Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Despite all the denials there are two definite groups debating here.

Without any exception the Shia brothers and sisters here are firmly standing behind Assad/Hezbollah/Iran no matter what.

Following are the facts:

Syrian Demography Stats:

Sunnis 77% Shias 13% (10% Alawis and 3% Ithnā’ashariyyah) Christians (of several variations, including Orthodox and Maronite) 10%

Bashar Assad a Ba’athist (supposed to be non-sectarian) rules Syria with Iron fist with power and positions firmly in hands of his co-religionists –the Alawis

Sunnis even though are in overwhelming majority, they are oppressed people.

Iraq Demography Stats:

Shias 62% (overwhelming Ithnā’ashariyyah) Sunni around 35% and Christian Sects 3%

Saddam Hussein a Ba’athist (supposed to be non-sectarian) ruled Iraq with Iron fist with power and positions firmly in hands of his co-religionists –the Sunnis

Shias even though in majority, they were oppressed people.

When America/Europe/Zionists attacked Saddam’s Iraq our Shia brothers and Sisters on this very thread were surely cheering the invaders to ‘rescue’ their co-religionists

Double standards?

In similar vein Sadaam was not a sectarian person… He was a Secularist baaathist. His army constituted people of all background, not just Sunnis. So this was never a shia vs sunni thing for him. It was the Shias/Americans/Zionists/ types that took over and turned into a sectarian warfare…

Be Divided and get conquered. And shout freedom

In similar vein Americans and other Zionists have succeeded in strengthening the hands of rebels (against rule of Sadaam Hussein) looking for Western style democracy……

Syria’s Population is not a complex one – Sunnis are 77%

If this interests you Ithnā’ashariyyah are around 3% strong!

There are only 22 Jews in Syria – all in Damascus – majority had emigrated to greener pastures westwards.

Syrian Jews - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hezbollah has committed a biggest blunder- It was seen as an Islamic force against Israel – It’s stand was admired by Sunnis Muslims all over the world – this move has the shown the true heart and hand of Hezbollah – It has proved to be a military arm of Shia Iran proxying for Iranian interests.

Take note the Palestinian groups will move away from alliance with Iran.

Propping up of Syrian despot Bashar al-Assad military Hezbollah has lost its Islamic credentials. It should have stayed out of this conflict to preserve its strength – In long run Bashar Assad is doomed – like it or not just like in Iraq the Majority will rule and the minority will suffer – unfortunately – brutality of the conflict will assure that.

Unfortunately Hezbollah will be isolated caught between a rock and a hard place

You should not really gloat about post-revolution Iran’s relationship with Syrian regimes.

The Hama massacre (Arabic: مجزرة حماة‎) occurred in February 1982, when the Syrian Arab Army and the Defense Companies, under the orders of the country’s then-president, Hafez al-Assad, besieged the town of Hama for 27 days in order to quell an uprising by the Muslim Brotherhood against al-Assad’s government.[1][2] The massacre, carried out by the Syrian Army supposedly under commanding General Rifaat al-Assad, President Assad’s younger brother, effectively ended the campaign begun in 1976 by Sunni Islamic groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood, against the government.

Initial diplomatic reports from western countries stated that 1,000 were killed.[3][4] Subsequent estimates vary, with the lower estimates claiming that at least 10,000 Syrian citizens were killed,[5] while others put the number at 20,000 (Robert Fisk),[1] or 40,000 (Syrian Human Rights Committee).[6][2] About 1,000 Syrian soldiers were killed during the operation and large parts of the old city were destroyed. Alongside such events as Black September in Jordan,[7] the attack has been described as one of “the single deadliest acts by any Arab government against its own people in the modern Middle East”.[8] The vast majority of the victims were civilians.[9]

Hama massacre - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

^It seems that nobody is reading the comments before replying and therefore it is futile to address much of your points. Your main point though about Saddam is worth noting. Despite what Saddam had done to Shia (killed a few millions and attacked places like Shrine of Imam Hussein) could you show me where Americans were cheered to get into Iraq?
and guess who has resisted Americans in Iraq, it is not the al Qaeda but Shia resistance as said by US secretary of States Robert Gates last month on CNN that most of their boys killed in Iraq are work of Shia militants.... like I said before, Al Qaeda bunch is only good at killing civilians coming out of mosques or people shopping for food in the market.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Yes you don’t have to reply to my points; it does not matter in the least. You read it – that matters.

If you had been watching news in 2003 you would have seen crowds lining up the streets welcoming the Americans – do you blame them? Anybody who got rid of Saddam Hussein for them was welcome.

Shia politicians likes of Ayad Allawis, Ahmed Chalabis, Sayyid Abdul Aziz al-Hakim (Ayatollah Mohammad Baqir al-Hakim’s brother) were jostling with each other to offer their good services to the occupiers. You must understand the opportunists are always around.

