Bassam Tawil: More Palestinian and Western Mistakes/Mustafa Saadoun: KRG formally welcomes Jews back to Iraq/Asaad Hanna: Despite Russian airstrikes, FSA continues to confront regime
IDLIB, Syria — The Syrian revolution broke out in March 2011 as Syrians demanded freedom and democracy from an authoritarian totalitarian regime. This regime, however, confronted peaceful demonstrations with live ammunition that led to the killing and wounding of several demonstrators back then. Several months later, the situation in Syria evolved, and the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which was formed in July of 2011, turned into the Syrian revolution’s military arm that confronts the Syrian regime’s military machine.As the Syrian regime failed to put an end to the revolution, it subsequently resorted to its allies, namely Hezbollah and Russia, for military and political support, and it [seems to have] shifted from giving orders to receiving ones while serving Iran’s and Russia’s interests. This impeded the FSA from making any decision to start or stop a battle before consulting its Iranian ally, as shown by the recent truce that was signed between the opposition and the regime in September 2015; the negotiating team was Iranian, and there were no regime representatives facing the Islamist Ahrar al-Sham movement. The Russian intervention that started in late September was a desperate attempt to defend the regime, which prompted the opposition FSA forces to announce full public mobilization aimed at confronting the Russian aggression, which they described as an occupation of Syrian territory, according to the FSA forces.
After it received Russian support, the regime braced itself for a major battle to try to regain the territory it had lost. It launched its first battle in the countryside of Hama — which had been under the opposition control — and it started a fierce ground campaign under Russian air cover on Oct. 7.
Surprisingly, however, the regime forces failed to advance and lost more than 27 armored vehicles in an attack dubbed the “Tank Massacre.” The [regime] forces lost the battle and the FSA maintained its positions in Hama. Also, after the regime failed to advance toward the center of Hama’s countryside on Oct. 7 and after media outlets such as Al-Araby and All4Syria showed such abatement to the regime’s supporters, the regime opened several other fronts in the southern countryside of Aleppo, the northern countryside of Homs and the Latakia mountains as it desperately sought to advance and show its progress in the media as an achievement aimed at lifting the spirits of the regime supporters and forces.
For this instance, a video published by pro-regime Russia Today news outlet on Oct. 12 depicts the battles led by the Syrian regime forces in some small villages in Hama’s countryside, which are, however, still under the opposition’s control. However, despite all of that pressure, the FSA forces managed to preserve their regions and maintain their positions as they switched from offense to defense. While the regime machinery suffered significant destruction in all of the fighting areas, the term TOW missile was widely heard during the battles. The key player in this battle was the FSA, and this proved its ability to confront ground forces backed by Russian air cover. The name of the US-made TOW anti-armor missiles was widely used in these battles, as some FSA moderate units employed these precise and effective missiles in repelling armored tracked vehicles and heavy machinery. TOW missiles can be controlled even after grenades have been launched.
According to military experts who spoke to Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, these grenades are very likely to strike their target as they rely on the grenadier’s skills. The TOW missile requires calm nerves. They require grenadiers who can completely disconnect from the tense and heated atmosphere of battle. Fighters with such characteristics have a very good chance of hitting their target as the missile has a range of 3,800 meters (about 12,500 feet), knowing that the grenade can be controlled through wires that connect the grenade to the base. The grenade’s direction can be shifted at a speed of 200 meters (around 656 feet) per second if the target moves or tries to hide.
Suhail al-Hamoud seems to be one of the most skilled TOW missile grenadiers in Syria, looking at the number of destroyed vehicles, and Al-Monitor met with him to further learn about this subject. Hamoud defected from the Syrian army in 2012 and served as an assistant in anti-tank battalions a year into the outbreak of the revolution. “I was trained in the Syrian army to use the Russian Malyutka and red-arrow anti-armor missiles, which are not so different from the TOW missiles but do not enjoy the same precision, so I gained experience in dealing with all anti-shield missiles both in terms of structure and trajectory and regardless of their points of strength or weakness,” he said. Hamoud enjoys wide popularity among Syrian dissidents who either know him personally or from social networking sites. He has chosen the nickname of “Abu TOW” (Arabic for “father of TOW”), given his passion for the missiles.
