ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: A bipartisan delegation of Congresspeople is just back from Ukraine. It was a trip designed to strengthen the U.S.-Ukraine alliance, and it was planned before news broke of the whistleblower complaint against President Trump involving that same country. Congressman John Garamendi led the delegation as a senior member of the House Armed Services Committee. And the Democrat from California joins us now. Welcome, Congressman. JOHN GARAMENDI: Good to be with you. SHAPIRO: One central question in the impeachment inquiry is whether President Trump demanded help investigating a political rival in exchange for U.S. aid to Ukraine. And I know that aid was a central topic on your trip, so what did you learn about Ukraine's reliance on American assistance? GARAMENDI: Well, first of all, Ukraine is an extraordinary country. These citizens of that country are determined to be independent. They have been fighting a war against Russia for the last five years. They've lost 13- to 14

The US military has carried out strikes against targets in Syria in what the United States Central Command (CENTCOM) said was a response to recent attacks on US forces by "Iranian-aligned targets" in the country.

Independent Thinking: Humanitarian disaster in Syria and Turkey Audio NCapeling 16 February 2023

Episode 15 of our weekly podcast examines the far-reaching consequences of the earthquakes which struck Turkey and Syria on the region’s fragile geopolitics.

With thousands killed and international aid flooding in, what hope is there for the many thousands of people in Syria and Turkey caught between the groups and governments involved in conflict for more than a decade.

The panel aslo discusses the political impact within Turkey, as fears grow that President Recep Tyap Erdogan may postpone the upcoming election amid outcries over corruption and the devastating loss of life.

Joining Bronwen this week is Lina Sinjab, Syrian filmmaker and BBC journalist covering the Middle East, Charles Lister, senior fellow and director of the Syria programme at the Middle East Institute, and Ziya Meral, senior associate fellow on Turkey at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI).

About Independent Thinking

A weekly podcast hosted by Chatham House director Bronwen Maddox, in conversation with leading policymakers, journalists, and Chatham House experts providing insight on the latest international issues.

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The U.S. military conducted retaliatory airstrikes Tuesday in Syria, targeting facilities of Iran-backed militias following rockets launched at U.S. forces in the Middle Eastern country.

Two OMers are riding unicycles across the US this summer in aid of Syrian refugees and displaced people.

Initiating conversation with a man at the entrance of the Syrian club, Ben* learnt about his pain and encouraged him to consider God's truth.

US forces on Tuesday carried out strikes against targets linked to an Iranian-backed groups in Syria in response to a rocket attack on Washington's troops in the country, the US military said.

Tehran, Iran — Iran's foreign ministry is calling for an arms embargo on Israel and the expulsion of its arch-foe from the United Nations, following a deadly strike in Syria.  Foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said Tehran "strongly condemned the aggressive attack carried out by the Zionist regime against a residential building" in the Damascus area.  The strike on an apartment Sunday belonging to the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, killed nine people including a Hezbollah commander, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said.  Baghaei called for measures against Israel, including "an arms embargo" and its "expulsion from the United Nations."  Regional tensions have soared since the outbreak of the Gaza war in October 2023, triggered by the Palestinian Hamas militant group's unprecedented attack on Israel.  The conflict has drawn in Tehran-aligned militants in the region and included rare direct attacks between Iran and Israel.  Since Syria's civil war broke out in 2011, Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes in Syria, mainly targeting army positions and fighters including from Hezbollah.  Israeli authorities rarely comment on the strikes but have repeatedly said they will not allow arch-enemy Iran to expand its presence in Syria.

