The first United Nations aid deliveries arrived on Thursday in areas controlled by militants in Syria.
Rescuers in Turkey searching for earthquake survivors (AP)
Rescuers were scouring debris on Friday nearly 100 hours after the 7.8-magnitude massive earthquake hit Turkey and Syria, killing more than 21,000 people in one of the region’s worst disasters for a century.
The first United Nations aid deliveries arrived on Thursday in areas controlled by militants in Syria, but chances of finding survivors have dimmed since the passing of the three-day mark that experts consider a critical period to save lives.
Top aid officials were planning to visit affected areas with World Health Organization Head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and UN humanitarian Chief Martin Griffiths both announcing trips.
The president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Mirjana Spoljaric, said she had arrived in Aleppo.
“Communities struggling after years of fierce fighting are now crippled by the earthquake,” Spoljaric tweeted on Wednesday.
“As this tragic event unfolds, people’s desperate plight must be addressed,” she stressed.
On his part, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged the Security Council to authorize the opening of new cross-border humanitarian aid points between Turkey and Syria.
“This is the moment of unity, it’s not a moment to politicise or to divide but it is obvious that we need massive support,” Guterres said.
Similarly, Geir Pedersen, the UN Special Envoy for Syria stressed on Thursday the need to avoid “politicization” of aid to earthquake victims in Syria and urged Washington and Brussels to ensure there were “no impediments”.
Exclusive: Syrian government sending aid to armed-groups-held areas
In the same context, Syrian informed sources told Al Mayadeen on Thursday that a convoy carrying Syrian aid is preparing to enter Idlib through the Saraqib border crossing and is currently waiting for UN representatives to hand over the relief aid to Idlib.
The sources said that if international organizations are late, Syria will not hesitate to deliver this aid by itself to help the disaster-stricken people.
“The negotiations were fruitful, and aid is on the way,” they added.
According to Al Mayadeen sources, the UAE had been negotiating for the past three days with militants in Idlib to open the crossings to allow the entry of aid.
“The militats were finally convinced with an aid convoy making it into Idlib through the Syrian Red Crescent and international organizations in Syria,” the sources added.
“The militants want to garner international support for themselves alone under the pretext that the Syrian government would not allow aid to make it into their areas,” the sources indicated.
Al Mayadeen correspondent also reported that “there is an aid convoy preparing to enter Idlib.”
“The aid convoy will make it through the UN path through the Saraqib crossing,” and “the efforts of the militants to get aid into Idlib through the Turkish borders have all been met with failure.”
Freezing temperatures
In the Turkish city of Gaziantep, located near the epicenter of the quake, temperatures plunged to minus three degrees Celsius (26 degrees Fahrenheit) early on Friday.
Despite the cold, thousands of families had to spend the night in cars and makeshift tents — too scared or banned from returning to their homes.
Gyms, mosques, schools, and some stores have opened at night. But beds are scarce and thousands spend the nights in cars with engines running to provide heat.
Monday’s quake was the largest Turkey has seen since 1939 when 33,000 people died in the eastern Erzincan province.
In addition to 3,377 deaths in Syria, Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) said the death toll from the earthquake in Turkey has reached 18,342, while 74,242 have been injured, bringing the confirmed total to more than 21,000 deaths.
Experts fear the number will continue to rise sharply. Despite the difficulties, thousands of local and foreign searchers have not given up the hunt for more survivors.
On a visit to the area, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan admitted there had been “shortcomings” in the government’s handling of the disaster.
Relief pledges
The World Bank said it would give $1.78 billion in aid to Turkey to help with relief and recovery efforts. Immediate assistance of $780 million will be offered from two existing projects in Turkey, said the bank, while an added $1 billion in operations is being prepared to support affected people.
In Syria, the General Director of the Syrian Civil Aviation Authority (SCAA), Basem Mansour, revealed that the countries that have started sending aid planes so far are: UAE, Russia, Iran, India, Pakistan, Armenia, Algeria, Iraq, Oman, Egypt, Venezuela, Jordan, Libya, and Tunisia.
Amid complete silence from the #West, some countries actually stepped up and answered Syria's humanitarian cry for help.
Earlier, the US Treasury Department announced a temporary lifting of some Syria-related sanctions following calls from the Syrian state and the international community in the aftermath of the 7.8-magnitude that struck Syria and Turkey.
In another blow to the sinister plots of the Turkish madman Erdogan, the US-led coalition to support ISIS in Syria and Iraq snatches a top ISIS commander who went astray, apparently, in an area under the Turkish illegal occupation in northern Syria.
In the early hours of dawn, today, the US-led coalition to support ISIS (ISIL) in Syria and Iraq carried out an airdrop operation in the outskirts of the Syrian city of Jarabulus currently under the occupation of the Turkish army and its slew of anti-Islamic Al Qaeda and Al Qaeda-affiliated terrorist groups, the coalition claims they captured a top ISIS commander.
Simultaneously, the Syrian Arab Army units protecting the city of Saraqib in the southeastern countryside of Idlib repelled a large attack by terrorists of the Turkey-sponsored Al Qaeda Levant (aka Nusra Front, HTS, FSA, Moderate Rebels…), the attack was successfully repelled.
The following report by the Lebanese news channel Al Mayadeen covers both of the above news:
The US-led international coalition announced in a statement that its forces had arrested at dawn today a senior leader of ISIS during an operation in Syria, the statement indicated that the detainee is classified as one of the top commanders of the organization in Syria, and he is an expert in making bombs.
According to the statement, the coalition forces will continue to hunt down ISIS remnants wherever they are, to ensure their permanent defeat.
American helicopters had carried out an airdrop operation in the Jarabulus area, north of Aleppo, which is under the control of Turkish-backed militants, the airdrop took place between the villages of Al-Hamir and Ghandour, amid violent clashes.
In parallel, the Syrian army repelled an attack launched by armed groups on the Idlib countryside. According to Sputnik agency, the reconnaissance units of the Syrian army monitored armed groups that tried to advance toward military sites along the line of contact in the vicinity of the city of Saraqib, after which violent clashes erupted in which the Syrian army used artillery and missiles to stop the militants’ attack.
End of the transcript.
Aside from the obvious lies repeatedly spewed that the USA combats terrorism when in reality, its main goal was to achieve its goals through ‘creative chaos’ by sponsoring ‘moderate rebels’ and supplying them with ‘non-lethal weapons’ to effect regime change in Syria, as per official US statements, and as per the very admissions of current and former US officials, these highly choreographed and publicized operations to take out an ISIS commander here or there by US regimes are always carried out when a PR stunt is needed to be used on the domestic level in the USA itself and also to deliver messages to its regional allies that its army is still relevant in military terms, not only to steal oil and wheat from the poor people.
However, the main question we’ve asked before and continue to ask: how come the first and second ISIS leaders felt safe in areas under the control of the Turkish army, for the first, and inside Turkey itself for the second, and now this commander who the US also says it captured in areas under the control of fighters loyal to Erdogan?
Worth noting that Turkey is the second most important member of NATO after the USA, the same ‘defensive’ alliance that mastered distributing roles in games that cost the lives of millions of people, devastated millions of others, uprooted, displaced, maimed, raped, tortured, and many ended up being used as spare parts and sex-slaves around the world.
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For NATO, dismembering a country [Syria] is a second-best war aim, after the failure of complete ‘regime change’.
Idlib; where NATO-embedded media is exposed
The NATO-embedded media often speaks as though the HTS/Nusra/al-Qaeda held enclave in two-thirds of Idlib Province represents Syria and is a haven of ‘moderate rebels’. They also claim the enclave holds 4 million people, while the Syrian government says 1.3 million.
War propaganda themes have become dutifully reported ‘facts’: this is a ‘Syrian Civil War’ (even as Syria is occupied by NATO’s two largest armies plus Israel, plus thousands of foreign terrorists), the Syrian Government has repeatedly used ‘chemical weapons’ (i.e. WMDs, meriting NATO retaliation) and (for some unexplained reason: pure evil?) bombs its own schools and hospitals.
But there is another Idlib: that part liberated, at great cost, by Syria’s national army.
From August 2019 through to early 2020, the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) liberated the south-eastern third of Idlib province, including the towns of Khan Shaykhoun, Maarat al-Numan, and Saraqeb. That opened the M5 highway for all traffic from the south to Aleppo, through Hama and SE Idlib.
The SAA looked for further advances, but the NATO powers demanded an end to Syrian operations, in defense of the al-Qaeda enclave. That real threat of intervention led Russia to engage in further talks with Turkey and to stall further advances.
Yet this development demonstrated that Syria, with its allies, could have freed the country from all terrorism were it not for repeated interventions from the NATO-led war coalition, which prefers to dismember and maintain occupied enclaves: NW Idlib, the NE ‘autonomous’ zone, the US occupied al Tanf zone and the Israeli occupied Golan.
In November 2021, I visited Syrian Idlib, authorized by the Syrian Army, just as most western journalists are authorized by US troops when they enter its various war zones. In one day, we traveled to Khan Sheykhoun in the south through Maarat al-Numan, the second-largest provincial city, to the strategic crossroads town of Saraqeb.
Khan Sheykhoun is the only Idlib town I saw with a significant civilian population. Mayor Mohammad Iskandar told us that 600 to 700 families have returned, about 10% of the pre-war population. Now far from the frontline, the town is peaceful with some rebuilding and small markets.
Most of those displaced moved to Turkey or north Idlib and some to other parts of Syria. The mayor is in touch with many and says most want to return, but the armed groups (HTS/Nusra) demand large sums of money for them to leave.
We also spoke with Mr. Iyad Sukheta, who runs a small grocery store, a small farm, and used to drive a bus. Like the Mayor, Iyad has also remained in Khan Sheykhoun throughout the conflict.
He says the ‘musalaheen’ (armed groups) took many prisoners and killed many local people, including his 17-year-old son. They wanted him to use his bus to drive people north, but he refused.
Asked about the chemical weapons incident of April 2017, Iyad said that the prisoners were not sacrificed (as they had been in East Ghouta in 2013) but rather, after a Syrian airstrike, the armed groups attacked the local people directly with chemicals. Many were killed.
Back in 2017, the armed groups blamed the SAA, using their own false flag massacre to incite President Trump (who had campaigned against the war) to make his first missile strike on Syria.
Maarat al-Numan is a much bigger town, with an ancient history and sitting on the frontline between Syrian forces and the Turkish-backed Nusra/HTS gangs. Even though the SAA has pushed its effective frontline forward three times in the past two years, there are no civilians here. The frontline, about 4km north, is constantly tested by the armed groups.
I visited Maarat’s museum with its famous Roman and Byzantine mosaics, which have been protected for several years with sandbags. As with many mosques, schools, and hospitals throughout Syria, the HTS/Nusra terrorists had used it as a military headquarters, digging tunnels under the Museum.
Jabal Zeitoun (Olive Mountain) is now at the center of the frontline, as it occupies the high ground from which the SAA’s 9th Division has placed a substantial vanguard of soldiers, tanks, arms, and surveillance equipment. Yet the actual Maarat frontline extends over many kilometers.
Nusra/HTS had built barricades around the town’s hospital and placed a small mosque inside. We saw evidence of supplies (medicines and cars) from Qatar, Germany, Sweden, and France. The typical pattern of the armed groups’ takeover of Syrian hospitals (for example in Aleppo) has been that they first rob all existing supplies.
Despite nominal support at the UN for the ‘territorial integrity’ of Syria, the NATO states had backed a breakaway Idlib enclave called ‘North Syria’. In much the same way, and contrary to international law, they still support an ‘Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria’. Dismembering a country is a second-best war aim, after the failure of complete ‘regime change’.
Further on up the road, the crossroads town of Saraqeb is also at the frontline, with Nusra/HTS making daily small arms attacks on, and occasional shelling of, SAA positions. They hide behind, and sometimes in front of, the many Turkish bases which are all across northern and central Idlib. The aim of these attacks, according to General J, has been to provoke retaliation which might spark direct conflict between Syrian and Turkish forces.
Captain Y took us to the frontline, looking out on the road to Ariha, and with a Turkish base 1.7 kilometers ahead. They know these distances quite precisely and are ready to liberate their country from foreign occupation and NATO-backed terrorism when the time is right.
Syria could have eliminated terrorism and restored its territorial integrity long ago, were it not for the NATO-led war coalition which prefers to fragment and occupy segments of the country, all along its land borders. In this way, they provide safe haven for internationally-proscribed terrorist groups.
The opinions mentioned in this article do not necessarily reflect the opinion of Al mayadeen, but rather express the opinion of its writer exclusively.
هناك حرب مخابراتية إعلامية تستخدمها أجهزة المخابرات الغربية، وهي تسبق وتستمر إلى ما بعد الحرب العسكرية. وهذه الحرب بحاجة إلى اهتمام شديد وإلى تكريس الميزانيات والخبراء والأدمغة والأقلام لتفنيد كل الادعاءات والردّ عليها من على منصات إعلامية نافذة للغرب.
هناك نوع من الحرب يبدأ قبل شنّ أي هجوم ويستمر خلاله وبعده وهو الذي يوفّر الأرضية والحالة المجتمعية والسياسية والإعلاميّة لنجاح أي هجوم عسكري في أي مكان ولأي هدف كان، وقد مردت الدول الغربية الاستعمارية على تخصيص الميزانيات السخيّة ووضع الخطط التفصيلية، وشحذ الأدوات المهنية لمثل هذه الحرب، بحيث مازالت تتربع على عرش هذه الحرب وتنتصر فيها مرة تلو أخرى، وذلك لإغفال الآخرين لهذه الحقيقة الهامة وإحجامهم عن التوقف قليلاً وتغيير جداول ميزانياتهم وأولويات خططهم.
