Weeks of violence in the city of Homs appear to have come to an end, at least for the time being, as the arrival of members of the Arab League monitoring team saw Syrian forces withdrawing tanks and armored vehicles from the city.
Opposition figures in the city were quick to condemn the pullback as insincere, suggesting that they believe that the move did not signal an actual end to violence against protesters. Major rallies were reported in Homs, pressing for Arab League action.
Complicating matters, a new statement from Human Rights Watch accused the Assad regime of deliberately hiding a number of its political detainees form the monitor teams, saying the “important” detainees were ferried out before monitors arrived.
Still, violence appears to have significantly subsided today, with the only reports of casualties coming from Syria’s state media, reporting on an attack against a textile company near the Turkish border. Exactly which group was responsible for the attack was unclear, but the military was quoted as saying the attackers escaped into Turkey.
Stopping the violence is always a good first step.
Now negotiations must begin. Alawite rule is simply unsustainable but any transition to Sunni rule must come with guarantees of safety for minorities. Perhaps the biggest reason for the regime digging in its heels is the fear of revenge should the Shiites lose control.
Oh, yeah, Assad will stop the violence…at least till the observers leave. Then, he'll resume.
Trust Human Rights Watch to “complicate matters.” This is the same NGO that was pledged $100 million last year by George Soros, the predatory currency speculator who was aptly described on this website once upon a long time ago as a “False Prophet-At-Large” for his purported concern for human rights; and whose Middle East director, Sarah Leah Whitson, formerly worked for Goldman Sachs.
who would tolerate a country hiding detainees from international monitoring groups!?
WHOA…!!!
Wait a minute here…yesterday the lead was:
"Arab League monitors arrived en masse in Syria today to observe the rising violence across the nation, and immediately got something significant to monitor as regime forces shelled the city of Homs, killing 30…."
Plus one monitor already "wounded" and leveling charges of genocide…
But today the headline reads that the monitors STARTED ARRIVING IN HOMS…
Am I missing something here…?…are we traveling backward in time now…?
Well if this does not put the final nail in the credibility coffin of this website then I don't know what does…
Not a word about that bogus monitor from yesterday…not a word about the phantom shelling that miraculously left no building with a single scrape…
A reader yesterday gave a link to the Syrian news agency exposing that fake monitor…I had never actually visited any official Syrian website before, but now it is plain who is telling the truth and who is PEDDLING FAKE NEWS…
Holy crap, dude. You're getting slow. Actually 2 people beat you to the first comment. Assad is not going to be pleased with your behavior. Remember, the condition is that you must be the first (and if possible the only one) to spew as much propaganda and hateful lies as possible. Giddy up or your genitals may be on the chopping block soon.
The only one I see here PEDDLING FAKE NEWS…is…hmmmm…YOU! How disgusting! And there you go with the building without a scrape. Of course, no mention on your part that there is no media – except for state teevee of which you are apparently a part of – to report the "news" only from Assad's point of view. Are you ever ashamed? Naaaaw, never mind answering that, you'd have to have a conscience, a brain and a heart for that.
Assad is about to get the Kosovo treatment. I remember far enough back when Antiwar.com opposed such things.
[moderator’s note: OK, so your short-term memory, up to a microsecond ago, is intact. Congratulations – TLK]
Moderator: Is this a forum for readers to comment, or is it a place for “moderators” to snidely attack anyone who dares criticize? In other words, if you want to have a forum for your readers you should allow them to comment without childish sarcasm. If you are concerned that opposition to your horrible coverage of Syria is almost universal among your commenting readers, perhaps there is something wrong with your coverage rather than something wrong with your readers.
