Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
Nobody locally is willing to fight for Assad, so it’s all moot what we might think.
Yes of course, what I take issue with is people on here celebrating his downfall without taking a single moment to think about how it might not be such a great result for Europe.
Farage wants to leave the ECHR. Is this a popular policy?
Saying woke foreigners are interfering with British Sovereignty is a tried and trusted method of undermining a European institution. I think it happened once before about a decade ago, although I might be wrong.
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
That's absolute rubbish. Russia has not been 'protecting' Syria; it has been protecting the areas that Assad still controlled.
Also, Syria has been very useful to Russia: It has been a training ground for their troops / air force. It has granted them a very useful naval base. The air bases give them freight contact with Africa (from where they are getting lots of money via mercenaries).
It also is another nail in the coffin of the idea they are a world power. CSTO utterly failed to come to Armenia's aid last year, and now Russia may be thrown out of another important military ally. These are not signs of strength.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
Nobody locally is willing to fight for Assad, so it’s all moot what we might think.
Yes of course, what I take issue with is people on here celebrating his downfall without taking a single moment to think about how it might not be such a great result for Europe.
I, for one, am not 'celebrating' his downfall. But I am also not mourning it.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
If things go well some Syrian refugees will return. That was looking very unlikely while Assad remained in power and the civil war remained unresolved.
It's a fair metric for whether Assad's fall was a positive step. If more refugees result then that's a pretty clear sign it was not. If refugees start to return then that's an equally clear sign that what follows is an improvement.
Irrespective, there will be new refugees created. Anyone too close to the old Assad regime will be trying to hightail it out the country.
(And - of course - this is why the Trump administration's policies towards Mexico are so dumb. The more you wreck the Mexican economy via tariffs, the more you create people with nothing to lose by heading North across the Rio Grande.)
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
Nobody locally is willing to fight for Assad, so it’s all moot what we might think.
Yes of course, what I take issue with is people on here celebrating his downfall without taking a single moment to think about how it might not be such a great result for Europe.
I, for one, am not 'celebrating' his downfall. But I am also not mourning it.
The same attitude people had when Gaddafi fell in Libya, which has turned out brilliantly for us.
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
Obama was wrong to threaten to do something and then not do it.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
Nobody locally is willing to fight for Assad, so it’s all moot what we might think.
Yes of course, what I take issue with is people on here celebrating his downfall without taking a single moment to think about how it might not be such a great result for Europe.
I, for one, am not 'celebrating' his downfall. But I am also not mourning it.
The same attitude people had when Gaddafi fell in Libya, which has turned out brilliantly for us.
So you are mourning Assad's regime? You would have wanted it to continue?
If so, that's rather unreasonable. It was not a static, permanent situation, as we have seen over the last couple of weeks. Unless you wanted Assad to retake the whole country, with all that would have entailed for the populations that rebelled...
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
We did not cause this destabilisation. The events of the last few weeks were not triggered by the west, but by others. Perversely, Hamas on October 6th, and Putin in 2022, may have been the major triggers. Iran/Hezbollah and Russia have been the forces holding Assad up. Russia's massively weakened, as is Hezbollah. Both need their fighters elsewhere.
I'm also rather sceptical about your immigration fears. The countries that have done the vast majority of work to house Syrian refugees are those adjacent countries such as Turkey and Jordan. We have taken a few tens of thousands of Syrian refugees. Turkey has taken over three million; Jordan over half a million. (1)
*If* the new regime is better than Assad (not hard...), then many of those may actually want to return home.
I remember the complaints on here about Cameron's plan to pay those countries housing Syrian refugees, to help them with the costs. Many - especially on the right - vociferously complained about this.
I argued he was right then, and *if* there is another massive outflow of refugees, we should do the same now.
You are absolutely correct in identifying the proximate triggers of the collapse: the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the Hamas attack on Israel both meant that the traditional supporters of the Assad regime no longer had the ability to prop it up.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
Nobody locally is willing to fight for Assad, so it’s all moot what we might think.
Yes of course, what I take issue with is people on here celebrating his downfall without taking a single moment to think about how it might not be such a great result for Europe.
I, for one, am not 'celebrating' his downfall. But I am also not mourning it.
The same attitude people had when Gaddafi fell in Libya, which has turned out brilliantly for us.
So you are mourning Assad's regime? You would have wanted it to continue?
If so, that's rather unreasonable. It was not a static, permanent situation, as we have seen over the last couple of weeks. Unless you wanted Assad to retake the whole country, with all that would have entailed for the populations that rebelled...
I'd rather have propped him up from the off when we decided not to help the FSA. We should have covertly sent enough help to keep him in power and stable rather than have Russia step in and dilute our influence in the area. Yeah it would have been shit and made us feel dirty but that's politics for you.
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
Obama was wrong to threaten to do something and then not do it.
I’m afraid to say that we are heading for war with the EU. Look at this EPP graphic of the Mercosur deal where they paint the Falklands as part of Argentina:
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
Obama was wrong to threaten to do something and then not do it.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
We're not replacing anyone.
The fact is that the Assad family have ruled a country by brutal repression of most of its inhabitants, on behalf of 20% of its population, for decades. The dad was an evil bastard, but he kept the autocracy stable. The son is every bit as evil - and has even more blood on his hands - but is also incompetent.
You're effectively arguing that we intervene against the majority of the population, to keep a weak ruler who's also a war criminal in power. That's just bullshit.
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
Obama was wrong to threaten to do something and then not do it.
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
Obama was wrong to threaten to do something and then not do it.
And we should remember Miliband's part in that...
"There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia"
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
Nobody locally is willing to fight for Assad, so it’s all moot what we might think.
Yes of course, what I take issue with is people on here celebrating his downfall without taking a single moment to think about how it might not be such a great result for Europe.
I, for one, am not 'celebrating' his downfall. But I am also not mourning it.
The same attitude people had when Gaddafi fell in Libya, which has turned out brilliantly for us.
So you are mourning Assad's regime? You would have wanted it to continue?
If so, that's rather unreasonable. It was not a static, permanent situation, as we have seen over the last couple of weeks. Unless you wanted Assad to retake the whole country, with all that would have entailed for the populations that rebelled...
I'd rather have propped him up from the off when we decided not to help the FSA. We should have covertly sent enough help to keep him in power and stable rather than have Russia step in and dilute our influence in the area. Yeah it would have been shit and made us feel dirty but that's politics for you.
That would have been like propping up Mussolini in 1943. We would have been propping up an evil; one who the world had censured for use of chemical weapons.
Farage wants to leave the ECHR. Is this a popular policy?
Saying woke foreigners are interfering with British Sovereignty is a tried and trusted method of undermining a European institution. I think it happened once before about a decade ago, although I might be wrong.
It'll certainly be a popular policy once he has banged on about it for next four years with the help of social media disinformation funded by god knows who.
And we would join Russia in being the only other european country to not be in it iirc. So what's not to like for our man of the people Nige?
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
Obama was wrong to threaten to do something and then not do it.
And we should remember Miliband's part in that...