ما أقصده هو الحرب الإعلامية التي يستخدم القائمون عليها من أجهزة المخابرات الغربية خبراء في اللغات والتعبير وخبراء في تاريخ وثقافة وأديان وطوائف الشعوب ليعلموا من أين ينفذوا إلى عقول هذه الشعوب وقلوبها ويسيّروها وفقاً للمصالح الغربية، ويستخدمون خبراء في علم النفس وخبراء في الترويج وخبراء في الأصوات والموسيقى والتأثير وربما خبراء في اختصاصات لم نطّلع عليها بعد ومازالت حكراً عليهم ولمراكز أبحاثهم ووسائل إعلامهم، إذ أن الدارس لساحة الصراعات والحروب التي تشنها القوى الغربية لنهب ثروات الشعوب وعلى الأخص الولايات المتحدة التي تشن الحروب اليوم مع أتباعها على دول عديدة يكاد يصاب بالدهشة من المفارقات الجمّة بين الواقع على الأرض وبين الادعاءات التي يتم الترويج لها في إعلام الكون حتى تصبح حقيقة لا يتجرّأ أحد على تحدّيها، وحتى إذا تجرأ لن يتمكن من قلب المعادلة وإعادة الاعتبار للوقائع التي تشير إلى عكس توجه العاصفة الإعلامية.
والأمثلة أكثر من أن تُحصى. وإذا بدأت بضرب المثال عن وطني سوريا فإننا نجد أن الغرب وبعد أن أنشأ غرفاً ومنظمات وموّلها بسخاء لتشويه ما يحدث على الأرض السورية (وقد كشفت تسريبات الوثائق البريطانية عن حرب إعلامية منظمة وممولة منذ اليوم الأول منذ بداية الحرب الإرهابية على سوريا) بعد ذلك بدأوا بإخراج أفلام ومنحها جائزة أوسكار لأكاذيب صمموها واخترعوها وروّجوا لها وأصبحت بالنسبة لهم واقعاً بديلاً يدحض سيرة الواقع المعاش ومن هذه الأفلام “رجل حلب الأخير” و”الكهف”، وبالنسبة لجماهير الغرب فإن هذه الأفلام هي القناة الأساسية التي تنبؤهم بما جرى في سورية. رغم أن هذه الأفلام، تماماً كقصة الطفل عمران، هي عبارة عن أكاذيب ملفقة لا تمتّ إلى الحقيقة بصلة قام بها بعض المأجورين وعلى رأسهم فراس فياض لتقديم ما يشتهي الغرب رؤيته وسماعه عن حرب ابتدعها لتدمير حياة الملايين من شعب مسالم في بلد آمن ومستقر يشكّل شوكة في أعين الصهاينة والطامعين بإرث هذه الأمة.
وفي الاتهامات المزعومة عن استخدام الحكومة السورية للغازات السامة في دوما وسراقب، تأتي هذه الاتهامات لتناقض تناقضاً صارخاً تقرير منظمة حظر الأسلحة الكيماوية والتي أكدت أن سوريا قد تخلت عن كلّ أسلحتها الكيماوية وأنها خالية من السلاح الكيماوي وكان هذا منذ سنوات، والبارحة في 16/4/2021 عقد السفير الروسي في الأمم المتحدة فاسيلي نيبينزيا جلسة استماع لخبراء منظمة حظر الأسلحة الكيماوية، وخبراء آخرين في الملف والموضوع أكدوا خلالها وبما لا يدع مجالاً للشك تلاعب بعض العناصر في المنظمة بالتقرير الذي كتبه الفريق الذي زار سوريا واستبدلوه بأكاذيب من قبل أطراف لم تطأ أقدامها أرض سورية، كما رفض المسؤولون في المنظمة الاستماع لهؤلاء الذين زاروا سورية والمدير السابق للمنظمة لأن تقاريرهم تؤكد على عدم استخدام الحكومة السورية للغازات السامة وأن ما تمّ الترويج له على شاشات التلفزة هو مسرحية إعلامية هزلية لأن هؤلاء الناس لو تعرضوا للغازات السامة لكانوا أمواتاً ولما كانوا موجودين لسكب الماء عليهم.
والذاكرة تعود بنا إلى كولن باول وإلى ادعاءات أميركا بأن العراق يمتلك أسلحة دمار شامل، وبعد أن أنهوا بحثهم في الملف ووجدوا أنه على الأغلب لا يوجد أي دليل لما أكدوه مراراً وتكراراً ختموا التقرير بالشمع الأحمر وأودعوه أقفال الأمم المتحدة ومنعوا فتحه إلى ما بعد ستين عاماً أي بعد أن يكون كل من عاش وشهد الأحداث أصبح في ذمة الله.
وهناك قصص مشابهة كثيرة ومتوفرة عبر الاتهامات التي يكيلونها لروسيا والصين بشأن مواضيع عدة، وعن الأكاذيب التي تطبخ في ذات المطبخ عن الحرب على اليمن، وعما يجري في أوكرانيا وعن حقيقة المواقف من الاتفاق النووي الإيراني والقائمة تطول. ولكن ما يثلج الصدر اليوم هو بداية التصدي وإن يكن مازال في بداياته لهذه الحرب المخابراتية الإعلامية الخطيرة، إذ أن الجلسة التي عقدها البارحة السفير الروسي في الأمم المتحدة وأعطى المنبر لعدد من الشهود الموثوقين والذين فنّدوا الحقائق حول الملف الكيميائي السوري بطريقة يجب أن تدفع القائمين على التزوير إلى الخجل من أنفسهم وعدم الإقدام على مثل هذه المهزلة مرة أخرى.
وفي الإطار ذاته وبذات الروح قرأت مقالاً في جريدة (الصين اليومية) عن إقليم شيجيانغ بقلم الكاتب فو زو وبتاريخ 8/4/2021 فنّد فيه بما لا يدع مجالاً للشك الأكاذيب الأميركية حول إقليم شيجيانغ وأثبت بالأرقام اهتمام الحكومة الصينية بالتعليم لكل سكان هذا الإقليم وبالتعليم الداخلي الذي يوازي بجودته أي تعليم داخلي في العالم. كما يتحدث الكاتب عن تحسين المستوى المعيشي لسكان الإقليم والعمل الذي يدأبون للقيام به لتحسين مستوى معيشتهم وأن الصين تقف ضدّ أي اضطهاد أو تطهير عرقي أو إبادة يدّعي الغرب أن الصين تمارسها في الإقليم. ومن الواضح من تاريخ الصين ومن عملها للقضاء على الفقر في كل الصين وعلى رفع مستوى المعيشة للصينيين أنها حضارة تهتم بالإنسان وبمقدرات عيشه ولا تدخل التفرقة الدينية أو العنصرية في قاموس سياساتها.
ومن ناحية أخرى من المضحك أن تدّعي الولايات المتحدة الحرص على حياة المسلمين الإيغور في الصين وعلى تعليمهم ومستوى معيشتهم وقد كرّست منظمات إرهابية ومولتها بالمال ومازالت، لتدمير آلاف المدارس في سورية والتي يرتادها مسلمون ومسيحيون، ولتدمير الجوامع والكنائس والأسواق التاريخية والآثار والحضارة. فكيف يمكن أن تكون حريصة على مسلمي الصين ومدمّرة لمسلمي العراق وسورية وليبيا واليمن؟ من أين أتى اهتمام الولايات المتحدة بمسلمي الإيغور في الصين إلا من باب التدخل في شؤون الصين الداخلية، تماماً كما هي سياستها حيال تايوان وهونغ كونغ من جهة، وسياستها تجاه أوكرانيا والقرم بالنسبة إلى روسيا من جهة ثانية. لا يمكن فهم ما تقوم به الولايات المتحدة إلا من باب التدخل في شؤون الدول الداخلية والحرص على أمن “إسرائيل” وقوتها الإرهابية في المنطقة.
لقد علِمَتْ الولايات المتحدة أن الكيان الصهيوني هو الذي قام بالهجوم على محطة نطنز لتدمير المباحثات الأميركية الإيرانية ولكننا لم نسمع كلمة إدانة لهذا الهجوم من الولايات المتحدة أو من أي دولة غربية. كما أنهم يلتزمون الصمت عن كل الأكاذيب التي يتم الترويج لها عن أوكرانيا والقرم بعد أن اتخذت الولايات المتحدة عقوبات ضد روسيا على أسس واهية لا دليل واحد فيها على كل الادعاءات بل هي تعترف أن صحة هذه الادعاءات منخفضة إلى متوسطة.
المهم في الموضوع هو أن هذه الحرب المخابراتية الإعلامية التي تسبق وترافق وتستمر إلى ما بعد الحرب العسكرية بحاجة إلى اهتمام شديد وإلى تكريس الميزانيات والخبراء والأدمغة والأقلام لتفنيد كل الادعاءات والردّ عليها من على منصات إعلامية نافذة للغرب وتصل إلى أسماع البشر في كل أنحاء الدنيا تماماً كما فعل السفير فاسيلي نيبينزيا في الجلسة الهامة التي تحدث بها الخبراء وفندوا ألاعيب منظمة الأسلحة الكيماوية، وتماماً كما فعلت جريدة الصين اليوم بتفنيد كل الأكاذيب المختلقة حول إقليم شيجيانج. ولا بأس من تخصيص ميزانية سخيّة لهذا الأمر حتى وإن تم اقتطاعها من ميزانيات الدفاع العسكرية لأن الدفاع بالكلمة والترويج للحقائق النابعة من الأرض في وجه الأكاذيب والافتراءات قد يوفّر على الجيوش معارك عسكرية مكلفة وقد يساهم في تثقيف الرأي العام العالمي حول حقيقة السياسات الغربية والكلفة الباهظة التي يدفعها البشر في كل أنحاء الأرض نتيجة هذه السياسات.
إن مواجهة سياسة القطب الواحد وضمان ولادة عالم متعدد الأقطاب تحتاج إلى استراتيجيات شاملة تتصدى لاستراتيجيات الهيمنة والتدخل والإسفاف والتزوير والذي كلّف دماء وحياة واستقراراً وأمناً لشعوبنا جمعاء.
نحن بحاجة إلى وقفة عميقة صادقة وذكية وشاملة وبحاجة لمقارعة من يشن الهجوم ويدمر البلدان بأدوات أذكى وأدهى من أدواتهم على كل الصعد وفي كافة المجالات.
There is a media intelligence war used by Western intelligence services, which precedes and continues until after the military war. This war needs great attention and budgets, experts, brains and pens are devoted to refuting and responding to all allegations from west-window media platforms.
There is a kind of war that begins before, during and after any attack, which provides the ground and the societal, political and media situation for the success of any military attack anywhere and for any purpose, and the western colonial states have been forced to allocate generous budgets and draw up detailed plans, and sharpen the professional tools of such a war, so that they still sit on the throne of this war and win it again and again, in order to ignore others for this important fact and their reluctance to stop a little and change their budget schedules and priorities.
What I mean is the media war on which western intelligence agencies use experts in languages and expression, experts in the history, culture, religions and communities of peoples to know where to carry out to the minds and hearts of these peoples and to conduct them in accordance with Western interests, and use experts in psychology, promotion experts, experts in sounds, music and influence, and perhaps experts in disciplines that we have not yet seen and are still exclusive to them, their research centers and their media, as The study of the arena of conflicts and wars waged by western powers to plunder the wealth of peoples, especially the United States, which is waging wars today with its followers on many countries, is almost surprised by the great paradoxes between reality on earth and the allegations promoted in the media of the universe so that it becomes a reality that no one dares to challenge, and even if he dares, he will not be able to turn the equation and reconsider the facts that indicate the opposite of the direction of the media storm.
Examples are too many. If you start to set an example of my homeland syria, we find that the West, having created rooms and organizations and generously funded them to distort what is happening on Syrian soil (leaks of British documents have revealed an organized and funded media war since the first day since the beginning of the terrorist war on Syria) then began to direct and give films The Oscar for lies they designed, invented, promoted and became, for them, an alternative reality that refutes the biography of living reality, including “The Last Man of Aleppo” and “The Cave”, and for western audiences, these films are the main channel that predicts what happened in Syria. Although these films, just like the story of The Child Imran, are fabricated lies that have nothing to do with the truth, some of the hacks, led by Firas Fayyad, have done to present what the West desires to see and hear about a war it created to destroy the lives of millions of peaceful people in a safe and stable country that is a thorn in the eyes of the Zionists and those who aspire to the legacy of this nation.
In the alleged accusations of the Syrian government’s use of toxic gases in Douma and Saraqeb, these accusations are in stark contrast to the report of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), which confirmed that Syria has abandoned all its chemical weapons and that it is chemical-weapon-free and this has been for years, and yesterday on 16 April 2021, Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Vassily Nebenzia held a hearing of experts of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, and other experts in the file and subject confirmed during it and not There is no doubt that some elements of the organization manipulated the report written by the team that visited Syria and replaced it with lies by parties that did not set foot on Syrian soil, as the officials of the organization refused to listen to those who visited Syria and the former director of the organization because their reports confirm the Syrian government’s non-use of toxic gases and that what was promoted on television is a comic media play because if these people had been exposed to toxic gases they would have died and would not have been there to pour water on them.
