At least 62 bodies found in Syria's Banias: watchdog

At least 62 bodies found in Syria's Banias: watchdog (via AFP)

The bodies of at least 62 murdered residents have been found in a Sunni neighbourhood of the Syrian city of Banias, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Saturday. The latest incident was condemned by the opposition Syrian National Coalition, which said reports of several mass killings in…

'All options on table' over Syria: US official

'All options on table' over Syria: US official (via AFP)

A senior US administration official said Thursday that "all options are on the table" if it can be confirmed that Syria has used chemical weapons against opposition forces. The White House said earlier in the day that Syria had likely used chemical weapons against rebel fighters on a "small scale,"…

Syria rebels seize key military base in Daraa

Syria rebels seize key military base in Daraa (via AFP)

Rebels fighting the regime of President Bashar al-Assad on Saturday seized a key air base in the southern Syrian province of Daraa after two weeks of fierce battles with loyalist troops, a watchdog said. In the ancient Umayyad mosque of Damascus, thousands of Assad supporters attended the funeral of…

Iraq - What Were We Fighting For Again?

Iraqi Forces At Syrian Border (AFP)

As the United States tries to decide how to support the rebel army in Syria the country that we spent a trillion dollars and lost 4,000+ Americans is fighting that same rebel army.

For the first time, Iraqi forces opened fire on Syria shelling the positions of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) days after Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki warned that a victory of the Syrian opposition would spread chaos in the region.
Al Arabiya correspondent near the Syrian-Iraqi border reported that Iraqi snipers took up positions on buildings near the Rebiya crossing while others forces shelled the positions of the Free Syrian Army.

The correspondent said that large reinforcements were being deployed by the Maliki government in Baghdad near the Syrian borders.

On Wednesday, Maliki warned if victory by Syrian rebels will spark sectarian wars in his own country and in Lebanon and will create a new haven for al-Qaeda that would destabilize the region.
“Neither the opposition nor the regime can finish each other off,” he said. “If the opposition is victorious, there will be a civil war in Lebanon, divisions in Jordan and a sectarian war in Iraq,” Maliki said in an interview with the Associated Press.

So we overthrew an arch enemy of Iran and replaced it with an Iranian client state.  Of course this is no real surprise as it was predicted by many before the war started.
via James Joyner. 

Arm the Syrian Rebels?

Mitt Romney wants to arm Syrian rebels: What are the risks? (via The Christian Science Monitor)

Mitt Romney announced this week that as president he would make sure Syria’s rebel fighters get the heavy arms they seek to bring down President Bashar al-Assad’s helicopters and fighter jets. But with extremist Islamist elements – some affiliated with Al Qaeda – appearing to play a growing…

Israel Makes a Hole

This much is apparent, though not confirmed, Israeli jets crossed into Syria and bombed something. BBC has looked at it and is mystified, there is evidence of dropped fuel tanks and Syria complained - quietly - to the UN. Israel and the US have nothing to say. Area neighbors are stunningly quiet, Israeli jets over an Arab country and none of the Arabs have anything to say. It is true that the Syria/Iran connections are not popular with the Sunni Arab nations, but neither is Israel.

The Telegraph makes a connection between the docking of a N Korean cargo ship Al Hamed and the strike. After unloading the ship has disappeared from data sites. The strike occurred three days later in the NE corner of Syria near the Iraq border. Ronen Solomon, an Israeli data analyst who made the connection also noted that the ship had been owned by a N Korean business until a few months ago when ownership was transferred to a yet unidentified group.

Nobody is willing to talk about the raid. Haaretz makes note of a Syrian/N Korean meeting in Pyongyang preceding the strikes. Speculation is that the US shared intelligence with Israel regarding the meeting, but nobody is talking about that, either.

The silence is deafening, a CNN correspondent stated that he had seen photographs of a single building with a single hole in it, dead center, and yet nobody has anything to say in the face of the escalating tensions between Israel and Syria beginning with the Lebannon war. George Bush was downright testy with David Gregory about not addressing the situation. It is not the hole that is distressing, it is the silence.

The Real Failure

The editorial board of the New York Times has broken with the rest of the MSM on the Nancy Pelosi visit to Syria and placed the blame where it belongs - the Bush administration.
The Real Fumble in Damascus

There is at least one point on which we and the critics of Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Damascus can agree: It is the White House, not the speaker of the House, that should be taking the diplomatic lead. But the Bush administration has far more appetite for scoring political points than figuring out whether talking to Syria might help contain the bloodletting in Iraq or revive efforts to negotiate peace.

So long as Mr. Bush continues to shun high-level discussions with this troublesome but strategically located neighbor of Israel, Lebanon and Iraq, such Congressional visits can serve the useful purpose of spurring a much needed examination of the administration’s failed policies.

Of course the Bush administration and the lunatic neocons that drive it's foreign policy prefer to drop bombs not negotiate. As a result they have set conditions that insure that negotiations never take place.

In the administration’s perverse view, the only legitimate time for negotiations would be after the most contentious and difficult issues — Syria’s support for Hamas and Hezbollah, its meddling in Lebanon and open border with Iraq — have already been resolved. Thus, what ought to be the main agenda points for diplomatic discussions have been turned into a set of preconditions designed to ensure that no discussions ever take place. As the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, Congressional representatives of both parties, this page, and many others have pointed out, Washington should be eager to raise just those issues, along with the possibility of a land-for-peace deal with Israel, directly with Syrian leaders.

This insane policy is contrary to the administration's own policy objectives.

By initiating such talks, the administration would give itself a chance of driving a wedge between Syria and Iran. That could strengthen Washington’s efforts to restrain Iran’s growing influence over Iraq. Further isolating Iran might also persuade Tehran that the price of its nuclear ambitions is too high.

Now they do take a jab at Pelosi in the final paragraph.

Ms. Pelosi did not help matters by claiming in Damascus that Israel was ready to talk — an assertion that Israeli officials were quick to deny. Her job is to spur the Bush administration to pursue active diplomacy, not to attempt to conduct that diplomacy herself. The more she hews to the careful path, the more useful her efforts will be.

Did Israel tell Pelosi they were ready to talk and then back down after a call from the Bush administration? A possibility at least I think. It would be better if the Speaker of the House was not conducting foreign policy but someone has to.