U.S. hands Damascus its last warning

U.S. Foreign Policy Forum

http://www.nationalpost.com/search/...F3-6A4F4DA9F6DA

U.S. hands Damascus its last warning
Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad remain defiant: U.S. says 'there are consequences lurking in the background' unless aid to terrorists ends

Scott Stinson
National Post, with files from news services


Monday, May 05, 2003
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Colin Powell, the U.S. Secretary of State, said yesterday he had delivered a final warning to Syria to stop aiding terrorist groups.

He said Damascus would have a price to pay if it failed to meet Washington's demands to close the offices of Islamic terrorist organizations in its country.

"There are consequences lurking in the background," Mr. Powell said on U.S. television. He did not specifically threaten military action in his meeting with Bashar Assad, the Syrian President, on Saturday -- but he did say George W. Bush, the U.S. President, would "have all his options on the table" should Syria ignore the U.S. edict to change its ways following the destruction of Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq.

"There are many ways to confront a nation," he said, adding that diplomatic and economic sanctions and military force are all possible. That stance is a step back from the rhetoric employed by some U.S. officials immediately after the fall of Baghdad, which suggested Syria was the next target for disarmament.

Mr. Powell and other U.S. officials said yesterday that Damascus had already taken action to shut down terrorist offices, but Syrian officials declined to comment on those claims.

"You have to ask him what he meant," said Bouthaina Shaaban, a spokeswoman for the Foreign Ministry. "I'm really not entitled to answer."

"We are more interested in what he said about a comprehensive peace rather than what he said about offices," she said.

Officials with the groups identified for closure by Mr. Powell were more blunt: "I haven't been informed of any such thing," said Usama Hamdan, a Hamas official in Lebanon.

"The Americans know well that our presence is part of the Palestinian presence in Syria and Lebanon and that it's not voluntary. It is forced, because of the occupation of our land and the expulsion of Palestinians [at the creation of Israel]," he said.

Visitors to the group's Damascus headquarters, as well as those of Islamic Jihad -- another terrorist faction Mr. Powell demanded Syria shut -- were told senior officials were travelling.

Officials from Hezbollah, a Shiite Muslim group backed by Syria and Iran, were similarly defiant.

"I doubt anyone would answer [the U.S.] call, for as long as there is [Israeli] occupation, no one can even propose disarming the resistance," said Sheik Hassan Izzedine, a senior official of Hezbollah.

"We are not worried a bit about the future and we consider ourselves people with a just cause and we reject any threat."

Mr. Powell said the Bush administration will closely follow developments in the region, and warned that Syrian promises of action would not suffice.

"There are no illusions in [Mr. Assad's] mind as to what we are looking for from Syria," he said.

"There was, as we put it in diplomatic terms, a candid exchange of views, but it is not promises that we are interested in -- or assurances -- but it is action. We will see what happens in the days, weeks, months ahead."

Mr. Powell said since Damascus has a new neighbour with a changed power structure in Iraq, the United States "would be watching, and we would measure performance over time to see whether Syria is prepared now to move in a new direction in light of these changed circumstances."

The Secretary of State has long been one of the Bush administration's most diplomatic voices, and his entreaty to Syria was viewed as a waste of time by some U.S. officials.

Newt Gingrich, a member of the Pentagon Defence Policy Board and former speaker of the House of Representatives, recently said "the concept of [Mr. Powell] going to Damascus to meet a terrorist-supporting, secret police-wielding dictator is ludicrous."

Donald Rumsfeld, the U.S. Secretary of Defence who has charged Mr. Assad with sending military equipment to Iraq, struck a softer tone yesterday by saying, "Words are one thing, action is another. I know what [the Syrians] have been doing and it's been unhelpful.... In my view they were making unwise decisions previously. What they'll do after this visit remains to be seen."

