May I never see in the patient anything but a fellow creature in pain. (Oath of Maimonides)

Orono, Maine (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) –

Empathy will never be exhausted as gaza schools and hospitals 

are torn asunder by pilots in fighter jets, their grievances 

transposed from another time and place into strafing refugee villages with clinical precision;

 All good gained from sufferings of times long past, all dissipated by the voracious bombing of innocents as tens of

thousands of women and children are slain with impunity in a violence that rains down upon terrified heads; 

A puzzled drone operator in Gaza asked “when will the Israeli public wake up to the conflagration that has been taking place 

in their name while turning Gaza into rubble…what is it with these kippah-wearing part-time soldiers with their comments: 

“Nova was their Nakba” I see children crawling out from under rubble looking for remnants and yet we keep bombing; Is there no answer to this happening?

Israeli strike kills grandfather of ‘soul of my soul’ his grand-daughter Reem having been killed by an earlier air strike…Ten more killed in one family in Gaza airstrikes on Dec 17

 “Israeli strike In Deir al-Balah in the central Strip killed 10 people, including the city’s mayor, Diab Al-Jaru (Haaretz)

Palestinians have had a millennium of agriculture and olive groves and goat herds with multiple generations of shared 

Values, but eighty years ago dispossession of six million acres took place with 700,000 forced into becoming refugees; The

vacuously cruel insistence that Gazans are human animals, such phrases resonating among a leadership destitute of 

empathy for what they are perpetrating, an inversion of reality allowing victimizers to victimize the unprotected while ignoring 

the bestial state of mind  that justifies the lethality of bombing. smothering truth with unfeeling biblical hair-splitting ;

According the Oxford Handbook of Genocide Studies, and The Cambridge World History of Genocide, colonial policies included the deliberate genocide of indigenous peoples in North America…Genocide intent includes spreading of disease via the ‘reduction’ of [natives] to densely crowded and unhygienic settlements…population removals to barren ‘reservations…deliberate starvation and famine, exacerbated by destruction and occupation of the native land base and food resources…”Economics should never be above moral issues and human rights issues” (Eitay Mack, Israeli lawyer & activist))

but soon a time comes when they are unable to relieve themselves of guilt and shame nor can they continue to 

manufacture counterfeit glee, excusing themselves from the barbarism of murdering children;  thus do the 

perpetrators of afflictions extend their excuses into the 

moral complexities of trauma, while split-personalities are 

rife with vengeful zealotry, a moral decay that cannot be atoned for multiple generations; This holocaust we are 

witnessing puts to rest “never again” by leaders who project 

evils upon their adversaries, while their own annihilating 

contentiousness is blindingly obvious to the discerning; Will they have recourse to the wailing wall to absolve themselves,

or will they continue to resort to biblical self-praising

while conflating 45,000 massacred civilians, including 16,000 

children with 1500 Israelis killed or taken hostage; War crimes become genocide when demonizing permits normalizing the 

daily erasure of a people by punishing them with gross afflictions; Yet zealots possess a moral schizophrenia 

“Gaza’s Afflictions,” Digital, Midjourney / Clip2Comic, 2024

and an ethical decay that will infuse generations, even though they are genetically entwined and historically linked: 

I’ll tell you what should have been done already yesterday, and many months ago: to shout out for a cease-fire, not only to obtain a hostage deal… but also to protect the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank… We need to protect the Palestinians in the name of a shared future….. Israeli philosopher Omri Boehm

America’s leaders have wrought upon their children’s heads a blame that cannot be erased with well-groomed words; 

Essential thinking is necessary to awaken to conciliation and healing; Did not the Sermon on the Mount preach 

selflessness and love which reflected hillel’s golden rule that “what is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow [man]; 

that is the whole torah”; One hundred peace groups in israel acknowledge the golden rule but only one member in a recent 

session of the Knesset supported the genocide case against Israel, and he was suspended, indicating that some minds 

can be elevated above the cruel thoughtlessness of militant leaders; Did not Freud say that Yahweh is one-half volcano god? 

Was not Christ born a Hebrew in Palestine? Are we not all 

haunted by the Law of Unintended Consequences?