The memory brings us back to Colin Powell and America’s claims that Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction, and after they have finished their research on the file and found that there is probably no evidence of what they have repeatedly confirmed, they sealed the report with red wax, called it the locks of the United Nations and prevented it from opening it until after 60 years, i.e. after all those who lived and witnessed the events became in the hands of God.
There are many similar stories available through accusations by Russia and China on several topics, about the lies that are being cooked in the same kitchen about the war on Yemen, what is going on in Ukraine and about the reality of the positions on the Iran nuclear deal and the list goes on. But what is heartening today is the beginning of the response, although it is still in its infancy for this dangerous media intelligence war, as the meeting held yesterday by the Russian Ambassador to the United Nations and gave the platform to a number of reliable witnesses who refuted the facts about the Syrian chemical file in a way that should lead the counterfeiters to be ashamed of themselves and not to make such a farce again.
In the same spirit, I read an article in the China Daily on Zhejiang Province by writer Fu Zhou on April 8, 2021, in which he refuted beyond a doubt U.S. lies about Zhejiang province and in numbers demonstrated the Chinese government’s interest in education for all the region’s population and internal education, which is equal to the quality of any internal education in the world. The author also talks about improving the standard of living of the territory’s population and the work they are doing to improve their standard of living and that China stands against any persecution, ethnic cleansing or extermination claimed by the West to be practiced by China in the territory. It is clear from China’s history and its work to eradicate poverty in all China and to raise the standard of living of the Chinese that it is a civilization that cares about human beings and their livelihoods and does not include religious or racial segregation in the dictionary of its policies.
On the other hand, it is funny that the United States claims to take care of the lives, education and standard of living of Uighur Muslims in China, and has dedicated terrorist organizations and financed them with money and continues to destroy thousands of schools in Syria frequented by Muslims and Christians, and to destroy mosques, churches, historical markets, monuments and civilization. How can you be keen on the Muslims of China and destroy the Muslims of Iraq, Syria, Libya and Yemen? Where did the U.S. interest in Uighur Muslims in China come from except for interference in China’s internal affairs, just as its policy on Taiwan and Hong Kong on the one hand, and its policy toward Ukraine and Crimea for Russia on the other. What the United States is doing can only be understood in order to interfere in the affairs of internal states and to ensure the security of Israel and its terrorist power in the region.
The United States has learned that it was the Zionist entity that attacked Natanz station to destroy the U.S.-Iran talks, but we have not heard a word of condemnation from the United States or any Western country. They also remain silent about all the lies promoted about Ukraine and Crimea after the United States has taken sanctions against Russia on flimsy grounds, not a single evidence of all allegations, but recognizes that the veracity of these allegations is low to medium.
What is important about the matter is that this media intelligence war that precedes, accompanies and continues until after the military war needs great attention and devoting budgets, experts, brains and pens to refute all allegations and respond to them from media platforms open to the West and reach the ears of people in all parts of the world just as Ambassador Vasily Nebenzia did in the important session in which the experts spoke and refuted the tricks of the Chemical Weapons Organization, just as the China Today newspaper refuted all the fabricated lies about Zhejiang. There is nothing wrong with allocating a generous budget for this matter, even if it is cut from military defense budgets, because defending by word and promoting facts emanating from the ground in the face of lies and fabrications may save armies costly military battles and may contribute to educating the world public opinion about the truth of Western policies and the high cost paid by them. Humans are all over the earth as a result of these policies.
Confronting one-pole politics and ensuring the birth of a multipolar world requires comprehensive strategies that address strategies of domination, intervention, subsistence and forgery that have cost blood, life, stability and security to all ourpeoples.
We need a deep, honest, intelligent and comprehensive stand and need to fight those who launch the attack and destroy countries with smarter and more powerful tools at all levels and in all areas.
Press TV: Syria has dismissed as “false and fabricated” the results of a probe by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) into an alleged chemical attack in the northwestern city of Saraqib on February 4, 2018.
Time we investigated the White Helmets for ties to terror groups and Western intelligence. 40 witnesses went to The Haig to testify on White Helmets staging gas attacks, no report was ever published. https://t.co/VoADb5Efg4
On Monday, the OPCW released the findings of its Investigation and Identification Team (IIT), which blamed the Saraqib incident on the Syrian government.
The Director General of @OPCW Fernando Arias Gonzalez has just put in a disgraceful performance at the #EuropeanParliament Security and Defense Committee – He filibustered for ages and refused to answer our questions on the 'doctored alleged Chemical attack' on Douma in #Syria…
“The report reached the conclusion that there are reasonable grounds to believe that, at approximately 21:22 on 4 February 2018, a military helicopter of the Syrian Arab Air Force under the control of the Tiger Forces hit eastern Saraqib by dropping at least one cylinder. The cylinder ruptured and released chlorine over a large area, affecting 12 named individuals,” it claimed in a report.
💬#Zakharova: We have taken note of the report on the alleged chlorine attack in Saraqib, #Syria🇸🇾, in 2018. This is the 2️⃣nd report forced on the @OPCW by the US and its allies.
In a statement published on Wednesday, the Syrian Foreign Ministry said the OPCW’s “misleading report,” written by “an illegitimate and incredible team,” fabricates “facts” to incriminate the Damascus government.
“This report has included false and fabricated conclusion which represents another scandal for the OPCW and the inquiry teams that will be added to the scandal of the reports of Douma incident in 2018, and Ltamenah in 2017,” it said.
“The Syrian Arab Republic condemns, in the strongest terms, what has been included in the report of the illegitimate so-called ‘Investigation and Identification Team’ and rejects all its context.”
Shameful for Germany, of all nations, who gassed millions, to blame the innocent and kowtow to Israeli pressure. https://t.co/2e8RHOW7bE
The ministry also stressed that the Syrian government categorically denies using toxic gases in Saraqib or in any other city or village, affirming that the army has never used such materials during most difficult battles carried out against armed terrorist organizations.
Eyewitnesses I interviewed said the gas cylinder was driven in from Hatay, Turkey in a Mitsubishi truck and delivered to al Nusra and Turkish intelligence, working with the White Helmets. Multiple confirmations. Live with it. https://t.co/FlAcBRSYBY
It further reiterated that Syria categorically rejects the use of chemical weapons at any time or place, saying, the country “has never used any chemical weapon and can’t use it.”
Syria surrendered its entire chemical stockpile in 2013 to a mission led by the United Nations and the OPCW.
It believes that false-flag chemical attacks on the country’s soil have been staged by foreign-backed militants in a bid to pressure the government amid army advances.
Revelations suggest that the OPCW may have intentionally doctored its findings about alleged gas attacks in Syria to avoid implicating the foreign-backed militants.
Damascus has repeatedly urged the chemical weapons watchdog to avoid politicizing Syrian issues.
VT Editors is a General Posting account managed by Jim W. Dean and Gordon Duff. All content herein is owned and copyrighted by Jim W. Dean and Gordon Duff
Dear friends, during the past 2 weeks, there were signals of the growing confrontation between Hayat Tahrir al-Sham as well as the intensifying coordination between Turkey and Russia in Greater Idlib.
The region of Greater Idlib remains the main source of tensions in Syria.
The March 5th ceasefire deal reached by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow allowed an end to be made to the open military confrontation between the Turkish Armed Forces and the Syrian Army. However, as of mid-April, the main provisions of the deal have yet to be implemented. Members of al-Qaeda-linked groups still enjoy freedom of movement across Greater Idlib and keep their positions with weapons and heavy equipment in southern Idlib.
The safe zone along the M4 highway, the creation of which was agreed, has not been created. All Russian-Turkish joint patrols have been conducted in a limited area west of Saraqib and have just been a public move needed to demonstrate that the de-escalation deal is still in force.
Ankara turns a blind eye to regular ceasefire violations and other provocative actions by militant groups and their supporters. Additionally, it has continued its military buildup in Idlib. The number of Turkish troops in the region reportedly reached 7,000, while the number of so-called ‘observation posts’ exceeded 50. Meanwhile, Turkish-affiliated media outlets ramped up a propaganda campaign accusing the Assad government of killing civilians, of ceasefire violations, of using chemical weapons and of discrediting the de-escalation agreement by calling it the surrender of the goals of the so-called Syrian revolution.
On the diplomatic level, neither Turkey nor Russia demonstrate open antagonism, but statements coming from the top military and political leadership of Turkey regarding the conflict in Syria demonstrate that Ankara is not planning to abandon its expansionist plans or aggressive posture towards the country.
These factors set up a pretext for and increase the chances of a new military escalation in Idlib. However, this time the conflict is likely to lead to at least a limited military confrontation between the Turkish and Russian militaries. Both sides have troops deployed in close proximity to the frontline, including the expected hot point of the future escalation – Saraqib.
Possible phases of escalation are the following:
Without the full implementation of the Moscow de-escalation deal and neutralization of radicals, the military situation in southern and eastern Idlib will continue to deteriorate. Militants, inspired by their impunity and the direct protection of the Turkish Army, will increase their attacks on the positions of Syrian forces and their Russian and Iranian allies. These attacks will gradually increase in scale until they provoke a painful military response from the Syrian Armed Forces. Militants, surprised at this blatant ceasefire violation by the bloody Assad regime, will continue their attacks, now justifying them by the right of self-defense. G_4 (A) Turkish diplomats and media outlets will immediately accuse the Assad government of violating the word and spirit of the de-escalation deal and will claim that the “unjustified aggression of the regime”, which is supported by the Russians, led to the killing of dozens of civilians and will film several staged tear-jerkers from Idlib to support this. The so-called ‘international community’ led by the Washington establishment and EU bureaucrats will denounce the aggression of the Assad regime and its backers.
In the face of the continued and increased attacks from Idlib armed groups, the Syrian Army will have two options:
To retreat from their positions and leave the hard-won, liberated areas to the mercy of Turkey and its al-Qaeda-affiliated groups;
To answer the increased attacks with overwhelming force and put an end to the ceasefire violations by radicals.
It’s likely that the Syrians will choose the second option. The military standoff in Idlib will officially re-enter a hot phase. The previous years of conflict have demonstrated that militants cannot match Syrian troops in open battle. Therefore, if the Turkish leadership wants to hold on to its expansionist plans, it will have no choice but to intervene in the battle to rescue its proteges. Syria and Turkey will once again find themselves in a state of open military confrontation.
As in previous escalations, the Turkish military will likely opt to start its military campaign with massive artillery and drone strikes on positions of the Syrian Army along the contact line in southeastern Idlib and western Aleppo. Special attention will be paid to the area of the expected confrontation between Syrian troops and Turkish proxies: the countryside of Saraqib, Maarat al-Numan and Kafr Nabel. Turkish forces will not be able to stop the Syrian Army advance without taking massive fire damage to their infrastructure and to the forces deployed in these areas. Such strikes will also result in further escalation because they will pose a direct danger to the Russian Military Police in Saraqib and Maarat al-Numan, and to Russian military advisers embedded with the Syrian units, which are deployed in southeastern Idlib.
If Turkish strikes target Russian positions and lead to notable losses among Russian personnel, Moscow will be put in a situation where they will be forced to retaliate. Since the start of the military operation in Syria in September 2015, the Russian Armed Forces have concentrated a capable military group in the country protected by short- and long-range air defense systems and reinforced by Bastion-P coastal defense and Iskander-M ballistic missile systems. Additionally, the Russian Black Sea and Caspian Fleets and Russian long-range aviation have repeatedly demonstrated that they are capable of destroying any target on the Syrian battleground and thus also in any nearby areas.
The Russian retaliatory strike will likely target Turkish military columns in close proximity to the frontline as well as Turkish depots, positions of artillery, armoured vehicles, and material and technical support points in Greater Idlib.
If, after the Russian strike, the Turkish leadership does not halt its aggressive actions and its forces continue attacks on Russian and Syrian positions in Syria, the escalation will develop further.
The second wave of Russian retaliatory strikes will target Turkish military infrastructure along the border with Syria. HQs and logistical hubs in the province of Hatay, which were used to command and supply its Operation Spring Shield, will immediately be destroyed. The decision to deliver strikes on other targets along the border will depend on the success of Turkish forces in their expected attempt to attack Russia’s Hmeimim airbase and put it out of service.
Another factor to consider is that should Turkey appear to be too successful in their attack on the Hmeimim airbase, they risk losing their entire Black Sea fleet. While theoretically the Turkish naval forces deployed in the Black Sea are superior to the Russian ones in numbers, the real balance of power there tells a different story. The combined means and facilities of the Russian Black Sea fleet, the Caspian Sea fleet, air forces and coastal defense forces deployed in the region would allow Moscow to overwhelm and sink the entire Turkish Navy. On top of this, Russia, unlike Turkey, is a nuclear power.
Turkey’s NATO allies have already demonstrated that they are not planning to risk their equipment or personnel in order to support Erdogan’s Syrian adventure. Furthermore, a new round of complaints to the UN or demonstrative sanctions will be no help to any destroyed Turkish airbases or to a fleet resting deep underwater.
Ankara will have to find a diplomatic way to de-escalate the confrontation before it gets to this point. The format of this diplomatic solution and the consequences, which Turkey will have to suffer for its military adventure, will depend only on the moment, when the Erdogan government understands that it’s time to stop.
