Re: What To Do About Syria
Quote:
Originally Posted by
yosi
If you were living now in Syria and writing the same words about the Syrian foreign minister, would you still be alive to answer this question?
I think both of us know the answer........
in a country like ours comprising of at least 18 different religious sects and ethnic groups many of which are not on good terms meaning they wish to annihilate each other, the kind of freedom u r talking about can't be had because of the intolerance and tendency toward violence engendered deep in most of the population, it is simply not suited for us and to be honest its presence or absence is hardly an issue given the harm that can come from it in our society. look at lebanon, they have that freedom there, what good has it done them?
having said that, i must also say that after dr. bashar al assad became president, things have changed drastically in these areas, and the iron grip of what u might call a police state was greatly reduced, and what is happening now is a proof of that as there was no chance in hell of such violations taking place in the time of president hafez al assad.
syrians value security and peace of mind almost over anything, ask here anyone now what is the thing they miss the most and they will tell u it is security, syria was one of the safest countries in the world, here in damascus before all this crap started, u would go out at 2 AM and find the streets filled with people going about their business and girls walking alone and foreigners -including americans- dining out, i used to even go to the animal shelter i own in the country side at midnight 4 days a week due to my day job, there was no such thing as fearing for your life here in syria and everyone knew it was because of the government had a very tight grip over security and that unfortunately is mutually exclusive with the kind of freedom u r talking about.
i have been in a detention facility before over a problem with my ID card, and i can tell with confidence that the syrian rule that said "u will not be harmed if u have not crossed any red lines" did apply fully.
we r not a democratic country in the western sense and we never wanted to be, please don't let the media hype convince u of anything otherwise, i wish u spoke arabic, it would have been easier to find testimonies to show u that what is happening is 100% about deep hate between religious sects that was nurtured for years by the religious figures from saudi arabia and qatar who own over 170 satellite religious channels bombarding sadly uneducated people with concepts that no human mind can accept starting with banning women from driving all the way up to fully justifying beheading of children if their haircut indicates they r of the alawai sect (of course only if u say: "praise god for making it halal to kill u" after u detach the head).
did u not see the female officer in the previous to last video i posted? everyone was very cool with her death and the disrespect her dead body is being treated with just because her hometown is the same as the president.
do u know that the so freedom loving so called libyan rebels passed a law to imprison anyone who orally praises al ghaddafi or any of his family members or any of his regime key people??? do u know that the sentence of this crime is life imprisonment if the judge deems that a harm to the country resulted from that praise??? is there anything i can say more after that! will a so called revolution in my country bring me the freedom to criticize someone without fear???
one last thought on the subject of freedom and justice, i would like to say and this is my personal opinion, that the USA is the most blood thirsty nation in the world starting with the mass killing of native americans all the way to sending young and mentally unstable american soldiers one of which has the capacity to single handidly butcher an entire afghan family.
Re: What To Do About Syria
Quote:
Originally Posted by
bishr
syrians value security and peace of mind almost over anything, ask here anyone now what is the thing they miss the most and they will tell u it is security, syria was one of the safest countries in the world, here in damascus before all this crap started, u would go out at 2 AM and find the streets filled with people going about their business and girls walking alone and foreigners -including americans- dining out, i used to even go to the animal shelter i own in the country side at midnight 4 days a week due to my day job, there was no such thing as fearing for your life here in syria and everyone knew it was because of the government had a very tight grip over security and that unfortunately is mutually exclusive with the kind of freedom u r talking about.
Israel, your neighboring country, is a democratic country , without all the security Syrian style , but still , you can go out at 2 AM , and find the streets filled with poeple, so it's not the security that makes the difference , it's something else ............
Quote:
Originally Posted by
bishr
i don't expect u to understand, we r from different worlds.
I agree with you , you were born and raised in a non-democratic society , you became used to it because you had no other choice.....
now you can write whatever on your mind without having to be afraid that you will heresome hard knockings on your door in the middle of the night after you have wrote your TRUE opinion , doesn't it give YOU something to think about?