Mr. Powell's request to stop aiding terrorism side-stepped the issues of military aid to Iraq and Mr. Bush's earlier accusation that Syria took possession of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction so they would not be discovered by U.S. and British military forces in Iraq.

Instead, Mr. Powell said he had "a good discussion" about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with Mr. Assad, adding Syria has been helpful in the U.S.-led war against terrorism.

Mr. Powell's trip to the Middle East also included a session with Lebanese President Emile Lahoud, where the Secretary of State pushed for the removal of Hezbollah's armed presence in southern Lebanon. He said the United States has "concern about the continuing terrorist activities of Hezbollah in the region and around the world."

A Lebanese newspaper reported Mr. Lahoud told Mr. Powell Hezbollah "is a legal political party," while Sheik Naim Kassem, Hezbollah's deputy leader, said "Lebanon refuses to take dictation from America."

Mr. Powell's discussions with Middle East leaders are part of U.S.-led efforts to implement a three-year "road map" to peace in the region that was unveiled last week. It calls for a separate Palestinian state that is at peace with Israel and is accepted by Arab governments.

White House asks Israel to ease up on the Palestinians, A10 z This road map is more like a roadblock: Comment, A14 z Editorial, Page A15

© Copyright 2003 National Post

next one ?

We'll give Syria a few years to clean up their act. Maybe not 12 like Saddam, but at least three to five years. The US does, however, exepct that Syria will start to demonstrate a more reponsible stance with respect to terrorist groups.

All of those groups thrive off of the Isreali/Palestinian conflict. If these groups are allowed to act with impunity in countries like Syira, then Middle East peace will be very difficult, if not impossible, to attain. These terrorist groups make every attempt to keep the conflict going in the Middle East. If peace is attained, then thay have no need to exist. Bottom line: Peace is what threatens these organizations. Peace is the last thing these groups want.

As far as I know, Isreal doesn't threaten others with or export WMDs. They have them for defensive purposes and don't really pose a threat to those who do not wish to attack Isreal.

What does the arms trade have to do with anything?

Ickle, do you believe that Mid-East and neighbors countries will accept a Mid-East free of WMDs ... except Israel ?

nowar- help me out here! where are your posts regarding syria's invasion and occupation of Lebanon? i've been looking , but , alas, can't find any!

as far as I know it's about Iraq and the result of the war against Iraq, and this one was about the disarmement - you know WMDs, and maybe those coming from Iraq, by the way still not found - of Syria and the stop of the terrorism support from Syria after using the same argument by US gov to build the case against Iraq - remember the so called proofs from Powell ? -

I didn't talk about any other countries, other did, so I added my comment about one point: WMDs and freeing Mid-East from these WMDs .........

but if you want, we can make a thread on Lebanon and all will have their smack, including ..... I just let you answer .....

ok, clearer: it's in the Iraq forum, the final warning to Syria from Powell is the latest one after the end of the Iraq war and the it's that war which was about WMDs ....


About other countries: Ickle started with in this thread
About the WMDs: Davedom started with in this thread then Ickle in response to Davedom, then my question in response to this discussion.


Maybe you should learn a little bit about how a forum is supposed to run .........

about the right to exist: they were ready in 1995 .......

about the :

Thank you, nowar, but I know quite well how a forum works. Perhaps YOU should learn as you should have posted this thread in the Terrorism forum as it deals with terrorist groups that Syria covers and not about WMDs or Iraq.

syria's gov. is ruled by al-aqsa, hamas, hezbollah, plfp, palestinian islamic jihad.

during their first warning, they ended up turning over regime members who were indeed in syria, after denying any such thing could happen.

obviously assad is scared shitless about telling these groups to take a hike, but when you rule a country, that's your responsibility. when he doesn't stand up to that responsibility, others like the u.s will, and that's the way it should be.

