Sat. 17 Sept. 2011
WALL st. JOURNAL
Ø EU's Syria Sanctions Likely to Be Delayed…………………1
WASHINGTON POST
Ø Our man in Damascus……………………………………….2
NYTIMES
Ø Syria’s Protesters, Long Mostly Peaceful, Starting to Resort to Violence……………………………………………….….4
WORLD TRIBUNE
Ø Iran's IRGC sends snipers to do Assad's 'dirty work'………..8
GUARDIAN
Ø What do you think – should we impose sanctions on Syria?...... 10
HAARETZ
Ø Report claims U.S.-Israel rift more than just a clash of personalities…………………………………………….…..11
YEDIOTH AHRONOTH
Ø Erdogan hints Israel behind leaked tapes ……………...…..14
HOME PAGE
EU's Syria Sanctions Likely to Be Delayed
Laurence Norman,
Wall Street Journal,
SEPTEMBER 16, 2011,
WROCLAW, Poland—The European Union will likely expand its sanctions regime against Syria toward the end of next week, delaying slightly the measures that are expected to include a ban on new European investment in the oil sector and an asset freeze and travel ban on new individuals and companies, EU diplomats said Friday.
In Syria Friday, troops killed at least 17 people in raids on antigovernment protesters, activists said, but failed to stop thousands from nationwide demonstrations against President Bashar Assad's autocratic rule.
Earlier this week, EU diplomats said officials were working on two new rounds of sanctions targeting President Assad's crackdown on protestors. The first set of measures, including the investment ban, were expected to take effect next Monday.
However, the EU now plans to present all the measures in one go, probably on the final day of the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York next week. Under this plan, the new sanctions would formally be adopted by Sept. 24, the diplomats said.
The officials said EU member states agreed to some additional sanctions during discussions Thursday.
One of the diplomats said these include placing an asset freeze and travel ban on two additional Syrian government ministers and targeting a Syrian television station.
In addition, the EU plans to go ahead with its investment ban on the oil sector and a ban on the export of bank notes and coins into Syria from the EU, where much of Syria's currency is printed. As previously reported, sanctions will also be placed on a leading Syrian commercial bank and on Syriatel, the country's leading mobile phone operator, diplomats said.
There is now a political deal for all these measures. Officials are working on ironing out some technical issues around the investment ban. Governments must still give a final sign-off to the measures next week.
The new sanctions come in response to a crackdown that human rights groups say has claimed more than 2,000 lives.
On Friday, activists in Syria reported new demonstrations from the capital, Damascus, and its suburbs to the southern province of Daraa, where the protest movement was born in mid-March, according to the Associated Press. Crowds also gathered in the eastern province of Deir el-Zour as well as the province of Latakia on the Mediterranean coast and central regions.
The Friday protests—which have become a weekly ritual after the midday Muslim prayer services—were held under the banner "We will continue until we bring down the regime."
The EU recently agreed to an embargo on Syrian crude oil exports and broadened the scope of its sanctions to include people benefiting from or supporting the regime. That has allowed the EU to target leading Syrian businessmen and could mean the expansion of sanctions to companies who supply materials for the Syrian military.
HOME PAGE
Our man in Damascus
Editorial,
Washington Post,
Saturday, September 17,
LIKE MANY IN Congress, we were skeptical about President Obama’s early policy of attempting to “engage” the Syrian dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad. When Mr. Obama nominated a veteran diplomat, Robert S. Ford, as ambassador to Damascus last year, we didn’t oppose his confirmation, but we predicted that the outreach would not work. When Mr. Assad proved that point by responding to peaceful protests with repeated massacres, we suggested a logical U.S. response would be to recall the ambassador, who went to Damascus early this year on a recess appointment.
Since then, however, Mr. Ford has embarked on an entirely different mission. Rather than seeking to engage the regime, he has been directing his diplomacy at the beleaguered Syrian people. He has done this with extraordinary creativity and courage, and mostly at his own initiative. While the United States has often responded with ambivalence and timidity to the Arab world’s great popular uprising for freedom, the ambassador to Damascus has stood out for his forthright and effective support for that cause. He ought to stay in Damascus.