Re: What To Do About Syria
Quote:
Originally Posted by
bishr
in a country like ours comprising of at least 18 different religious sects and ethnic groups many of which are not on good terms meaning they wish to annihilate each other, the kind of freedom u r talking about can't be had because of the intolerance and tendency toward violence engendered deep in most of the population, it is simply not suited for us and to be honest its presence or absence is hardly an issue given the harm that can come from it in our society. look at lebanon, they have that freedom there, what good has it done them?
having said that, i must also say that after dr. bashar al assad became president, things have changed drastically in these areas, and the iron grip of what u might call a police state was greatly reduced, and what is happening now is a proof of that as there was no chance in hell of such violations taking place in the time of president hafez al assad.
syrians value security and peace of mind almost over anything, ask here anyone now what is the thing they miss the most and they will tell u it is security, syria was one of the safest countries in the world, here in damascus before all this crap started, u would go out at 2 AM and find the streets filled with people going about their business and girls walking alone and foreigners -including americans- dining out, i used to even go to the animal shelter i own in the country side at midnight 4 days a week due to my day job, there was no such thing as fearing for your life here in syria and everyone knew it was because of the government had a very tight grip over security and that unfortunately is mutually exclusive with the kind of freedom u r talking about.
i have been in a detention facility before over a problem with my ID card, and i can tell with confidence that the syrian rule that said "u will not be harmed if u have not crossed any red lines" did apply fully.
we r not a democratic country in the western sense and we never wanted to be, please don't let the media hype convince u of anything otherwise, i wish u spoke arabic, it would have been easier to find testimonies to show u that what is happening is 100% about deep hate between religious sects that was nurtured for years by the religious figures from saudi arabia and qatar who own over 170 satellite religious channels bombarding sadly uneducated people with concepts that no human mind can accept starting with banning women from driving all the way up to fully justifying beheading of children if their haircut indicates they r of the alawai sect (of course only if u say: "praise god for making it halal to kill u" after u detach the head).
did u not see the female officer in the previous to last video i posted? everyone was very cool with her death and the disrespect her dead body is being treated with just because her hometown is the same as the president.
do u know that the so freedom loving so called libyan rebels passed a law to imprison anyone who orally praises al ghaddafi or any of his family members or any of his regime key people??? do u know that the sentence of this crime is life imprisonment if the judge deems that a harm to the country resulted from that praise??? is there anything i can say more after that! will a so called revolution in my country bring me the freedom to criticize someone without fear???
one last thought on the subject of freedom and justice, i would like to say and this is my personal opinion, that the USA is the most blood thirsty nation in the world starting with the mass killing of native americans all the way to sending young and mentally unstable american soldiers one of which has the capacity to single handidly butcher an entire afghan family.
Bishr I understand the difficulties of living in Syria right now, but your explanations don't make sense to me, and are not similar to any I have heard from other people from the region.
In the first place, foreign fighters have been attracted to numerous conflicts in the region since 1948, if not before, there is nothing new or unusual about it. Americans and Europeans -not necessarily Jewish- fought for the new State of Israel in 1948, and fought for it again in 1967. Curiously, fewer individual foreign fighters were involved on the Arab side in 1948 and 1967, fought by the armies of Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Iraq
However, as I said in another post, when civil war broke out in the Yemen in 1962, one side was supported by the Saudis and the other by the Egyptians, with the USA, Israel and the USSR also chipping in for either side. The guerillas at war with the Sultan of Oman in Dhofar in the 1960s were part supported by the Russians and the Chinese at various moments until the conflict ebbed away in the 1970s, while the main group of guerillas were defeated by an amalgam of troops from Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Iran, with the help of the British SAS.
As for Lebanon, you make no mention of the civil war that raged for 15 years from 1975 to 1990 and which led Syria and Iran to intervene in domestic politics until the Syrians were forced to leave in 2005; the Iranians are still there. The violence inflicted on Lebanon by the Syrians has yet to be fully calculated. Why do you think the Lebanese were delighted to see the Syrians leave?
You could have mentioned those Palestinians forced out of the West Bank in 1967, who formed guerilla bands/fedayeen, and, having been responsible for a breakdown in law and order in Jordan were thrown out of that country in 'White September' 1970 -whereupon they decamped to Lebanon and created chaos in the south and were one of the sparks that created the civil war in 1975.
If you want to understand the violence in Syria today, you need to think about the battles for control of the state and the aborted experience of parliamentary democracy, both of which resulted in a dictatorship that created a stability of terror, the illusion of law and order underpinned by a social structure based on spies and informers, the use of the Ba'ath Party as a source of jobs and influence, and violent repression and imprisonment without trial, torture and execution for those opposed to the regime. So it is daft for you to say
we r not a democratic country in the western sense and we never wanted to be, please don't let the media hype convince u of anything otherwise
because there were parliamentary systems and elections in Egypt, Lebanon and Syria at various times between the 1920s and the present day -in all cases except in Lebanon, the democratic system produced weak governments that were unable to make a significant impact on domestic economic and social policy (Lebanon is a different case).
