Will the U.S. intervene on Maliki’s side in Iraq? If Obama is honest about not determining outcomes of “somebody else’s civil war,” as he said in reference to Syria, then, he’s unlikely to do anything serious in terms of providing support to embattled Maliki.
Sunni-majority towns in Iraq are falling to a broad Sunni alliance that includes ISIS as a major player. Only Iran and Maliki want us to believe that ISIS is solely responsible for the current offensive.
On the other hand, the idea that Iran is orchestrating this development in order to convince America and the international community to allow her to intervene directly in Iraq is naive. Such intervention would be too costly and Iran is already knee-deep in the Iraqi quagmire anyway, not to mention the Syrian one, and does not need to do so more overtly. Should Iran’s decide to embark on such a course, it would be a massive miscalculation on their part.
As talks in Geneva open with Vitriol, Accusations and Acrimony, according to local activists and certain revelations via social media, ISIS, Al-Nusra and the Islamic Front have reportedly reached a deal allowing for the establishment of a joint administration of all rebel-held territories in the country. The agreement calls for the establishment of High Sharia Commission to supervise the conduct of military operations, assess the legality of agreements reached with members of the international community, provide services in local communities, launch economic development projects, and manage local sharia courts focused on resolving local disputes. If this development is indeed true, then, it comes to underscore the complete disassociation of the political process currently unfolding in Geneva from the realities on the ground.
Continue reading “Notes on Current Developments – January 23, 2014”
Opinion: Syrian genocide needs justice – CNN.com.
(CNN) — The debate over what is happening inside Syria should now end. A new report by three veteran war crimes prosecutors, released exclusively by CNN and The Guardian, offers what appears to be irrefutable evidence of systemic war crimes by the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
The Ammar Abdulhamid Archive 