“It’s like a Ponzi Scheme that collapses when you stop making a profit. Netanyahu is a believer in magical thinking. He supports a war against Iran, but such a war would be a disaster for Israel. These leaders around him  are resorting to biblical thinking., no longer acting rationally…Its an eschatological end-times thinking which they want to believe….(Alistair Crooke)

Consequences take place in the deep recesses of consciousness, where the majority, in their indifference, gnaw 

upon a mountain of platitudes: tectonic plates move slowly but when they erupt in volcanic action the sudden conflagration 

can change the nature of the world, killing not only the innocent but also the guilty in the holy land; The scales of justice are 

finely balanced between vice and virtue but out of the traumas will come a reckoning; The deadly weapons of mass destruction 

result in the intense trauma suffered by civilians while ten thousand children’s limbs are torn apart by lethal weapons,  

to  float in ghostly parables and nightmarish dreams as the rabbinic zealots of upside down thinking confront truth-telling; 

The renowned Rabbi Yakoov Shapiro noted: “Zionism is poison for the Jews; it is a suicidal ideology…and a liability to the Jews”; 

it does not represent Judaism, it is mythological nationalism; Israel is no longer a safe place but a foreign country and not the promised land”. 

Israel is deeply divided, it  is on the brink of an institutional collapse as the law …a wall between the kingdom of Judah and Israel all over again…Radical rabbis rely on oral Talmud that they maintain is the true Talmud….the clash is profound….all based on magical thinking…Armageddon with Iran means to attack the head of the octopus, while in Gaza the aim is ethnic cleansing so as to plant 50 settlements.(Alaisdair Crooke)

No matter if the “greater good” is called upon to justify horrors, there is nothing holy in massacring human life, 

since holiness is a quality to strive for, not a volcano to feed, while attempting  to ignore finely balanced  scales of justice; 

When the golden rule is so blatantly flaunted there is always and everywhere a reckoning for gross misdeeds and vast

atrocities; The pain and suffering and the taking of land rightly belonging to others, shouts out for deep remorse and moral atonement.

(The Conversation) – The fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria has opened a new front for geopolitical competition in the Middle East.

Now, however, instead of Iran and Russia playing the most influential roles in Syria, Israel and Turkey see an opportunity to advance their conflicting national and regional security interests.

Under their respective leaders, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, relations between the two countries have deteriorated sharply in recent years. This sets the stage for a bitter showdown over Syria.

A new rivalry is emerging

Turkey is widely reported to have backed the offensive led by the Sunni rebel group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), to drive Assad from power, thus backstabbing Syria’s traditional allies, Iran and Russia.

Tehran has intimated that without Turkey’s support, HTS would have been unable to achieve its blistering takeover.

Now, with Assad gone, Erdoğan is believed to be positioning himself as de facto leader of the Sunni Muslim world. He also wants Turkey to be one of the dominant powers in the region.

Erdoğan has said if the Ottoman Empire had been divided in a different way following its defeat in the First World war, several Syrian cities, including Aleppo and Damascus, would have likely been part of modern-day Turkey.

Turkey immediately reopened its embassy in Damascus after Assad’s fall and offered help to HTS in shaping the country’s new Islamist order.

As part of this, Erdoğan has opposed any concession by HTS to the US-backed Kurdish minority in Syria’s northeast, which he regards as supporters of the Kurdish separatists in Turkey.

Meanwhile, Israel has taken advantage of the power vacuum in Syria to advance its territorial and security ambitions. It has launched a land incursion into the Syrian side of the strategic Golan Heights and has executed a massive bombardment of Syria’s military assets across the country.

Israel’s foreign minister said destroying these assets – which included ammunition depots, fighter jets, missiles and chemical weapons storage facilities – was necessary to ensure they didn’t fall into the “hands of extremists” that could pose a threat to the Jewish state.

Turkey sees Israel’s recent actions in Syria and the occupied Golan Heights as a land grab. Israel’s actions have also been denounced by Arab countries, who demand Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity be respected.

Israel is clearly concerned about the rise to power of an Islamist group and the transformation of Syria into a jihadist state.

This is despite the fact that HTS leader Ahmad al-Sharaa (also known as Abu Mohammad al-Jolani) has signalled he does not want conflict with Israel. He’s also pledged not to allow any groups to use Syria for attacks on Israel.

At the same time, al-Sharaa has called for the withdrawal of Israel from Syrian territory according to a 1974 agreement that followed the 1973 Yom Kippur war.

Bitter foes

Erdoğan, Turkey’s moderate Islamist president, has long been a supporter of the Palestinian cause and a fierce critic of Israel. But tensions have significantly escalated between the two sides since the start of the Gaza war.

Erdoğan has called for an Arab-Islamic front to stop what he’s called Israel’s “genocide” in Gaza. He has equally berated Israel’s invasion of Lebanon earlier this year.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, has lashed out at Erdoğan over the years. He has called him a “joke” and “dictator” whose jails are full journalists and political prisoners. He has also accused of Erdoğan of committing a “genocide” of the Kurdish people.

Washington, which is allied to both Turkey and Israel, has launched intense diplomatic efforts to ensure that HTS moves Syria in a favourable direction. It is keen to see a post-Assad system of governance aligned with America’s interests.