Mr. Ford’s unorthodox campaign began in July, when he visited the city of Hama with the French ambassador at a time when it was controlled by the opposition movement and besieged by government forces. He met some of the demonstrators and pointedly reported that there was no sign of the “armed gangs” the regime claimed had taken over the city. Mr. Assad responded by launching an ugly propaganda campaign against Mr. Ford in the state media and by dispatching a mob of thugs to throw rocks and tomatoes at the U.S. Embassy.
That might have remained an isolated episode — but it turned out Mr. Ford was just getting started. Last month he visited the town of Jassem in defiance of restrictions the Syrian government had imposed on his movements. And on Sept. 11, he joined several other ambassadors in attending a gathering to mourn a leading human rights activist, Giyath Matar, who had been arrested and tortured to death. Shortly after Mr. Ford departed, Syrian security forces attacked and destroyed the funeral tent where he sat.
In notes posted on the embassy’s Facebook page, Mr. Ford has dissected the regime’s crimes in blistering language. “Peaceful protesters are not ‘terrorists,’ and after all the evidence accumulated over the last six months, no one except the Syrian government and its supporters believe that the peaceful protesters here are,” he wrote. After one of the 1,400 people to respond to that note predicted he would be killed for his behavior, the ambassador replied, “I take his post to be a perfectly good example of the kind of intolerance that has provoked such discontent in Syria.”
Mr. Ford has ensured that the U.S. Embassy will be remembered for its solidarity by the tens of thousands of Syrians who have taken to the street with astonishing courage and who sooner or later will rule their country. It’s possible he will be thrown out by Mr. Assad, despite the embarrassment this would cause. But it would truly be unfortunate if Mr. Ford were forced to leave Damascus at the end of this year because of the Senate’s failure to confirm him. The reasons for opposing his appointment have vanished along with his original mission. Senators who want to aid the cause of freedom in Syria should vote to keep our man in Damascus.
HOME PAGE
Syria’s Protesters, Long Mostly Peaceful, Starting to Resort to Violence
Anthony Shadid,
NYTIMES,
16 Sept. 2011,
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Syria’s uprising has become more violent in the country’s most restive regions, in what may signal the start of a protracted armed struggle after six months of largely peaceful protests in the face of a ferocious government crackdown, diplomats, activists and officials say.
Reports have mounted of clashes in Homs; in the outskirts of the capital, Damascus; in the southern Houran region; and at the border near Turkey. Officials and diplomats have spoken of at least three ambushes of military vehicles — two buses and a jeep — in Homs, in which at least five soldiers were killed. Activists have reported other clashes between soldiers and deserters in several regions of Syria.
Though the degree of violence remains unclear, the changing dynamics underline what has become a reality of Syria’s tense stalemate: The longer President Bashar al-Assad remains in power, the more violent the country will become, even if no one knows what will follow him if he is ousted from power. Propelled by frustration, the opposition’s resorting to arms would probably serve the interests of the government, adding validity to its otherwise specious contention that it faces an armed insurgency financed from abroad and driven by the most militant Islamists.
“It is quite simply a trap that the protesters will fall in,” said Peter Harling, an analyst for the International Crisis Group who travels to Syria often.
As on past Fridays, the country witnessed a spasm of violence, as security forces sought to crush protests that, by many accounts, have lost some momentum in recent weeks. At least 44 people were killed, and military strikes, with tanks and armored vehicles, continued around Hama and in northwest Syria, a rugged region near the Turkish border. The newly dead added to one of the region’s grimmest tolls: more than 2,600 killed by government forces, according to a United Nations count, and possibly tens of thousands arrested since the uprising began.
