<< And who benefits from these falling dominoes? Apart from Western arms manufacturers and oil companies, the big winner is Saudi Arabia that has always hated the presence of secular governments, and has long attempted to replace them with theocracies that are more amenable to Saudi control. >>
View from abroad: Assad: the next domino?
 | www.dawn.com While Assad might be a brutal dictator, he is still a rational player. | |
Few people in the West seem to understand what's at stake here. Assad, for all his brutality and tyranny, is a secular leader who leads a country with a diverse ethnic and religious mix of people, including Druze, Turcoman tribes, Alawites, Christians, Kurds and Sunnis. If he is toppled, I would not like to be a member of any non-Sunni minority. Remember how hundreds of thousands of Christians were driven out of Iraq? And let's not forget the thousands of Yazidis killed, made homeless, and their women taken as sex slaves by IS.
This is the fate that awaits Syrian minorities if the Assad government is toppled, and this is why they continue supporting — and fighting for — Bashar al-Assad. But targeting him is part of a pattern of removing secular leaders: Saddam Hussain, for all his many faults and brutal ways, presided over a state where women enjoyed equal rights and participated freely in public life. Now, they are mostly forced to stay at home. In Libya again, a dictatorial secular leader held a tribal society together. After the West orchestrated his departure and death, the country is a chaotic black hole where militias, terrorists and warlords fight for control over oil.
And who benefits from these falling dominoes? Apart from Western arms manufacturers and oil companies, the big winner is Saudi Arabia that has always hated the presence of secular governments, and has long attempted to replace them with theocracies that are more amenable to Saudi control. The kingdom fears the emergence of democratic movements in these countries that could ultimately question the legitimacy of the House of Saud. This is why it launched its own counter-revolution to push back the Arab Spring a few years ago. For the time being, it has succeeded, but for how long will it stem the aspirations of young, educated Arabs?
Among others who gain is Israel. Iraq, Syria and Libya were all sworn enemies of the Zionist state, and supported the Palestinian cause. Now, only Iran is left, and Netanyahu is doing his best to push Washington into armed conflict with Tehran. With Trump eager to do Israel's bidding, there is a good chance Israel might succeed.
So as the West, led by America, bombs and kills hundreds of thousands across the Middle East, should people in Berlin, Paris, Brussels and London be shocked by the occasional terror attacks they face from furious Muslims?
Sent: Tuesday, April 11, 2017 9:06 AM
To: pfc-friends@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: {PFC-Friends} Fw: Who is to blame?
True. But before the Americans, ME was the British playground. It tore the Ottoman Empire apart and desecrated the holy place in Makkah and Madinah, in collaboration with the self styled "King" Abdul Aziz ibn Saud of Najd. When the British lost its steam, Americans stepped in. Saudis continue to remain the stooge of the West to date. It is an irony, if not disgrace, that Saudi Arabia, the supposed leader of Islam, came in open support of Trump's anti-Muslim ban in the US. If Assad can be blamed for what is happening in Syria, Saudis should also take the blame for what it is doing to Yemen.
Sent: Monday, April 10, 2017 8:30 AM
To: pfc-friends@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: {PFC-Friends} Fw: Who is to blame?
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