These interests include HTS’ support for America’s Kurdish allies in northeast Syria and the continued presence of 1,000 American troops in the country. The US also wants HTS to continue to prevent the Islamic State terror group from regaining strength.

“In this Corner . . .” Digital, Dream / Dreamland v3 / Clip2Comic, 2024

The US will also have to manage the emerging geopolitical rivalry between Israel and Turkey in Syria.

Some observers have not ruled out the possibility of an Israeli-Turkish military showdown, should Israel turn what it calls its temporary occupation of the demilitarised zone on the Syrian side of the Golan Heights into a permanent territorial acquisition.

This is not to say a war between them is imminent. But their clashing interests and the breadth of mutual hostility has certainly reached a new level.

Iran’s loss could be costly

For Iran, Assad’s ouster means the loss of a critical ally in its predominantly Shia “axis of resistance” against Israel and the United States.

The Iranian regime had worked hard to build this network over the last 45 years as a fundamental part of its national and wider security. It had propped up Assad’s minority Alawite dictatorship over the Sunni majority population in Syria at the cost of some US$30 billion (A$47 billion) since the popular uprising against Assad began in 2011.

And with Assad now gone, Iran is deprived of a vital land and air bridge to one of its key proxies – Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The Assad regime’s sudden demise is now causing soul searching in Tehran about the wisdom of its regional strategy – and whether it will have any significant role at all in the new Syria. This seems unlikely, as al-Sharaa (the leader of HTS) has declared his disdain for both Iran and Hezbollah.

Al-Sharaa has prioritised the establishment of a publicly mandated Islamist government and Syria’s reconstruction and national unity over a conflict with Israel, Iran’s arch enemy. This will no doubt lead to contention with the hardliners and reformists in Iran.

Only time will tell how all of this will play out. At this stage, the future of Syria and the region hangs in the balance. And much depends on whether HTS leaders will move to set up an all-inclusive political system and unite a Balkanised Syria.

Amin Saikal, Emeritus Professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

(Jerusalem) – Israeli authorities have intentionally deprived Palestinian civilians in Gaza of adequate access to water since October 2023, most likely resulting in thousands of deaths and thus committing the crime against humanity of extermination and acts of genocide, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. 

In the 179-page report, “Extermination and Acts of Genocide: Israel Deliberately Depriving Palestinians in Gaza of Water,” Human Rights Watch found that Israeli authorities have intentionally deprived Palestinians in Gaza of access to safe water for drinking and sanitation needed for basic human survival. Israeli authorities and forces cut off and later restricted piped water to Gaza; rendered most of Gaza’s water and sanitation infrastructure useless by cutting electricity and restricting fuel; deliberately destroyed and damaged water and sanitation infrastructure and water repair materials; and blocked the entry of critical water supplies.

Click below for Report:

He pledged, “There will be no imposition of the hijab on the Christian community or any other group because these matters are not a point of contention, and people are free.” It is not sure what he meant by “any other group.” If he meant “any other non-Sunni minority group,” then mandatory veiling could still be imposed on women of Sunni Muslim heritage.

When the fundamentalist, Salafi HTS was ruling the northern Syria province of Idlib earlier this year before they took over the whole country, it promulgated a law on public behavior that required all girls older than twelve to wear a veil in public, forbade public performance of music, demanded gender segregation, and established a morals police of the sort that used to patrol Saudi Arabia and still does police behavior in Afghanistan. It seems a little unlikely that its leaders have changed their minds about the desirability of any of these measures, though they also are not as strong in big cities like Aleppo and Damascus as they had been in small, rural Idlib.

Asked about whether women would be allowed to continue to serve as judges, as they did in secular, Baathist Syria, he replied that they would be allowed to go to law school, but maybe not to preside over courts: “”Women certainly have the right to learn and receive education in any field of life, whether in teaching, law, judiciary, or others. However, for women to assume judicial authority, this could be a subject for research and study by specialists, and it is too early to discuss this aspect.”

Women were 13% of judges in Baathist Syria, and had double that representation in the capital of Damascus.

Women comprised 46% of university students in the old regime, though they tended to major in fields such as education and literature and were underrepresented in medicine, economics, and engineering, according to Freedom House.

Arnaut hinted broadly that universities would be gender-segregated under the new government: “Syrian universities already exhibit many positive ways of proceeding, but these need to be reinforced to enhance the educational process and produce better outcomes than before. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen these ways of proceeding in a way that allows male and female students to focus their minds more fully on the educational process.”

Juan Cole, “Obeida Arnaout,” 2024.

