FTAC – Hamas – Gaza – Latest IDF Missile Strike

09 Sunday Feb 2014

Posted by commart in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Islamic Small Wars, Israel, Middle East, Political Psychology, Politics, Regions

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Israel, peace, political, politics

The U.N. had a readied charter for Palestine in 1948. The Arab states rejected Israel’s charter, launched a war of annihilation, lost it, enhanced Israel’s defense ability, and managed to keep the issue alive for what will soon be 70 years.

Setting Fatah aside, Hamas has found itself isolated by the counterrevolution in Egypt — it had swung with the Muslim Brotherhood’s rise to power — and its enthusiasm for Sunni-based Islamic Jihad in Syria, bringing it into collision with Hezbollah and annoying sponsor Ayatollah Khamenei.

At the end of “Cast Lead” in 2008/2009, so has been my impression, Israel’s Defense Forces, and truly representing Israel, had promised Hamas that the next barrage of rocket fire from Gaza — there had been about 8,000 (!) launches prior to “Cast Lead” — would be met by eliminating the senior fighting leadership of Hamas. True? I don’t know. However, Hamas has been motivated to suppress the fire of the non-Hamas launching units.

The global anti-Semitic rhetoric seems sponsored — same rant where the Far Out Left meets anti-western (anti-human, imho) “Islamist” Ambition writ large — but peace has been not only always available but also pursued and evident in trade throughput, both directions, with Gaza, the acceptance of a Judenfrei Gaza (2005 evacuation of Jews from the strip, where the archaeological record of habitation reaches back 3,500 years) that proved that “land for peace” doesn’t work and won’t, and in local labor and trade, which part includes Jews and Muslims laboring side by side in peace.

At this point, I think agreements will only follow what becomes true on the ground. What’s true in Gaza today is that Hamas has found itself isolated. As political rogues within its own zone of control threaten by proxy the existence of its senior leadership, it has chosen a path beside a cold peace.

The news inspiring the comment: IDF Targets Gaza Terrorist, Eliminates Imminent threat to Israel – 12/9/2014.

Note: I’ve slightly revised the last paragraph of the material quoted but did so in keeping with original intent.

My prediction: peace will one day be more evident in Gaza and in cross-border relationships than war, and the politicians involved will have to fall all over themselves trying to catch up with it.

Alas, that day seems distant and yet a little closer too.

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The reason for staying is loyalty to approximately 500 Palestinians who are among the plant’s 1,300 employees, Birnbaum claimed. While other employees could relocate on the other side of the Green Line if the plant moved, the West Bank Palestinian workers could not, and would suffer financially, he argued.

“We will not throw our employees under the bus to promote anyone’s political agenda,” he said, adding that he “just can’t see how it would help the cause of the Palestinians if we fired them.”

SodaStream Boss Admits West Bank Plant Is ‘a Pain’ — Praises Scarlett Johansson – Forward.com – 1/28/2014.

Additional Reference

I’ve put these references in ascending chronological order as they may suggest a story, even in headlines, about fits and starts, crimes and punishments, and, in the end, behavioral change.

Hamas claims responsibility for tunnel under Gaza-Israel border – Diplomacy and Defense Israel News | Haaretz – 10/21/2013.

IDF EXACTS MAJOR PRICE FROM HAMAS…FINALLY…Kills Its Military Commander…Commentary By Adina Kutnicki | Adina Kutnicki – 11/14/2014.

Hamas: Our Rockets Will Reach North of Tel Aviv – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News – 11/22/2013.

IDF soldiers fire at, hit Palestinian placing bomb on Gaza-Israel border | JPost | Israel News – 12/23/2013.

IDF observing Hamas strides to deter Gaza rocket fire | JPost | Israel News – 1/12/2014.

Hamas deploys forces near Gaza-Israel border to stop rocket fire – Diplomacy and Defense Israel News | Haaretz – 1/21/2014.

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Fallujah – That Was Then – Is This Still Then?

07 Friday Feb 2014

Posted by commart in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Iraq, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Politics, Regions

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conflict, Fallujah, Iraq, political, politics

Four years ago, al-Qaeda appeared to have been destroyed in Iraq. Last week, fighters from the group captured Fallujah, a city where hundreds of Americans were killed or wounded in the last decade fighting the jihadists. How did this stunning reversal of fortune happen?

David Ignatius: Iran’s fingerprints in Fallujah – The Washington Post – 1/8/2014.

Don’t think for a moment that the United States isn’t still involved in Iraq. At the moment, the government of Iraq is preparing for what might be called the Third Battle of Falluja.

The Third Battle of Falluja | The Nation – 2/6/2014.

* * *

As long as the Iranian and Saudi Arabian sponsors continue to move around suitcases full of money, more or less, one might expect the tides to shift in the fashion established: extremist or deeply partisan combatants on the battle lines; noncombatant residents between those lines, conceptually, and likely to be punished in the path of whatever machinery might have the upper hand for a few hours, days, weeks, or months.

As in Syria, there seems nothing like an armed central and moderate force in place of opposed tribal alliances, and creating that central-moderate force seems ever as difficult or more difficult than setting the usual hotheads at each other’s throats.

Perhaps that accounts for this week’s slouching toward the “Third Battle of Fallujah” where ends desired in common, such as they may be, may seem doubtful to those who must achieve them.

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Sochi | Putin – Assad – Khamenei | Barrel Bombs

06 Thursday Feb 2014

Posted by commart in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Eurasia, Fast News Share, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Politics, Regions, Russia, Syria

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Assad, barrel bombs, Putin, Sochi

CNN Reference: Opposition: Fresh barrel bomb attack kills 15 in Aleppo – CNN.com – 2/6/2014.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and the world will in about eight to ten hours bear witness to peaceful competition among nations by way of the winter Olympic games in Sochi; however, while they are doing that, Bashar al-Assad and forces beneath his command may continue prosecuting their war as they have since spring 2011; the other side may be mixed with forces still loyal to Idris — there’s a Quixote story somewhere down there in that beleaguered company — but they too will be at play in the killing fields, and one cannot make such as al-Nusra or ISIS / ISIL (I get so confused) look better than they have proved themselves in battle against bakeries and truck drivers.

How beautiful Sochi will be.

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Raw: Syrian Forces Drop Barrel Bombs on Aleppo – YouTube – 2/6/2014.

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Iran – Ayatollah Tortures Ayatollah

06 Thursday Feb 2014

Posted by commart in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Iran, Islamic Small Wars, Politics, Russia

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Boroujerdi, disinformation, Iran, Iran nuclear program, Islamic Small Wars, ISW, political, political prisoners, politics

According to reports received by “Human Rights Activists for Democracy in Iran”, despite Mr. Boroujerdi’s serious and worrisome health conditions, and instead of transferring him to a hospital, Movahedi, deputy prosecutor to Special Clerical Tribunal went to his cell to harass and psychologically torture Mr. Boroujerdi.

BamAzadi: Boroujerdi’s Serious Health Condition and Harassment by Movahedi Deputy Prosecutor to Special Clerical Tribunal – 2/1/2014.

* * *

Ayatollah Hossein-Kazamani Boroujerdi, a senior member of the Shiite Muslim clergy, is presently serving the eighth year of an 11-year sentence handed down to him by the Islamic Republic’s courts for advocating the separation of state and religion inside Iran. He has also spoken against political Islam and its leaders.

Ayatollah Tortured, Near Death, in Iran for Criticizing Political Islam :: Gatestone Institute – 2/5/2014.

Gatestone’s article goes on to list other Iranian political prisoners.

For the regime, one may imagine, the political prisoner is a thorn set aside and safe from creating further botheration.

For opponents to the regime, the same political prisoner may be treated as a convenient perennial.

It would appear then that Ayatollah Seyed Hossein Kazemeini Boroujerdi has become a reliable fixture as a prisoner of conscience.

As anarchy and civil war grind on in Syria — and the major politicians mouth sock puppet platitudes — Boroujerdi, even in prison for many years, stands signal for the manners and values promoted by Ayatollah Khamenei’s: autocracy, imprisonment, kleptocracy, subjugation.

Related: Reuters Investigates – Assets of the Ayatollah – 11/11/2013.

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Earlier this morning, the issue of Iran’s nuclear development programs came up on Facebook with the posting of this piece, which pointed toward disinformation in the U.S. – NATO perception of Ayatollah Khamenei’s kleptotheocracy.

Misread Telexes Led Analysts to See Iran Nuclear Arms Programme – Inter Press Service – 2/5/2014.