washington — The U.S. military said Monday that it had carried out strikes against nine targets associated with Iranian groups in Syria.  In a statement, the U.S. military said the strikes were made against two locations in Syria and were a response to several attacks on U.S. personnel in Syria in the past 24 hours.  The U.S. has occasionally carried out strikes against targets linked to Iran in both Iraq and Syria. In February, the U.S. launched airstrikes in Iraq and Syria against more than 85 targets linked to Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and militias it backs, in retaliation for a deadly attack on U.S. troops.  "These strikes will degrade the Iranian backed groups' ability to plan and launch future attacks on U.S. and coalition forces," the U.S. military said after the most recent strikes.  The U.S. has 900 troops in Syria and 2,500 in neighboring Iraq, on a mission to advise and assist local forces trying to prevent a resurgence of Islamic State, which in 2014 seized large swaths of both countries but was later defeated.  The U.S. has sent warships and fighter aircraft to the region since the Israel-Hamas conflict erupted on October 7, 2023, to try to deter Iran and Iran-backed groups from getting involved in the conflict.  U.S. forces have also helped shoot down projectiles that Iran launched toward Israel this year. 

More than 110,000 civilians are dead. More than 2 million are refugees. The United States, France and Turkey are moving closer to military intervention.

Whether driven by humanitarian aims or not, a U.S. military strike on Syria would be perceived as yet another forceful grab for regional and global hegemony.

Gowan discusses the obstacles to a peace process, including the fact that extremist rebel factions are unlikely to recognize any ceasefire arrived at in Geneva.

In Syria and across the Middle East, every actor embroiled in conflict is considered a terrorist by someone, making resolutions exceedingly difficult to achieve.

Sectarian warfare in Iraq and a brutal regime in Syria have led to a level of violence and chaos that is extreme even by the Middle East's standards.

Sayeda Zainab, a stronghold of Hezbollah and the site of a major Shi’ite shrine, has been the target of previous strikes. 

The strikes were in response to attacks on US personnel over the past 24 hours, CENTCOM reported.

Children in northern Syria are suffering from hunger, illness, and malnutrition as a result of poverty, poor living conditions for most families, and the collapse of purchasing power amid the soaring prices of all essential food commodities. Displacement and a lack of job opportunities make this worse. Nour al-Hammoud, a 5-year-old girl whose family was […]

U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces announced Tuesday that they had captured the city of Raqqa from Islamic State militants.

“Everything is finished in Raqqa, our forces have taken full control of Raqqa,” SDF spokesman Talal Sello told AFP. A formal declaration would be announced after operations to clear any remaining sleeper cells and to remove landmines in the city were completed, Sello added.

The move is a major setback for the Islamic State which considered Raqqa the de-facto capital of its self-declared caliphate. It comes on the third anniversary of the global effort to defeat ISIS.

Raqqa was the first provincial capital to fall from government control in March 2013 after it was captured by a rebel army. The army included both Syrian opposition groups and more hard line  parties including al-Nusra and the Islamic State.

A civilian government  that was established in the city divided two months later, and less than a year later ISIS recaptured Raqqa and named the the capital of their caliphate.

About 900 civilians have been killed since the the start of the five-month operation, including 570 people in coalition air raids, according to the Syrian Network for Human Rights. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights put the civilian death toll at 1,130 people. American journalist James Foley was beheaded in the mountains south of the city.

SDF fighters pulled down the Islamic State’s black flag from the city’s National Hospital near the city’s stadium, according to a Reuters report.

Special presidential envoy for the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS Brett McGurk said in August that the U.S. would attempt to perform a “stabilization” in Raqqa — including demining, removing rubble from major pathways to allow trucks and equipment through, and “basic electricity, sewage, water, the basic essentials to allow populations to come back to their home.”

It is not clear when the 300,000 civilians who have fled Raqqa since April during the operation will be able to return.

The post U.S.-backed Syrian forces recapture Raqqa from Islamic State group appeared first on PBS NewsHour.

Syria's First Lady, Asma al-Assad, has been diagnosed with medlinkleukemia/medlink, according to the Syrian presidency. "After the appearance

US forces on Tuesday carried out strikes against targets linked to an Iranian-backed groups in Syria in response to a rocket attack on Washington's troops in the country, the US military said.

The UN Disengagement Observer Force warns of severe violations by Israel along the Alpha Line, risking increased tensions with Syria.

Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2020.

The offensive began hours after Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President-elect Donald Trump discussed Syria over the phone and agreed on the need to combine efforts in the fight against terrorism.