Studies have shown that gender segregation in higher education harms women students and faculty. If they have to go to a separate all-women medicine or law school, and there are few women students in those fields, then they will suffer lack of resources. They will also be viewed as second-class citizens by the male portion of the university.

Then came the big issue, of women in politics. The one-party Baathist state was sectarian and dictatorial, not to mention genocidal, and so women’s participation does not tell us much (except that they were tainted by the atrocities committed by the government). But for what it is worth, 11 percent of the members of the phony “parliament” were women, and in recent years 3 of 31 cabinet members were women.

Arnaut was asked about whether women would be able to continue in these roles: “As for women’s representation in ministerial and parliamentary roles, we believe that this matter is premature and should be left to legal and constitutional experts who will work on rethinking the structure of the new Syrian state. Women are an important and honored component, so tasks must align with roles that women can perform. There will be no concerns regarding women’s issues.”

In other words, no, HTS does not envisage women being allowed to serve in parliament or on the cabinet or as prime minister.

That was bad enough. He went on to make a fool of himself by saying women are biologically unsuited to leadership roles: “There is no doubt that women have their biological and psychological nature, as well as their specific characteristics and composition, which must align with particular tasks. For example, it is not appropriate to suggest that women use weapons or be placed in roles that do not suit their abilities, composition, or nature.”

I read that the anchor interviewing him pointed out that hundreds of thousands of Syrians fled the Old Regime to safety in Germany, and that the leader who allowed them into the country and gave them safety was Angela Merkel, a female chancellor.

Al-Quds al-`Arabi quoted a reaction from Professor Milena Zain Al-Din from Damascus University: “We, the young women and women of Syria, are activists, politicians, human rights advocates, journalists, economists, academics, workers, and homemakers. We are revolutionaries, detainees, and fighters, and above all, we are Syrian citizens. Obeida Arnaout’s rhetoric is unacceptable. The Syrian woman, who has struggled and endured alongside millions of Syrian women, is not waiting for you to choose a place or role for her that aligns with your mindset for building our nation.”

The paper also quoted women who pointed to the countless modern Syrian women who have fulfilled roles as “politicians, judges, fighters, doctors, activists, and working mothers,” advising Arnaout to catch up on his reading about them.

Some women on social media demanded that Arnaout retract his remarks and resign.

On Dec. 10, I hastily convened the first public forum in the area on the events in Syria, “The Fall of the House of Assad,” hosted by the Joan B. Kroc School of Peace Studies, and the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the University of San Diego, to discuss the dramatic demise in Damascus of Bashar Assad’s presidency. As a Catholic university, on that very stage in 2013, I asked, as a Muslim, for the audience to grant a moment of silence for Father Paolo Dall’Oglio, an Italian priest who ran the Deir Mar Musa Monastery, an interfaith Syrian site for both Muslims and Christian. Dall’Oglio mysteriously disappeared in 2013. After more than a decade his fate may finally be known.

The Kroc School had invited me in 2013 to speak about America’s plan to bomb Syrian military sites after Assad’s chemical weapons attack outside of Damascus. I argued then that the U.S. would be dragged into another forever war in the Middle East. In 2024, on that same stage, I told students that American aircrafts were bombing Islamic State of Iraq and Syria sites, indicating that there was no end in sight to this war.

Besides geopolitics, I talked about the last decade of war, of Syrians who came to and from Southern California. They included Syrian Armenian power gangs from the streets of Glendale, who travelled as foreign fighters to the frontlines of Aleppo, filming themselves on social media in front of a destroyed home, fighting for the Assad regime to retake the rebel-held city.

In the other direction, after Yusra Mardini’s family home in Syria was destroyed, they fled as refugees, saving a drowning dinghy and all its passengers in the waters of the Aegean. It turned out she came from a family of Olympic swimmers. She enrolled at USC to study visual arts, the same subject I teach at UC San Diego, where, alas, she could have studied with me about herself in my “Art and the Middle East” course, as I show the harrowing and inspiring Netflix movie about her life, “The Swimmers.”

Nonetheless, I did have a student, Mohammad, who had also witnessed his house being destroyed back in Syria. He was 7 years-old. In February 2017, as a professor, I sat on a kindergarten floor at a grade school in City Heights next to him, part of an increasing number of adults volunteering to help refugees adapt to school in the U.S., resisting Trump’s “Muslim ban” that year.

“Joy in Damascus,” Digital, Dream / Dreamland v3 / Clip2Comic, 2024

The staff told me not to speak to him in Arabic, so that he could learn English, but I ignored them. Together, we built a house from toy bricks, whereupon he said, “Let’s destroy it like my house in Syria.” I replied, “Nothing will happen to your new house.” During the cleanup, I asked the volunteer staff if we could leave his house standing until we left the classroom. I took the boy to his father, waiting at the entrance, who informed me that Mohammad would be meeting his new brother, born just an hour ago, a life made possible because the U.S. had let in a refugee family.

