To say that the uprisings in Syria, or anywhere in the region, are al-Qaeda orchestrated is to insult to whole towns and cities which are giving martyrs on a daily basis to overthrow their dictatorial regimes. I mean, what a sham. All leaders, and I mean all leaders in the region, have sought to discredit their people’s justified grievances by referring to them as dirt, rats, scum, or terrorists. NYT: As leaders in the Arab world and other countries condemn President Bashar al-Assad’s violent crackdown on demonstrators in Syria, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki of Iraq has struck a far friendlier tone, urging the protesters not to “sabotage†the state and hosting an official Syrian delegation.
Mr. Maliki’s support for Mr. Assad has illustrated how much Iraq’s position in the Middle East has shifted toward an axis led by Iran. And it has also aggravated the fault line between Iraq’s Shiite majority, whose leaders have accepted Mr. Assad’s account that Al Qaeda is behind the uprising, and the Sunni minority, whose leaders have condemned the Syrian crackdown.
There are two factors in Syria: 1-is the popular uprising, 2-An armed uprising on the borders. To the north, they are the kurds, to the east, they are the Salfi’s coming back from Iraq. Much of the true violence is near the borders.
There is no doubt that an authoritarian regime like Assad will take the advantage and push back even on the peaceful demonstrators. But that is a far outcry to believe that all the demonstrations are indigenous and unarmed. That simply is not true.
It is also interesting that we only find armed uprising in Libya and Syria. In Libya, by now, we know it was initiated from the very beginning by foreign elements. And we have wide spread coverage of Syria, sanctions till the eyes can see.
Meanwhile, an uprising in Bahrain is being put down by armed forces of two nations with little if any coverage. Yet, no international outrage, no coverage, no sanctions. Nothing!