"There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia"
Erm, isn't there a vital naval base?
And a lot of prestige.
The popularity of Russia with dictatorships is largely based on the strong man image. Russians fleeing isn't a good look for them.
Events in Syria are progressing fast, and who knows where they will end, but they are certainly bad for both Russia and Iran.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
If things go well some Syrian refugees will return. That was looking very unlikely while Assad remained in power and the civil war remained unresolved.
It's a fair metric for whether Assad's fall was a positive step. If more refugees result then that's a pretty clear sign it was not. If refugees start to return then that's an equally clear sign that what follows is an improvement.
Irrespective, there will be new refugees created. Anyone too close to the old Assad regime will be trying to hightail it out the country...
By what route, though ? The brutal geographic facts don't allow for the kind of mass migration Assad precipitated when he bombed Aleppo.
Bill Kristol and Trump 2.0 finally find agreement:
Bill Kristol @BillKristol · 1h Syria's future will be complicated, but we should celebrate if Assad falls.
(I can't help but add that Obama's failure to enforce his red line after Assad used chemical weapons in August, 2013, was a disastrous decision, with terrible consequences for Syria and far beyond.)
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
That's absolute rubbish. Russia has not been 'protecting' Syria; it has been protecting the areas that Assad still controlled.
Also, Syria has been very useful to Russia: It has been a training ground for their troops / air force. It has granted them a very useful naval base. The air bases give them freight contact with Africa (from where they are getting lots of money via mercenaries).
It also is another nail in the coffin of the idea they are a world power. CSTO utterly failed to come to Armenia's aid last year, and now Russia may be thrown out of another important military ally. These are not signs of strength.
You should pay more attention to him rubbing salt in the wound over their failure in Ukraine.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
Nobody locally is willing to fight for Assad, so it’s all moot what we might think.
Yes of course, what I take issue with is people on here celebrating his downfall without taking a single moment to think about how it might not be such a great result for Europe.
I, for one, am not 'celebrating' his downfall. But I am also not mourning it.
The same attitude people had when Gaddafi fell in Libya, which has turned out brilliantly for us.
So you are mourning Assad's regime? You would have wanted it to continue?
If so, that's rather unreasonable. It was not a static, permanent situation, as we have seen over the last couple of weeks. Unless you wanted Assad to retake the whole country, with all that would have entailed for the populations that rebelled...
I'd rather have propped him up from the off when we decided not to help the FSA. We should have covertly sent enough help to keep him in power and stable rather than have Russia step in and dilute our influence in the area. Yeah it would have been shit and made us feel dirty but that's politics for you.
That would have been like propping up Mussolini in 1943. We would have been propping up an evil; one who the world had censured for use of chemical weapons.
I also doubt Assad would have gone for it.
Unless there was an alternative secularish dictator available to install we should have propped him up from the beginning. It's also not like keeping Mussolini in power because the known outcome in Italy would be some kind of democracy and an improvement in living standards for Italians and surrounding nations. Removing dictators in middle eastern countries has never had that outcome. It gets worse every time.
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
Extremely unlikely. If the Tories are under 30 in 2028 it means Reform are flourishing, so the Tories will need a leader able to cut a deal with Farage
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
Hunt has about as much chance of winning the Tory membership vote as Dominic Grieve.
He also has zero chance of squeezing the Reform vote and Labour is already below 30% and cannot be squeezed much further anyway and while Hunt might squeeze the LDs a little they are only on 11-12% still too, Reform are polling double that
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
Obama was wrong to threaten to do something and then not do it.
And we should remember Miliband's part in that...
"There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia"
I’m afraid to say that we are heading for war with the EU. Look at this EPP graphic of the Mercosur deal where they paint the Falklands as part of Argentina:
They've done another version of the graphic which doesn't have the Falklands coloured in blue. Will we downgrade the war to a mere punitive expedition?
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
Obama was wrong to threaten to do something and then not do it.
Had Obama toppled Assad in 2013 it would have been even worse than now, maybe with ISIS taking over almost all the nation
I’m afraid to say that we are heading for war with the EU. Look at this EPP graphic of the Mercosur deal where they paint the Falklands as part of Argentina:
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
Nobody locally is willing to fight for Assad, so it’s all moot what we might think.
As I said Alawites likely will for their own survival if nothing else
I’m afraid to say that we are heading for war with the EU. Look at this EPP graphic of the Mercosur deal where they paint the Falklands as part of Argentina:
They've done another version of the graphic which doesn't have the Falklands coloured in blue. Will we downgrade the war to a mere punitive expedition?
If the expedition gets in trouble then we'll be able to get it back unscathed in the small boats this time.
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
Extremely unlikely. If the Tories are under 30 in 2028 it means Reform are flourishing, so the Tories will need a leader able to cut a deal with Farage
Hypothetically, it would be interesting to see how a Tory party that was totally focused on retaining the upmarket part of its coalition would do in Tory/Lib Dem marginals. It would be a different kind of core vote strategy that ceded the working class vote to Reform.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
If Assad's regime falls completely then we should provide haven for the few remaining Christians left in Syria, about 2% of the population now only and if the rebels start massacring Alawites take any Lebanon can't. That is it
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
Nobody locally is willing to fight for Assad, so it’s all moot what we might think.
Yes of course, what I take issue with is people on here celebrating his downfall without taking a single moment to think about how it might not be such a great result for Europe.
I, for one, am not 'celebrating' his downfall. But I am also not mourning it.
The same attitude people had when Gaddafi fell in Libya, which has turned out brilliantly for us.
So you are mourning Assad's regime? You would have wanted it to continue?
If so, that's rather unreasonable. It was not a static, permanent situation, as we have seen over the last couple of weeks. Unless you wanted Assad to retake the whole country, with all that would have entailed for the populations that rebelled...
I'd rather have propped him up from the off when we decided not to help the FSA. We should have covertly sent enough help to keep him in power and stable rather than have Russia step in and dilute our influence in the area. Yeah it would have been shit and made us feel dirty but that's politics for you.
That would have been like propping up Mussolini in 1943. We would have been propping up an evil; one who the world had censured for use of chemical weapons.
I also doubt Assad would have gone for it.
Unless there was an alternative secularish dictator available to install we should have propped him up from the beginning. It's also not like keeping Mussolini in power because the known outcome in Italy would be some kind of democracy and an improvement in living standards for Italians and surrounding nations. Removing dictators in middle eastern countries has never had that outcome. It gets worse every time.
IANAE on it, but AIUI there was a significant chance of Italy becoming Communist immediately after WW2, with Communist political parties popular - especially if the socialists and communists had joined forces. If my understanding is correct, then your assertion of it becoming a 'democracy' was not guaranteed.
According to Flight Radar, and Big Jet TV (Youtube), Emirates flight 31 from Dubai to Heathrow tried landing there THREE times, now diverted to Frankfurt, just landing there in a few minutes!
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
So he's saying - if I parse it correctly that:
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
Obama was wrong to threaten to do something and then not do it.