In 2013, the Syrians in the audience seemed despondent. This month, I recounted Mohammed’s story to a USD audience and two female students approached me, optimistic about the country’s future, as Mohammed must be, who should be 13 or 14 now.

Syria is at a critical juncture, as it forms a transitional government, either bringing stability or following the fate of Libya and Yemen, overthrowing a dictator only to witness the victorious rebels fight amongst themselves, not only preventing refugees from returning, but creating more of them. Mohammed’s story is also intended for America promising “mass deportations.”

As one tragedy hopefully comes to an end, President-elect Donald Trump should not follow the legacy of President Bashar Assad of further causing the dispersion of the desperate.

Reprinted with the author’s permission from the San Diego Union Tribune

The lawsuit, filed yesterday in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, presents detailed allegations that Blinken has deliberately circumvented the Leahy Law through procedural mechanisms designed specifically to shield Israel from accountability. The Leahy Law explicitly bars US military aid to foreign security units credibly implicated in serious human rights abuses.

Blinken, who is Jewish, is accused of ignoring mounting evidence of Israeli crimes. The apartheid state stands accused of genocide by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and it’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The plaintiffs include Amal Gaza, a pseudonym for a mathematics teacher from Gaza who has been forcibly displaced seven times since October 2023 and lost 20 family members to Israeli attacks; Ahmed Moor, a US citizen whose relatives in Gaza face imminent threats from Israeli operations; siblings Said and Hadeel Assali, who have lost multiple family members including six cousins killed in an Israeli air strike in November; and Shawan Jabarin, executive director of the Palestinian human rights organisation Al-Haq.

The 39-page complaint outlines how the State Department has established what it calls the “Israel Leahy Vetting Forum” (ILVF), which the plaintiffs argue creates “distinct and insurmountable processes” to avoid enforcing the Leahy Law on Israel. The lawsuit contends that this special forum imposes uniquely burdensome procedures for reviewing allegations against Israeli forces that are not applied to any other country.

A striking element of the complaint highlights that while the State Department has suspended thousands of security units from other countries under the Leahy Law since its enactment in 1997 – including units from Bangladesh, Colombia, Mexico, and Nigeria – it has not suspended a single Israeli unit, despite extensive documentation of rights violations.

“Blinken of Arabia,” Digital, Dream / Dreamland v3, 2024

The lawsuit comes at a critical time, with the complaint noting that Israel has received approximately $17.9 billion in US military aid over the past year, effectively providing more than half of Israel’s weapons arsenal since October 2023. The plaintiffs argue this assistance has enabled Israeli forces to commit widespread human rights violations in Gaza and the West Bank.

The legal action seeks several remedies, including compelling Blinken to provide Israel with a list of units ineligible for US aid and obtain written assurances that such units will not receive assistance. It also calls for a permanent injunction prohibiting US aid to Israeli security units where credible evidence exists of human rights violations.

“This lawsuit demands one thing and one thing only: for the State Department to obey the law requiring a ban on assistance to abusive Israeli security forces,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), which is supporting the legal action. “For too long, the State Department has acted as if there’s an ‘Israel exemption’ from the Leahy Law, despite the fact that Congress required it to apply the law to every country in the world.”

The complaint particularly focuses on the State Department’s handling of credible reports of violations. It cites that while the Department’s own annual human rights reports consistently document Israeli security forces’ involvement in serious abuses, these findings have not triggered the mandatory restrictions required by the Leahy Law.

A specific example highlighted in the lawsuit involves the case of the Netzah Yehuda Battalion, which was implicated in the death of a 78-year-old American citizen of Palestinian origin, Omar Assad, yet continued to receive US assistance despite what plaintiffs argue was inadequate remediation of the incident.

The legal document alleges that the State Department’s calculated failure to apply the Leahy Law is “particularly shocking” given the unprecedented escalation of Israeli aggression since October 2023, citing findings by the ICJ regarding plausibly genocidal actions and the ICC’s arrest warrants for Israeli leaders.

Bruce Fein, counsel for the plaintiffs, filed the lawsuit under the Administrative Procedure Act arguing that Blinken’s actions and omissions constitute both procedural and substantive violations of the Leahy Law, undermining its core purpose of preventing US complicity in human rights abuses.

The case represents one of the most significant legal challenges to US military assistance to Israel and could have far-reaching implications for US foreign military aid policies if successful.