“Our generation lived a peaceful life full of love and joy, but what is happening in our country has forced us to engage in battles and take up arms. Despite all the violence we live in, we are still human beings, and we have not changed. We are waiting for the war to end to throw away the arms and get back to our previous lives,” he said. Speaking of what he achieved during the revolution years, Hamoud said, “I destroyed around 70 targets, of which 57 machineries were destroyed through TOW missiles and 11 machineries through the Malyutka missiles. These targets included planes [in Aleppo International Airport], tanks, armored vehicles and armored personnel carriers in addition to DShK machine guns.”
There were reports that the supply of TOW missiles has increased after the Russian military intervention in support of the regime, which opened several battles simultaneously in the southern countryside of Aleppo, the countryside of Hama and the countryside of Homs, in addition to other areas where the regime tried to make progress. Hamoud, however, said that reports of an increase in the supply of missiles are wrong. He added that the use of these missiles has increased as a result of the growing need for them in the battles. Hamoud also attributed this to the increased media coverage of the Syrian developments following Russia’s intervention in support of the regime.
After KRG formally welcomes Jews back to Iraq, will their numbers increase?
Mustafa Saadoun/Al-Monitor/November 21/15
BAGHDAD, Iraq — Many Iraqi Jews forced from their country or displaced following persecution and dispossession more than six decades ago still dream of returning to their homeland. They retain a nostalgia for their temples and the streets where they grew up. It may be difficult or ultimately impossible for a large number of them to turn this dream into reality, but some have begun to return thanks to a law recently passed in Iraqi Kurdistan. Last month, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) announced the opening of a Jewish representation office at the Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs, increasing the number of officially recognized religions to seven. The others are Islam, Christianity, Yazidism, Yarsanism, Alawism and Kaka’ism. The history of the Jews in Mesopotamia dates back to the sixth century B.C. The Jewish community played an important role in Iraq’s economic and cultural life, but in the 1940s Jews became the victims of organized attacks under the Baathist regime. Many were murdered, and their homes and businesses looted and confiscated. Those who survived fled to Europe, the United States and Israel. The persecution of Jews in Iraq coincided with the rise of the Zionist movement, the expulsion of Arabs from Palestine and the establishment in 1948 of the State of Israel, with which the Jews of Iraq had nothing to do. Most Iraqi Jews lived in Baghdad, where they freely practiced their religion. After the founding of the Iraqi state in 1921, Sassoon Eskell, a Jew, became its first minister of finance. He remained in office for two years and was known for his commitment and professionalism while presiding over the ministry.
Mariwan Naqshbandi, spokesperson for the KRG Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs, told Al-Monitor, “The KRG parliament in April 2015 issued the Law of Minorities, which was unanimously approved before being signed by KRG President Massoud Barzani. This law confers to every religious community in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq the right to establish a representation office and practice its rituals freely.” According to Naqshbandi, more than 300 Jewish families live in the Kurdistan region. “The number of Jews in the Kurdistan region is increasing every day, and this led the KRG to open a representation office for them like with other religions and sects. Jews are now entitled to submit their projects to the KRG and to build temples through their representation office,” he said. “There are large numbers of Jewish families intending to return to live in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. They believe it is a safe place for them, especially after they confirmed their intention not to participate in the political process.” Saad al-Hadithi, a spokesperson for Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, told Al-Monitor, “The opening of the representation office for Jews in the KRG is a good step, provided this office remains free from the influence of the State of Israel, since Iraq rejects any relations with that country.”
On whether there has been a request to open a representation office for Jews in Baghdad and other areas, Hadithi stated, “I have no knowledge of any such request, but the number of Jews in Baghdad is not so high as to open a representation office for them like other religious communities. The opening of representative offices depends on the size of the population.”In 1950 the Iraqi government stripped Jews of their citizenship. The same government, headed by Nuri al-Said during the monarchy, also promulgated a 1951 law freezing the assets of all persons deprived of their citizenship. Araz Shukr, a pseudonym, is an Iraqi Jew living in the Kurdistan region. “Our presence in Iraq is not new. We have been living in this country for thousands of years. We were forced out of Iraq more than half a century ago, and we moved to other countries. We have the right to return to our country,” he told Al-Monitor. “There are Jewish families living in Israel who want to return to Iraq and live in the Kurdistan Region, as they feel that living in Iraq is part of their history and reaffirms their presence in this world. Despite everything available to them in Israel, Iraq is still their homeland.” Israa Khaled, who conducts research on the Iraqi Jewish community, told Al-Monitor, “The decision of the KRG [to open a Jewish office] should have been implemented immediately after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime in 2003. Although the decision to open a representation office came late, it remains crucial. This decision benefits the Kurdistan Region, which includes the oldest communities in Iraq and the world. Numerous Kurdish Jewish families still reside in Kurdistan at the moment, but hide their religious affiliation for fear of societal oppression.”