Early on May 1, several missiles launched from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights hit positions of the Syrian Army near Tell Ahmar and Quneitra city. The strike reportedly led to no casualties among Syrian personnel, but destroyed several pieces of military equipment.
This was the second Israeli strike on Syria in less than a week. On April 27, Israeli airstrikes hit the countryside of Damascus, including the al-Mazzeh Airport. Pro-Israeli sources claim that underground facilities of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were the target.
Meanwhile, a new drama is developing in the militant-held part of Greater Idlib. After briefly clashing with the Turkish Army near Nayrab, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham found themselves in the center of a new scandal.
On April 30, the group’s fighters were confronted by supporters of other radical groups in the town of Maaret Elnaasan in western Aleppo. According to pro-opposition sources, the main reason of tensions is the decision of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham to open a crossing for commercial purposes to the government-held area. This initiative faced resistance among militant groups directly controlled by Turkey. The Turkish Army even tried to block a road towards Maaret Elnaasan. However, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham militants were able to suppress the protest and the crossing was opened. The further protests that continued on May 1 forced Hayat Tahrir al-Sham to close the crossing.
Earlier in April, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham tried to open a similar commercial crossing near Saraqib, but this attempt was also blocked by Turkish-led forces.
Representatives of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham claim that the opening of such crossings is vital to contain the developing economic crisis in the militant-held area. According to them, a large part of goods produced within the militant-held area, first of all food, is being sold in the government-controlled territory.
Various fees on commercial activities and contraband traffic are among key sources of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham budget, which has been facing difficulties amid the shirking funding from its foreign sponsors. On the other hand, the ability to fill own budget from independent sources of income allows the terrorist group to remain to a large degree independent from direct Turkish support. Thus, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham is capable of remaining a relatively independent player and the most powerful militant group in the entire Greater Idlib.
At least 4 Syrian soldiers were killed and several others were injured in an ISIS attack on the army convoy near the T3 pumping station in the province of Homs. The terrorists used an improvised explosive device to strike the bus moving within the convoy and then shelled it with machine guns.
The attack likely came in response to the intensified security efforts of the army in the Homs-Deir Ezzor desert. Just recently, government troops eliminated several ISIS militants and captured 2 vehicles belonging to the terrorist group.
Dear friends, during the past 2 weeks, there were signals of the growing confrontation between Hayat Tahrir al-Sham as well as the intensifying coordination between Turkey and Russia in Greater Idlib.
The region of Greater Idlib remains the main source of tensions in Syria.
The March 5th ceasefire deal reached by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow allowed an end to be made to the open military confrontation between the Turkish Armed Forces and the Syrian Army. However, as of mid-April, the main provisions of the deal have yet to be implemented. Members of al-Qaeda-linked groups still enjoy freedom of movement across Greater Idlib and keep their positions with weapons and heavy equipment in southern Idlib.
The safe zone along the M4 highway, the creation of which was agreed, has not been created. All Russian-Turkish joint patrols have been conducted in a limited area west of Saraqib and have just been a public move needed to demonstrate that the de-escalation deal is still in force.
Ankara turns a blind eye to regular ceasefire violations and other provocative actions by militant groups and their supporters. Additionally, it has continued its military buildup in Idlib. The number of Turkish troops in the region reportedly reached 7,000, while the number of so-called ‘observation posts’ exceeded 50. Meanwhile, Turkish-affiliated media outlets ramped up a propaganda campaign accusing the Assad government of killing civilians, of ceasefire violations, of using chemical weapons and of discrediting the de-escalation agreement by calling it the surrender of the goals of the so-called Syrian revolution.
On the diplomatic level, neither Turkey nor Russia demonstrate open antagonism, but statements coming from the top military and political leadership of Turkey regarding the conflict in Syria demonstrate that Ankara is not planning to abandon its expansionist plans or aggressive posture towards the country.
These factors set up a pretext for and increase the chances of a new military escalation in Idlib. However, this time the conflict is likely to lead to at least a limited military confrontation between the Turkish and Russian militaries. Both sides have troops deployed in close proximity to the frontline, including the expected hot point of the future escalation – Saraqib.
Possible phases of escalation are the following:
Without the full implementation of the Moscow de-escalation deal and neutralization of radicals, the military situation in southern and eastern Idlib will continue to deteriorate. Militants, inspired by their impunity and the direct protection of the Turkish Army, will increase their attacks on the positions of Syrian forces and their Russian and Iranian allies. These attacks will gradually increase in scale until they provoke a painful military response from the Syrian Armed Forces. Militants, surprised at this blatant ceasefire violation by the bloody Assad regime, will continue their attacks, now justifying them by the right of self-defense. G_4 (A) Turkish diplomats and media outlets will immediately accuse the Assad government of violating the word and spirit of the de-escalation deal and will claim that the “unjustified aggression of the regime”, which is supported by the Russians, led to the killing of dozens of civilians and will film several staged tear-jerkers from Idlib to support this. The so-called ‘international community’ led by the Washington establishment and EU bureaucrats will denounce the aggression of the Assad regime and its backers.
In the face of the continued and increased attacks from Idlib armed groups, the Syrian Army will have two options:
To retreat from their positions and leave the hard-won, liberated areas to the mercy of Turkey and its al-Qaeda-affiliated groups;
To answer the increased attacks with overwhelming force and put an end to the ceasefire violations by radicals.
It’s likely that the Syrians will choose the second option. The military standoff in Idlib will officially re-enter a hot phase. The previous years of conflict have demonstrated that militants cannot match Syrian troops in open battle. Therefore, if the Turkish leadership wants to hold on to its expansionist plans, it will have no choice but to intervene in the battle to rescue its proteges. Syria and Turkey will once again find themselves in a state of open military confrontation.
As in previous escalations, the Turkish military will likely opt to start its military campaign with massive artillery and drone strikes on positions of the Syrian Army along the contact line in southeastern Idlib and western Aleppo. Special attention will be paid to the area of the expected confrontation between Syrian troops and Turkish proxies: the countryside of Saraqib, Maarat al-Numan and Kafr Nabel. Turkish forces will not be able to stop the Syrian Army advance without taking massive fire damage to their infrastructure and to the forces deployed in these areas. Such strikes will also result in further escalation because they will pose a direct danger to the Russian Military Police in Saraqib and Maarat al-Numan, and to Russian military advisers embedded with the Syrian units, which are deployed in southeastern Idlib.
If Turkish strikes target Russian positions and lead to notable losses among Russian personnel, Moscow will be put in a situation where they will be forced to retaliate. Since the start of the military operation in Syria in September 2015, the Russian Armed Forces have concentrated a capable military group in the country protected by short- and long-range air defense systems and reinforced by Bastion-P coastal defense and Iskander-M ballistic missile systems. Additionally, the Russian Black Sea and Caspian Fleets and Russian long-range aviation have repeatedly demonstrated that they are capable of destroying any target on the Syrian battleground and thus also in any nearby areas.
The Russian retaliatory strike will likely target Turkish military columns in close proximity to the frontline as well as Turkish depots, positions of artillery, armoured vehicles, and material and technical support points in Greater Idlib.
If, after the Russian strike, the Turkish leadership does not halt its aggressive actions and its forces continue attacks on Russian and Syrian positions in Syria, the escalation will develop further.
The second wave of Russian retaliatory strikes will target Turkish military infrastructure along the border with Syria. HQs and logistical hubs in the province of Hatay, which were used to command and supply its Operation Spring Shield, will immediately be destroyed. The decision to deliver strikes on other targets along the border will depend on the success of Turkish forces in their expected attempt to attack Russia’s Hmeimim airbase and put it out of service.
Another factor to consider is that should Turkey appear to be too successful in their attack on the Hmeimim airbase, they risk losing their entire Black Sea fleet. While theoretically the Turkish naval forces deployed in the Black Sea are superior to the Russian ones in numbers, the real balance of power there tells a different story. The combined means and facilities of the Russian Black Sea fleet, the Caspian Sea fleet, air forces and coastal defense forces deployed in the region would allow Moscow to overwhelm and sink the entire Turkish Navy. On top of this, Russia, unlike Turkey, is a nuclear power.
Turkey’s NATO allies have already demonstrated that they are not planning to risk their equipment or personnel in order to support Erdogan’s Syrian adventure. Furthermore, a new round of complaints to the UN or demonstrative sanctions will be no help to any destroyed Turkish airbases or to a fleet resting deep underwater.
Ankara will have to find a diplomatic way to de-escalate the confrontation before it gets to this point. The format of this diplomatic solution and the consequences, which Turkey will have to suffer for its military adventure, will depend only on the moment, when the Erdogan government understands that it’s time to stop.
During the past ten years, the region as entitled by the Americans the Great Middle East has witnessed major transformations where wars were the decisive element in them. The wars on Syria and Yemen were the most important tests of the balances of power, because the American project which aims at imposing hegemony on the region through weakening the resistance axis especially Iran and distancing Russia and China away from the waters of the Mediterranean Sea puts into consideration after the failed wars of Afghanistan and Iraq and the failed wars of Israel on Lebanon and Gaza that the wars by proxy will made out of its allies partners in the new regional system. It was clear during the past years that Turkey and Saudi Arabia have supported America whether in cooperation or alternation or competition, but it was clear too that the Mediterranean was a Turkish mission while the Gulf and the Red Sea were Saudi-Emirati mission. This means that waging a war on Syria under Turkish leadership and a war on Yemen under Saudi leadership. Meanwhile America and Israel continue the military and political intervention and maneuvers when needed without getting involved in open confrontations.
The early months of this year 2020 witnessed a number of developments, starting from the American assassination of the two commanders Qassim Soleimani and Abu Mahdi Al Muhandis, followed by the announcement of the Deal of the Century, opening pending governmental issues in Lebanon and Iraq, and the American understanding with Taliban Movement which included an American commitment of withdrawal. The decisive battles in Syria and Yemen showed that this year is the year of reaping, the year of resolving and determining options. This is can be deduced by linking what is done by America itself not by proxy. Therefore, it becomes clear that the goal of assassination and the Deal of the Century is to prepare for the withdrawal by breaking the link between staying in the region and the requirements of the security of Israel, and between securing these requirements through the assassination and the legislation of the annexation of the Palestinian territories and Juduazition and settlement, and ensuring the flow of money and weapons from Washington to Tel Aviv without restrictions that were before the deal of the century. What has been illegal before has become now legal; furthermore, the Palestinian geography in the occupied territories in 67 has become the way for the Israeli security after its barter for peace was the way for security.
If the strategic axis of the American movement is the withdrawal as shown in the interconnected American steps, then the wars of proving eligibility from Syria to Yemen become necessary for each of Turkey and Saudi Arabia. Therefore this grants the battles waged by Turkey and Saudi Arabia this year in Syria and Yemen a different meaning from those waged in previous battles, and this grants the victories of Syria and the resistance axis especially Hezbollah on one hand and Ansar Allah and the Yemeni army on the other hand different meaning from the previous ones. This is the meaning of reading differently the geography of battles. With regard to the Saudi security the Yemenis succeeded in having control on the strategic province of Al Jawf, as the Syrians along with the resistance forces succeeded in defeating the Turkish army in Saraqib the strategic security knot according to Syria and Turkey. Therefore, the upcoming settlements become projects of face-saving for each of Saudi Arabia and Turkey as an interpretation of the regional failure.
In the axis of the alliance with Washington, and in the time of defeat those who were out of the range of war will have role as Egypt and France. Egypt which considers well the Saudi considerations did not accept to participate in the war on Yemen and it maintained its relationship with Syria especially in confronting the Turkish and Muslim Brotherhood danger. France which works under the American policies has shown a different approach towards Iran and Hezbollah in the main issues of the nuclear file and the dealing with the Lebanese government. At the time of the preparation for the American withdrawal, America becomes in more need of those who can deal with the opponents. So, this grants Egypt and France different advanced roles in the upcoming stage especially because Israel is living in a state of strategic confusion that goes beyond the inability to fight wars, to the extent of the inability of running politics which repeated its elections for the third time and still unable to form a government, and if it does so it will not be able to take the initiative due to the fragility of its political and military situation.
– خلال عشر سنوات عرفت المنطقة التي يسمّيها الأميركيون بالشرق الأوسط الكبير تحوّلات كبرى، كانت الحروب هي العنصر الفاصل فيها، وشكلت الحرب على سورية والحرب على اليمن الاختبارات الأهم لموازين القوى، حيث المشروع الأميركي الهادف لفرض الهيمنة على المنطقة، عبر إضعاف وترويض محور المقاومة وقاعدته إيران، وإبعاد روسيا والصين عن مياه البحر الأبيض المتوسط، يضع في حسابه بعد حربي أفغانستان والعراق الفاشلتين، وحروب «إسرائيل» الفاشلة على لبنان وغزة، أن حروب الوكالة التي سيتولاها حلفاؤه، هي التي ستصنع منهم شركاء في النظام الإقليمي الجديد، وكان واضحاً خلال السنوات التي مضت أن تركيا والسعودية قد شكلتا ميمنة الأميركيّ وميسرته، سواء بالتعاون أو بالتناوب أو بالتنافس، لكن كان واضحاً أيضاً أن البحر المتوسط مهمة تركية، والخليج والبحر الأحمر مهمة سعودية إماراتية. وهذا يعني خوض حرب سورية بقيادة تركية، وحرب اليمن بقيادة سعودية، فيما يواصل الأميركي والإسرائيلي التدخل والمناورة العسكرية والسياسية حسب الحاجة، لكن من دون التورط في مواجهات مفتوحة.
