Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker.

“No one wears a parka as well as Bob Parker.”  

Don’t forget to vote in the 1-clik The Press online mayoral poll for Christchurch.

Christchurch Mayoral Race Poll

Except we note that Obama’s educational records, which may relate to “overseas student” scholarships, remain sealed.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/8807008/Dalziel-and-Parker-set-for-mayoral-race

The Syrian civil war bears many similarities to the small sectarian conflict in the Balkans that escalated into WWI. It has many belligerents, including big world super powers, and this week America and Iran joined the conflict in more direct ways (US arms to rebels; Iran sending troops to support Assad).

In “The Global Dangers of Syria’s Looming Civil War” (The Atlantic, 13 Feb. 2012)  James Kitfield says, “Some analysts have interpreted the Syrian conflict as part of a regional proxy war between pro-opposition Sunni states, such as Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, and Iran and Shi’ites in Iraq, who support the Alawite-led Syrian government.” 

The conflict began two years ago on 15 March 2011 as a natural extension of the Arab Spring uprisings, in Syria, as its citizens sought to imitate what other Arab states had done starting with Tunisia, especially in Egypt where they succeeded in throwing off Mubarak; the Syrians sought to remove Assad.

The Syrian army brutally repressed the initial protests as a show of decisive leadership and against the flow of what was happening in the Arab Spring, and this polarised the populace. Defecting soldiers and civilian volunteers became a ‘rebel uprising’ after the Syrian army fired on civilians and perpetrated other brutalities, including subsequently: wholesale massacres of entire towns and whole families, bombings of civilians, heinous deviant torturing of children, rape, and chemical warfare.

In early 2013 Amnesty International declared that “the vast majority of war crimes and other gross violations continue to be committed by government forces,” but there are now atrocities on both sides as belligerents retaliate against each other with ever escalating viciousness.

WWI escalated largely because of border threat issues.  This is the same in Syria now, where there  have been several military incidents on borders with other countries, in a repeat of the WW I build-up:

• Syrian-Turkish border
• Syrian-Israeli border
• Iraqi-Syrian border
• Jordanian-Syrian border
• Lebanese-Syrian border

The International Committee of the Red Cross has defined the conflict as a “Civil War” but it now has foreign participants such as Iran and Russia. America have joined the conflict inviting France and the UK to join in as well.  This is a viscous sectarian religious civil war with no quarter.

The Assad regime says the “rebels” are armed terrorists and “foreign mercenaries” but in fact several armed mercenary groups from Iran and Lebanon are supporting the Syrian regime; and now other muslim groups are arriving to support the rebel side much like the sectarian divide of the Iran-Iraq war, also between Sunni and Shite Muslim.

The death toll to May 2013 has been estimated by international groups present on the ground, at 80,000 with 4 million displaced.  This is adding political pressure on Jordan and Turkey where most of the refugees have fled.

Who are the main players?

Government Assad Regime

1. As in Iraq under Saddam Hussein, this is the Syrian Ba’ath Party government.
2. The Shabiha militia (of Assad’s party)
3. Hezbollah from Lebanon is supporting the regime with fighters.
4. Russia supplies weapons and gives other military support.
5. Iran supplies weapons too, arms Hezbollah and has now committed to sending a first wave of 4000 Iranian troops.
6. Palestinian PFLP

Civilian Rebels (The Free Syrian Army or FSA)

1. Defected Syrian army soldiers
2. Syrian civilians (mainly unarmed)
3. Islamist group Jabhat al-Nusra
4. Qatar has sent support
5. Mujahadeen principally the Mahdi al-Harati and the Al-Nusra Front
6. Turkey has condemned the Assad regime, but so far has not got involved other than coping with Syrian refugees on its border, despite border provocations.
7. Palestinian Hamas
8. Israel has hit Syrian army targets from the air

Wild Cards (Palestinians & Kurds)

1. 500,000 ‘Palestinians‘ live in Syria. They remained largely neutral in the early days of the uprising but now Hamas is supporting the rebels after atrocities and Palestinian deaths at the hands of the Syrian army.
2. However the Palestinian PFLP-General Command is supporting Assad but is also focussed on trying to “recapture” Israeli-won territory in old Syria (after Syria attacked Israel and lost), namely the Golan Heights.  This cross border agenda is likely to escalate the crisis towards a bigger war and draw in more players, just as WW I did.
3. Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons against the Kurds in Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war. The Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) in Syria said last year it did not support either the government or the opposition but Kurdish fighters (focussed on eventually winning a =n independent Kurdish homeland) have since clashed with both government and rebel forces. This too is likely to escalate the Syrian war into something much larger.

So, a summary of the main players: