Tags
conflict, Islamic Small Wars, journalism, numbers, Syria, Taliban, war
Update 7/16/2013
Officials will catch up with the war just as soon as it moves farther away from them and far into the Twilight Zone of Language in which lying may tell more about states of affairs — and the character of motives involved — than truth telling.
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Al Jazeera. “Pakistan Taliban says its fighters in Syria.” July 16, 2013.
PTI. “Pakistan verifying reports of Taliban fighting in Syria.” DNA, July 16, 2013.
VOA. “Pakistan Denies Local Taliban Has Sent Hundreds of Fighters to Syria.”
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So awful has the Syrian melee become, but this precisely in the manner of the Islamic Small Wars’ “hot zones”, that even eagle-eyed satellites probably can’t tell much about who (from where) is fighting whom (from where).
Send in the spies and wish them luck because if any get out information — much less survive — on behalf of any of the interests involved, that data has to come from either direct witness or a additional primary sources that may well be lying themselves.
Main Ramble
Most travellers (STET) must have a visa to enter Syria; the only exceptions are citizens of Arab countries. Obtain a visa before arriving at the border, preferably in your home country, well before your trip. Avoid applying in a country that’s not your own or that you don’t hold residency for as the Syrian authorities don’t like this.
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/syria/practical-information/visas#ixzz2Z94ewuqn
Ahmed Ressam, the focus of this FRONTLINE report, was somewhat of an expert in fake passports. He used a counterfeit French passport to enter Canada and apply for political asylum. While living there, he supplied fake Canadian passports to other Algerians. And he used a fake Canadian passport under the alias of Benni Noris in his failed attempt to enter the United States and bomb Los Angeles International Airport.
Apparently, the lawful go to the bother of obtaining authentic passports and entry visas while the unlawful do much the same in pursuit of inauthentic passports and visas.
🙂
As with proposed firearms laws in the U.S., the lawful are to have the registered and traceable weapons, leaving the unlawful with unregistered and less traceable weapons.
No news here, huh?
😦
The appearance of the Taliban in the Syrian theater underscores the notion (mentioned here several times) that Syria is “dark energy”, an imploding star, the black hole of the Islamic Small Wars: it sucks in energy and plainly burns without end in sight.
* * *
However, one may ask, who has gotten out?
Russia has evacuated the last of its personnel from Syria, including from its Mediterranean naval base in Tartus, in a move that appears to underline Moscow’s mounting concerns about the escalating crisis.
Of course, the figures of who has been trying to get away from combat in Syria hovers around four million in combined internally displaced and refugee persons.
If the dead may be considered those who also left, then add about 100,000 to whatever the total figure may be of persons unavailable for fighting.
At the moment, there seem to be about 200 civilians trapped in a Damascus mosque (e.g., Sky News, “Syria: 200 Civilians ‘Trapped in Mosque’,” July 15, 2013).
Gulf News / Retuers reports, “In Qaboun, Republican Guards troops detained hundreds of people in public places to prevent rebel fighters from hitting government troops as they breached rebel defences and entered the district, activists said” (“Syria: Bashar Al Assad’s forces advance on rebel-held Qaboun,” July 15, 2013).
If the above sentence said to you other than “Assad’s forces use human shields,” please remark on the alternative reading.
* * *
Ye know the co-producers by their music!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvFdP67mUwc&feature=share&list=TLN8mvNpEiOyc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdAv2bdYRtw&feature=share&list=TLN8mvNpEiOyc
What happens in Syria should stay in Syria.
Update 1/22/2014: the music was Russian, grand, so I recall. Evidently, the suggestion has been removed. I’ll leave the pulled-abandoned tiles up for a while. / I believe Mr. Putin holds the keys to Syria, an old Soviet client, now a potential New Russia Secular state because Russians, foremost, and most everyone else have no want of who’s been laying down the law lately in some Syrian enclaves:
Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists impose Islamic rules, ban music, shisha in Syrian province — RT News – 1/21/2014.
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But it doesn’t.
The wounded refugees were kicked out of the hospital by force, thrown on the side of the adjacent roads, despite the presence of seriously wounded and paralyzed individuals.
Nmsyria. “Wounded Syrians Kicked Out of Lebanese Hospital.” July 15, 2013.
Related video:
* * *
While many clearly oppose the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his security forces, others appear indifferent. Abu Hamza, a driver, now lives with his family in a dusty canvas tent. “I didn’t go to protests. I’m not political,” he says. “We left because of the shelling and the sniping”.
* * *
Syria has become a death camp.
It has become the place between a decayed Soviet-Era dictatorship and a boisterous but malignant and deeply narcissistic global totalitarian religious assault.
Syria has become the place where fighters go to fight — nationalist, Islamists, Sunni rebels, Shiite militants — and the place of catastrophe for four million lives disrupted and uprooted “because of the shelling and the sniping.”
# # #
Additional Reference
AP. “Pakistan’s religious extremists leave for ‘greener pastures’.” Dawn, July 15, 2013.
Leigh, Karen. “War Comes to a Damascus Private School.” Syria Deeply, July 1, 2013.
Roggio, Bill. “Pakistani Taliban establish ‘base’ inside Syria.” The Long War Journal, July 12, 2013.
RT. “Syrian rebels’ Damascus chemical cache found by Assad army – State TV.” July 14, 2013.
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