And this is the crux of the issue: democracy is no guarantee of political stability, and in more than one country we are asked to believe that strong central government is the key to stability -one of the greatest fears inside and outside China is the end of Communist Party rule; China, Japan, Russia and the South Koreans are all worried about the collapse of power in North Korea -successive US Presidents have failed to promote a democratic revolution in Saudi Arabia because they have no idea what it would produce and prefer 'the devil they know'.
But there have been successful transitions from dictatorship to democracy -in Greece, Spain and Portugal in the 1970s; in Europe after 1989 the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary and Poland have been able to make the transition; corruption however is still damaging politics in Albania, Croatia and Serbia, Roumania and Bulgaria. How democratic Russia is, is a question that many think results in a negative answer.
It is not in the interests of Saudi Arabia for Syria to be a democratic country; the more violence the greater likelihood of any strong leader being preferred to a weak parliamentary system which they don't want to see anyway. Saudi motives are rooted in domestic politics anyway, as they base their legtimate claim to rule the Holy Places on one of many versions of Islam which they continue to promote as if it were the only one.
These conflicts about power, and the spoils of power, will continue, and people will be killed, injured, raped and displaced from their homes.
Finally, it is easy to mock the USA, and judge it wanting on foreign policy. For all its faults, and the USA contains in its modern history enough paradoxes to keep us going for many years of debate, the fact is that hundreds of local officials are elected in every state, who in most other countries would be appointed without the approval of the local population. It takes time to build a democracy, and elective systems must be allowed to fail and reform themselves, before a stability of choice can emerge as a coherent replacement of violence. There is nothing unique about the Middle East that makes this impossible, but as I say if this is a genuine revolution, it has barely got started, and the next 10 years could determine what happens in the next 100.
Re: What To Do About Syria
Brilliant piece of explanation Stavros.
Re: What To Do About Syria
Quote:
Originally Posted by
yosi
Israel, your neighboring country, is a democratic country , without all the security Syrian style , but still , you can go out at 2 AM , and find the streets filled with poeple, so it's not the security that makes the difference , it's something else ............
I agree with you , you were born and raised in a non-democratic society , you became used to it because you had no other choice.....
now you can write whatever on your mind without having to be afraid that you will heresome hard knockings on your door in the middle of the night after you have wrote your TRUE opinion , doesn't it give YOU something to think about?
the only thought that came to my mind after reading your reply is that it was a perfect case in point of the mentality that is turning this world into a horrible place to live in.
you for reasons that i can't fathom presume to dictate to members of other cultures whether they r free or not! u believe that those who disagree with u and oppose the idea of bringing your style of freedom to their countries do so because they don't know any better! u even use the israel as an example to reinforce your point of view! how is a country that thrives on daily using bulldozers to wipe out the olive farms and the houses of thousands of Palestinians be used as a positive example??? how can a country that deprives the millions of people living in gaza from fuel for electricity and water to wash their dead loved ones before burying them be used as a good example??? how can u even mention israel in such a context one day after the anniversary of the Sabra and Shatila massacre??? have u ever heard of that massacre??? i sincerely hope u were not being serious! even if there was any sense in your evaluation of our level of freedom in syria, the mention of israel totally negated it.
how many more failed attempts of uncle sam exporting his model of freedom to other countries does it take to finally stop and think that world doesn't need that kind of help? i don't want u to think that i am changing the subject because i mentioned that to ask u the following:
if we r so oppressed and helpless and persecuted by our governments, why did the people of iraq resist the occupation of the USA till the last moment, till the last american occupation base was cleared? why did they sacrifice so many lives to drive the invading forces out? is it possible in any way to call what happened in iraq a victory for the USA in either the military or the cultural sense? do u call the constant killing of USA/NATO soldiers in Afghanistan by the Afghan soldiers and not Taliban members a gesture of appreciation from the general population of Afghanistan??? what does it take for this despicable self-righteousness to end??? what about libya?? haven't u seen the reports on the news of the number of times NATO ran out of bombs needed to bring freedom to freedom loving people in libya? why do u think it took six months of bombing instead of the maximum of two that NATO said it would need to make libya succumb? please take the time to check the included video although it is about libya not syria.
if syrians were as u say living in fear and loathed their government so much, why has only so few participated in this so called revolution? why after 18 months have the rebels achieved nothing on the ground? why did the USA have to ship thousands of al-qaeda members from yemen to syria via turkey??? that last part alone is in more than enough to show what's really happening!