Had Obama toppled Assad in 2013 it would have been even worse than now, maybe with ISIS taking over almost all the nation
The he shouldn't have made his threat (with William Hague as cheerleader).
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
It would need the MPs to panic and arrange another coronation - the members would never stand for him.
Hunt might actually be the best placed of the potential candidates to do a deal with Refuk - on the understanding that the Hunt-led Tories would concentrate on battling the Lib Dems in the Tory shires, whilst Refuk are given free reign in the red wall / left-behind areas.
Not sure he'd find that a particularly appealing prospect, though!
I’m afraid to say that we are heading for war with the EU. Look at this EPP graphic of the Mercosur deal where they paint the Falklands as part of Argentina:
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
If Assad's regime falls completely then we should provide haven for the few remaining Christians left in Syria, about 2% of the population now only and if the rebels start massacring Alawites take any Lebanon can't. That is it
Why should Christians go to the top of the list, compared to any other religious grouping Islamist nutters may go after? The Yazidi, who so many people on here seem to care about and were treated so badly by ISIS/L, were not Christian.
“Come January 2025,” Willis added on Facebook, “my wife will start suing each and every news organisation that falsely refers to YMCA, either in their headlines or alluded to in the base of the story, that YMCA is somehow a gay anthem because such notion is based solely on the song’s lyrics alluding to elicit [sic] activity for which it does not.”..
President Zelensky in congregation at Notre Dame cathedral reopening as well as President elect Trump and Prince William and President Macron and German President Steinmeier and the Prince of Monaco. Trump just spoken to Prince William
What are the Arab countries going to do about Syria? I don't imagine they like seeing the imperial powers battling it out.
Are Arab countries in any position to do anything about it?
Saudi Arabia has failed in its intervention in Yemen. Iraq has enough trouble of its own. Jordan seems to have stayed relatively stable in recent decades precisely by not getting involved in other countries troubles.
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
It would need the MPs to panic and arrange another coronation - the members would never stand for him.
Hunt might actually be the best placed of the potential candidates to do a deal with Refuk - on the understanding that the Hunt-led Tories would concentrate on battling the Lib Dems in the Tory shires, whilst Refuk are given free reign in the red wall / left-behind areas.
Not sure he'd find that a particularly appealing prospect, though!
Hmm. Interesting argument.
I just stuck a couple of £ on him at the 46 on display and for some reason got in at 170.
“Come January 2025,” Willis added on Facebook, “my wife will start suing each and every news organisation that falsely refers to YMCA, either in their headlines or alluded to in the base of the story, that YMCA is somehow a gay anthem because such notion is based solely on the song’s lyrics alluding to elicit [sic] activity for which it does not.”..
I'm looking forward to the court cases.
That's not what my acquaintance, who used to clean out YMCA hot tubs, says.
The Assad regime is crumbling in Syria, in a way that could not really have been predicted. This has significant implications for Russia, who use Syria for access to the Mediterranean and to support their fleet in the Med.
Anyone with any wise insights into the implications, if any. Is this all good or bad.
According to Flight Radar, and Big Jet TV (Youtube), Emirates flight 31 from Dubai to Heathrow tried landing there THREE times, now diverted to Frankfurt, just landing there in a few minutes!
Nice guy that PBers think we should have propped up. This is just one of his prisons, though one of the more notorious.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sednaya_Prison Sednaya Prison (Arabic: سجن صيدنايا Sajn Ṣaydnāyā), nicknamed the "Human Slaughterhouse"[a] is a military prison near Damascus in Syria operated by the Syrian government. The prison has been used to hold thousands of prisoners, both civilian detainees and anti-government rebels.[1][2] The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) estimated in January 2021 that 30,000 detainees have perished in Sednaya from torture, ill-treatment and mass executions since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War,[3] while Amnesty International estimated in February 2017 "that between 5,000 and 13,000 people were extrajudicially executed at Saydnaya between September 2011 and December 2015."
A former inmate of the prison who was detained for participating in a peaceful non-violent protest told Amnesty International that at Sednaya prisoners were forced to choose between dying themselves or killing one of their own relatives or friends. The former inmate also stated that in the first prison he was at, prisoners were also forced into cannibalism, but that prison was "heaven" compared to Sednaya Prison. According to the inmate, the other prison (Branch 215) was "to interrogate" (including through torture), but when that was done, you were moved to Sednaya "to die"...
The headline is already absurd enough, then you realise they are talking about Chingford.
Building THREE new homes is now beyond the pale. THREE!
Approved by the Planning Committee.
Looking in the local press, it's classic NIMBYism. "I supporting housing, just not HERE .. ug, ug, ug !"
Resident Simon Twohig said during last night’s meeting: “We appreciate the long-term need [for housing], but this is too many residential buildings in too small and confined a location.” Locals previously told the Local Democracy Reporting Service the street was “losing its identity,” and extra cars would mean “chaos, absolute chaos”. https://www.essexlive.news/news/essex-news/leafy-essex-border-neighbourhood-losing-9772295
Why even the need for the planning committee? What is ever wrong with three houses?
These people need to be told to kindly F off.
If SKS loses on this issue with such a majority he’s lost me for good.
Hang on, Horse, that headline isn't by the objectors, who are clearly referring to the street. And that is at least something that is logically tenable, whether or not the position taken.
Obviously by some crap AI system. So don't blame them for it, [edit] like the tweeter does.
No it isn’t.
Rejecting the building of three houses is not logically tenable in any way.
It is, if the location is too small or dangerous, for instance.
Otherwise you're saying it is unjustifiable to refuse *any* planning application (OK, for three or more houses). And therefore effectively demanding that the planning system is completely cancelled.
Which is a completely different matter to complaining about a specific case of people complaining about three houses. Where you may well be justified [edit].
Whilst I agree that specific objection to specific schemes can be valid if (in England) they are about "relevant planning matters" (there's a longish list). I had a proposed profit-mongering house very close to one of my tenants reduced from 5 bedrooms to 3 bedrooms, because it loomed over the garden like the Balrog over Gandalf at Khazad-dum (metaphorically); I'm very good at writing objections where necessary.
It ... Did ... Not ... Pass (unmodified).
Quite often a large majority are laid aside because they are not about things that can objected about, and getting a PP through is partly about drawing the potential teeth first. Maybe 80-90% of objections are 57 varieties of "Waaaaaaahhhhh !".
Here the planning committee passed the proposal, which means that it had been evaluated according to law by professionals, and the committee agreed.
So I think Nimby likely to be a fair accusation here, given that the mindset is often "but we HAVE to oppose development, don't we?".
Just catching up on the day’s events after going out for a long lunch (but got volunteered to be the driver).
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
Just catching up on the day’s events after going out for a long lunch (but got volunteered to be the driver).
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
Starmer is not UK head of state, the German Chancellor isn't there only the German President, Prince William is there on behalf of the King
Just catching up on the day’s events after going out for a long lunch (but got volunteered to be the driver).
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
The event was for heads of state, wasn't it? I think Prince Billy went...
The Assad regime is crumbling in Syria, in a way that could not really have been predicted. This has significant implications for Russia, who use Syria for access to the Mediterranean and to support their fleet in the Med.