Edinburgh : Printed for Hamilton and Balfour, Kincaid and Donaldson, and W. Gray., MDCCLVIII. [1758]

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GAZIANTEP, Turkey—After five years fighting to preserve Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria, Russia now appears inclined to dispose of its infamous client. Assad’s persistent brutality and corruption, and his inability to establish even the semblance of a functioning state, has grown to be a burden Moscow would prefer not to bear.And then there’s the problem of Iran. Assad, members of his family, and his Alawite clansmen enjoy close, perhaps unbreakable, bonds to the regime in Tehran and to Iranian-backed militias in Syria. All of which undermines Moscow’s primary mission there: to rehabilitate the Assad regime as a symbol of stability capable of attracting hundreds of billions of dollars of foreign investment for reconstruction, which Russian firms would then be poised to receive. As long as Assad’s relatives continue to function as a mafia and give free rein to Iranian troops using Syria as base of operations to threaten Israel and plan attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq, those countries likely to foot the bill for Syrian reconstruction—the nations of Europe and the Gulf—are unlikely to come up with the cash. Amid Escalating Syrian Carnage, Turkey Shoots Down Assad’s PlanesThis has not gone unnoticed by the United States.“Assad has done nothing to help the Russians sell this regime,”James Jeffrey, the U.S. special envoy for the Coalition to Defeat ISIS, told reporters in a State Department briefing on Thursday. “You find Assad has nothing but thugs around him, and they don't sell well either in the Arab world or in Europe. We have heard repeatedly from Russians we take as credible that they understand how bad Assad is.” The Syrian president’s “refusal to make any compromises” in order to secure diplomatic recognition and acceptance for his regime has jeopardized “hundreds of billions of dollars in reconstruction assistance” for Syria, according to Jeffrey. Yet the Trump administration is unlikely to exploit this growing rift. “Getting Russia out of Syria,” Jeffrey said, “has never been our goal. Russia has been there for 30 years. It has a long-term relationship with Syria. We don’t think it has been healthy for the region. We don’t think it really is even healthy for Russia. But that’s not our policy.”  MEDIA FRENZYJeffrey’s statements come just one week after Russian state media unleashed a slew of reports and editorials targeting Assad, portraying the beleaguered president as hopelessly corrupt and unfit to govern, and suggesting the time had come to replace him with a new leader.The first batch of articles was published by the Russia’s Federal News Agency (FNA), an outlet owned by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Russian oligarch and chairman of several companies implicated in the 2016 U.S. elections scandal. Appearing over the course of a mere three hours on April 17, they would shake Syria to its core. The first of the three articles in question highlighted a corruption scheme carried out by the regime in summer 2019 in which the Syrian prime minister purportedly lied to citizens about oil and gas scarcities in order to justify the occurrence of long power outages while selling Syrian electricity to businessmen in Lebanon. The second piece cited an opinion poll claiming only 32 percent of Syrians would vote for Assad in the country’s upcoming 2021 presidential election. The third and final article, entitled, “Corruption is Worse than Terrorism,” chastized President Assad for personally failing to combat corruption, prevalent at all levels of the state.  That these were published by Prigozhin’s news agency was the kind of signal it would be hard for Assad to miss. Prigozhin, who first built his fortune as a caterer, is sometimes known as “Putin’s chef.” But of particular relevance to Syria is his role as chairman of the Wagner Group, whose mercenaries have fought alongside Assad regime forces since October 2015 and helped the latter take back control of key revenue generating infrastructure such as the al-Sha’ir gas field in Homs province.Deputy Assistant Secretary Christopher Robin told the same State Department briefing Thursday, “Wagner is often misleadingly referred to as a Russian private military company, but in fact it’s an instrument of the Russian government which the Kremlin uses as a low-cost and low-risk instrument to advance its goals.”The article on corruption would also point out, suggestively, that the Assads are not the only powerful family in Syria, “there are also the Makhloufs.”Rami Makhlouf, who is in fact Bashar al-Assad’s first cousin, is Syria’s wealthiest man, and also, it would seem, Russia’s man. Certainly he has strong