Please listen very carefully to what US secretary of the United States Robert Gates said last month on CNN - The year being 2013

Robert Gates Shiite militia groups are responsible for killing the U.S troops not _lt;lt; Al-Qaida - YouTube

Pay attention at 0.55 secs onwards – He said: “The truth is that most of our kids killed RECENTLY have been killed by extremist Shia groups…….”

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

And where did I say it was WRONG for the US to support rebels in Syria to establish democracy? My problem is Qaeda leading the rebellion against Assad. My problem is not the rebellion in Syria itself.

I support democracy in general. Be it Syria, Bahrain, Jordan, Saudi, Iran or Egypt.

Also, you calling the current government of Iraq a "rebel" of former dictator just shows your own prejudice. Once "rebels" take over then they become a government. You know that, but just that sectarian biases cloud your reasoning.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

I thought you said that people on this forum were cheering Americans !
And people you have named are Iraqi politicians who were out to serve their people once Saddam Hussein had disappeared in the jungle of Tikrit. Did Sunni leaders like Barazani, and Talabani not come out for their country? What else do you expect they should have done? In Syria.situation what is worrying is that the there are “muftis” out there right now calling for mass rapes, murder, and mayhem on sectarian bases in Syria. Syrian rebel leaders are giving out interviews of gratitude to Israeli TV networks and ‘Shias’ are declared worse than “Jews and Christians”! Shia sacred places are being destroyed and personalities of significance being dug out of their graves! where is the ‘Sunni’ leadership to condemn these acts? compare them to the statements of the scholar of the Shia from the time of invasion of Iraq and notice the difference.

After what Saddam had done to Shia religious leaders and the public in general they would have been really tempted to invite in the US. But if you have not studied the role of Shia scholars and their non-violent resistance (as Noam Chomsky called it in ‘Manufacturing Consent’) that broke the back of US policies then it is time to research on it. By the way, was there a Sunni country that even vocalized resistance to the invasion of Iraq?

Ok, I will have you visit the timeline of all the attacks and kidnappings of American and British soldiers in Iraq right from the beginning and inform me on how many were Shia militias and how many were done by others? Sunni militias were normally busy blowing up Iraqis in market or even Sunni tribal leaders who did not endorse to their mad policies of violence and Wahabi Shariah.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Another mission accomplished for Hezbollah. They hand over all the arrested fighters to the army. Well done to them.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Took them a week to do it. Look out for human bombs exploding in public places now from al-CIAda both in Syria and even in Lebanon.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

^Lebanon will be quite difficult for them to get into. Its got different dynamics both in terms of demography and security arrangements. As for Syria I would like to see Geneva2 go ahead and a decent opposition comes forward to sit down for talks (Putin today joked about prospects of Cannibals appearing in the talks). Picking up guns and letting extremists hijack a movement is not the way to resolve anything (which dictator or army would tolerate that?). Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen (where Saudis invaded with tanks and planes) led non violent struggle. Bahrain has been struggling for a couple of years (where even Pakistani kaka sipahis are rented out to the royal family for phenti of the protesters).

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Watch North-East Lebanon where refugees are in abundance.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

^watch the streets of London as there are more than 200 Britons reportedly involed in fighting in Syria. David Cameron can now have thrn since he was so adamant on arming them.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Meet the ‘Friends of Jihad’
Pepe Escobar for Asia Times

Western politicos love to shed swamps of crocodile tears about “the Syrian people” and congratulate themselves within the “Friends of Syria” framework for defending them from “tyranny”.

Well, the “Syrian people” have spoken. Roughly 70% support the government of Bashar al-Assad. Another 20% are neutral. And only 10% are aligned with the Western-supported “rebels”, including those of the kidnapping, lung-eating, beheading jihadi kind.

The data was provided mostly by independent relief organizations working in Syria. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) received a detailed report in late May - but, predictably, was not too keen on releasing it.

As Asia Times Online has been stressing for months, the Sunni business classes in Damascus and Aleppo are either neutral or pro-Assad. And most Sunnis now regard the gangs of foreign mercenaries weaponized by Qatar and the House of Saud as way more repellent than Assad.

Meanwhile, in Britain - where David of Arabia Cameron remains gung ho on a no-fly zone to protect the “Syrian people” - only 24% of Britons are in favor of further weaponizing the “rebels” (although 58% support humanitarian aid).

And at a rally in Doha, perennial al-Jazeera star and Muslim Brotherhood icon Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi - now pontificating at Al-Azhar in Cairo - has called for a jihad of all Sunni Muslims against Damascus. As he also branded Hezbollah as “the party of Satan” and condemned Iran for “pushing forward arms and men to back the Syrian regime”. He has in fact condoned a jihad of Muslims against Muslims, even though he insisted his call to fight Hezbollah is “not against all Shi’ites”.