Anyone with any wise insights into the implications, if any. Is this all good or bad.
Uncomfortable for Israel. Good for Turkey. Bad for Iran. And if you don't like these insights I've others...
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
If Assad's regime falls completely then we should provide haven for the few remaining Christians left in Syria, about 2% of the population now only and if the rebels start massacring Alawites take any Lebanon can't. That is it
Why should Christians go to the top of the list, compared to any other religious grouping Islamist nutters may go after? The Yazidi, who so many people on here seem to care about and were treated so badly by ISIS/L, were not Christian.
Because Christians generally won’t blow us up, drive into Christmas markets, machete our soldiers on British streets, or behead teachers. They are also less likely to do honour killings, cousin marriage, racist grooming gang rapes, and so forth
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
It would need the MPs to panic and arrange another coronation - the members would never stand for him.
Hunt might actually be the best placed of the potential candidates to do a deal with Refuk - on the understanding that the Hunt-led Tories would concentrate on battling the Lib Dems in the Tory shires, whilst Refuk are given free reign in the red wall / left-behind areas.
Not sure he'd find that a particularly appealing prospect, though!
The Tories could adopt a strategy of aiming to make it Labour that Reform replace rather than themselves. Let Jenrick et al join Reform to take the fight to Labour in WWC seats while they focus on driving the Lib Dems out of the Tory shires. They could even become the party of Rejoin and outflank Labour on the EU.
Nice guy that PBers think we should have propped up. This is just one of his prisons, though one of the more notorious.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sednaya_Prison Sednaya Prison (Arabic: سجن صيدنايا Sajn Ṣaydnāyā), nicknamed the "Human Slaughterhouse"[a] is a military prison near Damascus in Syria operated by the Syrian government. The prison has been used to hold thousands of prisoners, both civilian detainees and anti-government rebels.[1][2] The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) estimated in January 2021 that 30,000 detainees have perished in Sednaya from torture, ill-treatment and mass executions since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War,[3] while Amnesty International estimated in February 2017 "that between 5,000 and 13,000 people were extrajudicially executed at Saydnaya between September 2011 and December 2015."
A former inmate of the prison who was detained for participating in a peaceful non-violent protest told Amnesty International that at Sednaya prisoners were forced to choose between dying themselves or killing one of their own relatives or friends. The former inmate also stated that in the first prison he was at, prisoners were also forced into cannibalism, but that prison was "heaven" compared to Sednaya Prison. According to the inmate, the other prison (Branch 215) was "to interrogate" (including through torture), but when that was done, you were moved to Sednaya "to die"...
Straw man. Not a single PBer is saying Assad is anything but an evil bastard. The question is: will his likely replacements be even worse?
It’s the choice between Stalin or Hitler. We chose to support Stalin, who was personally responsible for the torture and death of MILLIONS
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
It would need the MPs to panic and arrange another coronation - the members would never stand for him.
Hunt might actually be the best placed of the potential candidates to do a deal with Refuk - on the understanding that the Hunt-led Tories would concentrate on battling the Lib Dems in the Tory shires, whilst Refuk are given free reign in the red wall / left-behind areas.
Not sure he'd find that a particularly appealing prospect, though!
There are only 17 LibDem seats among the top 100 Conservative targets and likely a lot harder to gain.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
If Assad's regime falls completely then we should provide haven for the few remaining Christians left in Syria, about 2% of the population now only and if the rebels start massacring Alawites take any Lebanon can't. That is it
Why should Christians go to the top of the list, compared to any other religious grouping Islamist nutters may go after? The Yazidi, who so many people on here seem to care about and were treated so badly by ISIS/L, were not Christian.
Because Christians generally won’t blow us up, drive into Christmas markets, machete our soldiers on British streets, or behead teachers. They are also less likely to do honour killings, cousin marriage, racist grooming gang rapes, and so forth
Which shows you know - or ignore - nearly 2,000 years of Christian history.
I also thought you were a friend of the Yazidi. Now you're saying they'll be doing all that?
The headline is already absurd enough, then you realise they are talking about Chingford.
Building THREE new homes is now beyond the pale. THREE!
Approved by the Planning Committee.
Looking in the local press, it's classic NIMBYism. "I supporting housing, just not HERE .. ug, ug, ug !"
Resident Simon Twohig said during last night’s meeting: “We appreciate the long-term need [for housing], but this is too many residential buildings in too small and confined a location.” Locals previously told the Local Democracy Reporting Service the street was “losing its identity,” and extra cars would mean “chaos, absolute chaos”. https://www.essexlive.news/news/essex-news/leafy-essex-border-neighbourhood-losing-9772295
Why even the need for the planning committee? What is ever wrong with three houses?
These people need to be told to kindly F off.
If SKS loses on this issue with such a majority he’s lost me for good.
Hang on, Horse, that headline isn't by the objectors, who are clearly referring to the street. And that is at least something that is logically tenable, whether or not the position taken.
Obviously by some crap AI system. So don't blame them for it, [edit] like the tweeter does.
No it isn’t.
Rejecting the building of three houses is not logically tenable in any way.
It is, if the location is too small or dangerous, for instance.
Otherwise you're saying it is unjustifiable to refuse *any* planning application (OK, for three or more houses). And therefore effectively demanding that the planning system is completely cancelled.
Which is a completely different matter to complaining about a specific case of people complaining about three houses. Where you may well be justified [edit].
Whilst I agree that specific objection to specific schemes can be valid if (in England) they are about "relevant planning matters" (there's a longish list). I had a proposed profit-mongering house very close to one of my tenants reduced from 5 bedrooms to 3 bedrooms, because it loomed over the garden like the Balrog over Gandalf at Khazad-dum (metaphorically); I'm very good at writing objections where necessary.
It ... Did ... Not ... Pass (unmodified).
Quite often a large majority are laid aside because they are not about things that can objected about, and getting a PP through is partly about drawing the potential teeth first. Maybe 80-90% of objections are 57 varieties of "Waaaaaaahhhhh !".
Here the planning committee passed the proposal, which means that it had been evaluated according to law by professionals, and the committee agreed.
So I think Nimby likely to be a fair accusation here, given that the mindset is often "but we HAVE to oppose development, don't we?".
Nice guy that PBers think we should have propped up. This is just one of his prisons, though one of the more notorious.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sednaya_Prison Sednaya Prison (Arabic: سجن صيدنايا Sajn Ṣaydnāyā), nicknamed the "Human Slaughterhouse"[a] is a military prison near Damascus in Syria operated by the Syrian government. The prison has been used to hold thousands of prisoners, both civilian detainees and anti-government rebels.[1][2] The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) estimated in January 2021 that 30,000 detainees have perished in Sednaya from torture, ill-treatment and mass executions since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War,[3] while Amnesty International estimated in February 2017 "that between 5,000 and 13,000 people were extrajudicially executed at Saydnaya between September 2011 and December 2015."