ties to the Kremlin and for years has been one of the most vocal critics of Iran’s presence in Syria. In July 2018, the al-Watan newspaper, one Syria’s most prominent pro-regime mouthpieces and owned by Rami Makhlouf since 2006, published a then unprecedented public rebuke to Iran, accusing it of sponsoring Islamist fanaticism throughout the Middle East alongside Turkey and Qatar, the main backers of Syria’s opposition. (Rami Makhlouf’s father Muhammad and brother Hafiz meanwhile are alleged by some to be living in Russia.) The April 17 articles published by Prigozhin’s FNA preceded the release of a wave of other articles and items in the media over the next 12 days that would further drive home the point that Moscow was considering options other than Assad to rule Syria. TASS, Russia’s largest state-run news agency, wrote in one editorial that, “Russia suspects that Assad is not only unable to lead the country anymore, but also that the head of the Syrian regime is dragging Moscow towards the Afghani scenario.” This is like evoking the Vietnam War for an American audience, a reference to the Kremlin’s botched campaign through the 1980s that helped bankrupt the Soviet Union and finally break it apart.Amid this coverage, TASS would also take swipes at Iran, claiming that the Islamic Republic has “no interest in achieving stability in the region, because it considers it a battlefield with Washington”.On April 30, the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC), a think tank established by Moscow’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, released a scathing report saying Russia was in talks with other parties to the Syrian conflict to draw up plans for a political resolution that did not include Bashar al-Assad as president. The report highlighted purported Russian efforts to compel the Syrian regime to commit to ceasefires with both American-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), and the Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army (FSA) opposition, while beginning steps to form a new unity government that would include representatives from both. That day, Rami Makhlouf, whose assets were frozen five months earlier as part of a tax dispute, uploaded a video onto his personal Facebook page accusing the Assad regime of corruption. In a state known for carrying out the full-scale slaughter of those who test its authority, Makhlouf’s videos, coming on the heels of the unprecedented Russian attacks in the media, sent shockwaves throughout the country.  THE ROYAL FAMILYWhile the Makhlouf clan clearly has thrown its lot in with Russia, key members of Bashar al-Assad’s immediate family and others with ties to Qardaha in Syria’s largely Alawite Latakia province, are among the most prominent Iranian-backed militia leaders in Syria. It’s an alliance that traces back to his father Hafez al-Assad, who was born in Qardaha, and who forged ties with the Iranian revolution almost from its beginning more than 40 years ago. The Iranians responded by offering religious legitimacy to the Alawite sect, which is regarded as heretical by Sunnis and indeed by many Shi’a.These Qardaha militia leaders have regularly engaged in armed clashes against Russian backed units. They are among the most egregious violators and abusers of power, overseeing wide networks of corruption similar to those lamented in the Russian media. And foremost among them is Bashar’s younger brother, Maher al-Assad. Since April 2018, Maher al-Assad has commanded the Syrian Army’s 4th Armored Division, one of country’s oldest, best equipped and overwhelmingly Alawite brigades. After the 2011 outbreak of the Syrian revolution, when the loyalty of much of the army was in doubt, it became a refuge for numerous Alawite-Shi’a dominated pro-regime militias.Currently, the 4th Armored Division’s members control many smuggling operations throughout the country, in cities from Albu Kamel on Syria’s eastern border with Iraq to Latakia on the Syrian coast, where the port was leased to Iran on October 1 last year. It has since become one of the biggest export hubs for drugs headed to markets in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. Examples abound: On July 5, 2019, Greek coast guard and drug enforcement officials announced the biggest drug bust in history, seizing 5.25 tons (33 million pills) of Captagon amphetamines worth $660m hidden in shipping containers loaded at the Latakia port in Syria. That followed a long string of such seizures made by Greek authorities. More recently, in late April, customs officials in both Saudi Arabia and Egypt also announced the seizure of similar quantities of drugs in containers traced back to Latakia. Local reports have accused a range of actors including Maher al-Assad’s 4th Division, Hizbollah, Rami Makhlouf, and others of profiting