– شهدت الشهور الأولى من هذا العام 2020 جملة من التطورات، بدأت باغتيال الأميركيين للقائدين في محور المقاومة قاسم سليماني وأبي مهدي المهندس، وتلاها الإعلان عن صفقة القرن، وتلاهما فتح ملفات حكومية معلقة في لبنان والعراق، والتفاهم الأميركي مع حركة طالبان وما تضمنه من التزام أميركي بالانسحاب، وجاءت المعارك المفصلية في سورية واليمن، لتقول جميعها إن هذا العام هو عام الحصاد، وعام حسم الاتجاهات، وبلورة الخيارات، وهو ما يمكن استنتاجه من الربط بين ما فعلته واشنطن بأيديها وليس بواسطة الوكلاء، أي اغتيال القادة وصفقة القرن والانسحاب من أفغانستان، ليصير بائناً أن هدف الاغتيال وصفقة القرن هو التمهيد للانسحاب، عبر فك الارتباط بين البقاء في المنطقة ومقتضيات أمن “إسرائيل”، وتأمين هذه المقتضيات عبر الاغتيال وتشريع عمليات ضم الأراضي الفلسطينية وعمليات التهويد والاستيطان، وضمان تدفق المال والسلاح من واشنطن إلى تل أبيب، دون قيود كانت تترتب على هذه العمليات قبل صفقة القرن، بحيث بات شرعياً بعدها ما كان غير قانوني قبلها، وصارت الجغرافيا الفلسطينية في الأراضي المحتلة عام 67 أداة الأمن الإسرائيلي، بعدما كانت مقايضتها بالسلام هي الطريق للأمن.
– إذا كان المحور الاستراتيجي للحركة الأميركيّة هو الاتجاه للانسحاب، كما تقول الخطوات الأميركية المترابطة، تصير حروب إثبات الأهلية على نيل الوكالة، من سورية إلى اليمن، امتحانات العبور الضرورية لكل من تركيا والسعودية. وهذا ما يمنح المعارك التي خاضتها تركيا في سورية والسعودية في اليمن هذا العام، مضموناً مختلفاً عن معارك الأعوام السابقة، وما يمنح انتصارات سورية وقوى المقاومة وعلى رأسها حزب الله من جهة وأنصار الله والجيش اليمني من جهة مقابلة، معاني مختلفة عن الانتصارات السابقة. وهذا ما يفرض القراءة لجغرافيا المعارك بعيون مختلفة، فقد نجح اليمنيون بالسيطرة على محافظة الجوف الاستراتيجية بالنسبة للأمن السعودي، بمثل ما نجح السوريون وقوى المقاومة بكسر الجيش التركي في سراقب عقدة الأمن الاستراتيجي لسورية وتركيا معاً، بحيث باتت التسويات المقبلة مشاريع حفظ ماء الوجه لكل من السعوديّ والتركيّ، لكن على قاعدة الفشل الإقليميّ.
– في معسكر التحالف مع واشنطن، يتقدّم عند الهزيمة موقع الذين كانوا خارج الحرب. وهذا هو حال كل من مصر وفرنسا، فمصر التي تراعي الحسابات السعودية كثيراً، لم ترتضي المشاركة في حرب اليمن وحافظت على علاقاتها مع سورية بعناية، خصوصاً في مواجهة الخطر التركي والأخواني، وفرنسا التي تعمل تحت سقف السياسات الأميركية عموماً أظهرت مقاربة مختلفة تجاه إيران وحزب الله في الملفين الرئيسيين، الملف النووي والتعامل مع الحكومة اللبنانية، وفي زمن التمهيد للانسحاب الأميركي تزداد حاجة واشنطن لمن يمكنهم التحدث مع الخصوم، ويصعد دور الذين يملكون قدرة بناء الجسور لا الجدران. وهذا ما يمنح لمصر وفرنسا أدواراً مختلفة ومتقدّمة في المرحلة المقبلة، خصوصاً أن “إسرائيل” في غرفة العناية الفائقة، فهي تعيش مرحلة ارتباك استراتيجي يتخطى العجز عن خوض الحروب، إلى حد العجز عن تسيير الآلة السياسية للكيان الذي يقوم بإعادة انتخاباته لمرة ثالثة ولا يزال عاجزاً عن تشكيل حكومة، وإن فعل فلن يستطيع الانتقال إلى المبادرة بسبب هشاشة وضعه السياسي والعسكري.
On April 15th, 27 members of Maghawir al-Thawra, a militant group in the Al-Tanf zone, which is both funded and trained by the US-led coalition, surrendered to the Syrian Army with all of their weapons and equipment. These included 9 vehicles, 11 weapons including 4 heavy machine guns and 5 grenade launchers, as well as up to 7,000 rounds of ammunition of various calibers for small arms, more than 20 RPG rounds, and 6 high-tech communication devices.
According to the Russian Defense Ministry, while the Maghawir al-Thawra members were moving to surrender, they were attacked by US-controlled forces and lost 3 vehicles.
Oleg Zhuravlev, chief of the Russian Center for Reconciliation in Syria said militants confessed that “they had been trained by US instructors to commit acts of sabotage at the oil-and-gas and transport infrastructure facilities, as well as to organize terror attacks on territories controlled by Syrian government forces.”
Later on the same day, Russian and Turkish forces conducted a 4th joint patrol along the M4 highway in southeastern Idlib. As on the previous occasions, the patrol took place along a short chunk of the highway west of Saraqib. The rest of the safe zone area agreed by Russian and Turkish leaders on March 5 in Moscow remains in the hands of radical militant groups.
In an official statement released on April 14, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham announced that it had formed 3 new units: the Talhah ibn Ubaydullah Brigade, led by Abu Hafs Binnish, the Ali ibn Abi Talib Brigade, led by Abu Baker Mheen and the Zubayr ibn al-Awam Brigade, led by Abu Mohamad Shura. The group provided no insight into the number of fighters in the new units or their tasks, but the estimated number of the new force is about 1,500.
Last month, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham launched a large recruitment campaign to revive its depleted special forces, the “Red Bands,” as well as its Inghimasi [suicide bombers] force.
Despite the fact that militants profit from the ceasefire regime with direct military protection from Turkey and are using the gained time to re-arm their units and train new fighters, they see any kind of Turkish cooperation with Russia as a direct threat to their interests. In some cases, this even leads to acts of aggression and threats against their sponsor’s forces.
For example, in a video which recently appeared online, members of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham were threatening to behead Turkish soldiers moving along the M4 highway and pin their heads to the top of the nearby earth barrier. This is the real face of the so-called moderate opposition that Ankara supports in Greater Idlib.
On April 15, an airstrike targeted an SUV in the town of Jdaidit Yabws right on the border with Lebanon. The vehicle allegedly belonged to Hezbollah, which has become the target of Israeli missiles. The first one missed allowing the passengers to exit the vehicle a few moments before it was hit by the second missile.
The UAE-based Sky News Arabia and al-Arabiya claimed that high-ranking commanders of Hezbollah were the target of the Israeli strike.
On April 13, the Turkish Army and its proxies from the so-called Free Syrian Police clashed with supporters of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and other radical Idlib groups east of the town of Nayrab on the M4 highway.
According to sources loyal to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham a few hundred members of the Free Syrian Police and a few dozen Turkish troops were involved in the operation. After a series of clashes with radicals, they removed an improvised protest camp set up east of Nayrab. At some moment, Turkish forces even appeared to be engaged in a firefight with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham militants, but the situation quickly de-escalated and the protest camp blocking the highway re-appeared a few km to the west of its previous location.
Pro-Turkish media immediately branded the April 13 developments as a heroic attempt to de-block the M4 highway and finally launch joint Russian-Turkish patrols along the entire pre-agreed to M4 security zone. This explanation is far from reality. The de-escalation deal remains far from any kind of real implementation. The area of the supposed security zone is still in the hands of al-Qaeda-linked militants.
Ankara had no opportunity to ignore the radicals’ nest east of Nayrab because it could put an end to even the current ‘limited’ format of the joint Russian-Turkish patrols. All 3 previous joint patrols took place in the limited area between Saraqib and Nayrab because of security reasons. If the camp east of Nayrab was not removed, even such patrols would be no longer possible.
However, even this limited move caused a new wave of tensions between Turkish-controlled armed groups and their more independent allies. A firefight erupted between members of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and Turkish proxies from Faylaq Sham near the village of Msibin on the M4 highway.
Earlier, tensions between members of Turkey’s Syrian National Army and Hayat Tahrir al-Sham-led forces were reported north of Daraat Izzah in western Aleppo.
Any Turkish attempts to de-block the M4 highway west of Nayrab will likely lead to a larger escalation in the area and may lead to more attacks on Turkish forces in Greater Idlib. The previous two IED attacks happened just after joint Turkish-Russian patrols west of Saraqib. The situation in Greater Idlib is in stalemate.
On the one hand, Ankara cannot continue ignoring attempts of groups that it funds to undermine its own attempts to implement the de-escalation deal with Russia at least formally. On the other hand, it does not want to use force to neutralize radicals in southern Idlib because the very same militants are the core of its influence in this part of Syria.
An explosion erupted on a natural gas pipeline in the area of al-Shadadi in the province of al-Hasakah. The incident happened just near the al-Jisba oil field controlled by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the US-led coalition. According to Kurdish sources, it remains unclear what group was behind the attack. Nonetheless, it is no secret that ISIS cells have recently increased their activities within the SDF-held area on the eastern bank of the Euphrates.
On March 15, Russian and Turkish forces conducted a first joint patrol in Greater Idlib in the framework of the new de-escalation agreement reached in Moscow. The planned route of the patrol goes along the M4 highway, where a buffer zone was set to be created. However, in fact the patrol happened just a few km west of the government-controlled town of Saraqib. The entire buffer zone and a notable area to the south of it, a total of 750km2, remains in the hands of terrorists. There were no signs of any withdrawal of heavy weapons or militants from the area.
The Russian military said that the patrol mission was shortened because of provocations by radicals. According to the released statement, terrorists used civilians, including women and children, as human shields. The Russian side added that Turkey was given more time to get rid of the extremists and ensure the safety of further joint missions. Surprisingly, the Turkish Defense Ministry admitted that there were some measures taken to prevent possible provocations. Nonetheless, it did not bother itself with explaining what kind of difficulties the sides experienced. Maybe because the Turkish military column itself faced a hard time moving through supporters of radical groups deployed on the M4 highway. Radicals and their supporters have been blocking the part of the highway laying in southern Idlib since March 13.
Earlier in March, Turkish top officials repeatedly vowed to crush any force that would oppose the implementation of the new de-escalation agreement. The Turkish leadership easily forgot these declarations, when it appeared that the main obstacle to the implementation of the agreement were organizations directly or indirectly supported by Ankara. Unfortunately, there is nothing new in this behavior. Over the month, the Erdogan government has showcased itself as a consistent supporter of the seedlings of terrorism remaining in Idlib.
Meanwhile, Idlib armed groups continued undermining efforts of the Turkish media and diplomacy to paint them as a moderate opposition. On March 15, media affiliated with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham offered a bounty of $25,000 to any person that would kill Evgeny Poddubny or Oleg Blokhin. Both of them are Russian war correspondents currently working on the frontline in Idlib and covering military developments there. Contrary to their Turkish and Western colleagues, they do not turn a blind eye to terrorist ideology and actions of Idlib armed groups. Later ‘Idlib democratic activists’ upped the bounty offering to $50,000 for anybody who would kill Poddubny. The amount of $100,000 is proposed for the aforementioned journalist or any member of the Russian patrol mission captured alive.
At the same time, the National Front for Liberation, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and other militant organizations intensified their recruiting campaign in northwestern Syria. Persons with a large amount of “free time” and in good physical condition now can join even Hayat Tahrir al-Sham’s special forces unit, the so-called Red Bands. This fact is another confirmation of the heavy casualties suffered by terrorist groups during the past years of the war.
On top of this, the security situation is once again deteriorating in northern Syria. According to pro-militant sources, an IED attack hit a military convoy of Turkish-led forces near the town of Ras al-Ayn. Three militants and two Turkish soldiers were reportedly killed in the attack.
The recent Turkish-Russian de-escalation agreement allowed to put an end to military hostilities between the Syrian Armed Forces and the Turkish Army. However, its effect will be temporary and will not last for long if the issue of radicals in Greater Idlib is not solved in the nearest future.
On March 15, Syrian opposition supporters and activists intercepted a convoy of the Turkish military that attempted to open the M4 highway in Greater Idlib.
The Turkish convoy, which consisted of several battle tanks, armored vehicles and bulldozers, was tasked with opening the M4 to facilitate a joint Russian-Turkish patrol that was supposed to take place on the highway later.
Opposition protesters blocked the highway by deploying obstacles and even climbing Turkish vehicles. This forced the convoy to withdraw. However, the protesters went on to stone the vehicles of their allies.
Turkey’s failure to open the highway led to the cancellation of the pre-planned joint patrol. Russian and Turkish troops conducted a very limited patrol west of Saraqib city in southeast Idlib instead.
The reopening of the M4 highway, which links the coastal city of Lattakia with Aleppo city, is the keystone of the recent Russian Turkish agreement on Greater Idlib.