A former inmate of the prison who was detained for participating in a peaceful non-violent protest told Amnesty International that at Sednaya prisoners were forced to choose between dying themselves or killing one of their own relatives or friends. The former inmate also stated that in the first prison he was at, prisoners were also forced into cannibalism, but that prison was "heaven" compared to Sednaya Prison. According to the inmate, the other prison (Branch 215) was "to interrogate" (including through torture), but when that was done, you were moved to Sednaya "to die"...
Straw man. Not a single PBer is saying Assad is anything but an evil bastard. The question is: will his likely replacements be even worse?
It’s the choice between Stalin or Hitler. We chose to support Stalin, who was personally responsible for the torture and death of MILLIONS
Just catching up on the day’s events after going out for a long lunch (but got volunteered to be the driver).
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
Your bias is showing. This is a silly attack. It is heads of state so of course Starmer wasn’t there.
Nice guy that PBers think we should have propped up. This is just one of his prisons, though one of the more notorious.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sednaya_Prison Sednaya Prison (Arabic: سجن صيدنايا Sajn Ṣaydnāyā), nicknamed the "Human Slaughterhouse"[a] is a military prison near Damascus in Syria operated by the Syrian government. The prison has been used to hold thousands of prisoners, both civilian detainees and anti-government rebels.[1][2] The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) estimated in January 2021 that 30,000 detainees have perished in Sednaya from torture, ill-treatment and mass executions since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War,[3] while Amnesty International estimated in February 2017 "that between 5,000 and 13,000 people were extrajudicially executed at Saydnaya between September 2011 and December 2015."
A former inmate of the prison who was detained for participating in a peaceful non-violent protest told Amnesty International that at Sednaya prisoners were forced to choose between dying themselves or killing one of their own relatives or friends. The former inmate also stated that in the first prison he was at, prisoners were also forced into cannibalism, but that prison was "heaven" compared to Sednaya Prison. According to the inmate, the other prison (Branch 215) was "to interrogate" (including through torture), but when that was done, you were moved to Sednaya "to die"...
Straw man. Not a single PBer is saying Assad is anything but an evil bastard. The question is: will his likely replacements be even worse?
It’s the choice between Stalin or Hitler. We chose to support Stalin, who was personally responsible for the torture and death of MILLIONS
Except it clearly isn't. He's a weak and useless leader, and any effort to prop him up is likely futile. All it would achieve is to extend a bloody conflict, and alienate whoever takes over.
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
It would need the MPs to panic and arrange another coronation - the members would never stand for him.
Hunt might actually be the best placed of the potential candidates to do a deal with Refuk - on the understanding that the Hunt-led Tories would concentrate on battling the Lib Dems in the Tory shires, whilst Refuk are given free reign in the red wall / left-behind areas.
Not sure he'd find that a particularly appealing prospect, though!
There are only 17 LibDem seats among the top 100 Conservative targets and likely a lot harder to gain.
The only viable strategy for the Conservatives is to reverse this year's losses to Labour.
And then gain some more from Labour.
We have a situation where the Conservatives could win Bolsover and still have fewer than 300 MPs.
Indeed, though Reform are more likely to win Bolsover and the other redwall seats now.
Badenoch has near zero chance of winning a Tory majority again next time, if she wins power it will mainly be via gaining soft Leave marginal seats held by Labour while Farage wins most hard Leave marginal seats held by Labour. Then the 2 doing a deal together to form a government in a hung parliament
What are the Arab countries going to do about Syria? I don't imagine they like seeing the imperial powers battling it out.
Are Arab countries in any position to do anything about it?
Saudi Arabia has failed in its intervention in Yemen. Iraq has enough trouble of its own. Jordan seems to have stayed relatively stable in recent decades precisely by not getting involved in other countries troubles.
But worth keeping an eye on Jordan - which will be on the lists of extremist targets and, also in the problems department, in the nicest possible way doesn't especially want to be the home of a few million Palestinians seeking a homeland that isn't a pile of rubble.
Mutatis mutandis, also keep an eye on Egypt for the same reasons.
BTW not much sign yet of the Syrian moderates, LibDem community minded types who donate to their local hospice and put up hanging baskets that Cameron wanted us to back not so long ago.
Isn't it odd to be still playing out the aftermath of WWI 106 years after it ended.
Nice guy that PBers think we should have propped up. This is just one of his prisons, though one of the more notorious.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sednaya_Prison Sednaya Prison (Arabic: سجن صيدنايا Sajn Ṣaydnāyā), nicknamed the "Human Slaughterhouse"[a] is a military prison near Damascus in Syria operated by the Syrian government. The prison has been used to hold thousands of prisoners, both civilian detainees and anti-government rebels.[1][2] The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) estimated in January 2021 that 30,000 detainees have perished in Sednaya from torture, ill-treatment and mass executions since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War,[3] while Amnesty International estimated in February 2017 "that between 5,000 and 13,000 people were extrajudicially executed at Saydnaya between September 2011 and December 2015."
A former inmate of the prison who was detained for participating in a peaceful non-violent protest told Amnesty International that at Sednaya prisoners were forced to choose between dying themselves or killing one of their own relatives or friends. The former inmate also stated that in the first prison he was at, prisoners were also forced into cannibalism, but that prison was "heaven" compared to Sednaya Prison. According to the inmate, the other prison (Branch 215) was "to interrogate" (including through torture), but when that was done, you were moved to Sednaya "to die"...
Straw man. Not a single PBer is saying Assad is anything but an evil bastard. The question is: will his likely replacements be even worse?
It’s the choice between Stalin or Hitler. We chose to support Stalin, who was personally responsible for the torture and death of MILLIONS
We didn't choose. Hitler made the choice for us by attacking both us and Stalin.
Just catching up on the day’s events after going out for a long lunch (but got volunteered to be the driver).
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
The event was for heads of state, wasn't it? I think Prince Billy went...
From yesterday’s thread William was a very late addition. Was it really only Heads of State there?
Archbishop of Paris now speaking outside Notre Dame before knocking on great doors to reopen the cathedral officially and choir now starts the service
Not exactly in line with the principals of the Revolution.
Do you think Emperor Sun King Macron gives a shit about the principles of the Revolution? He is the President of the French elite and upper middle class now. The descendants of the peasants and lower middle class who revolted vote for Melenchon or Le Pen
On topic: Rishi's legacy is going to be worse than Trusses.
Turns out useless managerialism combined with a sprinkling of bonkers policies about smoking doesn't cut the mustard
Sunak made mistakes - as Chancellor, as Prime Minister and as Conservative leader.
But the damage was done by the Downing Street parties, Truss cos-playing mytho-Thatcherism and the ocean of sleaze.
The rot was too intrinsic within the Conservatives - they deserved to lose and to lose big.
I say this as someone who voted for them and wants them to learn from their mistakes and misbehaviour.
No it wasn't. The polling trajectory is quite clear. If this were correct, we'd have seen severe drops under Boris, worse under Truss, and Sunak steadying things a bit but falling to mount a significant recovery.
