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After months of violence and bloodshed between anti-government rebels and Bashar al-Assad's government, many global leaders are looking for an answer to end the aggression in Syria. According to some reports, Turkey is smuggling weapons to the anti-government rebels, but the US sells arms to Turkey. Ivan Eland, senior fellow at the Independent Institute, helps us follow the arms trade trail.
The US is setting up an international coalition aimed at supporting rebels in their struggle. The so-called “Friends of Democratic Syria” will involve countries willing to prop up the opposition, and pile more pressure on the regime. Direct military action is ruled out, but reports suggest British and Qatari special forces are already in the conflict zone. And while the US and its allies criticize Russia for supplying military hardware to Damascus, there are now calls from American lawmakers to arm the opposition. As RT’s Marina Portnaya reports, the region’s already been flooded with firepower made in the USA.
A belated celebration of the Prophet Muhammad’s birthday on the outskirts of this western Iraqi city on Saturday quickly took on the trappings of a rally for Syria’s rebels. Young boys waved the old green, black and white flag Syria adopted in the 1930s after declaring independence from the French. Others collected money to send aid and weapons to the fighters opposing President Bashar al-Assad’s government across the border.
“I wish I could go there with my gun and fight,” said Sheik Hamid al-Hais, a tribal leader interviewed at his compound in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar Province.
It is increasingly clear that Syria’s sectarian war is becoming the regional conflict that analysts have long feared.
The rush of recent events — including bombings and assassinations in Damascus and Aleppo, and intensifying violence in northern Lebanon coming directly out of the sectarian hostilities in Syria — suggest that the Assad government now also faces antagonists across its borders. Like Iraq and Afghanistan before it, analysts say, Syria is likely to become the training ground for a new era of international conflict, and jihadists are already signing up. This weekend, Al Qaeda’s ideological leadership and, more troublingly, the more mainstream Jordanian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, called for jihadists around the world to fight Mr. Assad’s government. Nowhere is the cross-border nature of sectarian hostilities more clear than in Iraq’s western desert, where Sunni Arabs are beginning to rally to the cause of the Syrian opposition and, in the process, perhaps strengthen their hand in dealings with an antagonistic Shiite-led national government in Baghdad. A weapons dealer who operates in Anbar, who said he goes by the alias Ahmed al-Masri, said, “Five months ago I was told that the Syrian brothers are in need of weapons.
I started to buy the weapons from the same guys that I previously sold to — the fighters of Anbar and Mosul. I used to bring them from Syria; now it’s the other way around.”
The man said he was selling mortars, grenades and rifles, and that his contact in Syria was also an Iraqi. In some instances, he said Iraqis were giving away weapons, and in those cases he charged money only to transport them across the border.
“It’s a good business, but it’s not easy money,” he said. “It’s risky, but this is life.”
Tribal leaders and security officials describe a small but increasing flow of weapons to Syria from Anbar Province and areas around Mosul, the northern city that is a headquarters for Al Qaeda in Iraq. For some weapons smugglers the price of an automatic rifle has increased dramatically — to $2,000 from about $300, according to one account.
Abdul Rahim al-Shammari, the head of the provincial council’s security committee in Mosul, said explosives and weapons were being smuggled through the border village of Rabia. A weapons trader in the area, who spoke anonymously because of the nature of his work, described smuggling weapons parts in empty cigarette cartons and said he recently made a $4,000 profit selling a PKC rifle. Across the border, he said, some Syrians were trading sheep and cows for weapons. The sympathies for the Syrian rebels here in Anbar are borne from centuries-old tribal connections and, as a region dominated by Sunni Arabs, a shared sect. “We have common tribes and a common border,” said Sheik Ali Hatem al-Suleiman, interviewed recently at his mansion in Baghdad, where he keeps a pet lion penned in the front yard.
Mr. Hatem described Mr. Assad as a “butcher” and said that men in Anbar, his ancestral home, were already trying to help the opposition. “Yes, they are giving weapons. They have to,” he said, adding that Anbar tribal leaders were to meet this week to discuss ways to support the rebels. Meanwhile, Al Qaeda in Iraq, whose membership has declined substantially in recent years, is trying to take advantage of the violence in Syria. A recent report by the McClatchy news agency quoted unidentified American officials as saying that Al Qaeda in Iraq was behind two deadly bombings in Damascus and probably also the bombing on Friday in Aleppo. In interviews, American officials in Baghdad said they believed that was likely, but had no evidence to confirm it.
Barbara Starr looks into stepped up U.S. eyes on the situation in Syria.
U.S. intelligence focus on Syria.
Travel any where in the world!! Get the job for you!
Real Shocking Crimes caught on camera: "Warning Graphic."
What your mainstream media never tell you: Marvel at the al-Jazeera film crew whipping the crowd to hysteria. This is what most UK/american mainstream media do ; get the crowds TO ACT for the cameras. Ever noticed the STAGED gun shots or in-the-lens chanting? It's all fake, staged propaganda for the liars at Sky/ITN/BBC?CNN/Fox. اسامہ بن لادن ہلاکओसामा बिन लादेन को मार डाला قتل أسامة بن لادن Oussama Ben Laden tué Osama Bin Laden getötet Usama bin Ladin dödas DURBAN, South Africa -- “No high hopes for Durban.” “Binding treaty unlikely.” “No deal this year.” Thus ran the headlines. The profiteering UN bureaucrats here think otherwise. Their plans to establish a world government paid for by the West on the pretext of dealing with the non-problem of “global warming” are now well in hand. As usual, the mainstream media have simply not reported what is in the draft text which the 194 states parties to the UN framework convention on climate change are being asked to approve. Behind the scenes, throughout the year since Cancun, the now-permanent bureaucrats who have made highly-profitable careers out of what they lovingly call “the process” have been beavering away at what is now a 138-page document. Its catchy title is "Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-Term Cooperative Action Under the Convention -- Update of the amalgamation of draft texts in preparation of [one imagines they mean 'for'] a comprehensive and balanced outcome to be presented to the Conference of the Parties for adoption at its seventeenth session: note by the Chair.” In plain English, these are the conclusions the bureaucracy wants. The contents of this document, turgidly drafted with all the UN's skill at what the former head of its documentation center used to call “transparent impenetrability”, are not just off the wall – they are lunatic.