Via Middle East Monitor

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Informed Comment.

Unless otherwise stated in the article above, this work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. A sentence was altered.

(The Conversation) – Tens of thousands of minorities fearing persecution have fled Syria since its takeover by the Sunni Islamist group Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham on Dec. 8, 2024.

While the group has promised to respect all ethnic and religious minorities under its rule, human rights advocates have urged caution. They cite the Islamic group’s poor history of respect for human rights in areas it has governed in recent years.

Syria’s population is predominantly Arab and Sunni Muslim, but minority communities have long been part of the region. Alawites, a Shiite sect and one of the largest minority groups, constitute about 10% to 13% of the population. The number of Christians, once another large minority group, has been dwindling since the start of the 2011 civil war. While accurate numbers are hard to come by, their population is believed to have shrunk to about 2.5% from 10%.

Druze, another religious group, constitute about 3%, while Kurds, an ethnic minority concentrated in the northeast, account for about 10% and are predominantly Sunni Muslim. Smaller groups such as Armenians, Circassians and Turkmen also contribute to Syria’s diverse mosaic.

As an expert on religious minorities, I believe that the future of these groups is central to discussions about Syria’s reconstruction. Their treatment will be a critical indicator of whether Syria can build an inclusive society, fostering trust among its diverse communities.

Syria’s complex minority landscape

The tensions surrounding Syria’s minorities are deeply rooted.

Sunni Muslims, the country’s most dominant faith group, have viewed groups such as the Alawites and Druze with suspicion for centuries. Though some Alawites consider themselves to be followers of Islam, other Muslim groups tend not to see them as part of the tradition, which exposes them to marginalization and persecution.

However, the rise of the Assad family, who are themselves Alawites, transformed the fortunes of Alawites. Under Hafez Assad – father of the ousted President Bashar Assad – who ruled Syria between 1971 and 2000, Alawites came to occupy key positions in the military and government. Concentrated primarily in Syria’s coastal regions such as Latakia and Tartus, Alawite communities viewed their alignment with the regime as a means of survival and advancement.

Photo of Latakia by Maria Turkman

At the same time, the Assad regime prioritized gaining the support of other minorities in ruling a Sunni majority country. The Druze, historically marginalized in Syria due to their beliefs that combine elements of Islam with pre-Islamic beliefs, found a degree of protection under the Assad regime in return for Druze support.

The Assad regime also developed mutually beneficial relationships with the Christian minority. Christians were provided access to government positions and economic opportunities, particularly in urban economic hubs such as Damascus and Aleppo. They were given preferential treatment in securing business licenses and trade opportunities. In return, most refrained from supporting opposition movements, contributed to the regime’s public image and cooperated with the government.

Conversely, the Kurds, with their own language and culture, faced discrimination because of their ethnic identity. The Assad regime marginalized them due to its broader nationalistic policies aimed at consolidating Arab identity and suppressing other ethnic groups.

The regime systematically undermined the Kurdish identity through measures such as banning the Kurdish language, refusal to register Kurdish names, replacing Kurdish place names with Arabic ones, and banning Kurdish books and materials.

Shifting dynamics after the civil war

The civil war that erupted in 2011 drastically changed the dynamics of relationships with minorities.

Assad’s violent crackdown on opposition groups led to the displacement of more than 13 million Syrians, including over 6.8 million refugees, according to UNHCR, the U.N. refugee agency. The war resulted in almost a half-million deaths, about half of which were civilians, and a devastated economy and infrastructure.

Alawites, Christians and Druze, who had previously enjoyed relative protection under the Assad regime, faced increasingly difficult choices as the war intensified. The escalating violence left these groups with few alternatives for survival.

Islamist opposition groups such as the Islamic State (IS) and Nusra Front, an al-Qaida-affiliated jihadist group, threatened and persecuted Christians, Druze and Alawites, often viewing them as collaborators with the Assad regime. In August 2015, IS kidnapped more than 200 Christians in a village in central Syria. In July 2018, IS militants attacked the southwestern Druze city of Sweida and killed more than 200 people.

In response, hundreds of thousands of minorities, particularly Christians, fled Syria and sought refuge in Lebanon and other countries.

Without viable alternatives guaranteeing their safety, many minorities saw the Assad regime, despite its growing unpopularity, as their protector from sectarian violence.

Yet minorities in Syria were not uniformly united in their support for the Assad regime during the civil war. Although limited in number, some Christians and Druze joined opposition movements or advocated for neutrality. The opposition figures included Christian leaders such as George Sabra, a prominent member of the Syrian National Council, a key opposition group against Assad during the early years of the war.

In August 2023, Druze in Sweida organized protests against the Assad regime.