My response From the Awesome Conversation (FTAC):

“At present, Iran can best be described as a country determined to preserve for itself the option of acquiring nuclear weapons capability at some future date: to shorten, to the greatest extent possible, the time it will take to build these weapons (and to warn the world) once the decision is made to do so, by developing dispersed, hardened dual-use nuclear fuel cycle capabilities; and to seek shelter from international nonproliferation pressure in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty’s (NPT) promise of access to nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.” 2012 – CFR – http://www.cfr.org/iran/iran-nuclear-challenge/p28330?excerpt=1

Counterpoint: http://www.fas.org/policy/iran.html

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries-G-N/Iran/

As no one pays me anything, lol, I’m definitely not paid enough to sift data on Iran’s nuclear development programs, whether for civilian grid distribution or fast warhead or other weapons system delivery.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MV_Iran_Deyanat

It takes time to dig up and dig into intelligence themes (even in what is becoming called “Open Source Intelligence). Try not to be swayed by the latest in claims without evaluating them with other data broadly compiled and at hand.

Deeply controlling and narcissistic personalities suffer from the hubris that they alone may control an entire information environment, and so they may but with gaps and holes streaming in data of greater integrity.

To misinform an enemy’s intelligence gathering apparatus while refusing third-party inspections in an area critical to regional and world peace has its own disingenuous and hideous cast: controlling a lie is not control: in fact, it is opposite as it invites aggression and seeds chaos.

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The former “Evil Empire” will host the Winter Olympics starting Friday. As then, as now: Russia, whether its constituents like it or not, has to keep buried beneath tons of glamour, glitter, ice, and snow the fact that it has supported an incredibly brutal dictatorship in Syria and just a step beyond it the same Ayatollah that has kept in prison and tortured another senior cleric for advocating what Russians prefer: a secular society separating church from state.

Russians online, I am certain, read the news too and doubtless follow the Syrian Civil War and its many themes, including the anachronistic Shiite-Sunni rivalry that energizes a certain portion of humanity while enriching beyond wildest dreams the dictators who profit on mass murder and suffering, albeit, lucky for them today, as sponsors of war of benefit to themselves.

Addendum

In addition to the routine imprisonment and torture of a political rival, the kindly-looking Ayatollah Khamenei via his client against the west Bashar al-Assad also supports (whether he knows it or not — but then how could he not know it?) this kind of behavior: UN quietly documents Syria’s war against children | The World – Financial Times blog – 2/5/2014.

What Russians are doing aligned with the Assad and Khamenei regimes today, I leave to Russians to answer for themselves.

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As Pearl Around a Grain of Sand

05 Wednesday Feb 2014

Posted by commart in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Fast News Share, Iraq, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Politics, Regions, Religion

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Al Qaeda, encapsulation, pearl, political, politics, religion, terrorism, terrorists

Video on how pearls are formed Naturally – YouTube – 1/3/2012.

” . . . a tapestry of light and color.”

Keep that in mind.

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“With its actions and way of thinking, the ISIL proved to all Arabs and Muslims that it is just a collection of sick individuals who love murder and blood without thought or specific identity,” said political analyst Zuhair Abbas al-Anzi, professor at the University of Anbar in Ramadi.

Al-Qaeda brings suffering, hardship to Syrians and Iraqis: activists | Al-Shorfa – 1/14/2014.

Today’s notice in al-Shorfa leaves much to be desired even if “clear, accurate, and complete”: it’s a little ahead of the story, perhaps as cocky as it may be encouraging.

That last citation goes on to this contemporary sentiment:

The group’s statements distort Islam and alienate people from the religion, she said.

“With statements like these, ISIL is killing the revolution, for Islam is a religion of forgiveness, tolerance, amity, acceptance of others and respect for all religions,” Nawfal said. “It was never a religion of killing, intimidation or restriction of worshipers’ livelihoods and freedom, nor is it a religion of slaughter, hate or deception.

“It is a religion for all mankind, not a particular group,” she added.

I’ve chosen to respect the sentiment even though a host of anti-Jihad sites like Answering Muslims: The Islamoblog of Acts 17 Apologetics remain but a mouse-click distant in time.

The way one feels about a religion, especially one’s own, may differ from the expression in history of it, but the contemporary personal interpretation nonetheless would seem to express the attitude and beliefs possessed today and put to the test by Muslim security forces throughout the range of the Islamic Small Wars, essentially confirming the presence and strength of modern views.

Alternatively stated: the various flavors and strains of Islamic legacy have their sway if not in scripture and tradition as promoted or enforced by zealots then in the actual preferences in behavior and tastes embraced by greater Muslim societies according to other cultural legacies (like the Pashtunwali) or aesthetic or sentimental values (e.g., Sufism and the poetry of Persian theologian Rumi).