Khaled called on the Baghdad government to also take action. She said, “[It should] open a private representation office for the Jews of Baghdad and other provinces since they are Iraqi nationals who unjustly left the country after being subjected to the ugliest acts of violence [and forced] to leave their homeland and migrate. These Iraqis still feel nostalgic for the land where [Jews have] lived for thousands of years.” She added, “The KRG must fulfill numerous tasks, including protecting Jews, recognizing their religious affiliation, providing them with the opportunity to participate in the political process, restoring their temples and shrines and ensuring their protection when they visit places of worship and practice their religious rituals, like other religions in the Kurdistan region.”The return of Jews to the Kurdistan Region of Iraq is a positive step and could continue. Such, however, is not the case in the near term for other Iraqi areas, where residents do not differentiate between Israelis, Jews and Zionists. The Baathist regime under Hussein had pushed the idea that the Jews were enemies of Iraq, conflating hostility toward Israel with hostility to Jews in general. This could take some time to change.
More Palestinian and Western Mistakes
Bassam Tawil/Gatestone Institute/November 21/15
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6928/palestinian-western-mistakes
The Palestinian “victims” — victims of their own credulousness — are known as shuhadaa, martyrs for the sake of Allah, victims of the misconception that Allah wants us to die for him. But Allah forbids us to murder. Muhammad forbids us to murder. The Qur’an forbids us to murder.Europeans, in general, obviously want the Jews dead — so long as the murder cannot be traced back to them. They seem to be hoping that their boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, combined with Arab and Iranian “hit men,” will do the job for them.
Also tragically, it has taken Mahmoud Abbas too long to realize that the ultimate objective of Hamas, the local representatives of the Muslim Brotherhood, after killing Israelis, is to have this violence cost the Palestinian Authority its existence in the West Bank. There, they openly plan to set up another Islamic emirate, like the one in the Gaza Strip.
The knife-wielding Palestinian children — and the other young people who commit murder — are also not a spontaneous occurrence. They do not simply “spring” full-blown from “imperialism,” “Syrian bombings” or an “endangered Al-Aqsa.” They are the product of a careful, methodical, ongoing tactic of brainwashing about how glorious it is to become a shaheed [martyr] by murdering.
We do need to liberated, but not from the people you think. We do not need help being liberated from Israel, which, even if it is harsh, has always been fair to us, but from the self-satisfied diplomats even now — in our name — swanning down the glossy halls of Europe.
The Palestinians have taken it upon themselves to sacrifice our younger generation — on the altar of pointlessness — again.
The Palestinians have been sending their children — still in their teens, and intoxicated by hatred and lies as the assassins of old were intoxicated by hashish — to the streets of Israel and the roads of the West Bank to murder Israelis again. And for what? Is Al-Aqsa mosque in danger? It is not. But the cynical, calculating Fatah, Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Hamas — and the Northern Branch of the Islamic Movement which has just been banned — are desperate to bring the Palestinian issue back to the headlines. They hope it would displace the true catastrophe of the chaos in Syria and Iraq, which has led to the flood of refugees to Europe.
The Palestinian “victims” — victims of their own credulousness — are known as shuhadaa, martyrs for the sake of Allah, victims of the misconception that Allah wants us to die for him. But Allah forbids us to murder. Muhammad forbids us to murder. The Qur’an forbids us to murder.
The Palestinian terrorists that murder Israelis usually die in the process; the question is, does murder keep the Al-Aqsa mosque out of “danger” — which it is not even in?
Do the senseless deaths on both sides advance the cause of a political solution and the establishment of a Palestinian state? No, only, apparently, to many Europeans — anti-Semitic racists who love Muslims as much as they hate Jews. These Europeans probably love Muslims because they hate Jews.
Europeans, in general, obviously want the Jews dead — so long as the murder cannot be traced back to them. They seem to be hoping that their boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, combined with Arab and Iranian “hit men,” will do the job for them. Sadly, the Palestinians, instead of looking like people who want peace, look like the Muslim extremists to whom the European racists offer ever more help. It seems inconceivable to these Europeans that we may not want to live with these savages any more than they do.