Instead we saw reasonably good polling for Boris until the Sunakites stabbed him, followed by a crash in polling after Truss's minibudget, followed by a cautious recovery when Sunak came in promising to steady the ship, followed by a faltering of that recovery and a slow, steady decline, eventually equalling the worst of Truss. Sunak owns that fully.
You have your political opinion and that's fine, but please don't try to misrepresent the facts on a political betting forum where everyone knows what happened.
Boris destroyed himself by repeatedly breaking his own lockdown rules and then pointlessly trying to protect sleaze merchants such as Patterson and Pincher.
Truss destroyed herself by cos-playing mytho-Thatcherism and putting people's homes and mortgages at risk.
The damage was done. And it couldn't be repaired whoever was Conservative leader.
Could Sunak have done better as Conservative leader ?
Yes. But even if he had done, and the other Conservative politicians had behaved themselves, they would still have lost.
You're not listening. We have frequent opinion polling throughout the entire era, and the polls DO NOT SUPPORT YOUR THEORY.
Its not a theory it was the reality.
You have to deal with it.
Instead you seem to be fantasising about some scenario where everyone ignores Boris breaking his own lockdown rules and then trying to pointlessly protect the likes of Patterson and Pincher.
You need to accept that Boris destroyed himself and thereby damaged the Conservatives.
And then Truss destroyed herself and made the damage terminal.
From then on the Conservatives were headed for defeat, only the scale of the defeat remained to be decided.
Again, like Mexican Pete the other day, you're simply ignoring facts and indulging in rhetoric. We have clear polling on the popularity of the Tory Party throughout the era concerned, we don't need to rely on your feelings about the matter, or mine.
As it happens, I don’t massively rate Boris as a PM (though I rate him as a campaigner) - I thought he was a better than Sunak, but that's not difficult. However, the polls at his nadir showed him about 5 points behind Labour.
Regarding Truss, you say that they couldn't recover after her, but in fact there was a fairly OK recovery on the back of optimism when 'the grown ups' came back in. The polls then went down again, as people found that the Sunak Government was actually a pile of shite. They didn’t go down because more and more people woke up and suddenly found they resented Truss did they - that's an utter nonsense.
Just catching up on the day’s events after going out for a long lunch (but got volunteered to be the driver).
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
He doesn't work after 6pm on a Friday.*
* One of the better Tory clichés.
It's certainly a line Sandpit could feed Nick Ferrari for his Monday morning LBC show.
Just catching up on the day’s events after going out for a long lunch (but got volunteered to be the driver).
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
The event was for heads of state, wasn't it? I think Prince Billy went...
From yesterday’s thread William was a very late addition. Was it really only Heads of State there?
It looks like the Presidents of Germany and Italy attended rather than Scholz and Meloni so Starmer can be excused.
A couple of thousand Syrian Army soldiers have crossed into Iraq and surrendered there. Not seeing much sign of resistance from the Syrian Army today. Can Assad still make it out? Will anyone fight for him to make a last stand?
The speed at which things have moved in the south has been stunning. It might all be over in Damascus before HTS has taken Homs.
The Alawites will, as Assad is one of their own and half of them will be massacred if the Islamist militant rebels take over.
If Assad has any sense he will arm all the Alawites in the Alawi heartland of the Syrian coast and Lebanese border and Alawi areas of Damascus and get them fighting street to street until more Russian mercenaries and Hezbollah fighters arrive to support them
Do you have any evidence for your assertion that the Alawites will be massacred if the rebels take over?
That was 11 years ago and involved ISIL. It's not very strong evidence.
PBers doing PR for Islamists again. Someone pass the sick bag.
How do you think we all feel after all your PR for Putin's evils on here? You must have generated an ocean of vomit.
Do you really think things will get better in Syria with a bunch of jihadis and Islamists in charge? You can dress HTS as much as you like but we're replacing a known enemy with predictable behaviour with an unknown enemy with unpredictable behaviour. How do you think it's going to play out for Syria's minorities with a bunch of Islamists in power? Last time ISIS had territory Yazidi women were turned into sex slaves and sold all across the Arabic world. How will this be any different?
I've never said it would get better, but it's also not very good to ignore Assad's regime and their crimes
If you read my posts on this, much depends on what happens next: HTS does not control the entire country, and I doubt has the ability to take power from the other regional groups (who are not all Islamist by a long shot). So what happens? You also need to throw Turkey into the mix, and its feelings towards the Kurds.
You seem to be happy for Assad to go away, fine, but with no clue as to what replaces that regime. This worked out terribly for the west in Libya which was a stable (though awful) dictatorship and now it's a hellscape of jihadis and Islamists who have made it terrible and a sanctuary for terrorists and people trafficking.
As much as I don't like Assad, the prospect of his replacement is extremely worrying, we're going to get another wave of refugees in Europe, more terrorists and more destabilisation of European countries due to this. If anything can out Marine Le Pen in the Elysee it's 2 million more Muslim refugees entering Europe.
If Assad's regime falls completely then we should provide haven for the few remaining Christians left in Syria, about 2% of the population now only and if the rebels start massacring Alawites take any Lebanon can't. That is it
Why should Christians go to the top of the list, compared to any other religious grouping Islamist nutters may go after? The Yazidi, who so many people on here seem to care about and were treated so badly by ISIS/L, were not Christian.
I'd take any non-Muslims and send back all of the Syrian Muslims who escaped from Assad. Time for their asylum to end.
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
It would need the MPs to panic and arrange another coronation - the members would never stand for him.
Hunt might actually be the best placed of the potential candidates to do a deal with Refuk - on the understanding that the Hunt-led Tories would concentrate on battling the Lib Dems in the Tory shires, whilst Refuk are given free reign in the red wall / left-behind areas.
Not sure he'd find that a particularly appealing prospect, though!
There are only 17 LibDem seats among the top 100 Conservative targets and likely a lot harder to gain.
The only viable strategy for the Conservatives is to reverse this year's losses to Labour.
And then gain some more from Labour.
We have a situation where the Conservatives could win Bolsover and still have fewer than 300 MPs.
Indeed, though Reform are more likely to win Bolsover and the other redwall seats now.
Badenoch has near zero chance of winning a Tory majority again next time, if she wins power it will mainly be via gaining soft Leave marginal seats held by Labour while Farage wins most hard Leave marginal seats held by Labour. Then the 2 doing a deal together to form a government in a hung parliament
The Conservatives will certainly not win a majority if they adopt any attitude of 'giving up' to Reform seats they won in 2019.
The headline is already absurd enough, then you realise they are talking about Chingford.
Building THREE new homes is now beyond the pale. THREE!
Approved by the Planning Committee.
Looking in the local press, it's classic NIMBYism. "I supporting housing, just not HERE .. ug, ug, ug !"
Resident Simon Twohig said during last night’s meeting: “We appreciate the long-term need [for housing], but this is too many residential buildings in too small and confined a location.” Locals previously told the Local Democracy Reporting Service the street was “losing its identity,” and extra cars would mean “chaos, absolute chaos”. https://www.essexlive.news/news/essex-news/leafy-essex-border-neighbourhood-losing-9772295
Why even the need for the planning committee? What is ever wrong with three houses?