Ignorance, the root and stem of all evil.
Plato
lizzy phelan-if you havent listened already please do - Truth about Libya - YouTube
Re: What To Do About Syria
how does "Administrative detention" work in line with democracy in israel???
Re: What To Do About Syria
Quote:
Originally Posted by
bishr
if we r so oppressed and helpless and persecuted by our governments, why did the people of iraq resist the occupation of the USA till the last moment, till the last american occupation base was cleared? why did they sacrifice so many lives to drive the invading forces out? is it possible in any way to call what happened in iraq a victory for the USA in either the military or the cultural sense?
do u call the constant killing of USA/NATO soldiers in Afghanistan by the Afghan soldiers and not Taliban members a gesture of appreciation from the general population of Afghanistan??? what does it take for this despicable self-righteousness to end???
if syrians were as u say living in fear and loathed their government so much, why has only so few participated in this so called revolution? why after 18 months have the rebels achieved nothing on the ground? why did the USA have to ship thousands of al-qaeda members from yemen to syria via turkey??? that last part alone is in more than enough to show what's really happening!
Ignorance, the root and stem of all evil.
Plato
Bishr, if you are indeed familiar with the recent history of Iraq, then look beyond the notorious entry of the US and UK forces into that country in 2003 to remove its 'weapons of mass destruction', and also beyond the even more notorious activities of the Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Neither side has a good record in Iraq. But ignorance of the facts will not advance your cause: as early as 2005 the formation of the National Council for the Awakening of Iraq led to the co-operation of Sunni Arabs (some of the former insurgents) with the US military to reduce violence in Iraq, so when you claim that the Iraqis fought till the last moment, till the last american occupation base was cleared...perhaps you should identify which Iraqis you are talking about.
Those attacks by Afghans on the US and British forces are relatively small if also distressing incidents, and if you are familiar with the situation in Afghanistan you will know that what you call a gesture of appreciation from the general population of Afghanistan would be the immediate replacement of Hamid Karzai with an honest man, were that possible in Afghan politics. The corruption of the Afghan govt is one of the key factors that has fuelled the resurgence of the Taliban, along with Pakistan's determination not to let India and other regional states get what they want out of this dreadful conflict. The US will be withdrawing its troops over the next 18 months, what do you think will happen then?
The opposition to the Ba'ath Party/Military rule in Syria is fragmented and poorly equipped compared to the Syrian armed forces. People are scared, yet they want change. If the situation in Syria was so good you need to explain why there is any opposition at all, only I hope you don't claim the breakdown of law and order is all down to foreign interference. When a political leadership, such as the one in Damascus, uses bombs and assassination squads to pacify its own citizens, you have to wonder on what basis they claim the right to rule.
Israel does not promote democracy in either Gaza or the West Bank, but you cannot deny that Israeli governments are democratically elected. You could have the same kind of representation as well, and it would be better than the one-party state that has failed in Syria. As for the USA, why do so many people I have met in the Middle East want a one-way ticket to California?
It isn't ignorance you need to worry about, its bad politics, on all sides.
Re: What To Do About Syria
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Dino Velvet
I'll take ideas from all sides. People dying every day with no end in sight.
Here's what to do: withdraw the CIA's support of al-Qaeda in attacking the Syrian government, and let the Syrian government go in peace. Problem solved.
It's amazing what good results one can obtain with a budget of zero. And it's also amazing what utter Hell one can inflict upon the world with a budget of trillions.
Re: What To Do About Syria
Quote:
Originally Posted by
bishr
you for reasons that i can't fathom presume to dictate to members of other cultures whether they r free or not! u believe that those who disagree with u and oppose the idea of bringing your style of freedom to their countries do so because they don't know any better!
Ignorance, the root and stem of all evil.
Plato
I don't try to dictate anything , all I am saying that you yourself enjoy this freedom of speech which you claim I try to dictate you ..........which you don't have back there in Syria....... and never had.
Ignorance ( and brain washing - and you are brain washed , my friend ) is indeed the root and stem of all evil.
Re: What To Do About Syria
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Stavros
Bishr, if you are indeed familiar with the recent history of Iraq, then look beyond the notorious entry of the US and UK forces into that country in 2003 to remove its 'weapons of mass destruction', and also beyond the even more notorious activities of the Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Neither side has a good record in Iraq. But ignorance of the facts will not advance your cause: as early as 2005 the formation of the National Council for the Awakening of Iraq led to the co-operation of Sunni Arabs (some of the former insurgents) with the US military to reduce violence in Iraq, so when you claim that the Iraqis fought till the last moment, till the last american occupation base was cleared...perhaps you should identify which Iraqis you are talking about.
