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Syria: Another Case of US-“Israeli” Divergence

Syria: Another Case of US-“Israeli” Divergence
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Ali Rizk

The latest furor about the use of chemical weapons in Syria has led to the drawing of similarities with the run up to the US war on Iraq back in 2003. However such an analogy overlooks some fundamental differences worthy of close scrutiny. While the "weapons of mass destruction" factor applies to both the Iraqi and Syrian cases (chemical weapons falls within the category of weapons of mass destruction), it is important to look at who made the declaration of the use of such weapons in each of the two cases.

Syria: Another Case of US-“Israeli” DivergenceIn the run up to the war on Iraq the neoconservatives of the ideologically driven Bush administration (see here Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz etc) were the ones who "played around" with intelligence which later led to then- US secretary of state Colin Powell to make the case for war in a speech to the security council under the false pre-text of weapons of mass destruction. In simple terms a group of right wing neocons craving for war took advantage of a US public which had just come out of the September 11 attacks, and therefore ready to stand behind the political leadership for a war which it perceived as part of the response to the most dangerous attacks on the homeland.
When one takes the current case of Syria on the other hand, we find that "Israel" is the one which made the first announcement about "the Syrian government" using Chemical weapons. The announcement was made publicly by Itai Brun, the head of the military intelligence division of the "Israeli" army, and came after repeated remarks by US president Barak Obama about the "chemical weapons red line" which has been interpreted as the line which, if crossed would lead to US military action against the Syrian government. What was the reaction of the US government to the "Israeli" claim?

US officials initially said they were surprised by the "Israeli" announcement and implied they had no such knowledge. What followed then was that these same officials (see Chuck Hagel, John Kerry) referred to "intelligence assessments of varying degrees of confidence that the regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale".

Then , in what appeared to be an "Israeli" response to the American response, "Israeli" media quoted a senior "Israeli" official saying:
"these are not intelligence estimates... rather proof, and even more than proof. There is substantial material about the use of chemical weapons by Assad's army. It is known to all intelligence agencies. All intelligence elements have been updated. No one has any doubts on the matter."

This time the American response was presumably, a much bigger disappointment to "Israel". After repeatedly stressing the necessity of sending in UN team to investigate the possible use of chemical weapons, US president Barack Obama stated in a white house press conference that "we don't know how they (chemical weapons) were used, when they were used,...who used them".

So while in 2003 US officials were enthusiastic for military adventures and dragged the country into war, today it appears that "Israeli" officials are enthusiastic to drag the US to war. This enthusiasm however is not shared by Washington with the American public mood in the post 9/11, post Iraq war and soon to be post Afghan war period completely the opposite of what it was in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. Obama's reluctance to get involved in another military adventure is very much connected to this factor and his stance received a boost with a recent poll conducted by the New York Times finding that 61% of people surveyed were against military action against Syria, even after the talk of chemical weapons.

The correct similarity to draw however could be between Syria and Iran, rather than Syria and Iraq. One of the most important observations one can make from the debate over war against the Islamic Republic of Iran, is that Washington, after its decline in power as a result of the military approach of Bush administration after 9/11 can no longer afford to do whatever "Israel" wants. To put it in a different way, just as the policy towards Iran revealed the difference in priorities between the Iranophobic Netanyahu government and the war-weary Obama administration, the policy towards Syria is revealing the exact same thing.

A major reason why one should draw the similarities between the case of Iran and the case of Syria is that the alliance between the two is strategic and Tehran views that the campaign against Damascus is a campaign against the resistance front led by the Islamic Republic.(a view which is correct and explains why the Iranophobic Netanyahu government wants foreign military intervention in Syria). In his latest speech Hizbullah secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said that "Syria's real friends (read here Iran, Hizbullah and Russia) would not allow Syria to fall into the hands of the US, "Israel" or the Takfiri's".

Sayyed Hassan's statements were made in the midst of the debate about foreign military intervention under the pre-text of chemical weapons and after he met Iranian Supreme leader Ayotollah Sayyed Ali Khamenei in Tehran and Russian Middle East envoy and deputy foreign minister Mikhael Boghdanov in Beirut. Such a statement means that if the US enters into a war with Syria it will end up entering a war against Syria's allies, including Iran, something the Obama administration has long been trying to avoid. According to well informed sources in Washington," the last thing the white house wants to do is kill Iranians" and "war with Iran is not even on the horizon".

So just as the big question in the case of Iran has been whether or not Tel Aviv will launch unilateral strike on Tehran without US consent, the same question must be asked in the case of Syria.

Source: moqawama.org

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