frankly this is letting terrorist groups run the country thing is getting a bit exhausted. sort of like telling hussein to disarm began to get irritatingly cyclical. these groups are a major obstacle in the peace process of the middle east, and unless someone makes them feel unwanted in syria, and that sure as hell isn't going to be assad or his generals, the middle east will continue to destroy itself, and most likely america blamed for it due to their 'foreign policy.' it's time people stopped playing the blame game and opened their ****ing eyes. most of the syrian gov. are avid supporters of the terrorist groups. how pathetic that a national gov. can't stand up to a bunch of idiots with ak's and face masks.

so, then what is everyone supposed to do? have any of you made the connection that diplomacy with syria has absolutely nothing to do with the terrorist groups? colin powell doesn't sit and talk to hezbollah reps. not that it would make any difference if he did.

if the israelis go after terrorists the palestinian civilians come out in full force, and they suffer the consequences of israeli retaliation to the terrorist groups. i think the israeli armed forces are interested in getting a hold of members of those groups and not much interested in gunning down civilians who throw rocks [even though they seem to do it anyway which shows how unorganized and ineffective their army is], but i do think the palestinian groups have a very big interest in killing anything that relates to israel.

so, now these groups claim they will not disarm, they will not leave their respective positions in syria, they do not want peace with israel, and they could give a **** about the road map to peace.

what's the world to do? interested to hear your comments.

if you're going to answer with some stupid, sarcastic remark that makes an empty connection to america's efforts in iraq, spare me.

your problem, nowar, is that you ignore the issue at hand. the only thing you're worried about is that the u.s is at the forefront of the issue, which to you is unacceptable and obviously a sign that they are trying to divert attention from iraq. be that as it may, the point is that this conflict instigated the sudden efforts by israel/palestine for peace, not to mention the u.s were the ones who created the roadmap for the process.

the wmd in iraq will be fine, don't worry, they're not going anywhere [or, maybe they were shipped to lebanon, check out debka.

now the problem is doing something about militant groups. if israel and palestine begin to make significant progress in peace, this will provide some much needed rest and stability for middle easterners. the one thing i've always wondered, why does it seem like no middle eastern country ever helps another middle eastern country unless they're smuggling oil? why don't neighbouring countries help in the reconstruction of iraq, for example? [iran doesn't count, they're not trying to help, just set up a subsidiary of iran]. reciprocal aid b/w middle eastern countries itshould be feasable. but it will never be unless there is a strong push for peace between israel and palestine, and that requires a pro-active role of the international community.

at this point to me it seems like nobody [i.e middle east, america] even cares about others *****ing about america. those israelis/palestinians who want peace want america to help. all the naysayers have done is talk, talk, talk. america should do this. america shouldn't do that. but what have those countries done? where were they to help create the roadmap? where are they pressuring syria to cut it's ties with militant groups? what were those countries doing about the smuggled oil and deaths of civilians at the hands of the regime? the rhetoric these days seems to place u.s sanctions as the primary cause for every single problem in the middle east, which is just a cop out. most other countries are just sitting back, watching, and making comments like they're at a critiquing session. get off your asses and do something, instead of attributing u.s sanctions to the cause of every one of the world's problems.

what really creates these problems and wide spread, economical/social degradation is the inability of governments to stand up to this ridiculous alternative-rule trend, where ******** with masks and guns suddenly decide they'll be in charge in the name of allah, to no opposition from the true, legal rulers of the country.

I think that as long as the Palestinian doesn't get something from Israel the terrorism in Israel will continue .....

Anyway, about the roadmap:

it's both side ..... and I doubt that this roadmap will succeed

If Israel will contain more Palestinians than Israelis it will lead to a disaster. The right to return includes kicking Israelis out of their homes - the homes where years ago Palestinian homes were.

These refugees can be allowed to return to the future Palestinian state, but not to Israel. Even the return to the Palestinian state gives concerns as the amount of bombings could drastically increase.