The situation for Syria’s Kurds has evolved significantly during the civil war. The Kurds seized the opportunity presented by the regime’s weakening control over large parts of Syria to establish self-rule in the northeastern region in 2012. They gained more legitimacy after playing a critical role in combating IS, with substantial support from the U.S. military.

Kurdish autonomy has provoked concerns, however, especially from Turkey, which is against the establishment of an autonomous Kurdish entity on its border. While the new leadership in Syria welcomed a partnership with the Kurds, it remains to be seen how the Kurdish demands for autonomy will be balanced with Turkey’s security concerns and Syria’s territorial integrity.

The fall of the Assad regime marks a turning point in Syria’s history. But, I believe, it also opens a chapter fraught with peril for the country’s minorities. The fate of these minorities will offer a glimpse into how inclusive the new Syria could become.

Ramazan Kılınç, Professor of Political Science, Kennesaw State University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

He nevertheless had the gall to accuse the Prime Minister of Ireland of being a bigot, closing the Israeli embassy in Dublin on the grounds that he views virtually all Irish people as racists. Hmm. There must be a word for when you negatively stereotype an entire people…

Likely the move came in response to Ireland’s recent decision to join in South Africa’s complaint against Israel for genocide with the International Court of Justice. Even more dangerous for the government of Benjamin Netanyahu and Gideon Saar, Ireland is seeking a more practicable definition of genocide. Current international legislation puts too much emphasis on intent and sets the bar for finding genocide so high it is almost impossible to meet.

Deputy Prime Minister Micheál Martin complained, “a very narrow interpretation of what constitutes genocide leads to a culture of impunity in which the protection of civilians is minimised.” He said the Irish view of the genocide convention is “broader” and prioritizes “the protection of civilian life.”

Some things about Saar should be remembered. In his youth he was a member of the far right Tehiya Party and he actively protested the 1982 Israeli withdrawal from Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula as a result of the Camp David peace accords. In other words, Saar has all his life held anti-Arab views and he wants to occupy and colonize the lands of his neighbors. The United Nations Charter, to which Israel is a signatory, forbids acquiring the territory of neighbors through aggressive war, but that was what Israel did in 1967 when it launched an invasion of Egypt, which had not militarily attacked it.

As Interior Minister, Saar rounded up African migrants in Israel and put them in a detention camp. He defended it and wanted to expand it. The camp was just for Africans. Hmm. There must be a word for when you target a particular racial group for collective punishment …

Saar opposed then President Trump’s “Deal of the Century” because it implied some form of a Palestinian state. Saar says Israel must remain the only state “from the river to the sea” (alert American university presidents, who seem to think this diction is racist). He firmly rejects any state for a Palestinian, insisting that they must remain stateless and under Israeli control forever. He says there can never be “two states for two peoples.” He wants to annex much of the Palestinian West Bank, a violation of international law. He considers Hebron (al-Khalil), a major Palestinian city in the Palestinian West Bank, to be part of Israel.

He said that Gaza “must be smaller” after the war, another advocacy of a war crime.

Let’s just imagine an American politician who wanted to occupy Manitoba or Tijuana militarily, who rounded up migrants and put them in camps, and who declared that there can be only one sovereign country in North America and it must be White. Those would be the US equivalents of Saar’s politics. Those politics, in our context, would be forthrightly characterized by everyone as racist.

It is one of the great ironies of our time that a man with these views can have the temerity to brand Irish President Michael D Higgins and Prime Minister (Taoiseach) Simon Harris racist bigots who are prejudiced against Jews.

Higgins gave as good as he got, saying “I think it’s very important to express, as president of Ireland, to say that the Irish people are antisemitic is a deep slander. To suggest because one criticises Prime Minister Netanyahu that one is antisemitic is such a gross defamation and slander.”

Juan Cole, “Pot’o’Gold,” Digital, Dream / Dreamland v. 3, 2024

Higgins came to the same realization as everyone else who has been gaslighted by right-wing Zionists with their phony (and cynical) charges of Jew-hatred whenever anyone objects to Israeli war crimes:

“Originally… I put it down to lack of experience but I saw later that it was part of a pattern to damage Ireland.”

It is sort of like if families of victims murdered by mid-twentieth-century Vegas hit man Bugsy Siegel were accused of only complaining because they didn’t like Jews.

Higgins insisted that Ireland “cannot be knocked off our principle[d] support of international law.” He pointed out that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is the one who has broken international law. [The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu.]

The Irish president pointed out that the Israeli government is currently violating “the sovereignty of three of his neighbours.” That would be Syria, Lebanon and Palestine. If Saar had his way it would be four, and would include Egypt.

