Written By:
Bill - Date published:
10:58 am, May 12th, 2018 - 11 comments
Categories: aid, China, class war, colonialism, International, Iran, israel, Russia, Syria, war -
Tags: iran, israel, russia
This post isn’t about wrongs and rights.
Israel has launched numerous air and missile strikes into Syria since the beginnings of the attempted overthrow of the Syrian government. Each time it has happened, Russia has been “given the nod”. And just as with Turkey moving it’s military against the Autonomous Regions of Rojava, Russia has stepped back and let it happen. Which makes sense.
Whatever your thoughts on it may be, Russia are in Syria on a legitimate basis according to international law. They know damned fine well, that if they play their cards right, they will exert a major and on-going influence through-out the region, and they will be somewhat inoculated against any Saudi inspired wahhabism . Part of having a successful presence is the ability to get on with any awkward neighbours (Israel and Turkey).
Iraq, Iran and Syria are on the one page.
Turkey and Israel are on another.
So Russia, for the simple sake of manageability and long term relationships, will allow Turkey to encroach on Syrian territory in the short term. They don’t care about the motives of Turkey, or the rights and wrongs of “Operation Olive Branch”. Neither do they care about Israel looking to thwart any on-going Iranian presence in Syria.
What Russia cares about is its own security, it’s naval base on the Mediterranean, and those future relationships that are required to exercise a meaningful sway in region.
They will stand (kind of quite literally) between Iran and Israel. There will be probably be some arrangement reached between Israel and Russia, whereby Russia takes on a measure of responsibility for limiting any Iranian presence in Syria. When all the dust has settled, neither Russia nor Syria will have any need for an Iranian military presence in Syria anyway. And they (Russia) will play nice with Iran in any process of gently leveraging them out or dampening any ambition any factional power base in Iran may have for building what Israel refers to as the “land bridge” between Iran and Lebanon.
There will probably also be an agreement between Russia and Turkey that will mollify Turkey’s obsession with all things Kurdish. That’s going to spell the end for Rojava one way or another.
Meanwhile, the US and the few European countries who have unlawful military presences in the region will, with much huffing and puffing, withdraw.
The Wahhabism that has come out of Saudi Arabia will be contained behind a useful, if incomplete buffer zone comprising Iran, Iraq and Syria. (Pakistan and Afghanistan could still act as conduits for exporting Wahhabism to the Russian Republics, but at least the Arabian Sea sits between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan). Turkey’s erstwhile facilitation of Jihadist incursions into Syria will be a major card in any future Russia/Turkey/Syria negotiations around dealing with any alleged PKK terrorist presence in Syria.
In short then, the US has blown it in terms of much of its Middle East influence. Israel may well find Russia’s immediate presence to be more to its advantage than the US’s “long arm”. Things will calm down.
And of course, lots of Chinese development money will flow into the region to finance the rebuilding of Syria and probably Iraq too. (As of February this year, the US had pledged precisely zero dollars in aid for Iraqi reconstruction)
And the bottom line is this. Even if everything else in this post transpires to be way off beam, this much I know for sure – not a single ordinary person anywhere in the Middle East will cause so much as a passing second thought to be elicited from any of the game playing bastards.
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Hi Bill, have been following Israel/Iran via Al Jazeera, they’ve just done a segment on it if you are interested, here is the link
https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/insidestory/2018/05/israel-iran-inching-closer-war-180511195154571.html
It’s like since ‘agent orange’ (trump) ditched the Iran deal that Israel has see it as a ‘free pass’ to step up conflict with Iran and even to justify it.
Al Jazeera must be undergoing a touch of cognitive dissonance having a pathological hatred of Israel (with good reason) but also unjustified resentment towards Syria.
Well perhaps it is justified considering the millions Qatar have put into distabilising Syria, and failing.
MSM of course chooses not to point out that the Golan Heights is Syrian territory which Israel has not been invited to occupy.
Where as Iranian forces are in Syria because they’ve been invited there.
But I do hope you’re right Bill. Rather a good analysis I think.
Thanks Brigid I had wondered who else had the intelligence to see that Iranian forces had not attacked Israel – just Israeli forces illegally occupying Syrian sovereign terittory
unjustified resentment
Perhaps they just don’t like people who murder journalists.
Or possibly the Iran deal simply embolden Iran allowing it to finance it terror campaigns and intervention in Syria, however it has also allowed sworn enemies to become friends, Israel, Egypt Saudis Arabia, Jordan UAE and to a degree turkey hence some will argue some good come from a poorly constructed Treaty I. Regard to unintended consequences from embolus g Iran
What ‘finance of terror campaigns and intervention in Syria’ are you referring to exactly?
Some links please.
Please stay away from hallucinogens. They do not help your arguments.
There has indeed been plenty of finance for “terror campaigns and intervention” flowing into Syria. Not much of it has come from Iran though:
https://dissidentvoice.org/2018/04/dear-salafist-wahhabist-apologists/
Bill you could well be right, however let’s just see if the extremist warhawks in Israel have got that memo…especially after the recent gains of Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Israel have displayed some very unhinged behavior lately, what might seem logical and strategically sensible on paper might not play out, especially when you are dealing with violent extremist fundamentalists like Likud.
http://www.presstv.com/Detail/2018/05/08/560986/Results-show-Hezbollah-gains-in-Lebanon-elections-
Also remember Netanyahu is fighting for his political life right now, which also brings another level of unpredictability into the equation.
I think we all know that historically what leaders will do to hang on to power is littered with bad decisions and and/or horrific actions.
Netanyahu has been trying to start a war with Iran for almost his entire political career. Now that he’s fighting for his political life (and likely his freedom), the corrupt little parasite is one of the most dangerous individuals alive.
I wonder if the Iran/Saudi rivalry should be mentioned here – to those countries at least it seems significant: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-42008809