Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

[Mher]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

Erdogan discussing a potential invasion of Syria


Turkey blocks YouTube in addition to Twitter

Access to video-sharing site YouTube has been cut off in Turkey, following a new leak of a government meeting compromising Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan. Other social media outlets have already been blocked ahead of a tumultuous election.

The latest leaked audio recording, which reportedly led to the ban, shows Erdogan discussing a potential invasion of Syria with his security chiefs.

The Turkish foreign ministry has issued a statement, calling the leak a “wretched attack” on national security. It also claims the audio was “partially manipulated”.

A source inside the presidential office told Reuters that access may be restored if the sensitive content is removed.

Invoking national security and privacy concerns has been the government’s tactic in fighting off a stream of leaks showing top officials engaging in unsavory or downright illegal practices.

Erdogan has also repeatedly claimed that most of the audio recordings are fakes. He labeled the latest audio revelation "villainous" during a stump speech in Diyabakir.

Twitter was blocked in Turkey on March 20, after a court order.

Since then, the California-based social network and organizations in Turkey have fought in several courts to have the decision reversed, calling it “disproportionate and illegal.”

A ruling in Ankara on Wednesday supported the appeal, but the country’s regulator has a month to unblock Twitter, leading to speculation that any such move would only take place after the election.

The incumbent party also enjoys the benefit of robust privacy legislation passed last month, which makes it easy to cut off any website even before any violation has been legally proven.

The US has led the chorus of international condemnation, calling the government’s moves "censorship" tantamount to “21st century book-burning.”

http://rt.com/news/turkey-block-youtube-twitter-649/

[Haykakan]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

Well what have we here...i guess proof does exist for mr bell afterall. Anyone got the actual vid?

Erdogan discussing a potential invasion of Syria


Turkey blocks YouTube in addition to Twitter

Access to video-sharing site YouTube has been cut off in Turkey, following a new leak of a government meeting compromising Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan. Other social media outlets have already been blocked ahead of a tumultuous election.

The latest leaked audio recording, which reportedly led to the ban, shows Erdogan discussing a potential invasion of Syria with his security chiefs.

The Turkish foreign ministry has issued a statement, calling the leak a “wretched attack” on national security. It also claims the audio was “partially manipulated”.

A source inside the presidential office told Reuters that access may be restored if the sensitive content is removed.

Invoking national security and privacy concerns has been the government’s tactic in fighting off a stream of leaks showing top officials engaging in unsavory or downright illegal practices.

Erdogan has also repeatedly claimed that most of the audio recordings are fakes. He labeled the latest audio revelation "villainous" during a stump speech in Diyabakir.

Twitter was blocked in Turkey on March 20, after a court order.

Since then, the California-based social network and organizations in Turkey have fought in several courts to have the decision reversed, calling it “disproportionate and illegal.”

A ruling in Ankara on Wednesday supported the appeal, but the country’s regulator has a month to unblock Twitter, leading to speculation that any such move would only take place after the election.

The incumbent party also enjoys the benefit of robust privacy legislation passed last month, which makes it easy to cut off any website even before any violation has been legally proven.

The US has led the chorus of international condemnation, calling the government’s moves "censorship" tantamount to “21st century book-burning.”

http://rt.com/news/turkey-block-youtube-twitter-649/

[Haykakan]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

JORDANIANS SPLIT OVER THE WAR IN SYRIA

Open Democracy
March 25 2014

Nikita Malik 25 March 2014

Syrian state media accuses Jordanians of being rebel allies but
this is to oversimplify. Many Jordanians do support the insurgency
against Bashar al-Assad. But some oppose it and many others have
grown skeptical as the spillover from Syria to Jordan increases.

In February 2014, Syrian state media accused Jordan of supporting
rebels in southern Syria, aided by the United States, Saudi Arabia,
and Israel. Indeed, the Jordanian government has allegedly played a
role in backing the insurgency in Syria.

But painting Jordanians as rebel allies with a broad brush would be
too simplistic: rather, popular opinion in the Hashemite Kingdom is
divided. Many Jordanians do support the insurgency against Syrian
President Bashar al-Assad, but some oppose it and many others have
grown skeptical over time, as the spillover from Syria to Jordan
increases.

"At the start of the crisis, I think that the majority of [the]
population in Jordan was pro-rebel, but . . . [with] time, that
majority started decreasing and in my opinion right now the Jordanian
population is quite divided," says Nafez, a youth activist and blogger
based in Jordan. Nafez sees several reasons for this gradual loss
of support: the economic distress caused by reduced trade and lost
access to the Syrian market, the large numbers of Syrian refugees,
and the extreme sectarianism and fundamentalism of the rebels. He
also notes that there are clear tribal and religious differences,
with northern tribes and Christian Jordanians often supporting Assad
while Jordanians of Palestinian descent are divided on the issue.