It sounds unfair and it almost seems to repeat the immigration of Jews to Palestine in the first half of the 20th century.
Only this time, Palestinians are the ones who want to immigrate, Palestinians are the ones who agree on the peace plan, and Israelis are the ones who restrict Palestinian immigration and some of the peace plan's paragraphs with the fear that the situation will get worse. One of the main differences between the two struggles for a state is that Israel didn't use terror towards civilians for its purposes, but Palestinians DO use it. Another main difference is that the Arabs, being a majority in the region were against the creation of a Jewish state claiming that the whole land of Palestine belongs to them. They fought till the end in order to prevent it from happening, but the Jews being the minority agreed on both states and still agree that a Palestinian state should exist next to Israel.

If these two differences disappear, there will be no conflict in the mid-east anymore.

America is propping up Israel with $millions of dollars a year. The US is not a by-stander in all this. If it wanted to it could exert huge pressure on Israel but instead it ASKS them if they will agree with the road map. Why doens't America give Israel an ultimatum - either agree to the road map or we will withdraw our $millions of dollars every year. It doesn't make this kind of ulitimatum because there is not the will there to do this. And I read that Sharron is now saying he won't agree to this and that bit of the road map.

The US has got to start acting fairly in the regine and be seen to do so. Hamas and other organisations would then loses support. And also the UN CAN talk to terrorist organisations. It happened in Ireland with the IRA and the British and Irish have been fighting for centuries. Now they talk.

Maybe the Jenin camp was attacked but we were talking about bombing with Bomber Jets or at least that's what I thought you were talking about.

Again you're changing the topic. Did I say that they warn terrorists before bombing them? That's something completely different. I was saying that when IDF bombs a certain weapons factory or a terrorist nest (where terrorists meet, plan bombings and produce weapons or smuggle weapons to) they warn the civilians that are around the location or in the targeted place to leave the place. If you don't believe me, read more, hopefully the media didn't hide it along with other facts. If I remember correctly, the Hammas member that was killed wasn't warned because according to the intelligence information gathered before the attack he was supposed to be alone, the death of his family was an unfortunate accident.

quote:

America is propping up Israel with $millions of dollars a year.

According to what I know, America also gives the PA millions of dollars so that doesn't mean ANYTHING. Also, I was not surprised how the media simply ignored (again) the fact that Sharon transferred to the PA 70 million bucks to aid them! Now, why in the hell according to your Israeli-hating view would Sharon do that? Some, who wouldn't want to be convinced and prefer to stick to their views would say: Sharon and Arafat probably made a secret deal, they buy weapons with this money and keep the Palestinians and the Israelis poor and poverty-stricken and escalate the conflict because it's fun.

quote:

If it wanted to it could exert huge pressure on Israel but instead it ASKS them if they will agree with the road map. The US has got to start acting fairly in the regine and be seen to do so.

If you read the road map you'll see that it doesn't offer ANYTHING except peace and security to Israel. The same it offers to the Palestinians but with additional dozens of benefits. And how exactly the US is pro-Israeli? It offers the Palestinians the right to return, it offers them an independent state, it offers 4 million Palestinian refugess the right to return and it asks from Israeli to withdraw, it asks Israel to remove all the settlements since 2001, it asks Israel to give away the lands from 1967, what does it offer to Israel? and that's called a pro-Israeli support of the US??!!

quote:

This is because the jewish lobbying groups, and the massive number of Jewish voters expect him to bend over and bark to Israel.

I believe there are WAAAAAY more Arab voters than Jewish. According to your 'theory' he should have attacked Israel a long time ago so that he would win the next elections.

Other Arab countires HAVE done a lot to solve this issue as you stated above. They have supported Hamas and Alqaeda. That's what they have done. They do not want Israel there period.
Frankly, I don't see how there will be peace with this attitude of the Arab world. Hope will happen one country at a time. Starting with Iraq then Syria and Iran. An eye for an eye is what they believe, not talk till you're blue in the face and that may be just what they will get.

just a remark: the roadmap is not a US made only .......