In the last few days, opposition activists and militants vowed to keep the highway blocked, threatening Russian forces and placing a bounty for killing Russian journalists.
Turkey don’t appear to have any real influence over Greater Idlib militants, which have been receiving support from it for years now. The chances that the M4 will be reopened by peaceful measures are very low. Ankara’s failure to open the M4 will likely push Damascus and its allies towards another military operation in the region.
For the first time in its official existence in 1985, Lebanon’s Hezbollah has now clashed on the battlefield with the Turkish army, one of NATO’s strongest. The face-to-face clash between Hezbollah and the Turkish military took place in the rural area of Idlib where dozens of Turkish service members lost their lives while fighting side-by-side with jihadists and foreign fighters of different nationalities, including al-Qaeda members. The Turkish-NATO army used similar weapons and tactics to Israel. They surprised Hezbollah by using armed drones and precision bombing behind the frontline, killing nine militants and wounding 65 in one single attack. So many Hezbollah militants were killed in one place due to the collapse of the entire building they gathered under, located behind the main battlefield line.
Another factor was the unexpected withdrawal of Russian air coverage at the moment Turkey was sending its Unmanned Combat Air Vehicles (UCAVs) (or Unmanned Aerial System (UAV) better known as armed drones) deep inland, bombing Iran and its allies for the first time. This confrontation has introduced a new military doctrine to Hezbollah militants and has taught them new lessons based on experiences Hezbollah has never been confronted with in the past. Turkey used its UCAVs, TRG-122 satellite-guided rockets, High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) and ground attacks by the Turkish army fighting alongside jihadists. It is most likely what Israel has been threatening Hezbollah with, in the event of war.
Moreover, Israel’s concern about the outstanding Hezbollah night assault capability on Saraqed has a double edge, pinpointing ability and a procedure Hezbollah can successfully carry out against Israel in case of war- thus triggering concern in Israel. Indeed, Israel is increasingly voicing concern about the level of threat posed by Hezbollah’s ‘al-Radwan’ Elite force spread along the borders of Lebanon. Could Israel be planning a similar quick attack against Hezbollah’s forces?
A source within the “Axis of the Resistance” said “during the last war in 2006, Israeli drones covered the sky of Lebanon, providing intelligence information to the Israeli base controller who forwarded the instructions to the F-16s to bomb selective targets. Today we are facing armed drones which can instantly bomb any target considered hostile, without losing precious time or jeopardising the life of the pilot on board of an F-16 when within range of any anti-air missile system Hezbollah could have acquired.”
According to sources within the “Axis of the Resistance”, Israel could “attack Hezbollah’s special forces to destroy this capability deployed along the borders. Israel is aware of the presence of a reserve force of several thousands of Hezbollah Special Forces who regularly rotate after serving in Syria- where they have survived one of the fiercest wars any army could face. Israel would also like to destroy all fortifications and tunnels spread along the borders without necessarily destroying the Lebanese infrastructure to avoid triggering an all-out-war. Therefore, in Israel’s mind, it may be amplifying Hezbollah’s threat to hit it and probably not to praise its performance! Israel is used to campaigning against a specific target or threat long before any attack, to justify its action, notwithstanding the irrelevance of international law in the eyes of Israel and its US ally.”
When the US wanted to invade Iraq, Saddam Hussein was suddenly manufacturing Weapons of Mass Destruction and leading the fifth strongest army in the world. The US destroyed the Iraqi army in days, but US media amplified Saddam’s threat to justify the invasion.
In Syria, Israel is portraying Hezbollah as fighting day and night and having equipped every single one of its militants with the most sophisticated weapons and night vision equipment. Israel is talking about Hezbollah’s increasing missile capability and the danger its Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah represents. This is similar to the campaign carried out for several months against Iranian Major General Qassem Soleimani prior to his assassination.
That doesn’t mean Hezbollah is not equipped with tens of thousands of rockets and missiles, and that its Special Forces are not very well trained. It is true that this elite force has gathered a unique experience in the nine years of war in Syria. However, Hezbollah has never initiated a war and will not look to trigger it, though it will not shirk if war is imposed. Hezbollah does not represent a danger to Israel unless it is attacked.
Israel has been threatening Hezbollah with an unprecedented kind of war; the kind of war Hezbollah has been recently exposed to in Idlib. Confronting a NATO army was an unprecedented experience which has taught Hezbollah a lot.
The first lesson learned was the use of mobile phones and the race to post on social media. Hezbollah has a directive similar to that of Israel and most armies around the world to avoid taking mobile phones on the front line. In the last years, Hezbollah leadership failed to impose on all its members the prohibition on mobile phones in Syria, notwithstanding many directives. Sending photos from the frontline is tempting for young Special Forces Hezbollah members to counter misinformation campaigns that the jihadists and rebels perfected.
During the recent battle of Idlib, Hezbollah held its ground and kept control of the eastern part of Saraqeb when the Syrian army pulled back behind its lines following the attack of thousands of jihadists. The Turkish army planned a push towards Talhiya to create a hole in the front and reach al-Hader via Tel el-Eiss. Hezbollah’s mobile phone usage helped Turkey identify the location of Hezbollah’s gathering forces and bomb the Radwan Special Force, killing nine and wounding 66 out of a total of 120, using Turkish drones. The remaining force was able to stop the advance when Fatimiyoun and Zeinabiyoun allies (who also suffered 21 killed) joined them in repelling the attack.
The counter-attack to recover Saraqeb was the most spectacular attack Hezbollah has carried out in 9 years of war. The attack took place at night when more time is needed to perform tasks and yet, in a few hours, the entire city of Saraqeb was liberated.
Israel was surprised how Hezbollah Special Forces attacked at night an entrenched enemy taking their positions in fixed and defendable locations around and within the city. Night fighting without previous reconnaissance and rehearsals is not within the capability of many armies. The dissemination of orders at night, avoiding killing their own men with “friendly fire” when attacking jihadists from different sides of the city, was not an easy task.
Attacking at night reduced the odds of hitting civilians in urban fighting in a city that has become a frontline. Hezbollah Special Forces relied on their navigational skill to find their way within jihadist positions and to clear the path without there being much night vision equipment around. When fighting at night, the jihadists were shooting in all directions and was not until the first morning hours that the jihadists realised the difficult situation they were in and started to pull out.
Hezbollah showed concern for every member of the Special Forces and yet carried out the night attack with new reinforcements arriving the night of the attack with little time available for briefing and familiarisation with the city. Russia was watching the advance of Hezbollah forces and supported it with 27 air attacks to help clear the way.
Fighting jihadists led and instructed by an intelligent NATO army, Turkey offered the opportunity for Hezbollah to learn and acquire new experiences on the Syrian battlefront. It was a live training exercise, simulating the new capabilities of the Israeli army and exploring the best way to hunt down armed drones and find adequate measures to avoid these deadly machines.
The recovery of Saraqeb was a unique school for Hezbollah: Israel cannot ignore the high performance of this quasi-state actor with an irregular but organised and a well-trained army. Tel Aviv can no longer surprise Hezbollah in the next war because it has failed to limit its military knowledge and its warfare capabilities. Hezbollah has many armed drones, tens of thousands of missiles and rockets and is capable of fighting in all weather and day-night conditions. It can take the initiative and counter-attack rather than limit itself to defence as it has done in all Israeli wars on Lebanon.
Hezbollah Special Forces showed on video how, from the battlefield, they film themselves laughing just before their death. Not because they look for a reason to die. On the contrary, extra precautions are taken to limit casualties. But if confronted with death, they leave a video trace of their spirit during the last seconds. Israeli threats against Hezbollah would certainly not shake their morale. The solution is straightforward for the Israeli officials: don’t try a war, even if the objectives are limited.
Proofread by: C.G.B and Maurice Brasher
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One Russian Airbase Could Take Down Turkey’s Entire Fighter Fleet? New Assessment Shows a Favourable Military Balance in Syria Underlying Moscow’s Success
While much uncertainty remains surrounding what exactly was agreed to in Moscow regarding the ceasefire agreement in Syria’s Idlib province, or how long Turkey intends to adhere to the new ceasefire agreement, it is clear that despite its bellicosity towards Damascus, Ankara has been extremely cautious about provoking Russia or undermining the strong relationship built over the past three years. Positive relations with Russia have remained particularly critical to Turkish interests since 2016 for a number of reasons. Increasingly alienated from the Western Bloc and its Gulf Arab allies, which are strongly suspected of having at least tacitly supported an attempted military coup that year, Turkey needed to quickly diversify its sources of economic and military security. Moving quickly to make amends for the downing of a Russian Su-24 strike fighter a year prior in November 2015, Turkey arrested the F-16 pilots responsible for the attack. Ankara subsequently saw its relations with Moscow quickly improve to the benefit of both sates – from the S-400 deal to growing exchange of tourists.
Russia for its part has a big stick to complement the carrot of positive defence and economic ties, and is capable of reigning in Turkish ambitions over Syria to a large extent accordingly. Alongside sanctions, cutting the flow of tourists and other economic measures, Russia has heavily fortified its position in Syria since November 2015 to deter attacks by Turkey and other potentially hostile parties. It has capitalised on this asset in a number of ways, more conspicuously by deploying Su-35 fighters to intercept Turkish incursions into Syrian airspace and more recently by deploying its Military Police to guard the strategically critical M4 and M5 highways and the city of Sarakeb. These targets were directly in the path of advancing Turkish backed Islamist militias in the first week of March, and with these militants relying heavily on Turkish air and artillery support to advance and take ground from the Syrian Arab Army, deployment of Russian personnel in tandem with the opening of negotiations drew a line under how much Moscow was willing to tolerate the jihadist push into Syrian territory.
What it is important to keep in mind is not only that Turkey needs Russia far more than vice versa – but also that, in regards to Syria, the balance of power between the two parties remains extremely one-sided. While NATO’s willingness to overtly support Turkey should it provoke an armed conflict with Russian forces remains highly questionable, an assessment of the military capabilities of both parties shows a tremendous Russian advantage in the field in the event of an armed conflict – with the far smaller size of Russian units in Syria compensated for by overwhelming technological supremacy. Underlining this often-missed point, I would strongly recommend the following video which assesses the outcome of a potential air war between Russian units at Khmeimim Airbase and the entire Turkish Air Force. This includes assets deployed to the airbase from December 2015 in response to the Turkish attack on the Russian strike fighter, such as Su-35 air superiority fighters and S-400 and S-300V4 surface to air missile systems.
A further lesson one can take from this assessment is why Turkey appears so eager to upgrade its air fleet in short order – either with the F-35 or with some combination of Russian Su-57, Su-35 and MiG-35 jets, having shown interest in all three. Negotiations to acquire the Su-35 in particular, the oldest of the three designs which has been in service since 2014, was reported in October 2019 to have reached its final stages. Given the precedent set by Russia’s Su-35 deal with Egypt, which was signed in 2018 but not announced until March the following year, it remains possible that a deal has already been made for transfer of the fighters to the Turkish Air Force to complement its S-400s.
بمتابعة ما يجري على الأرض السورية المحتلة في إدلب وحلب قبل تحريرها، خلال الأسابيع الأخيرة، يتضح أنّ الجيش العربي الأول في سورية، استطاع أن تمتدّ مواجهاته ليس ضدّ الارهابيين فقط، بل إلى الجيش التركي نفسه وبشكل مباشر، ويوقع بهم خسائر فادحة نقلتها وسائل الإعلام على الهواء مباشرة.
فالذي أنجزه الجيش العربي السوري، كبير للغاية. فقد استطاع تحرير حلب المحافظة والريف، والطريق الإقليمي (5 و4) الدولي، ومن الجانبين، بالإضافة إلى أهمّ ثلاث مناطق هي: معرة النعمان، وخان شيخون، وسراقب. ولعلّ المعركة حول سراقب على وجه التحديد باعتبار أنّ موقعها الجغرافي حاسم، إما السيطرة على الطريقين الدوليين، والتحكّم فيهما، وتمكين المواطنين والتجار من ارتيادهما ونقل بضائعهم ومنتجاتهم بكلّ حرية، فضلاً عن استخدامه مدنياً في التصدير والتنقل الآمن بين حلب ودمشق، وحلب واللاذقية، بما يعيد الاقتصاد الوطني إلى سيرته الأولى، وإما استمرار الإرهاب والنفوذ التركي الداعم له! ولذلك تحرك أردوغان تركيا من أجل دعم الإرهابيين وتزويدهم بالمال والسلاح المتقدّم ومئات المدافع المضادة للطائرات، والدبابات، إلا أنه مع فشلهم في التصدي لقوات الجيش العربي السوري، وتحرير أكثر من نصف إدلب، لم يجد هذا المتغطرس سبيلاً آخر، سوى التدخل العسكري بنفسه وبقواته، ودخل الحرب فعلاً في مواجهة الجيش العربي البطل. وزجّ بنفسه، وتصوّر واهماً أنّ ما لم يستطع الإرهابيون إنجازه في المواجهة مع الجيش السوري، سينجزه هو متوهّماً أنّ جيشه هو الأقوى، ولذلك اعتبر أنّ المعركة الأولى هي في منطقة سراقب، لتكون معركة فاصلة، ويستنشق الإرهابيون أنفاسهم لتستمرّ الحرب في سورية! إلا أنه عاش الهزيمة بنفسه، ووجد نفسه يدخل معركة خاسرة، استمرّت نحو أسبوعين دون إحراز أيّ تقدّم! وأجبر على التقهقر عن سراقب إلى الخلف، بعدما واجه خسائر ضخمة للغاية. وظلت الطرق الدولية تحت السيطرة السورية بفضل جيشها البطل المغوار. وفوجئنا والعالم كله معنا، بأردوغان المتغطرس مثل أسياده، يطالب بالإنقاذ حفاظاً على ماء الوجه، وذلك بمطالبته بوقف إطلاق النار!
