SYRIA: ISRAEL, ONLY REASON ASSAD STILL SURVIVES

The lack of robust Western intervention in Syria for such a long time (compared to, say, Libya) may seem quite confusing to many who are not in the know of the regional geographical permutations playing out. Western commentators, and many non-Western ones, from the mundane to the outright ridiculous, refuse to tell their readers the […]

The lack of robust Western intervention in Syria for such a long time (compared to, say, Libya) may seem quite confusing to many who are not in the know of the regional geographical permutations playing out. Western commentators, and many non-Western ones, from the mundane to the outright ridiculous, refuse to tell their readers the actual truth about the position of Syria in the region. Some claim that the lack of intervention is because Syria, unlike Libya, has no oil. No. Some claim it is because Syria is so far away from the West compared, again, to Libya. No. Some claim it is because the Russians and the Chinese are opposed to such intervention. No.

America and its allies are not afraid of Russian and Chinese (or the United Nations’) opposition to any frontal intervention. Not at all. Moscow and Beijing protested all they could in the case of Libya; yet America and her allies went in, and today Gaddafi is dead. The same Moscow and Beijing – and the whole world with them, including the United Nations – also earlier opposed the attack on Iraq, but America and its allies did go in, today the rest is history, and Saddam Hussein is now long dead. So no, no, and no!

This time around, America is using the Russian and Chinese opposition for one reason only; to try to find an acceptable Syrian alternative to current president Bashar al Assad. Acceptable, that is, to Israel, the real reason for the lack of any quick and robust intervention. For, essentially, the poor Syrian people, all 22 million of them, are left to the attacks of the Syrian Army simply because America and Israel are yet to come up with a Syrian version of Iyad Allawi or Hamid Karzai. They are looking for a suave, Western-trained, English-speaking and Israeli-friendly apologist. Egypt’s President Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood is suave, Western-trained and English-speaking, but no apologist. They are not looking for his type in Syria. The qualification of that ‘suaveness’ has to include ‘Israel-friendly’. That is the fact of the matter.

The ruling Ba’athist Party in Syria is the most anti-Islamic group in the whole Muslim world, and the late Iraqi President Saddam Hussein also belonged to it. Despite the fact that Assad is intrinsically opposed to Israel, his opposition is unlike that of Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The Ba’athists are opposed to Israel based on the historical socialist opposition to anything Western; and Israel is everything Western. Syria, to wit, hosts the so-called Israel Boycott Office (an Arab undertaking to ensure Israel is economically boycotted). Syria also hosts various anti-Israel revolutionaries from Palestinian HAMAS to Lebanese Hisbullah. You have to give that to Syria. But Israel and America are more comfortable with that. Reason being that a secular Assad is much more amenable than any Islamic-inclined regime that may take over.

Then another reason: Seventy percent of all the water of Israel comes from occupied Arab territory; Syria’s Golan Heights and Palestine. According to Ambassador Yoram Ettinger, an Israeli diplomat, in an article titled ‘The Golan Heights, Syria and Water’ (see think-israel.org/ettinger.golanheightswater.html): “70% of Israel’s water resources will not be under its control if it withdraws from the Golan (30%), Judea and Samaria [Palestinian West Bank] (40%). There is no precedent for a country giving away water sources.”

Then again, this column refuses to be drawn into the usual, and popular, Sunni versus Shi’a divide in many of the Arab conflicts. As a matter of fact, all Islam-loving Sunnis and all Islam-loving Shi’as should have since united and booted out the socialist and intensely anti-Islamic Syrian Ba’athist Hafez Assad and anti-Islamic Iraqi Ba’athist Saddam Hussein long before now, and Bashar Assad today. It should be noted that the Shi’ism of the Assads is more tribal than religious.

That is why Iran’s support for Syria must be understood in the same manner Saudi Arabia’s support for the ruling clique in Bahrain should be understood: primordial tribal and sectarian affiliations. Syria is the ONLY sovereign friend Shi’a Iran has in the region. The ruling Ba’athists being Shi’a does help, but it is the same thing as the Sunni Saudis supported the minority Sunni ruling family in Shi’a-majority Bahrain. If one is a problem, then the other is. In fact, it was Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah, with the US and the West behind him, that saved the Bahraini ruling family from a near-definite revolution not too long ago.

The Syrian opposition has historically been Islamic. According to many sources, from 1976 until the 1982 Hama Massacre, the Muslim Brotherhood led an armed insurgency against the Syrian government. In response to the uprising, in February 1982 the Hafez Assad government crushed the Islamic opposition centered in the city of Hama, leveling most of the city with artillery fire and leaving almost one hundred thousand people dead, mostly civilians, including women and children. Older Assad’s actions at Hama have been described, as quoted on Wikipedia, as possibly “the single deadliest act by any Arab government against its own people in the modern Middle East.” This should explain why it has been like father like son: Bashar continues to massacre his people with the artillery his father Hafez used in Hama in 1982.

For Muslims, Syria is very significant. It has been the cradle of prophethood, and of commerce. In fact, Prophet Muhammad, upon whom be peace, visited Syria at least twice on commerce before he became a Prophet; once as a child accompanying his uncle Abu Talib, and then in his adulthood as agent of the rich Makkan businesswoman Khadija (may Allah be pleased with her), whom he was later to marry. On that trip, widely reported in books of Islamic history, Muhammad was accompanied by Khadija’s other agent, Maisara.

As Assad reaches the end of the road, perhaps he will now turn around and offer a small Islamic tokenism, much as the Pharaoh (Fir’aun) did, and Saddam Hussein after him. We all recall that, when Pharaoh was sure he was going to drown after the miracle of the parting of the waters, he, as recorded in the Qur’an, uttered as his dying words: “I now believe in the God of Moses [Musa Alaihis Salam]”. Allah answered him: “Aal Aan?” (Only Now?). Meaning: too late. Such was the ‘return’ to Islam by Saddam Hussein when the going became rough and tough. His tokenism for Islam was to emblazon Allahu Akbar on the Iraqi flag: it did not change the course of history. Assad may emblazon an Allahu Akbar on the flag or, perhaps, even order his troops, when they bomb the next nursery school, to cry Allahu Akbar!!! too. Not that it would change the course of history.

So next time the opposition Free Syrian Army (FSA) launches a mortar attack and cry Allahu Akbar!!!, let them remember to conclude with Iyyaka Nasta’in!!! (O Allah, Thy Help We Seek!), as America and Israel are busy looking for suave English swagger.