On this blog, I continue to endorse “shimmer“, the idea that the conflict table — the basis for moral entrepreneurship — may loom large, but the assembly developed on top of it is actually small, by comparison, and largely rejected, or most Muslim-majority states would be strict sharia states instead of confused amalgams of autocratic and archaic practices and contemporary make-do laws. While the personifications of excessive pride and vanity in malignant leaders and their followers attempt to leverage the Qur’anic script (see this blogs comment on programming and scripting) for themselves, or, more accurately, use the template to deal themselves their own self-aggrandizing and glorious role in lives, those caught unluckily in their path struggle mightily to repulse or contain them.

Not the first time have I used this metaphor: as a grain of sand may be to an oyster, so “the terrorists”, so hard to define at times, so painfully present at times, may inspire their own worlds to work around them, envelope them, and vanish them in another more formidable, more beautiful, more radiant peace.

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“How to Build the New Syria” – Two Videos

05 Wednesday Feb 2014

Posted by commart in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Islamic Small Wars, Politics, Syria

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Assad, political, politics, Syria

Teenage refugee won’t give up on Syria – YouTube – 2/4/2014

CNN Source: Teenage refugee won’t give up on Syria – 2/4/2014.

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Syria’s Lost Generation: The Plight of the Youngest Refugees – YouTube – 15:00 – 1/24/2014.

* * *

Syria offers a three-front conflict zone, and it’s all a bit clouded: Assad vs Idris vs ISIS (more or less).

What appears to be missing, although we know where the displaced and refugee may be in general terms, is the military force of the humane, moderate, and reasoning. That category was to have been filled by General Salim Idris, but such a conceptual slot seems not to have translated well to the Syrian country-wide realpolitik of autonomous bands and militia — “loose and roaming energy” one might call that.

The two videos presented tell a side of the Syrian Civil War evident in political reality but absent of military representation while the field features “the brutal dictator” on one side and the horrifying al-Qaeda affiliates (in spirit if not in organizational fact) on the other.

With perhaps Putin’s input, to which none in the snoopy notebook class have privy, Assad holds the anti-al-Qaeda position and despite the regime’s own horrific spree of bombings and assaults on noncombatant Syrians, and may find favor on that most morally twisted (wrong actions, right direction) “high ground”.

It’s hard to imagine Assad staying given what millions of Syrians must know about him by way of their own personal losses — and the manner of those losses — but it has yet to dawn on the suffering that Syria may (must) be their fight too: the UN may step in only with the familiar “humanitarian assistance”; NATO and the west haven’t much truck with Assad and can’t seem to get Idris to steal the show; Putin doesn’t seem to care about humanity so much, but he could intervene, making a great grandstanding play of magnanimous post-Soviet Russian humanism during the Winter Olympics at Sochi (wait and see but don’t hold your breath); and “the Islamists” have quite a program — the most dismal on earth — in store for all who fail to impede them.

Additional Reference

Understanding Syria: From Pre-Civil War to Post-Assad – William R. Polk – The Atlantic – 12/10/2013.

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Fallujah – Waiting; Baghdad – Hit Again

05 Wednesday Feb 2014

Posted by commart in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Fast News Share, Iraq, Islamic Small Wars, Politics

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al-Maliki, Fallujah, Iraq

When the Iraqi Army withdrew from the major cities of Anbar in December in the wake of continued protests against their heavy-handed tactics, ISIS insurgents predictably poured down their familiar rat lines from Syria to join local insurgents in capturing the strategic cities of Fallujah and Ramadi. The horror that al-Qaeda has thrived on in Syria now constitutes its vision for Iraq.

Can Another ‘Anbar Awakening’ Save Iraq? – Defense One – 2/3/2014.

* * *

Analysts say that after a year-long crackdown by Maliki’s forces, tribal leaders in overwhelmingly Sunni Anbar province have set aside deep-rooted grievances with the Shiite-dominated regime to help Maliki crush the jihadists, possibly because he has promised some political concessions.

Given the increasingly autocratic Maliki’s track record of refusing to give the minority Sunnis a stake in running the country, imprisoning their political leaders or driving them into exile, he’s now asking them to help him to sort out a crisis for which he is at least partly to blame himself.

Maliki Girds for Fallujah Assault, Stakes Are High for Iraq – 2/4/2014.

It appears that while Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki may have the reflexes of a dictator, and so expressed those through his manner of using force in the past year, he may not have the want of power, callous and self-aggrandizing, as a dictator would have it. He has perhaps found the weakness in the role of elected official but also discovered the opportunity for greater strength in meaningful and committed coalition.