These people need to be told to kindly F off.
If SKS loses on this issue with such a majority he’s lost me for good.
Hang on, Horse, that headline isn't by the objectors, who are clearly referring to the street. And that is at least something that is logically tenable, whether or not the position taken.
Obviously by some crap AI system. So don't blame them for it, [edit] like the tweeter does.
No it isn’t.
Rejecting the building of three houses is not logically tenable in any way.
It is, if the location is too small or dangerous, for instance.
Otherwise you're saying it is unjustifiable to refuse *any* planning application (OK, for three or more houses). And therefore effectively demanding that the planning system is completely cancelled.
Which is a completely different matter to complaining about a specific case of people complaining about three houses. Where you may well be justified [edit].
Whilst I agree that specific objection to specific schemes can be valid if (in England) they are about "relevant planning matters" (there's a longish list). I had a proposed profit-mongering house very close to one of my tenants reduced from 5 bedrooms to 3 bedrooms, because it loomed over the garden like the Balrog over Gandalf at Khazad-dum (metaphorically); I'm very good at writing objections where necessary.
It ... Did ... Not ... Pass (unmodified).
Quite often a large majority are laid aside because they are not about things that can objected about, and getting a PP through is partly about drawing the potential teeth first. Maybe 80-90% of objections are 57 varieties of "Waaaaaaahhhhh !".
Here the planning committee passed the proposal, which means that it had been evaluated according to law by professionals, and the committee agreed.
So I think Nimby likely to be a fair accusation here, given that the mindset is often "but we HAVE to oppose development, don't we?".
The design did look like shit though
Who cares?
I Imagine peole who live locally and would have to walk past the monstrosities
BF reckons Jeremy Hunt has more chance of being next PM than Phillipson.
LOL.
I could see Hunt becoming Tory leader in the run up to the election if Kemi has made no impact and we're still below 30%.
It would need the MPs to panic and arrange another coronation - the members would never stand for him.
Hunt might actually be the best placed of the potential candidates to do a deal with Refuk - on the understanding that the Hunt-led Tories would concentrate on battling the Lib Dems in the Tory shires, whilst Refuk are given free reign in the red wall / left-behind areas.
Not sure he'd find that a particularly appealing prospect, though!
There are only 17 LibDem seats among the top 100 Conservative targets and likely a lot harder to gain.
The only viable strategy for the Conservatives is to reverse this year's losses to Labour.
And then gain some more from Labour.
We have a situation where the Conservatives could win Bolsover and still have fewer than 300 MPs.
Indeed, though Reform are more likely to win Bolsover and the other redwall seats now.
Badenoch has near zero chance of winning a Tory majority again next time, if she wins power it will mainly be via gaining soft Leave marginal seats held by Labour while Farage wins most hard Leave marginal seats held by Labour. Then the 2 doing a deal together to form a government in a hung parliament
The Conservatives will certainly not win a majority if they adopt any attitude of 'giving up' to Reform seats they won in 2019.
It is just reality, once Boris went (the only Tory most redwallers would ever vote for) the Tories will likely never win former safe Labour but strong Leave seats like Bolsover, Stoke, West Bromwich, Grimsby, Workington etc again.
Archbishop of Paris now speaking outside Notre Dame before knocking on great doors to reopen the cathedral officially and choir now starts the service
Not exactly in line with the principals of the Revolution.
Do you think Emperor Sun King Macron gives a shit about the principles of the Revolution? He is the President of the French elite and upper middle class now. The descendants of the peasants and lower middle class who revolted vote for Melenchon or Le Pen
Just catching up on the day’s events after going out for a long lunch (but got volunteered to be the driver).
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
The event was for heads of state, wasn't it? I think Prince Billy went...
From yesterday’s thread William was a very late addition. Was it really only Heads of State there?
Maybe he hates Ukraine and is rooting for a Putin win. Oh sorry I mixed Starmer up with Trump.
John Swinney is on course to command a pro-independence majority in Holyrood and lead the SNP into a third decade in power after a popular debut budget as first minister, according to a new poll.
In a significant blow to Scottish Labour, the first survey carried out since the Scottish government’s tax and spend plans were announced has seen the party’s support drop to its lowest level in three years.
Backing for independence has also risen to 54 per cent when undecided voters are excluded, the highest level for more than four years.
Archbishop of Paris now speaking outside Notre Dame before knocking on great doors to reopen the cathedral officially and choir now starts the service
Not exactly in line with the principals of the Revolution.
Do you think Emperor Sun King Macron gives a shit about the principles of the Revolution? He is the President of the French elite and upper middle class now. The descendants of the peasants and lower middle class who revolted vote for Melenchon or Le Pen
Even the bourgeoisie were anti-clerical
The bourgeoisie were classified as lower middle class then, the aristocracy, the clergy were the top 2 Estates and the rest commoners with a few of the wealthiest merchants and landowners also effectively the elite
Just catching up on the day’s events after going out for a long lunch (but got volunteered to be the driver).
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
Comments
Opposition fighters in Syria, in an unprecedented move, have totally taken over numerous cities, in a highly coordinated offensive, and are now on the outskirts of Damascus, obviously preparing to make a very big move toward taking out Assad. Russia, because they are so tied up in Ukraine, and with the loss there of over 600,000 soldiers, seems incapable of stopping this literal march through Syria, a country they have protected for years. This is where former President Obama refused to honor his commitment of protecting the RED LINE IN THE SAND, and all hell broke out, with Russia stepping in. But now they are, like possibly Assad himself, being forced out, and it may actually be the best thing that can happen to them. There was never much of a benefit in Syria for Russia, other than to make Obama look really stupid. In any event, Syria is a mess, but is not our friend, & THE UNITED STATES SHOULD HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. THIS IS NOT OUR FIGHT. LET IT PLAY OUT. DO NOT GET INVOLVED!
Also, Syria has been very useful to Russia:
It has been a training ground for their troops / air force.
It has granted them a very useful naval base.
The air bases give them freight contact with Africa (from where they are getting lots of money via mercenaries).
It also is another nail in the coffin of the idea they are a world power. CSTO utterly failed to come to Armenia's aid last year, and now Russia may be thrown out of another important military ally. These are not signs of strength.
(And - of course - this is why the Trump administration's policies towards Mexico are so dumb. The more you wreck the Mexican economy via tariffs, the more you create people with nothing to lose by heading North across the Rio Grande.)
* Obama was wrong to do nothing in Syria
* But Donald Trump is right to do nothing in Syria
Have I got that right?
If so, that's rather unreasonable. It was not a static, permanent situation, as we have seen over the last couple of weeks. Unless you wanted Assad to retake the whole country, with all that would have entailed for the populations that rebelled...
LOL.
https://x.com/eppgroup/status/1865019291545772201
The fact is that the Assad family have ruled a country by brutal repression of most of its inhabitants, on behalf of 20% of its population, for decades.
The dad was an evil bastard, but he kept the autocracy stable. The son is every bit as evil - and has even more blood on his hands - but is also incompetent.
