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Bashar al-Assad
Vanessa Beeley has been called “the Syria conflict’s goddess of propaganda.”
The former British army officer was behind a group that trained first responders in Syria.
I'm tired of pacifists. I'm not going to be polite around them anymore. I'm not going to be accommodating in polite society and pretend that while I differ, I respect the pacifist opinion. I don't. Pacifists are wrong, and this is why. Pacifism tolerates, even abets, terrorism and fascism -- and the war and violence that come from them.
If only it were so easy. The leader of a war-torn Middle Eastern country commits an atrocity; the West removes him. Problem solved. At least, that's the way Prime Minister Justin Trudeau seems to see the future in Syria. The only problem is that Trudeau has forgotten the many other players who have a stake in what happens in Syria.
If there is anyone to blame, it is -- and can only be -- the governments implicated in this internationalized conflict. Those who support the armed groups, both militarily and logistically, and those who oppose the international justice system investigating the atrocities and crimes perpetrated in this conflict are all to blame.
The challenge for Canadian foreign policy is to mitigate the risks of the rebels faltering in Aleppo, with the more long-term strategic challenge of Russia and Iran's vicious play for power. Should Aleppo fall, an even more dystopian region will emerge.
Syria was intolerable long before ISIS existed. It was so intolerable that brainwashed Syrian schoolchildren like me -- Christians, Muslims, and all other faiths -- have grown up to free their minds and sacrifice their lives by the thousands for a free Syria. The international community ignored our cries. Now that the Islamic State is in the picture, the world is paying attention to Syria again. As the world fights the radical presence of ISIS, they must keep in mind that Assad and the Islamic State are two sides of the same coin. They are both brutal, bloodthirsty murderers. If we destroy ISIS now, another ISIS will quickly emerge. I believe that the only way to destroy ISIS is to destroy Assad too.
Bashar Al Assad wants the public to know making Sarin Gas is "easy-bake-oven" simple, any Rebel could do it!
The inadmissibility of chemical weapons on the battlefield was as early as 1899 an international principle of war. As is often pointed out, even Hitler -- himself the victim of a gas attack -- recoiled from their use in battle. The First World War scrubbed battle of its supposed virtues and in the place of heroism instituted the practical diplomacy of a League of Nations.
Syrians were peacefully protesting neoliberal economic policies -- the same economic policies that are poisoning Canada -- and the dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad. They were hoping for a stronger, more sustainable economic model, coupled with a more democratic form of government. Unfortunately, the movement for peace, economic justice, and democracy, was hijacked.
