On Tuesday, President Donald Trump announced the “United States will withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal.” Shortly after, Reuters reported: “Syrian state media says Israel attacked just after U.S. quit Iran deal” and AP reported: “Israel Attacked Syria an Hour After the Iran Deal Was Ended, Says Report.” Attacks have continued between Israeli and Syrian forces since.
JANA NAKHAL, [in Beirut] jana.nakhal at gmail.com
A researcher and feminist, Nakhal said today: “In Syria, the Syrian government has been winning. In Lebanon, Hezbollah has just won big in the election. The Israeli and U.S. governments have been trying to attack Iran and their Syrian and Hezbollah allies. Like any colonial powers, it’s very hard for them to accept losing. So, their logic may well be, if we’re not in control, let’s burn it. Such a course of action may well spread more war well beyond Syria and Lebanon.” She has written for al-Akhbar Arabic and English as well as al-Adab and al-Nidaa magazine. Nakhal was recently in Afrin in northern Syria. See from ShadowProof: “Interview With Jana Nakhal, Lebanese Communist Party Member, On Occupation Of Afrin By Turkish Forces And Takfiri Fighters.”
CHARLES GLASS, [currently in England], charlesglassbooks at gmail.com, @charlesmglass
Glass was ABC News Chief Middle East correspondent and has written extensively on Syria, including covering the civil war on the ground. In 2016, his book Syria Burning was released.
In March, Glass wrote the piece: “Think the War in Syria Is Winding Down? Think Again” for The Nation, which stated: “Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is raising the stakes, declaring, ‘We will act if necessary not just against Iran’s proxies but against Iran itself’; and some voices in the West demand not reform and reconstruction, but renewed war.
“Rather than encourage U.S.-Russian agreement to end the war, the deep thinkers in Washington and Mar-a-Lago are urging the United States to wade deeper into the swamp. Kenneth Pollack, a former CIA analyst and Bill Clinton’s director for Persian Gulf affairs at the National Security Council, is one of the few commentators to admit that Syria is a means to an end. In a strongly argued series on the American Enterprise Institute’s website, Pollack advocates using Syria as the most effective arena to hurt Iran. …
“Pollack suggests ‘ramping up American covert assistance to the Syrian opposition to try to bleed the Assad regime and its Iranian backers over time, exactly the way that the United States backed the Afghan Mujahideen as they bled the Soviets in Afghanistan — or as the Russians and Chinese did to the United States in Vietnam.’ …
“The urge to hit Iran in Syria calls to mind an argument made, and heeded, 16 years ago, that ‘the option that makes the most sense is for the United States to launch a full-scale invasion of Iraq to topple Saddam, eradicate his weapons of mass destruction, and rebuild Iraq as a prosperous and stable society for the good of the United States, Iraq’s own people and the entire region.’ Americans know where that advice led the country. The author? Kenneth Pollack.”
