Primer: Syria MJT Michael Totten Interviews Barry Rubin

Primer: Syria MJT Michael Totten Interviews Barry Rubin

http://www.michaeltotten.com/

Some selected quotes.

Please visit Michael's Blog and read the whole thing

June 06, 2007vvvThe Truth About Syria
By Michael J. Totten

"Syria is not a radical regime because it has been mistreated by the West or Israel but because the regime needs radicalism to survive. It is a minority dictatorship of a small non-Muslim minority and it offers neither freedoms nor material benefit."

"MJT: Do you think the Syrians are behind the war of the camps raging in Lebanon now, or does this conflict match the timing of the UN tribunal coincidentally?

Rubin: I definitely think the Syrians are behind it."

>Organize and order a shadowy group of terrorists, called Fatah al-Islam, to disrupt Lebanon."

"Fatah al-Islam, is merely part of an older group, Fatah al-Intifada which has been a Syrian front group for almost 25 years."

"The leader of this group is a man by the name of Colonel Abu Khaled al-Amleh. And he lives and operates out of Damascus, Syria. "

"The field commander of the group is a man named Shaker al-Absi. He has been working as a Syrian agent since 1983."

"In Iraq, Absi worked with Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi, the head of al-Qaida—Usama bin Ladin’s group—there."

"Mr. Absi was involved in the murder of a U.S. diplomat, Lawrence Foley, in Jordan on October 28, 2003."

"MJT: Some foreign policy hands hope they can "flip" Syria from its alliance with Iran. Do you think this is possible in the long term if not in the short term?

Rubin: This is absurd and I discuss it at length in my new book, The Truth About Syria."

"How does a basically atheistic regime run by non-Muslims reinvent itself as Islamist? "

The Truth About Syria, By Barry Rubin, Palgrave-Macmillan, 2007

Barry Rubin is the director of the Global Research for International Affairs Center of the Interdisciplinary Center in Hertzliya, Israel. He is the author of 16 books, including The Truth About Syria, and is the editor of Middle East Review of International Affairs.

Post-script: Please support Michael Totten's independent writing and journalism

Visit his blog and read the whole thing

it's about to pop...

1 french, 3 american carrier groups plus an unnamed amount of destroyer groups are already in the persian gulf

and guess what friends, another carrier will be there in amount 11 days...

hmmmmm

iran returns the hostages, iran steps up attacks in southern iran....

hmmmmm

hezbollah and hamas are getting loud....

Arab war for Israel now starting, Saudi's issue threat!

"If Israel refuses, that means it doesn't want peace and it places everything back into the hands of fate. They will be putting their future not in the hands of the peacemakers but in the hands of the lords of war," he said.

Prince Saud dismissed any further diplomatic overtures towards Israel. "It has never been proven that reaching out to Israel achieves anything," he said.

"Other Arab countries have recognised Israel and what has that achieved?

"The largest Arab country, Egypt, recognised Israel and what was the result? Not one iota of change happened in the attitude of Israel towards peace." said Saudi foreign minister Prince Saudi al-Faisal


So let me get this straight, since the arab world has declared it'sself in a state of WAR with israel that now has been going on for 60 years and this additional declaration of war BY THE ARABS, does this not give Israel the legal, moral, and UN granted right to destroy those arab countries that seek her destruction?