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(CNN) — At least 25 people were killed and 30 others injured in three bombings that hit the Iraqi capital on Wednesday morning, Baghdad police officials said.

Iraq: Deadly car and suicide bombings rock Baghdad – CNN.com – 2/5/2014.

“While CNN is departing its current brick-and-mortar location in Baghdad, the network continues to maintain an editorial presence in Iraq through a dedicated team of CNN stringers and correspondent assignments as news warrants,” a CNN spokesperson confirms in a statement.

CNN Shutters Baghdad Bureau, the Last U.S. TV News Bureau in Iraq – TVNewser – 5/30/2014.

While I / we — or perhaps just me, it’s hard to tell — wait for news of an Iraqi military assault on ISIS fighters inside Fallujah, one might ask what happened to the “big media” news

CNN pulled it bureau out of Iraq in this still tense sector of the Islamic Small Wars.

That American troops have returned from the war zone might well demote the relevance of coverage to Americans, who in any case may be wondering what’s next now that the Superbowl is over and it’s still a long way to springtime, but the war persists and remains relevant to the world and a now worldwide readership for whom state boundaries may mean a lot less than the ethical, moral, religious, and political fissures that cross-cross our “small blue dot” of a planet.

* * *

In his weekly speech on Wednesday, Maliki said “We do not want to harm the civilians and wish them to come back home soon where the battle with terrorism will end soon” . . . .

Maliki assures end of military operations in Fallujah soon – IraqiNews.com – 2/5/2014.

What battle?

Which is not to say that the al-Maliki’s comforting words need to presage conventional fighting or that the same needs to be seen: arrests may take place quietly; fighters may refuse the fight offered; in fact, the mafia processes — “God mob” tactics — on which such as ISIS rely do “the battle” in minds, not fields, consigning so much state-owned firepower and manpower to at least temporary irrelevance.

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(Baghdad) – The execution-style killing of four members of Iraq’s SWAT forces, apparently by the ISIS armed group, is the latest atrocity in a campaign of widespread and systematic murder that amounts to crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said today.

Iraq: Execution of SWAT Forces Furthers Crimes Against Humanity – 2/5/2014.

The story dates back to a January 20, 2014 incident near Ramadi. The breaking story appears to be about what Human Rights Watch has to say about it.

* * *

As noted the last time I blogged, as a casual web-based observer, “Fallujah is dark” — not the spy novelist’s phrase for destroyed (e.g., ominously, “Moscow is dark”) but rather a comment about information: we know from common online news coverage that Fallujah has been ringed by state military, that some 35,000 families have been displaced, probably temporarily for once, that war machinery and materiel have been delivered to Iraqi forces, and that some kind of invasion of Fallujah is imminent but, perhaps, also difficult in design and navigation: any irregular at any time may cache his weapons, exchange his costume, and swim as Mao Zedong advised, moving among the people “as a fish swims in the sea.”

So we wait, read about car bombs elsewhere, and watch the grim statistics.

* * *

The most violent blast today took place across the street from the Iraqi foreign ministry, on the edge of the international Green Zone. Soon after, a suicide bomber detonated his explosives belt at a nearby falafel restaurant, the Associated Press reports. Another car bomb was detonated in Khilani Square in the city’s commercial center. Authorities managed to diffuse the fifth bomb near the oil ministry before it went off, according to the Agence France-Presse. At least 24 people died.

Iraq’s insurgency shows staying power – CSMonitor.com – 2/5/2014.

Additional Reference

Reflections on Falluja and the Impermanence of Victory – NYTimes.com – 1/28/2014.

Heavy clashes as Iraq fighting sparks rights worries – Yahoo News – 1/9/2014.

As Iraq battles Al Qaeda in Fallujah, Pentagon takes note. Will Afghanistan? (+video) – CSMonitor.com – 1/7/2014.

Fall of Fallujah reverberates in Washington. But will US help Iraq? (+video) – CSMonitor.com – 1/7/2014.

Who Are the Foreign Fighters in Syria? An Interview With Aaron Y. Zelin – Syria in Crisis – Carnegie Endowment for International Peace – 12/5/2013.