You're effectively arguing that we intervene against the majority of the population, to keep a weak ruler who's also a war criminal in power.
That's just bullshit.
Erm, isn't there a vital naval base?
Seems implausible, though.
I also doubt Assad would have gone for it.
And we would join Russia in being the only other european country to not be in it iirc. So what's not to like for our man of the people Nige?
The popularity of Russia with dictatorships is largely based on the strong man image. Russians fleeing isn't a good look for them.
Events in Syria are progressing fast, and who knows where they will end, but they are certainly bad for both Russia and Iran.
The brutal geographic facts don't allow for the kind of mass migration Assad precipitated when he bombed Aleppo.
Bill Kristol and Trump 2.0 finally find agreement:
Bill Kristol
@BillKristol
·
1h
Syria's future will be complicated, but we should celebrate if Assad falls.
(I can't help but add that Obama's failure to enforce his red line after Assad used chemical weapons in August, 2013, was a disastrous decision, with terrible consequences for Syria and far beyond.)
He also has zero chance of squeezing the Reform vote and Labour is already below 30% and cannot be squeezed much further anyway and while Hunt might squeeze the LDs a little they are only on 11-12% still too, Reform are polling double that
https://www.hrw.org/report/2010/07/16/wasted-decade/human-rights-syria-during-bashar-al-asads-first-ten-years-power
https://www.hrw.org/report/2015/12/16/if-dead-could-speak/mass-deaths-and-torture-syrias-detention-facilities
And then read the following, more recent information:
https://www.ecchr.eu/fileadmin/Sondernewsletter_Dossiers/Dossier_Syria_2021March.pdf
By all means condemn the Islamist groups. But don't fail to condemn Assad's regime as well.
https://x.com/EPPGroup/status/1865397907060404668
Hunt might actually be the best placed of the potential candidates to do a deal with Refuk - on the understanding that the Hunt-led Tories would concentrate on battling the Lib Dems in the Tory shires, whilst Refuk are given free reign in the red wall / left-behind areas.
Not sure he'd find that a particularly appealing prospect, though!
https://amp.theguardian.com/music/2024/dec/05/ymca-has-never-been-gay-says-the-songs-lyricist-and-singer
If you thought that YMCA by Village People was a gay anthem, think again. According to Victor Willis, who wrote the lyrics, the famous song is entirely heterosexual – and anyone suggesting something to the contrary should “get their minds out of the gutter”.
“Come January 2025,” Willis added on Facebook, “my wife will start suing each and every news organisation that falsely refers to YMCA, either in their headlines or alluded to in the base of the story, that YMCA is somehow a gay anthem because such notion is based solely on the song’s lyrics alluding to elicit [sic] activity for which it does not.”..
I'm looking forward to the court cases.
Saudi Arabia has failed in its intervention in Yemen. Iraq has enough trouble of its own. Jordan seems to have stayed relatively stable in recent decades precisely by not getting involved in other countries troubles.
I just stuck a couple of £ on him at the 46 on display and for some reason got in at 170.
Anyone with any wise insights into the implications, if any. Is this all good or bad.
This is just one of his prisons, though one of the more notorious.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sednaya_Prison
Sednaya Prison (Arabic: سجن صيدنايا Sajn Ṣaydnāyā), nicknamed the "Human Slaughterhouse"[a] is a military prison near Damascus in Syria operated by the Syrian government. The prison has been used to hold thousands of prisoners, both civilian detainees and anti-government rebels.[1][2] The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) estimated in January 2021 that 30,000 detainees have perished in Sednaya from torture, ill-treatment and mass executions since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War,[3] while Amnesty International estimated in February 2017 "that between 5,000 and 13,000 people were extrajudicially executed at Saydnaya between September 2011 and December 2015."
A former inmate of the prison who was detained for participating in a peaceful non-violent protest told Amnesty International that at Sednaya prisoners were forced to choose between dying themselves or killing one of their own relatives or friends. The former inmate also stated that in the first prison he was at, prisoners were also forced into cannibalism, but that prison was "heaven" compared to Sednaya Prison. According to the inmate, the other prison (Branch 215) was "to interrogate" (including through torture), but when that was done, you were moved to Sednaya "to die"...
So Macron brokered a meeting between Trump and Zelensky, but Starmer couldn’t be arsed to turn up? Would any other recent UK PM not have wanted to be there in that meeting?
https://youtu.be/egvoBvcIGOQ?t=830
How hard is it to harvest postcodes from an online form and de-duplicate? Any serious website could process thousands a minute.
Uncomfortable for Israel. Good for Turkey. Bad for Iran. And if you don't like these insights I've others...
It’s the choice between Stalin or Hitler. We chose to support Stalin, who was personally responsible for the torture and death of MILLIONS
God speed to all the pilots having ‘fun’ today, and hope they all took enough extra fuel.
https://www.electionpolling.co.uk/battleground/targets/conservative
The only viable strategy for the Conservatives is to reverse this year's losses to Labour.
And then gain some more from Labour.
We have a situation where the Conservatives could win Bolsover and still have fewer than 300 MPs.
I also thought you were a friend of the Yazidi. Now you're saying they'll be doing all that?
He's a weak and useless leader, and any effort to prop him up is likely futile.
All it would achieve is to extend a bloody conflict, and alienate whoever takes over.
Badenoch has near zero chance of winning a Tory majority again next time, if she wins power it will mainly be via gaining soft Leave marginal seats held by Labour while Farage wins most hard Leave marginal seats held by Labour. Then the 2 doing a deal together to form a government in a hung parliament
Mutatis mutandis, also keep an eye on Egypt for the same reasons.
BTW not much sign yet of the Syrian moderates, LibDem community minded types who donate to their local hospice and put up hanging baskets that Cameron wanted us to back not so long ago.
Isn't it odd to be still playing out the aftermath of WWI 106 years after it ended.
As it happens, I don’t massively rate Boris as a PM (though I rate him as a campaigner) - I thought he was a better than Sunak, but that's not difficult. However, the polls at his nadir showed him about 5 points behind Labour.
Regarding Truss, you say that they couldn't recover after her, but in fact there was a fairly OK recovery on the back of optimism when 'the grown ups' came back in. The polls then went down again, as people found that the Sunak Government was actually a pile of shite. They didn’t go down because more and more people woke up and suddenly found they resented Truss did they - that's an utter nonsense.
He doesn't work after 6pm on a Friday.*
* One of the better Tory clichés.
It's certainly a line Sandpit could feed Nick Ferrari for his Monday morning LBC show.
Farage however might be able to take them
John Swinney is on course to command a pro-independence majority in Holyrood and lead the SNP into a third decade in power after a popular debut budget as first minister, according to a new poll.
In a significant blow to Scottish Labour, the first survey carried out since the Scottish government’s tax and spend plans were announced has seen the party’s support drop to its lowest level in three years.
Backing for independence has also risen to 54 per cent when undecided voters are excluded, the highest level for more than four years.
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/scotland/article/john-swinney-on-course-for-pro-independence-majority-after-budget-9vcpvjwg7