We do need to liberated, but not from the people you think. We do not need help being liberated from Israel, which, even if it is harsh, has always been fair to us, but from the self-satisfied diplomats even now — in our name — swanning down the glossy halls of Europe.
The Palestinians are, not surprisingly, trying to avoid negotiating for peace. As any Palestinian leader will be killed, and go down in Palestinian history as a traitor unless he is able to come back with 100% of Palestinian demands, Mahmoud Abbas would only end up having to turn down any realistic offer — in full view of the international community. The Palestinian leaders are clearly hoping, as anyone would, that these Jew-hating Europeans — and others who breezily turn Jewish heritage sites into Muslim heritage sites — will hand them the whole 100% on a plate, free of charge.
The knife-wielding Palestinian children — and the other young people who commit murder — are also not a spontaneous occurrence. They do not simply “spring” full-blown from “imperialism,” “Syrian bombings” or an “endangered Al-Aqsa.” They are the product of a careful, methodical, ongoing tactic of brainwashing about how glorious it is to become a shaheed [martyr] by murdering.
Do the dispatchers send their own children out to become suicide bombers? Do the dispatchers go themselves? No, the Palestinians and other terrorists prey on swayable, possibly depressed children — looking for love or a “cause” in their lives to counteract the internal emptiness — to commit murder.
These murders by our young — and of our young — are, tragically, the direct result of the inflammatory lies of Muslim extremists, both secular and religious. Here, these include the Palestinian Authority (PA), Fatah, Hamas, the Islamic Movement In Israel (banned last week), and ISIS.
Also tragically, it has taken Mahmoud Abbas too long to realize that the ultimate objective of Hamas, the local representatives of the Muslim Brotherhood, after killing Israelis, is to have this violence cost the Palestinian Authority its existence in the West Bank. There, they openly plan to set up another Islamic emirate, like the one in the Gaza Strip.
Abbas seems to have woken up, but only after the genie was out of the bottle. He then had no choice but to appeal to his only lifeline, Israel, for support — while at the same time threatening to end security coordination with it. His hate-propaganda nevertheless machine continues to promote the murder Israelis while carefully ignoring Israeli deaths. Abbas instead still focuses on the “martyrdom” of the terrorists and their supposedly “cold-blood executions” at the hands of Israelis whose “crime” is stop them as they are in the act of trying to slit Jewish throats.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, speaking on PA television, September 16, 2015.
During the past six weeks, more than 70 Palestinians have been killed while trying to murder Israelis, and 12 Israelis have been murdered. Israel’s population, contrary to Palestinian expectations, has not collapsed and is, as usual, successfully moving to protect itself.
The real damage has been done to the Palestinian Authority’s credibility and to the belief, now held by fewer and fewer Israelis, that a political solution is possible.
The main questions still need to be directed to those who invented the slogan, “Al-Aqsa mosque is in danger”:
Is al-Aqsa mosque now less in danger? Given that, throughout the Middle East, mosques are being blown up one after another, Al-Aqsa mosque is not only in no danger, it is, on the contrary, eminently secure.
Has the recent Palestinian violence and terrorism moved the Israelis one inch toward surrendering?
Are the Islamists, including the Israeli-Arab members of Knesset, really working to benefit the lives and careers of the Palestinian people? Or, to benefit their own careers, are these politicians keeping their public whipped up like manipulated fighting dogs, and forever poor, to make sure that we will be forever dependent on them? This is a way you treat infants or animals, not people.
Fortunately, the attempt made by Hamas and its subcontractor for collective suicide, Ra’ed Salah’s Islamic Movement, to incite a religious war around the totally false slogan “Al-Aqsa mosque is in danger,” in order to oust Mahmoud Abbas and his cronies from the West Bank, the way they did in the Gaza Strip, has not succeeded. To begin with, their timing was off. The Arab and Muslim world is too busy engaging in mutual slaughter to bother itself with the lies of a gang of Palestinians. The Arab and Muslim world cannot be bothered with Israel, and it certainly cannot be bothered with preventing the overthrow of Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority.
Even if the Israelis would like nothing better than to see Al-Aqsa mosque destroyed, a notion for which there is no evidence, they still protect it with the best of their police force, out of respect for others, as we all wish others would respect us. Protecting Al-Aqsa mosque guarantees Israel’s security by respectfully honoring the religion of people different from them. It is also a reminder that all of us might actually benefit from respectfully honoring the religions of others different from us.
