community standards. However one of the alleged unacceptable posts by Hedges I found on youtube which I guess was “big enough” for Zuckerberg to respect. He and others have moved into our community of San Francisco not having clue about the values which have attracted many. SF values have been stomped all over by those newbies who confuse being politically correct and dominate with actually valuing differences and first amendment rights.
“Assad’s decision to brutally crush a pro-democracy movement triggered a 14-year-long civil war in 2011 that led to 500,000 people being killed and more than 14 million displaced.” This is the worst explanation of cause and effect regarding the problems Syria dealt with the last 14 years I have read.
Thank you, I was about the say the same. Assad responded to a US-sponsored color revolution that was disguised as “pro-democracy”. The whole ‘Arab Spring’ was a carnival of color revolutions. Whenever you hear that phrase, pro-democracy movement, you need to translate it to its true meaning, which is this: neoliberal globalist capitalism with a thin façade of elected government, provided that the government does not interfere with exploitation of the country’s resources by international corporations. In case of interference, the elected government will be replaced by a dictatorship.
Egypt is the best example.
Completely agree. Really troubling how some legitimately critical voices are airbrushing the role of the US and Israel out of these developments. I’d recommend that everyone read Craig Murray’s article on how the fall of Assad is an element of the Greater Israel plan.