وكان قد خلّف الوضع ما يلي:
1
ـ حجم الخسائر البشريّة التركية، كانت قد وصلت إلى مقتل نحو (400) جندي تركي، بينهم عدد الثلث ضباط، وجرح نحو (4000) شخص إصابات متنوّعة!
2
ـ حجم الخسائر في العتاد كبير، شمل عدداً كبيراً لم يحدّد من الدبابات تمّ تدميرها، مع إسقاط نحو (11) طائرة مسيّرة، وطائرة عسكرية اف (35)، وتدمير عدد كبير من الناقلات، كما ورد في أحد التقارير الهامّة والدقيقة.
3
ـ الانسحاب المخزي الذي وصل إلى الفرار الجماعيّ للجنود الأتراك، يسبقهم الفرار الجماعي للإرهابيين، الذين تجاوز عدد قتلاهم الـ (4000) شخص، بخلاف أعداد بالآلاف مصابين.
4
ـ أسر أعداد كبيرة من جنود أردوغان، والإرهابيين، فضلاً عن أسر جثث الجنود الأتراك، الذين تركهم زملاؤهم فارّين من المواجهة الشرسة للجيش السوريّ.
5
ـ لعب الطرف الروسي دوراً هاماً في دعم الجيش العربي السوري، حيث مثلت القوات الروسية وطائراتها، الغطاء الحمائي لقوات الجيش السوري، وكان لهذا التدخل، الأثر الهام في التعجيل والإسراع بخسائر الجيش التركي راح ضحية عملية واحدة نحو (40) من جنود وضباط أردوغان! ولم يكن في حسبان أردوغان مثل هذا التدخل الروسي، وناشد أردوغان الرئيس الروسي بوتين، برفع يده عن دعم القوات السورية من أجل تمكينه من الاستفراد بها، وإيقاع الهزيمة بالجيش السوري، الأمر الذي رفضه بوتين نهائياً.
ـ وقد كان لهذه التداعيات الايجابية بالنسبة لسورية شعباً وجيشاً وقيادة، وفي المقابل التداعيات السلبية لأردوغان وجماعاته الإرهابية، أن طلب أردوغان وملحاً في الطلب، المقابلة العاجلة مع الرئيس الروسي بوتين، على مستوى القمة، وذلك بعدما تخلت عنه أوروبا وأميركا وحلف الناتو الذي رفض طلبه بالتدخل والمساندة! والتقى أردوغان مع بوتين في موسكو، وهو منكسر، مطأطأ الرأس، يلاحقه العار بالهزيمة الساحقة لقواته، التي ضلت الطريق تحت قيادته، وذلك يوم الخميس (5) آذار/ مارس الماضي، فماذا كانت النتيجة وفقاً لما أعلن في المؤتمر الصحافي في نهاية اللقاء:
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ـ الإقرار والاعتراف، بما سيطرت عليه قوات الجيش السوري، من مناطق وأراضٍ ونقاط ارتكاز في الأراضي السورية بإدلب، وبالتالي إلغاء فكرة انسحاب القوات السورية إلى ما قبل المعارك الأخيرة!
2
ـ الاتفاق على الانسحاب الكامل من مساحات كبيرة، من قبل الارهابيّين، توافقاً مع اتفاق سوتشي، والتزام أردوغان بذلك، وبذلك تكون مساحة الثلثين من إدلب تكون قد تحرّرت تماماً.
3
ـ الاتفاق على مساحة فاصلة حول الطرق الدولية، كمنطقة آمنة بعرض (6) كم، وبالقرب من الحدود، وبذلك تصبح الطرق الدولية الاقليمية آمنة، وصالحة لحركة المدنيين والتجارة بين مدن حلب وإدلب واللاذقية ودمشق وغيرها.
ولا شك في أن لقاء بوتين/ أردوغان، كسر أنف أردوغان الذي جاء إلى موسكو مهزوماً ومدحوراً من الجيش السوري، الذي لولا انتصاراته على جيش أردوغان، ما كان ما تم، أو ممكناً أن يتمّ، والدليل الانتهاك وعدم الالتزام باتفاق سوتشي طوال هذه الفترة، والله الداعم، وتحيا سورية.
*أستاذ العلاقات الدولية والعلوم السياسية، والأمين العام المساعد للتجمع العربي والاسلامي لدعم خيار المقاومة، ورئيس الجمعية العربية للعلوم السياسية.
يسأل سائل لماذا مدّت روسيا اليد إلى أردوغان الغريق في إدلب وأريافها ومنحته فرصة جديدة للاستمرار عضواً في ثلاثية استانة الراعية لعملية البحث عن حلً في سورية، وهل كان بروتوكول موسكو المضاف إلى تفاهم سوتشي ضرورياً بعد طول خداع ونكول تركيّ وبعد الهزيمة التي تجرّعها أردوغان في منطقة إدلب وبلغت ذروتها في سراقب حيث ذاق مرارة هزيمة نكراء أنزلت به بحجم أذهبَ أحلامه وأوهامه (أو هكذا يجب أن يكون) وهل كان ضرورياً ان تقوم روسيا بكلّ ذلك رغم علمها لا بل يقينها بأنّ أردوغان ليس من الأشخاص الصادقين الذين يؤمن لهم او يستحقون الثقة بهم بعد أن جرّبته خلال السنوات الثلاث الماضية، وتأكدت من فشله في كلّ الاختبارات التي خضع لها؟
رداً على ذلك، وإذا نظرنا الى المسألة من منظور عملاني ظرفي، فإنّ أجوبة الأسئلة تلك تكون سلبية ومضمونها القول إنّ البروتوكول لم يكن ضرورياً او ليس مقبولاً في ظرفه، فأردوغان بعد معركة سراقب الثانية ظهر كليماً لا بل مثخناً بجراح الهزيمة ورأى أحلامه تتلاشى وتدفن مع جثث الـ 270 جندياً وضابطاً من جيشه التركي الذين اعترف بمقتلهم في الميدان في مواجهة منظومة الدفاع عن سورية، ويتأكد من أنّ أوهامه اختفت مع شروق شمس الحقيقة في سراقب بعد تحريرها الثاني الذي لم يستغرق أكثر من 10 ساعات فقط نفذ فيها الجيش العربي السوري ومعه وحدات من حزب الله اللبناني والحرس الثوري الإيراني معركة من أهمّ معارك القتال الليلي في الأماكن الآهلة، معركة أذهلت «إسرائيل» وأصابتها بدوار عسكريّ واستراتيجيّ عنيف نتج عن تفكيرها بما ينتظرها في الجليل عندما تدقّ ساعة تحريره.
نقول إنّ الإجابة ستكون سلبية ولم يكن البروتوكول ضرورياً، لأنّ أردوغان سيستفيد منه لحفظ ماء وجهه ولن ينفذ ما تعهّد به فيه، لأنّ التنفيذ سيجعله في مواجهة مباشرة مع كلّ ما اعتقد به أو ما خطط له، او ما دخل الى سورية من أجله، فكيف يحترم وحدة الأراضي السورية وهو الساعي للسيطرة عليها كلياً او جزئياً او أقله كما صرّح وأطلق المصطلح الغريب العجيب القائل بـ «حدود القلب العثماني» التي تتجاوز الحدود السياسية لتركيا القائمة حالياً وهو يريدها أن تصل لتشمل الموصل في العراق وحلب وحماة وحمص وإدلب في سورية. وكيف ينفّذ تعهّده بقتال إرهابيّي جبهة النصرة وهو الذي يعتبرها جيشه البديل الذي يعوّل عليه لتحقيق أحلامه؟
فأردوغان يحتاج من بروتوكول موسكو بنداً واحداً هو وقف إطلاق النار من أجل وقف العمليات العسكرية التي ينفذها الجيش العربي السوري وحلفاؤه والتي أدت الى تحقيق الأمن لحلب ومحيطها وفتح الطريق السريع لها، M5 ويعتبر هذا التدبير أي وقف إطلاق النار غنيمة له في ظرف الهزيمة المنكرة التي أنزلت به، ومن اجلها ذهب الى موسكو ودفع ثمناً باهظاً من كرامته وهيبته التي ضاعت في خنادق إدلب وسراقب وفي ممرات الكرملين في موسكو بين يدي قيصرها.
هذا في التحليل البسيط والنظر المباشر، ولكن إذا دققنا في الوضع استراتيجياً فنصل الى نتيجة أخرى، حيث إنّ لروسيا ولسورية مصلحة في هذا البروتوكول رغم تضمّنه بند وقف إطلاق النار الذي أوقف عملية التحرير راهناً، حيث إنّ هذا البروتوكول ومع علم الجميع أنه لن ينفذ منه إلا بند وقف إطلاق النار وبشكل مؤقت، فيه من الإيجابيات ما لا يمكن إهماله، فهذا البروتوكول:
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ـ يثبت ويضمن استقرار الأمن في المناطق المحرّرة حديثاً ويمنح الوقت الكافي للجيش العربي السوري لبناء منظومة الدفاع الملائمة التي تحمي تلك المناطق، ويؤمّن فتح طريق الـ M5 بشكل آمن وأكيد ويفتح طريق M4 بشكل مقبول برعاية روسية يكون التركي شريكاً في الحراسة فيها.
2
ـ يطوي ملف الخسائر التركية التي بلغت المئات بين قتيل وجريح، ويوقف المساعي التركية الرسمية للتحريض ضد سورية التي لا ترى في تركيا عدواً، وتميّز بين تركيا الدولة والشعب وهما جاران وصديقان وبين أردوغان الرئيس الذي يعمل بعقيدة وذهنية اخوانية ويمارس العدوان والإرهاب ضدّ سورية. وبالتالي سيكون وقف إطلاق النار الآن مدخلاً لتبريد الجرح التركي. وهذا ما تريده سورية التي تنظر الى العلاقة مع تركيا استراتيجياً وموضوعياً ولا تريد عداءها.
3
ـ يمنح الفرصة للجيش العربي السوري وحلفائه لإعاده التنظيم بعد معارك الشهرين المنصرمين، وتهيئة البيئة العملانية وتسوية خطوط التماس لتكون مناسبة للعمليات القتالية المستقبلية التي ستنطلق عندما تخلّ المجموعات الإرهابية بقواعد مناطق خفض التصعيد ووقف إطلاق النار، او تمتنع عن الانسحاب من محيط الـ M4 لمسافة 6 كلم شمالي وجنوبي الطريق.
4
ـ يقيم فضّ اشتباك ميداني بين تركيا وسورية التي لا ترغب أصلاً بمواجهة تركيا، ما يمكّن سورية من التفرّغ لمواجهة الإرهاب ويتيح لتركيا مواصلة إشغال مقعدها في منظومة استانة. وفكّ الاشتباك هذا كان هدفاً سعت اليه روسيا للحفاظ على منظومة استانة التي لا زالت ترى فيها الآلية السياسية الوحيدة المتوفرة للوصول الى حلّ للأزمة السورية وفقاً للمبادئ الأساسية التي تراعي وحدة سورية وسيادتها واستقلالها.
أما على صعيد العلاقة الروسية التركية البينية، فانّ من مصلحة روسيا وبعد أن صفعت أردوغان في الميدان لا بل أدّبته بالنار أن تظهر له بأنها لا زالت تشكل له ملاذاً يطمئن اليه بعد أن خذلته اوروبا واميركا والاطلسي وبعد عزلته عربياً، وأن تحتضنه في لحظة هزيمته وعزلته حتى تبقيه في منطقة وسطى بينها وبين الغرب الأطلسي من دون أن يكون متطرفاً لصالح ذاك الحلف الذي ينتمي اليه، تقوم بهذا مع يقينها بانه لن يكون حليفها ولن يتخلى او لن يُسمح له بالتخلي عن عضويته الأطلسية. ومع هذا يمكن أن تجعله روسيا بعلاقتها المدروسة معه أقلّ ضرراً وأهون خطراً عليها إذا أبقت معه على هذه العلاقة التي لا تستلزم من قبلها التفريط بالعناوين الأساسية لاستراتيجيتها وسياستها او لتحالفاتها وقد يكفيها بعض التسهيلات او السلوكيات السياسية او الاقتصادية التي لا تمسّ بنية المنظومة الروسية الاستراتيجية.
لكلّ ذلك نرى أن بروتوكول موسكو الإضافي كان ضرورياً وفي وقته الصحيح، ومع هذا نرى أيضاً انّ هذا البروتوكول لن يصمد طويلاً ولن يستعيد إدلب، اذ سيسقط بعد ان يؤدي دوره في فضّ الاشتباك السوري التركي، ويستعيد تركيا الى منظومة أستانة ويعطي وقتاً معقولاً للقوى العاملة في محيط إدلب للانطلاق الى وثبة التحرير المقبلة، التي ستكون حتمية لأنّ المجموعات الإرهابية التي تعرف انّ مصيرها محتوم وأنه لن يبقى لها وجود في أي شبر من الأرض السورية. هذه المجموعات لن تعمل بالبروتوكول ولن تنفذ شيئاً منه بما في ذلك وقف إطلاق النار، وعندما تصل خروقها الى الحد الذي يبرر استئناف العمليات سنرى القوات العربية السورية تستأنف التحرير الذي لن يكون إلا عسكرياً كما ثبت بالتجربة والبرهان خلال السنوات التسع الماضية.