It is absurd and offensive that after the Palestinians initiated — and then tried to justify the current wave of terrorism as “a legitimate non-violent peaceful protest against the occupation” — that they now cry crocodile tears about the supposed “Israeli executions” of Palestinian youths who take their knives and go Jew-hunting, but who then get killed in the process. Dimitri Diliani, of the Fatah Revolutionary Council, even had the effrontery to claim, falsely, to Russia Today TV, that Israelis, to justify their crimes, tried to plant knives near the bodies of the purportedly innocent Palestinians to frame them.
Mahmoud Abbas denied the Jews any access to the Temple Mount on the fabricated pretext that the Jews were defiling Al-Aqsa mosque. The Temple Mount, however is as sacred to Jews and Christians as to Muslims. To Jews, the Temple Mount is the location of their two Temples (the Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 C.E.); to Christians, it was at the Second Temple where Jesus expelled money-changers and those who sold doves (Matthew 21:12).
Ultimately, the American secretary of state, meeting with the King of Jordan and the Israeli prime minister, concluded that it was Israel that guarded Al-Aqsa and would continue to maintain the status quo. Thus the status quo was confirmed in Israeli’s favor.
The Palestinian Authority, Hamas and the Islamic Movement were left with nothing to say.
The upshot was that Mahmoud Abbas’s claim of defilement was rejected, and that Jews would still be allowed to visit. The Palestinians no longer serve as active participants; the Jordanians will continue to serve as religious administrators of Al-Aqsa Mosque, and the Israelis will continue as sovereign, and manage the security of the Temple Mount and Jerusalem.
Secretary Kerry’s repeated reference to the “Temple Mount, that is Al-Aqsa mosque” (Alharam Alshareef) to define the holy site struck a blow to both Mahmoud Abbas and the Islamists trying to deny the rights of the Jews. The Palestinian Authority has also — embarrassingly to many — been claiming that Jesus was a “Palestinian,” and trying to use the Temple Mount as an Islamic religious fulcrum for its baseless nationalist demands.
Secretary Kerry also put a stop to France’s pathetic attempts to curry favor with the Muslims living in its ghettoes when it proposed an international commission of inquiry to examine events in Al-Aqsa mosque. As Israel preserves full freedom of access throughout Jerusalem, the French can enter Al-Aqsa mosque and argue among themselves, but their attempts to enter Jerusalem through the back door was rejected by the Palestinians as an attempt to internationalize Jerusalem into a “Crusader city.”
When the Palestinians torched the Tomb of Joseph, it became clear that under Palestinian Authority control, Jewish and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem would be reduced to ashes, and that the Palestinians in the West Bank were no better than ISIS or the Taliban, which destroyed Palmyra and the ancient statues of the Buddha in Bamiyan.
The Jews, who dealt with two previous intifadas, are not particularly terrified by the thought of a third one. We have repeatedly seen that every violent Palestinian attempt has backfired and caused far more damage to us than to the Jews. The Palestinian Authority’s approval of Hamas’s incitement not only threatened its own downfall, but also looked as if it would precipitate the installation of an Islamic emirate in the West Bank — an event that would effectively have killed any dream of a Palestinian state.
Yes, the recent wave of stabbings and shootings has, to a small and transitory extent, diverted the world’s attention from the real tragedies of the Middle East. However, the millions of refugees in the Middle East (many knocking at the gates of Europe), will keep pushing to the sidelines the Palestinian cause; the slaughter; the mosques blown up; the churches burned down, and the genuine persecution of minorities, as opposed to the fairy tales invented by Mahmoud Abbas, Hamas and the seditious Israeli Arab members of Israel’s Knesset.
The other real loser is the trust between Arabs and Jews. Trust — with special thanks to Palestinian groups working fiercely against “normalization” rather than toward peace — has been totally eroded. Again, the only people we have hurt are ourselves: the demand of Israeli Arabs for equality is rapidly slipping down the list of public priorities. As the old Arab proverb says, “Ask someone with experience, not the doctor.”
At the end of the current violence that we began, will be left, as usual, with nothing to show for it, while the Israelis, who always rebound, will continue to thrive, prosper and move forward.
Clearly the time will soon come again for direct negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis — but the use of force, instead of than wresting concessions from the Israelis, will, as always, do just the opposite.
**Bassam Tawil is a scholar based in the Middle East.