Most Jordanians are neutral

According to a poll conducted by the Center for Strategic Studies (CSS)
at the University of Jordan, 60 percent of the national sample and
72 percent of the opinion leaders surveyed describe their political
position toward the crisis in Syria as "neutral." Yet 46 percent of
Jordanians are very concerned that violence in Syria will spread
to their own country, according to a study conducted by the Pew
Research Center.

The country has no shortage of internal problems to deal with. Threats
of civil disobedience are particularly prominent in the southern
district of Maan, which has been the scene of tribal clashes on
university campuses and where poverty and soaring unemployment have
provided an opening for Salafi jihadi groups.

Tribal opposition

"Jordanians of tribal origins tend to oppose the rebels, as the
northern tribes were negatively affected by the crisis," says Nafez.

"Southern tribes, who have more affinity and proximity to Saudi Arabia
but are smaller in number than the northern tribes, tend to show more
support for the opposition."

The influx of Syrian refugees is particularly worrisome to some tribal
communities, with residents in the northern town of Mafraq erecting a
mock Jordanian refugee camp to protest at escalating rents and prices.

The refugee crisis

The lack of enthusiasm for receiving refugees isn't limited to certain
areas or tribes only. According to the CSS survey, 71 percent of
Jordanians believe the country should not take in any more Syrians,
and 58 percent say that refugees in their own neighborhood have
caused a decline in public services. Over half those surveyed believe
that the country is moving in the wrong direction as a result of the
increasing flow of refugees, the worsening fiscal deficit, and the
failure to reform.

Many now feel that Jordan must isolate itself from the Syrian crisis.

According to the CSS figures, 75 percent support the idea of a buffer
zone within Syria to host refugees, but few seem to favour direct
Jordanian involvement. Thirty-eight percent of Jordanians argue that
such a buffer zone should be under United Nations jurisdiction,
while 21 percent say the Arab League should be in charge. Only 16
percent think that it should be under Jordanian control.

A divided Palestinian community

"In my opinion a significant number of Jordanians of Palestinian
origin tend to side with the rebels," says Nafez, the Jordanian
activist. "Those are usually the religious ones, who are affiliated
with the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas, while the ones affiliated with
the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Fatah tend to show
less support for the rebels."

Palestinians make up more than half of Jordan's population. While some
are strongly opposed to Assad, the war's terrible consequences for
Palestinians in Syria can erode support for the uprising. Commenting
on the catastrophic destruction in the Yarmouk camp for Palestinian
refugees in Damascus, the PLO-backed West Bank government's labor
minister, Ahmed Majdalani--who was born in Damascus--has blamed
"terrorists," rather than Syrian authorities, for holding Palestinian
refugees hostage.

Christians worried by Islamism

Jordan is an overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim country, but Christians make
up 6 percent of the population, roughly similar to their numbers in
Syria. Many Christians in both countries see Assad as a protector of
minorities and fear the Islamist-led rebel movement. At a meeting in
Jordan last April, Christian leaders discussed the challenges facing
Arab Christians, with Jordan's King Abdullah II urging interfaith
harmony and stating that "the protection of the rights of Christians
is a duty rather than a favour." Naturally, many minorities will
cling to such reassurances from their government in a time of crisis,
in Syria as well as in Jordan.

"You should see this to understand why Christians support the Syrian
government," an Armenian Christian friend from Jordan writes as he
sends me a photo of the headquarters of the Islamic State of Iraq and
the Levant (ISIL), a radical jihadi opposition group in Syria. It is
what used to be the al-Shuhada Armenian Orthodox Church in Raqqa,
in northern Syria, which the ISIL took over five months ago, along
with the Sayida al-Bishara Catholic Church. The group is now also
demanding that Christians pay a levy in gold. Raqqa was the first and
only provincial capital to fall completely under rebel control, in
March last year, and today it is ruled under a radical interpretation
of sharia law.

That is exactly what Jordanian Christians fear a rebel victory in
Syria would lead to--and it has begun to worry an increasing number
of Jordanian Muslims, too.

This piece was originally published on Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace on 17 March 2014.

http://www.opendemocracy.net/arab-awakening/nikita-malik/jordanians-split-over-war-in-syria

[bell-the-cat]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

Erdogan discussing a potential invasion of Syria

Translation of one of the calls. Seems there are two separate taped calls. Neither include Erdogan (RT is displaying its usual looseness with the facts) - he is just mentioned in the conversation of those taking part.

http://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1s15hj6

The original calls are here.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBTo4XwchCvfuQVNag_NqTw?app=desktop

[gokorik]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

But opinions are worthless without backing it up with at least a few hard facts. Hard facts seem to be the rarest things to find these days.