After months of violence and bloodshed between anti-government rebels and Bashar al-Assad's government, many global leaders are looking for an answer to end the aggression in Syria. According to some reports, Turkey is smuggling weapons to the anti-government rebels, but the US sells arms to Turkey. Ivan Eland, senior fellow at the Independent Institute, helps us follow the arms trade trail.
The US is setting up an international coalition aimed at supporting rebels in their struggle. The so-called “Friends of Democratic Syria” will involve countries willing to prop up the opposition, and pile more pressure on the regime. Direct military action is ruled out, but reports suggest British and Qatari special forces are already in the conflict zone. And while the US and its allies criticize Russia for supplying military hardware to Damascus, there are now calls from American lawmakers to arm the opposition. As RT’s Marina Portnaya reports, the region’s already been flooded with firepower made in the USA.
The rush of recent events — including bombings and assassinations in Damascus and Aleppo, and intensifying violence in northern Lebanon coming directly out of the sectarian hostilities in Syria — suggest that the Assad government now also faces antagonists across its borders. Like Iraq and Afghanistan before it, analysts say, Syria is likely to become the training ground for a new era of international conflict, and jihadists are already signing up. This weekend, Al Qaeda’s ideological leadership and, more troublingly, the more mainstream Jordanian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, called for jihadists around the world to fight Mr. Assad’s government. Nowhere is the cross-border nature of sectarian hostilities more clear than in Iraq’s western desert, where Sunni Arabs are beginning to rally to the cause of the Syrian opposition and, in the process, perhaps strengthen their hand in dealings with an antagonistic Shiite-led national government in Baghdad. A weapons dealer who operates in Anbar, who said he goes by the alias Ahmed al-Masri, said, “Five months ago I was told that the Syrian brothers are in need of weapons.
Abdul Rahim al-Shammari, the head of the provincial council’s security committee in Mosul, said explosives and weapons were being smuggled through the border village of Rabia. A weapons trader in the area, who spoke anonymously because of the nature of his work, described smuggling weapons parts in empty cigarette cartons and said he recently made a $4,000 profit selling a PKC rifle. Across the border, he said, some Syrians were trading sheep and cows for weapons. The sympathies for the Syrian rebels here in Anbar are borne from centuries-old tribal connections and, as a region dominated by Sunni Arabs, a shared sect. “We have common tribes and a common border,” said Sheik Ali Hatem al-Suleiman, interviewed recently at his mansion in Baghdad, where he keeps a pet lion penned in the front yard.
Mr. Hatem described Mr. Assad as a “butcher” and said that men in Anbar, his ancestral home, were already trying to help the opposition. “Yes, they are giving weapons. They have to,” he said, adding that Anbar tribal leaders were to meet this week to discuss ways to support the rebels. Meanwhile, Al Qaeda in Iraq, whose membership has declined substantially in recent years, is trying to take advantage of the violence in Syria. A recent report by the McClatchy news agency quoted unidentified American officials as saying that Al Qaeda in Iraq was behind two deadly bombings in Damascus and probably also the bombing on Friday in Aleppo. In interviews, American officials in Baghdad said they believed that was likely, but had no evidence to confirm it.
Barbara Starr looks into stepped up U.S. eyes on the situation in Syria.
U.S. intelligence focus on Syria.
Travel any where in the world!! Get the job for you!
Real Shocking Crimes caught on camera: "Warning Graphic."
What your mainstream media never tell you: Marvel at the al-Jazeera film crew whipping the crowd to hysteria. This is what most UK/american mainstream media do ; get the crowds TO ACT for the cameras. Ever noticed the STAGED gun shots or in-the-lens chanting? It's all fake, staged propaganda for the liars at Sky/ITN/BBC?CNN/Fox. اسامہ بن لادن ہلاکओसामा बिन लादेन को मार डाला قتل أسامة بن لادن Oussama Ben Laden tué Osama Bin Laden getötet Usama bin Ladin dödas DURBAN, South Africa -- “No high hopes for Durban.” “Binding treaty unlikely.” “No deal this year.” Thus ran the headlines. The profiteering UN bureaucrats here think otherwise. Their plans to establish a world government paid for by the West on the pretext of dealing with the non-problem of “global warming” are now well in hand. As usual, the mainstream media have simply not reported what is in the draft text which the 194 states parties to the UN framework convention on climate change are being asked to approve. Behind the scenes, throughout the year since Cancun, the now-permanent bureaucrats who have made highly-profitable careers out of what they lovingly call “the process” have been beavering away at what is now a 138-page document. Its catchy title is "Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-Term Cooperative Action Under the Convention -- Update of the amalgamation of draft texts in preparation of [one imagines they mean 'for'] a comprehensive and balanced outcome to be presented to the Conference of the Parties for adoption at its seventeenth session: note by the Chair.” In plain English, these are the conclusions the bureaucracy wants. The contents of this document, turgidly drafted with all the UN's skill at what the former head of its documentation center used to call “transparent impenetrability”, are not just off the wall – they are lunatic.