Those attacks by Afghans on the US and British forces are relatively small if also distressing incidents, and if you are familiar with the situation in Afghanistan you will know that what you call a gesture of appreciation from the general population of Afghanistan would be the immediate replacement of Hamid Karzai with an honest man, were that possible in Afghan politics. The corruption of the Afghan govt is one of the key factors that has fuelled the resurgence of the Taliban, along with Pakistan's determination not to let India and other regional states get what they want out of this dreadful conflict. The US will be withdrawing its troops over the next 18 months, what do you think will happen then?
The opposition to the Ba'ath Party/Military rule in Syria is fragmented and poorly equipped compared to the Syrian armed forces. People are scared, yet they want change. If the situation in Syria was so good you need to explain why there is any opposition at all, only I hope you don't claim the breakdown of law and order is all down to foreign interference. When a political leadership, such as the one in Damascus, uses bombs and assassination squads to pacify its own citizens, you have to wonder on what basis they claim the right to rule.
Israel does not promote democracy in either Gaza or the West Bank, but you cannot deny that Israeli governments are democratically elected. You could have the same kind of representation as well, and it would be better than the one-party state that has failed in Syria. As for the USA, why do so many people I have met in the Middle East want a one-way ticket to California?
It isn't ignorance you need to worry about, its bad politics, on all sides.
iraq:
excuse me but it is hard to look beyond killing 1.5 million iraqis and dumping deformation causing and cancer causing materials on the rest and causing them to remain without electricity for over 18 hours a day till now, all under the guise of looking for weapons of mass destruction that are yet to be found!
how does the formation of the so called "councils of awakening" or "sons of iraq" indicate that iraqis were co-operating with the US invading forces? correct me if i am wrong but these councils were not formed of volunteers and were mere mercenaries getting paid 15 million dollars a month as salaries by the US army to fight for them since it is cheaper that way! google the info about their salaries and also check the many reports on how tens and hundreds of them would turn on their own councels when they don't receive their salaries for a month. it is surely not hard to find people like that in a country that was devestated like iraq was! if u want me to identify which iraqis i am talking about and since u mentioned that the councils were mostly sunni, then i will list a few of the resistance groups to show u that they came from all the different religious groups in iraq:
1- the naqishbandia: sufi
2- promise day/hezbolla-iraq: shi'a
3- army of ansar al suna: sunni
and as for the continuation of the resistance, please check out the video below as one of many examples on how it continues till today, check the date of the video upload to youtube and the date in the title.
‫جيش رجال الطريقة النقشبندية قصف مقر للعدو الامريكي بتاريخ 16 9 2012‬‎ - YouTube
can u give me one reason why the iraqis would not want to kill every last american soldier??? has abu-ghraib been a gesture of friendliness from the USA??? for god sakes not even puppies were spared from the brutality of the american invading forces!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mjb8-2dh9s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y78T1...eature=related
afghanistan:
so about afghanistan, u call this week's attack that destroyed 6 fighter jet relatively small, eh??? also, u think that in Afghanistan, the taliban movement doesn't have solid roots and very widespread support??? as for what i think will happen there once the US forces admit their utter defeat there and leave is that the afghan people will continue to curse them till doom's day and that taliban will regain whatever small part of its power that it lost after that many years of battling with the US army and NATO.
syria:
so in syria the military that every male who is not a single son and is above 18 servers in is not indicative of the general direction the syrian people want to go in, but the USA funded/trained/armed militias running around bombing everything from mosques to hospitals and beheading anyone with a haircut they don't like are the true representation of what the syrian people want, right???
i never said the situation in syria was perfect and everybody was living in luxury, we r like any other country and have people who label themselves as opposition, but that doesn't give other parts of society the right to conspire against their country and facilitate its destruction!!! especially when they have no set demands or alternative policy of any kind! have they ever made a single statement about whether they are rebelling for better health or better education or better housing or better jobs or better anything???????????? your claims are completely unfounded about our leadership and are quite silly to be honest, u know exactly who trains and exports death squads, it is the same country that sent them to south america!
israel:
so to u democracy is merely about changing the name of the president every few years? what about the racial discrimination in israel? what about turning al-Aqsa mosque's yards into public parks and gardens?
