syria, 'yesterday', and coming attractions;

What is clearly a joint US-Israeli plan to remake the Mideast map is now well underway.  Changes will be seismic.

The Biden administration, by now almost totally controlled by pro-Israel neocons, is making its final major moves by loosing a Parthian shaft into the heart of the Mideast.

Syria – or what’s left of it – was divided up into zones – a third of the country with all its oil and gas fields is under the control of US military forces.  Revenues from this oil and gas accounted for half of Syria’s income and paid its armed forces.  Deprived of pay and munitions, the Syrian armed forces faded away, leaving the roads to Damascus open to Islamist forces, branded ‘terrorists’ by the west.

Israel collaborated closely.  In two days alone its powerful air forces launched 480 attacks against Syrian military and strategic targets, including Syria’s tiny navy on the coast and major air bases.  Israeli forces occupied a UN-sanctioned demilitarized zone on its northern border with Syria.

While western media and politicians waxed euphoric over the fall of former Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, there was amnesia about the history of Syria’s nasty dictatorship.  Not for me, of course, as a frequent visitor to the Assad’s frightening Syria.

The first time I visited Syria, there was a public hanging in front of my hotel. Later, I was arrested at the airport for carrying a hand-held dictaphone, described by guards as ‘a CIA radio device.’  Syria was even scarier than awful Iraq.  Paranoia and suspicion were everywhere. But I also met with government officials and walked most of the Syrian side of the heavily militarized Golan Heights, later seized and annexed by Israel.............more......