Higgins made the remarks as he accepted the credentials of the new Palestinian ambassador to Ireland. Ireland, Spain and Norway reacted to Israel’s Gaza genocide by recognizing the state of Palestine last May.

The Irish equivalent of The Onion, WW News, made up some amusing reactions. They had one person, asked about the departure of the Israeli embassy from Dublin, say, “Is this the first time the Israeli government has actually given up property?”

Another joke: “Since the embassy will be going spare, we can probably let Palestinian refugees move in?”*

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*Revised.

“I hope we’ll have a great opportunity with the new US administration to create full normalisation [of the Israeli occupation],” he was quoted as saying by Israeli media. This is not the first time that Smotrich, along with other Israeli extremists, has made the connection between Donald Trump moving back into the White House and the illegal expansion of Israel’s nominal borders.

Two things make Israel’s far-right optimistic about Trump’s return to the Oval Office: the Israeli experience during Trump’s first term in office, when the US president allowed the occupation state to claim sovereignty over illegal settlements, the Syrian Golan Heights and occupied East Jerusalem; and Trump’s more recent statement in the run-up to the elections.

Israel is “so tiny” on the map, said Trump when addressing the pro-Israel group Stop Anti-Semitism at an event in August, asking aloud: “Is there any way of getting more?” The statement, absurd by any definition, prompted joy among Israeli politicians, who understood it to be a green light for further annexation of Palestinian land.

Israel’s aims for colonial expansion have also received a boost in more recent days.

Following the fall of Bashar Al-Assad’s regime in Syria, Israel immediately invaded large swathes of the country, reaching as far as the Quneitra governorate, less than 20 kilometres from the capital, Damascus. What is taking place in Syria serves as a model of what to expect in the West Bank in coming months.

Israel occupied nearly 70 per cent of the Syrian Golan Heights in 1967. It cemented its illegal occupation of the Arab region by formally annexing it in 1981 through the so-called Golan Heights Law. That illegal move came shortly after another illegal annexation, that of occupied Palestinian East Jerusalem the previous year.

Although the West Bank was not formally annexed, the boundaries of East Jerusalem have been expanded well beyond its historic borders, thus swallowing large parts of the West Bank. Like East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, the West Bank is also recognised as illegally occupied under international law. Israel has no legal basis to maintain its occupation, let alone annex any Palestinian or Arab land. It is allowed to do so, however, due to US-Western support and international silence.

But why is Israel keen on annexing the West Bank now?

Aside from the “great opportunity” linked to Trump’s return to power, Israel feels that its ability to sustain a genocidal war on Gaza without any international intervention to bring the extermination to an end, would make the annexation of the West Bank a far less consequential matter on the international agenda.

“King Smotrich,” Dream / Dreamland v.3 / Clip2Comic, 2024

Even though the International Court of Justice (ICJ) issued a decisive ruling on the illegality of the Israeli occupation on 19 July, followed by the issuance of arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant by the International Criminal Court (ICC) on 21 November, no action was taken to actually hold Israel accountable. The annexation of the West Bank is unlikely to change that, especially as Israel conducts its wars and illegal actions with direct US support.

The Democratic administration of Joe Biden has financed and supported all Israeli wars, including the current genocide. Trump is expected to be equally generous, or at the very least, not at all critical.

With all of this in mind, the annexation of the West Bank in the coming weeks or months is a real possibility. In fact, Smotrich has already informed “workers of the Defence Ministry body in charge of Israeli and Palestinian civil affairs in the West Bank” about his plans to “shut down the department as part of an envisioned Israeli annexation of the area,” the Times of Israel reported on 6 December.

While such annexation will not change the legal status of the West Bank under international law, it will have dire consequences for the millions of Palestinians living there, as annexation is likely to be followed by a violent campaign of ethnic cleansing, if not from the whole of the West Bank, certainly from large parts of it.

Annexation will also render the Palestinian Authority legally irrelevant.

It was created following the Oslo Accords to administer parts of the West Bank in anticipation of a future sovereign state, which has never materialised. Will the PA agree to remain functional as part of the Israeli military administration of a newly annexed West Bank?

Palestinians will certainly resist, as they always do. The nature of the resistance will prove critical in the success or failure of the Israeli scheme. A popular Intifada, for example, will overstretch the Israeli military, which will likely use an unprecedented degree of violence to suppress Palestinians, but is unlikely to succeed.

Annexing the West Bank at a time when Palestine — in fact, the whole region — is in turmoil, is a recipe for perpetual war. From the viewpoint of Smotrich and his ilk, that will be another “great opportunity”, as it will secure their political survival for years to come.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor or Informed Comment.

Via Middle East Monitor

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