What do you call Syrian dictator bashar al-assad overseeing the death of a half-million of his own people?
Well, if you’re the United Nations, you condemn it as a “devastating humanitarian situation – in July of 2020, over four years ago – and ignore it thereafter.
But if you’re the UN you do not call it a genocide. The word was not used in that now-over-four-years-old condemnation.
Hey, Syria isn’t Israel, is it? there’s a huge difference. I mean it Syria wasn’t fighting mass murderers committed to its annihilation who massacred over 1,200 of its people, took hundreds more hostage, and then hid within its civilian populations, making it impossible to fight back without collateral damage, were they? What’s wrong with you anyway?
But, whatever the UN calls Syrian’s leadership, it now looks more and more like the al-assad horror show is about to end. The problem? Who might be taking over.
From Milo Pope’s article at London’s Daily Mail:
Syrian opposition fighters have reached the suburbs of the Damascus capital for the first time since the region was recaptured by government troops in 2018, as president Bashar al-Assad’s regime nears collapse.
One resident said the city was on edge, with security forces on the streets and many shops running out of staple foods.
The Syrian army withdrew from much of the country’s south on Saturday but later said it was fortifying positions in the Damascus suburbs and in the south.
Syria’s state news agency denied reports that Assad had already fled to Russia claiming he continued to govern from Damascus.
However, following the statement claiming it was ‘false news’, a source has told CNN that Assad was ‘nowhere to be found’ at his usual residences in the capital.
Armed groups reached the suburb of Darayya this afternoon, some five miles from the centre, according to the Turkish Anadolu Agency.
‘Our forces have begun the final phase of encircling the capital, Damascus,’ said rebel commander Hassan Abdel Ghani today, with the Islamist-led alliance that launched the offensive 10 days ago.
‘Damascus awaits you,’ HTS leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, also known as Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, said in a statement Saturday addressed to rebel fighters on Telegram.
The big questions?
-What will this mean for the Syrian people? Is this going to be an improvement, a different version of the nightmare they are already living or even worse?
-What will this mean for Israel? al-assad is a hezbollah-supported leader, so his removal, per se, is good news. But the news isn’t good if whatever replaces him is as anti-Israel or even moreso.
No one knows how this will play out. But it seems evident that we will start to get the answers relatively quickly….meaning that, whatever the news will be for the Syrian people and Israel, it’s going to be lights-out for the genocidal (even if the UN can’t figure that out) al-assad.
Stay tuned.