Hidden memories of Iraq – Correspondent

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FTAC – A Comment on Yarmouk Camp and Turkish Airstrike Against ISIS

30 Thursday Jan 2014

Posted by commart in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Syria

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ethics, humanism, morality, obligation, political, politics, Syria, Yarmouk Camp

You have asked a difficult question. The sentimental guidance offered by Hillel the Elder seems insufficient in the face of immense suffering, not only in Syria, but in Burma (genocide targeting a tribal Muslim people), in Congo (the land of child slaves and child soldiers), and a thousand other places (probably fewer, but still, it’s pretty bad): “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am not for others, what am I?”

What is our humanity? What is our obligation as regards the humanity of others?

Gaza officialdom may bleat, hate, and whine about Zionists, but Gaza business and labor and basic service providers work every day with Israel in the interests of commerce and development.

Jews go everywhere — even to the other side, lol — where need exists.

With everyone else, we / Jews / Israel are helping Syrians with emergency medicine and supplies — not leading the pack (I don’t know who is) but there even with a minimum of recognition.

The remaining residents of the Yarmouk Camp, kept separated from Syrian, used as tools for some future Arab war of annihilation to erase Jewry and Judaism (the better to claim originality for Islam, I guess), are starving — being made to starve — between armies. What did they — now women, children, and old men — do to deserve or bring on that fate?

No one has intervened militarily in Yarmouk Camp because no one outside of the Syrian conflict knows how to play a rescue operation, much less coordinate one with so many parties ringside.

In 2007, Lebanese Defense Forces managed to evacuate Nahr al-Bared, another refugee “camp”, by checking through residents at one gate and busing them away to another camp. By agreement with other Arab states, they were forbidden to enter Nahr al-Bared, so they got the residents out, left the foreign fighters in, and using tanks razed the entire city, once of 30,000 souls, to the ground — and then they bombed what was left of resistance in tunnels.

Yarmouk? It’s like watching people drown and no one can get through the sharks surrounding them to save them.

Since day one of live fire, Syrians on the receiving end — now millions either dead, maimed, displaced, or refugee — have begged the world for help, and the great politicians surrounding have played like gamblers at a felt table: one wants things to be as they were, primarily because the money was very good with the way things were — and it’s still very good with the way things are; another wants a moderate messianic miracle, i.e., an Arab democracy, capitalist, open, and in love with Israel.

Some 130,000 casualties later plus six million souls robbed of their former lives and their businesses, jobs, and homes, business seems to be booming around the care of the victims of war, not that it’s making money, but it seems easier delivering tents, clothing, food, and water, and some medicine to those bereft than it does producing sufficient international cooperation to remove Assad, shut down the al-Qaeda affiliates, and freeze Syria (no pun intended) into a state (of existence) approachable for constitutional and physical reconstruction.

* * *

In an unprecedented incident yesterday, Wednesday, Turkish jets attacked a Jihadist convoy on Syrian soil after 2 of their own military vehicles had been fired upon near the Turkish/Syrian border.

The incident happened near the Cobanbey border crossing in the south of Turkey. The jets reportedly destroyed a pick-up, a truck and a bus all belonging to the extreme Jihadist group Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL or ISIS). There were no casualties on the Turkish side.

IN UNPRECEDENTED MOVE TURKISH JETS DESTROY ISIS CONVOY IN SYRIA AFTER ITS MILITARY COMES UNDER FIRE | altahrir, news of Islam, Muslims, Arab Spring and special Palestine; SYRIA NEWS | Peter Clifford Online – 1/30/2014.

I don’t know whose using money to sew so much chaos in the middle east, but now pressured by an immense refugee challenge, the want to get at its sources all around may be quite high.

It appears yesterday’s strike by Turkey involved a clear tit-for-tat exchange of fire, but the Turkish military, which has traded with Israel for its hardware, more a while ago, I’m sure less today, and has NATO cooperation in the region, is the more formidable power.

Perhaps the Turks have also had enough of “spillover” from Syria’s civil war.

Additional Reference

Israel ‘cuts arms sales to Turkey’ – UPI.com – 4/26/2010.

Israel supplies Turkey with military equipment for first time since Gaza flotilla – Diplomacy & Defense Israel News | Haaretz – 2/18/2013.

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BackChannels

~ Conflict, Culture, Language, Psychology

Category Archives: Middle East

FTAC – Hamas – Gaza – Latest IDF Missile Strike

Additional Reference

Fallujah – That Was Then – Is This Still Then?

Iran – Ayatollah Tortures Ayatollah

Addendum

“How to Build the New Syria” – Two Videos

Additional Reference

FTAC – A Comment on Yarmouk Camp and Turkish Airstrike Against ISIS

Additional Reference