Ten days ago the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov offered the neo-Ottoman Sultan wannabe Erdogan a very large banana that time to come down the tree which he climbed very fast and very high, he rejected it.
Yesterday, the Russian Tsar Putin brought Erdogan to the Kremlin, held him behind closed doors one on one for 3 hours, and extended with Erdogan’s entourage for another 3 hours, he offered him a carrot, Erdogan took the carrot and was very thankful to the Tsar.
Prior to yesterday’s summit between the established Tsar Putin and the wannabe Sultan the Turkish madman Erdogan, the latter was issuing threats the combined forces of NATO couldn’t achieve when they were at the height of their power and at the weakest time of the Syrian Arab Republic. The Ottoman wanted the Syrian Arab Army to withdraw from the Syrian province of Idlib, handover cities and towns freed during the past month from al-Qaeda terrorists back to those sub-humans, accept free movement of the Turkish Janissary and lift the siege off their posts they established within the Syrian province, and to stay away from the Damascus – Aleppo, and Aleppo – Latakia highways, yes, utterly insane but what to expect from someone like Erdogan?
After fierce battles throughout the month the Syrian Arab Army and their allies fought against thousands of anti-Islamic al-Qaeda terrorists and thousands of the Turkish Janissary forces (TSK or Turkish Army), the SAA managed to clean more than one thousand square kilometers and hundreds of towns, villages, and strategic hills. The military operation launched by the Syrian Arab Army and their allies was meant to implement the Sochi agreement by force after Turkey failed to implement its part of the agreement for more than 16 months, these include mainly:
Securing the north-south Aleppo – Damascus highway aka M5.
Securing the east-west highway known as the M4, especially the Aleppo – Latakia part of it which runs through Idlib province.
Cleaning Saraqib from terror, the city sits on the M4 – M5 intersection.
Disarming al-Qaeda terrorist groups like the Nusra Front aka Jabhat al-Nusra aka Al-Qaeda Levant or HTS.
All of the above-mentioned points were about to be achieved before Erdogan sent thousands of the Turkish Army troops to act as human shields to protect al-Qaeda terrorists from the advancing Syrian Arab Army, and that’s exactly what they did and that’s why they lost significantly when the SAA was shelling the gatherings of al-Qaeda terrorists resulting in the killing of dozens of the Turkish Army soldiers who were sharing the posts with the very terrorist group that is listed as such by the UNSC, Russia, Syria, the USA, and even by Turkey itself!
Simultaneously, the Turkish madman Erdogan unleashed a new wave of refugees towards Europe in large numbers, except this time it was obvious for the Europeans that these refugees are coming from almost everywhere else except Idlib, most from Central Asian countries all the way to Afghanistan, and some from the African east coast.
The outcome of yesterday’s summit as stated by the Russian President and the Turkish madman and detailed, to some extent, by their foreign ministers, confirm the above-mentioned points:
No mention of the M5, meaning the SAA which cleaned the vital artery from terrorists will keep it.
No mention of reversing the SAA last month gains, instead, a ceasefire will be established at the current position of the SAA.
The M4 highway will be reopened and Russian and Turkish joint military police units will patrol it. There will be a 6 kilometers perimeter secured on both sides of the road.
The agreement also reiterated an article from the previous Sochi agreement that is combatting terror will continue, especially the groups designated as such by the USNC resolutions. Erdogan, instead of implementing this part of the Sochi agreement, augmented these terrorist groups, namely Nusra Front, with radical terrorists loyal to him brought from other places, launched a recruiting campaign within Turkey for Arabic speaking fanatics, supplied them with new advanced weapons including MANPADs to shoot down SAA helicopters and airplanes, anti-armored missiles, increased the intelligence sharing, and worse than all of that he sent the Turkish soldiers to sacrifice their lives in order to protect these terrorists.
Yesterday’s ‘agreement’ explicitly states that combatting these terrorist groups will continue. I’d personally say this will continue to be carried out mainly by the Russian air forces, and by the SAA in case they try to advance towards the SAA posts or the cleaned town and villages.
The agreement does not refer to the new refugee crisis launched by Erdogan towards Europe, the ceasefire, if implemented and respected by Erdogan forces (TSK and Nusra Front) in Idlib, will drop any need for refugees coming from Afghanistan to cross into Europe, Erdogan’s refugees and humanitarian abuse couldn’t be more exposed and the citizens of Europe should decide through their ‘democratically elected’ governments whether they want to fall preys for Erdogan’s blackmailing in this regard.
History, especially modern history, more precisely the events of this last decade, teaches us valuable lessons if we want to learn from it: Never trust a flip-flop, never trust a Turk with dreams to revive the buried most hated most criminal Ottoman empire, never to trust a Muslim Brotherhood, never trust a US stooge, never to trust a liar, never to trust someone who uses the suffering of innocent people, in their hundreds of thousands to his personal goals, and all these evil features are embodied in a single individual, who happens to rule a regional power for the past 17 years.From the post 6 hours summit at the Kremlin Erdogan was totally lost he shook hands with his own foreign minister who was with him all the time
سينفق المحللون والإعلاميون الأتراك والمؤيدون لتركيا، ومثلهم المعادون لسورية ولمحور المقاومة، جهداً ووقتاً لتظهير نتائج القمة التي جمعت الرئيس الروسي فلاديمير بوتين بالرئيس التركي رجب أردوغان، كانتصار تركي روسي على حساب سورية، لأن أحداً لن يستطيع القول إن روسيا خسرت. فالأفضل أن يلجأ المشككون والمعادون إلى تصوير القمة كتقاسم مصالح روسيّ تركي على حساب سورية، لكنه سيكون من الصعب أن يمتلك أحد من هؤلاء جواباً على أسئلة من نوع، أين أصبح تهديد أردوغان بعملية عسكرية اختار لها اسم درع الربيع وحدّد لها موعداً وهدفاً هو إعادة الجيش السوري إلى النقاط التي كان فيها قبل بدء عملياته العسكرية؟ وأين أصبح الحديث عن إخراج الجيش السوري إلى ما وراء نقاط المراقبة؟ وماذا عن الطريق الدولية التي تربط حلب بدمشق، التي باتت بيد الجيش السوري بعد معارك ضارية كانت أهمها معركة سراقب؟ وأين مصير الأحياء الشمالية والغربية لحلب التي صارت بيد الجيش السوري؟
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القراءة البسيطة لنتائج القمة، تقول إن ما تناوله الاتفاق يطال ما لم يُنجزه الجيش السوري من تطبيق تفاهم سوتشي بالقوة، فالاتفاق تجاهل كلياً ما أنجزه الجيش السوري، مكرساً أن هذا الجزء من مناطق خفض التصعيد ليس على طاولة التفاوض، وأن المطروح هو الاختيار بين ان يواصل الجيش السوري مع حلفائه مدعوماً بالنار الروسية ما تبقى من تطهير لمناطق يسيطر عليها الإرهاب بحماية وشراكة الجيش التركي، خصوصاً في مناطق تأمين الطريق الدولي بين حلب واللاذقية، أو أن يقوم الرئيس التركي لحفظ ماء وجهه بتجديد تعهّده بالتعاون لتنفيذ هذه المهمة التي تلكأ بتنفيذها، عبر ضمان فتح الطريق من جهة، ومواجهة الجماعات الإرهابية من جهة أخرى. وهنا يمكن بدء النقاش فقط، فما مضى قد مضى وما كُتب قد كُتب، وما قبل سراقب غير ما بعدها.
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النقاش المجدي فقط هو حول ما إذا كان أردوغان سيلتزم هذه المرّة بموجباته أم سيعود للمراوغة والتلكؤ، والرهان على المتغيرات والخداع، وتاريخ أردوغان حافل بمثل هذه الرهانات الخاطئة، ولا يوجد عاقل يستطيع أن يقول إن الوفاء بالتعهدات من خصال أردوغان، فكيف إذا كان مرغماً، لكن ما يجب وضعه في الحساب كمتغير جديد على أردوغان وفريقه قراءته جيداً، هو أنها المرة الأولى التي يأتي فيها التفاهم الروسي التركي ليكرس نتائج نصر عسكري سوري بالمباشر الميدانيّ وليس بالحصيلة الإجمالية السياسية للتفاهمات، ويقلص مسافة الجغرافيا والزمن وفقاً لنتائج هذا النصر، فما تمّ حسمه حسم وانتهى، وما بقي فهو مفتوح لخياري العودة للحسم أو فتح المجال لفرصة، ويعلم اردوغان هذه المرة أن الموازين التي ستحكم المعارك المقبلة ستكون أشد اختلالاً لصالح الجيش السوري والحلفاء، وستكون روسيا أشد انخراطاً بصورة علنية فيها، وربما لا تكون فرصة بعدها، وإن كانت فستكون لمساحة أضيق في الجغرافيا والزمن، بما يتناسب مع خطة القضم والهضم التي يعتمدها الجيش السوري منذ بدء معركة حلب الأولى قبل ثلاثة أعوام، وتدحرجت بعدها الانتصارات.
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السياق الوحيد الذي تفتحه تفاهمات موسكو واضح، وهو استعادة الدولة السورية لكامل جغرافيتها، وصون وحدتها وسيادتها، وفتح الباب لتراجع تركي تحت سقف الإقرار بهذه المعادلة، لأنها الإطار الذي لا تراجع عنه لبناء استقرار قابل للحياة من جهة، ولضمان تبديد الهواجس التركية تجاه الملف الكردي من جهة أخرى، ويبقى اتفاق أضنة مطروحاً على الطاولة.
Early on March 5, the Israeli Air Force carried out a series of airstrikes on targets in the Syrian provinces of Homs and Quneitra. According to the Syrian military, the attack was conducted from Lebanese airspace at 00:30 local time. Israeli warplanes used two civilian flights of Qatar Airways as a cover for their strikes. The Syrian side claimed that it had intercepted all the hostile missiles. However, ground explosions were reported in Quneitra. Therefore, at least some of them in fact did hit their targets.
The previous Israeli strikes on Syria took place on March 2 and February 23. On March 2, an Israeli attack helicopter destroyed a vehicle in the province of Quneitra after Israeli troops in the Golan Heights had reportedly come under sniper fire. On February 23 Israeli warplanes targeted positions of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group in Damascus.
‘Entirely by chance’ the increase of Israeli military actions in Syria came amid the escalation of the Syrian-Turkish conflict in Idlib.
On March 4, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the Turkistan Islamic Party and other al-Qaeda-linked groups supported by the Turkish Army made another attempt to recapture the town of Saraqib, located on the M4-M5 highways crossroad, from the Syrian Army. Despite the intense artillery and air support from Turkey, al-Qaeda members failed to achieve their goal.
Supporters of the 25th Special Forces Division and Hezbollah deployed there claim that Turkish-led forces suffered notable losses in the clashes but provide no particular numbers. Video evidence from the ground confirms that pro-government forces recaptured a T-90 battle tank that they had lost earlier in the same area.
Syrian troops also entered the village of Afis north of Saraqib but failed to fully secure it. The village remains contested. If Turkish-led forces keep control over it, they will be able to carry out attacks on vehicles moving via the M5 highway from Saraqib to Aleppo.
Earlier on the same day, 2 Turkish soldiers were killed and 6 others were injured in Syrian Army artillery fire in eastern Idlib. In response, the Turkish military tried to shoot down a Syrian Su-22 warplane bombing al-Qaeda positions west of Saraqib. Turkish supporters claim that an anti-air missile was launched by an F-16 fighter jet. However, most likely this was a MANPAD launched from one of Turkey’s so-called ‘observation posts’ in the area. During the past weeks, Turkish soldiers were repeatedly spotted launching MANPADs at Syrian and Russian aircraft. The Russian Defense Ministry officially says that Turkish observation posts have merged with terrorist bases and have been used to carry out attacks on government-controlled areas. Nonetheless, Turkish soldiers surrounded by the Syrian Army continue enjoying safety and receiving supplies. This is another demonstration of the fact that modern conflicts often take strange forms.
Setbacks in southern and eastern Idlib forced Turkey and its proxies to shift the focus of their military efforts. Late on March 4, Turkish-backed al-Qaeda forces attacked positions of the Syrian Army in western Aleppo. By the morning of March 5, they had captured the village of al-Sheikh ‘Aqil and al-Rraqim Hilltop. The control over these positions will allow them to shell the western suburb of Aleppo city more effectively.
Since the start of Turkish military actions in Idlib in February, the Syrian military had shot down 13 Turkish military UAVs, pro-government sources claim. According to them, this number includes 7 Bayraktar TB2 and TAI Anka combat drones. It should be noted that only a part of these claims has been confirmed by visual evidence.
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham militants tried to stage a chemical provocation in eastern Idlib, but poisoned themselves, the Russian Defense Ministry reported on March 4. According to the report, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham members were planning to stage the incident on March 2nd during the Syrian Army advance in the western part of Saraqib by blowing up canisters with a chemical substance, but a canister leak caused casualties among the militants themselves.
UPROOTED PALESTINIANS: SALAM ALQUDS ALAYKUM 