Still al-Qaradawi also said, “How could 100 million Shi’ites defeat 1.7 billion [Sunnis]?” Only because [Sunni] Muslims are weak". It’s more than implied that Shi’ites are the enemy.

So who cares what the “Syrian people” might think? The Western “Friends of Syria” could not have found a more willing golden patsy to promote their usual, self-fulfilling Divide and Rule gambit - the Sunni-Shi’ite divide. It’s always handy to have dysfunctional GCC petro-monarchies posing as “liberators” so the West once again may conduct a proxy war “leading from behind”.

In other news, where’s Evelyn Waugh when you need him? It’s Scoop all over again, with Syria replacing a “promising” war in the African Republic of Ishmaelia and every hack in the Western world doing a remix of the Daily Beast, proclaiming Assad’s imminent demise because, well, we’re with the rebels and we have decided they are going to win.

Those infidel missiles
As it stands, the Geneva II negotiations promoted by Washington and Moscow seem to be as good as six feet under (although they are getting together today to define the framework).

The European Union has lifted its arms embargo on Syria - a move that was essentially a Franco-British delirium that went over the heads of reluctant EU members. It had to be Britain and France, of course, the two former imperial powers that almost a century ago carved up a line in the sand dividing the Levant and now want a redesign.

This would mean, in practice, that the EU has declared war on Damascus. Well, sort of. Under the EU agreement, no weaponizing will go on before autumn. And the belligerent Franco-British duo has to make sure any weapons are used only to protect civilians. Who will supervise this - a bunch of Brussels bureaucrats in army fatigues? Well, they can always revert to default - ask for American help. Every grain of sand in the Levant knows the CIA is “assisting” Qatar and Saudi Arabia to weaponize the “rebels”.

And then there’s the distinct possibility that Britain may have acted, once again, as an American Fifth Column inside the EU, paving the road for a possible Obama administration “all options are on the table” intervention.

Russian President Vladimir Putin checkmated the EU - and the US - in no time. Yes, those famous S-300 missile systems are coming to Damascus, and soon. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said the missiles were a stabilizing factor in Syria that would dissuade schemes by “hotheads”. He also stressed - correctly - that the EU may just have bombed the planned Geneva talks.

Former Russian Air Force General Anatoliy Kornukov told Interfax-AVN Online that Damascus would need at least 10 battalions of S-300 air defense missile systems to fully protect its territory from a possible NATO attack. [1] In this case, there’s no way a no-fly zone - a Franco-British wet dream - can be imposed.

Each S-300 surface-to-air missile system consists of a radar-equipped command post and up to six 5Zh15 missiles. It would take only a month to train Syrians to operate them. Kornukov observed, “Our systems can be deployed within five minutes.” And they’re almost impossible to jam.

What are the “Friends of Syria” going to do about that? Call another meeting? Time for al-Qaradawi to go on al-Jazeera and upgrade his jihad to include Russian missiles (after all these are infidel weapons). Why not set an example and volunteer himself to the front line?

Link: Asia Times Online :: Meet the ‘Friends of Jihad’

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

^Can you post a link to NATO's report? You can't. Because these are lies spread by pro-Assad goons.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

^Unfortunately I only know as much as the article says about these numbers.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

^I'm not asking for numbers...I'm asking for a link for the actual report by NATO. No reliable newspaper has reported this news.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

^Pepe Escobar states that the original report was withheld from publishing if you read his article.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Looking at stats number of casualties released yesterday suggest there might be as many as 90,000 to 120,000 total dead in Syria out of which 41,000 are confirmed as people of Alawite sect. This despite Alawites making up only around 12% of the total Syrian population (the percentage of them dead is between 45%+ of total casualties).

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/14/us-syria-crisis-deaths-idUSBRE94D0L420130514

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

So how did they get on their hands on this report if it was withheld from publishing? Think!

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Syrian Observatory probably overestimated Alawite casualties

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Formal report not publishing does not mean there was no data collected and analyzed.

Re: Hezbollah Leader Vows to Fight on Behalf of Syrian Regime

Those figures by reuters are published by SOHR (Syrian Observatory for Human Rights) which is doing the bulk of reporting from inside Syria in absence of big number of International media. Their reporting so far has been fairly objective (even though I do not know who runs them) whereas the article posted by you is just an opinion of an individual and that too coming from some source from France!

Having said that I too am skeptical about all these numbers as there is hardly any way to verify them (much like numbers that come out of Pakistan). Plus even if the number of Alawite death was correct then one possible reason could be high number of Syrian Army casualties and bulk of them being Alawites expands the proportion of the number of their deaths.