You want a hard fact how bout turkeys inaction in sealing the boarder. its been 100+ hours since the attack begun and there's still two way traffic. Use youtube to find the videos.. o wait can you? haha

[bell-the-cat]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

TWO UPDATES ON SYRIA'S CHRISTIANS

First Things
March 26 2014

by Mark Movsesian

Two updates on last week's post about the persecution of Christians
in Syria -one hopeful, one much less so.

First the hopeful one. As I wrote last week, the Islamic State
in Iraq and the Levant, an al-Qaeda affiliate fighting with Syrian
opposition, has succeeded in capturing the town of Raqqa and imposing
the classical dhimma on the town's Christian inhabitants.The dhimma is
a notional contract that Christians make with the Islamic community;
it offers Christians protection and some autonomy in exchange for
their agreement to pay a poll tax called the jizya and to accept
restrictions on their dress, movement, construction of churches, etc.

Although the historical origins are obscure, the dhimma was a standard
concept in classical Islamic law. The Ottomans abandoned the concept
only in the 19th century. Its revival now, even in this limited way,
is a very worrying sign.

In a response to my post, a post at Andrew Sullivan's blog points to
comments condemning ISIL by a scholar at Egypt's al-Azhar University,
the leading center of Sunni Islamic learning. The scholar, Sheikh
Abdul Zahir Shehata, maintains that Islamic law makes imposition of
the dhimma illegal in these circumstances. ISIL's collection of the
jizya , he says, is "a form of theft that uses religion as a cover."

It's gratifying to see someone from al-Azhar making the point. But
there is a certain ambiguity in Shehata's remarks. If you read them
closely, you see that he is not necessarily condemning the jizya as
such, only its collection by a renegade group:

"ISIL contradicts itself," Shehata said. "On the one hand they say
they are implementing the provisions of Islamic sharia, including the
'jizya', however the Islamic state must be a full-fledged state and
recognised by its citizens and subjects, which is not the case in
the areas where ISIL is imposing its control by force and bloodshed."

Maybe it's a problem with the translation, or perhaps one has to
read the whole interview to understand Shehata's point. But it's
important to focus on the nuances. Perhaps Shehata's real point
is that only a true Islamic law state, not a band of rebels acting
outside government authority, may impose the jizya-in which case,
Syria's Christians may find his rejection of ISIL's actions less
reassuring than first appears.

The less hopeful update: over the weekend, fighters with a different
al-Qaeda offshoot in the opposition, a rival of ISIL known as the Nusra
Front, captured the Armenian Christian town of Kessab. The fighters
crossed the border from Turkey, where their bases are located, and
attacked the town on Friday. By Sunday, it had fallen.

Thousands of Kessab's Christians-some of whom had sought refuge from
Raqqa-have fled to the nearby city of Latakia, where they receiving
assistance from the local community, the Red Cross, and Red Crescent.

Eyewitnesses report that the Nusra Front has looted Christian homes
and stores and desecrated churches in Kessab.

Many Armenian Christians in Kessab descend from refugees who fled
the last great persecution of Christians in the region, the Armenian
Genocide of 1915-itself a byproduct, in part, of a jihad the Ottoman
Empire declared against Christians during World War I. The sad ironies
will not escape any of the Christians in Syria today.

http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/fir...ias-christians

Firstly, any article with the word "dhimma" in it is almost certainly Zionist propaganda. Of course the article is all third-hand stuff, but even first hand stuff has no facts to back up claims like "The fighters crossed the border from Turkey, where their bases are located". Are these bases invisible? If not, name them, give the coordinates. Are they actually "refugee" camps? Hatay is a densely populated area, not some wilderness in the middle of nowhere.

[bell-the-cat]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

You want a hard fact how bout turkeys inaction in sealing the boarder. its been 100+ hours since the attack begun and there's still two way traffic. Use youtube to find the videos.. o wait can you? haha

It wouldl be too much to expect a serious conversation with an Armenian.

[gokorik]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

Look whos talking are you seriously trying to deny the fact that 2 way traffic has existed since monday

[gokorik]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

And that nothing has been done to seal the boarder. Either the boarder is intentionally been abandoned temporarily or the government is unable to maintain control over certain areas in its territory (Failed state)

[Haykakan]

Re: Bashar al-Assad, Syria and the Armenian people

O cmon Bell you are so hypocritical its making me sick. You just posted the conversation where the Turkish authorities are discussing the use of groups like Nusra and ISIL for their own goals yet you are now saying there is no proof. Then you accuse this as being zionist propaganda when the zionists and the turcks are actually on the SAME SIDE!!!! You are so full of CCRRAAPPP!!!!!