Reporting on Syria is notoriously difficult, with the government preventing most journalists from entering. But in the past few weeks, activists say armed clashes have also occurred twice in Harasta, near Damascus, between soldiers and deserters. An American administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said armed insurgents were still operating in Idlib, in the northwest, and diplomats believe sporadic clashes have also erupted in Dara’a, the southern town where the uprising began; Deir al-Zour, an eastern region knit by extended clans; Rastan, between Homs and Hama; and the outskirts of Damascus, which remain some of Syria’s most restive locales. Residents of Homs, in particular, are believed to be arming.
Estimates of the number of protesters who have taken up weapons are anecdotal. Indeed, despite what appears to be government exaggerations, attacks have occurred since the uprising began, especially in the poor, drought-stricken southern steppe. But the American official said that the armed dimension of the uprising had grown noticeably in recent days.
“We’re already seeing the beginning of it, and the longer it goes on, the worse it’s going to be,” the official, in Washington, said. “It’s a very concerning development.”
“I wouldn’t go so far as to say now is the turning point, but I feel like we’re seeing the beginning of it,” the official added.
The violence seems to be most pronounced in Homs, where activists say protesters are best organized. The city, relatively favored by the government in recent years, has a majority Sunni population, with a minority of Alawites, a heterodox Muslim sect from which Mr. Assad’s government draws much of its leadership. There are persistent reports of gun battles there, and of killings that seem to be sectarian in nature.
“All we know, and it’s very clear, is that it’s intense there and it’s two-sided,” the American official said of Homs. “We don’t want Homs to become the scenario for the rest of Syria. If it did, everything could really descend into a chaotic situation.”
Activists have reported defections since the start of the uprising, though the military and security forces have remained largely cohesive. The official put the number of defections at 10,000 — “around that” — and said a couple of hundred of them had coalesced into two groups, apparently rival, called the Free Syrian Army and the Free Officers Movement.
Since they erupted in mid-March, the protests have demonstrated a remarkable resilience, despite the bouts of repression, among the most ferocious in the region. But these days there is a sense of desperation, as moments that seem decisive come and go, and what seem to be limits of peaceful protests become clear to some.
“Protesters are telling authorities that they have the patience of Job,” said one activist in Damascus, Iyad Sharbaji. “They have faith and believe that, if the protests stop, there will be revenge and killings that no one will survive from.”
“That is why people are insisting to continue until the end,” he added.
But a leading opposition figure, Louay Hussein, made clear how he would choose if faced with the prospect of civil war or an agreement with the government.
“If we had to choose between the worst of two evils, then we will choose reconciliation with the president,” Mr. Hussein said. “We will reconcile and forgive if that is what we need to do to protect the country from civil wars and division.”
The turn to violence may be coming after what activists, diplomats and analysts believe is a newly intensified crackdown, as security forces better concentrate on activist leaders. In the town of Daraya, near Damascus, the entire leadership of the protest movement — at least 20 people — were arrested, and one of them was killed. In Duma, another restive town near the capital, five checkpoints were set up along the road on Friday, and intelligence agents posted at each carried lists of activists they were trying to detain.
Mr. Sharbaji, the activist in Damascus, recounted that an activist carrying a banner was arrested, then 16 more were picked up: the person who bought the fabric, the person who scrawled the slogan, and some of their relatives and their friends.
The American official described the tactic as “arresting them, detaining them and, in some cases, killing them.”
Mr. Harling suggested that the government’s strategy was aimed at making it too perilous to protest.
“Quite simply, the regime is raising the costs of peaceful demonstrations to force protesters either to quit, in which case it wins, or to resort to weapons, in which case it could corroborate its narrative of a seditious insurgency and probably win also,” he said.
HOME PAGE
Iran's IRGC sends snipers to do Assad's 'dirty work' in Syria
LONDON — Iran has provided sniper units to kill Syrian protesters targeted by the regime of President Bashar Assad.
World Tribune (American newspaper)
16 Sept. 2011,
Syrian opposition sources said Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has sent scores of snipers to help in Assad's crackdown of the revolt. They said the snipers were ordered to target protest organizers as well as those filming the demonstrations.