from the massive drug exports emanating from the port. In January 2019 the 4th Armored Division launched attacks on the Russian-backed Tiger Forces unit in an attempt to wrest control of smuggling routes between regime- and opposition-held territory in Idlib province. The clashes led to the death of 70 fighters. These and other skirmishes prompted Russia to back a major campaign to arrest 4th Division and other Iranian-backed units throughout the country beginning in April 2019, which succeeded in rounding up numerous mid-ranking Iranian-backed officers. Among those targeted in the campaign was Bashar Talal al-Assad, a cousin to the president (similar name, different people) who was wanted on drug and weapons trafficking charges. Unlike others who were detained in the roundup, Bashar Talal al-Assad and his ‘Areen Brigade managed to fight off Russian-backed forces that sought to arrest him in Qardaha. He then pledged to attack Russia’s Hmeimim military base, located 17 miles east of Latakia city, in the event the regime sought to arrest him again.For Russia, the threat of such attacks on its military infrastructure is a real concern. The Hmeimim base—from which Moscow has directed its entire military campaign in Syria—had already been subject to a series of attacks from January to October 2018 by other Iranian-backed militias in the area. The threat posed by both Iran’s acquisition of the Latakia port and its support for local Assad family proxies in Syria’s coastal region is exacerbated by the fact that Tehran has also begun making progress toward completing construction of its Shalamcha railroad, which, via stops in Basra, Baghdad, Albu Kamel and Damascus, will give Tehran direct access to the Syrian and Lebanese coasts. If Iran succeeds in integrating the Latakia port with the Shalamcha rail line, this will cut off Hmeimim from Russian forces in central and southern Syria and enable Tehran to quickly deliver weapons to proxy forces in Latakia that are already engaged in clashes against Russian-backed groups. WORLDWIDE CONSENSUSMoscow’s inability to control Iranian backed Syrian militiamen engaged in widespread crime, corruption, and assaults on Russian forces has infuriated the Kremlin. But Russia is not the only major player on the ground with scores to settle against Iran, and the Russian military leadership in Syria has ignored if not largely encouraged Israeli strikes on Iranian troops throughout the country.It may not be coincidental that the Israeli attacks have increased in pace and scope since April, following the flurry of Russian media articles attacking Assad and his regime. “We have moved from blocking Iran’s entrenchment in Syria to forcing it out of there, and we will not stop,” Israel’s new defense minister, Naftali Bennett, declared on April 28. Without Russia, Iran has found itself the odd man out in Syria, the single party still seeking to push for war at a time when most other international players have been struck with fatigue and simply seek to put Syria’s pieces back together. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey, the last patron of Syria’s battered FSA opposition, has himself made peace with Moscow, effectively agreeing last March to cede control of wide swaths of rebel held territory after a particularly bloody Russian led campaign against the last FSA holdout in Idlib province that ended in victory for regime forces. Ironically, Erdoğan’s long-held desire to overthrow Syria’s president may still come to fruition, albeit not as he expected, as Assad’s ouster may come at the hands of Russia itself, and not the revolution. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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Not to be outdone by their peers back at home, the Russian military pilots keeping jihadists in check in Syria have pulled off their own Victory Day parade – and there’s this amazing footage to prove it.
Read Full Article at RT.com

The Syrian government said Tuesday it suspects a U.N.-backed inquiry based its reporting on highly questionable testimonies.

A decision from the U.S. State Department to expel Syrian diplomats from the country was long overdue, members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee said.

Nearly half of the declared chemical weapons in Syria have been removed from the country, a U.N. monitoring mission said Thursday.

Ahmad al-Mostafa can't afford milk for his baby daughter. A Syrian refugee, he has barely been able to feed his family since Lebanon sank into economic crisis last year. But now, a coronavirus lockdown has made things even worse.

Ahmad al-Mostafa can't afford milk for his baby daughter. A Syrian refugee, he has barely been able to feed his family since Lebanon sank into economic crisis last year. But now, a coronavirus lockdown has made things even worse.