[moderator’s note: This is a forum for readers to comment. In addition to being a moderator, I’m also a reader. I have never said that there is not “something wrong” with Antiwar.com’s coverage of Syria. I have simply opined that, contra the allegations of some readers, any defects in that coverage are unintended defects rather than a conspiracy to promote US, NATO, et al involvement in the conflict – TLK]
Moderator: I cannot help but wonder whether your supervisors at this website are aware of your childish antics and unprofessional style. As to the defects in coverage, you clearly are paying no attention to your readers who are pointing out with great specificity the analytical and journalistic errors in Antiwar.com's coverage of Syria. Accusing your critics of embracing "conspiracy theories" displays a poverty of reason and inability to defend your positions. Ignoring the criticism of your readership is an editorial decision that must be made by this website, but as an organization dependent on donations it seems foolhardy to ignore your customers — unless you count on some sort of "bailout" somewhere that makes you less dependent on the rank and file readership. One wonders…
Mr. Daniels,
I'm quite sure that my supervisors at this web site are aware that I do my job, and that I do it with 100% professionalism. Unprofessionalism would entail simply banning anyone who criticizes Antiwar.com's coverage. As you may have noticed, that's not what I am doing.
I'm also paying quite a bit of attention to the readers who are critiquing Antiwar.com's coverage. Look at virtually any other discussion thread, and you'll find I seldom respond/comment.
Nice try at making my alternatives be 1) "Ignore" you, 2) "Inappropriately" engage you, or 3) Kiss your ass. I decline all three.
Oh I see, you are this mysterious "TLK." One minute you are a moderator, another minute you are a mysterious three-initialled reader, yet another minute you are someone called "Thomas L. Knapp" — blogger, no less! Tell us, what are your qualifications as a political analyst? Foreign affairs expert? Surely one would think after raising half a million dollars with such ease from these mysterious "super donors" they could afford something more than a snarky teenager to insult Antiwar.com's readers with such jejune sarcasm…
Please stop tacking your opinions onto other's posts as a, "moderator's note:"
Mr. Knapp: Who said anything about a conspiracy…?
Yesterday you whined that Mr. Ditz was not a “regime mole…”
I do not remember anyone ever suggesting that, and nothing along those lines has crossed my mind…
What we are saying is your “coverage” stinks to high heaven…whether intentionally or not…we have no way of knowing…
Fix the coverage or just leave this story alone…what you are doing is promoting exactly the US State Department plan to create another Kosovo or Libya…
The same cookie cutter formula…demonize the target regime with fake news and fake atrocities…while all the while committing REAL ATROCITIES using your terrorist proxies on the ground…
Then comes the “fog of war…”…It’s time to act…which means Nato bombing…
and the country is turned into a hellhole FOR 99 PERCENT OF ORDINARY PEOPLE…
the wrecked country is then turned over to REAL CRIMINALS FAR WORSE THAN THOSE DEMONIZED…
only difference is they are State Department stooges…
Shame, shame, shame. Shame on you Assad stooge! What a troll you are, you remind me of the Israeli trolls. You probably troll from them too or, at least, have been training with them since you're using the same exact techniques as those employed by the Israeli Foreign Ministry.
Methinks thou are but a PNAC brat.
Why don't you just attack an opinion and not the person? Do you realize you lose all credibility by calling a person names?
Well said, David…
Mr. Knapp’s behavior is inappropriate for a moderator to say the least…
And you make an excellent point about the conscious editorial decision to ignore readers who object to fake news on this website…
[moderator’s note: Make up your mind. Is it “inappropriate” for me to respond, or is not responding “ignoring” you? It’s one or the other – TLK]
Hmm… I have to wonder now about some “friendly” financier writing checks…I notice every time they run their fund raiser they have a big donor who matches contributions…of course nobody knows who this big donor is…he wants to remain anonymous…
And the people running this website are more than happy to oblige Mr. Moneybags…maybe that’s why Mr. Knapp is so quick to deny accusations that nobody ever made…guilty conscience perhaps…?
This slide has been going here for quite a while…A couple of years ago after the Honduras coup this website (and this same news writer) started running disgusting stories in support of the coup regime and demonizing Mel Zelaya…whose only crime was to start giving a fair shake to the Indians and the rest of the poor…
Now I read how Honduras is the murder capital of the world…Washpost a couple of days ago…murder rate has tripled in just a few years…well your team is sure shining bright antiwar…
Really this website is completely bogus…they say they are anti-intervention but man they sure don’t walk the talk…
Thank you Gordon. I first followed (and donated to) Antiwar.com because of their principled opposition to the lies being pushed to justify the Kosovo intervention. All of the components were identical to the Libya and Syria cook-up, but all of a sudden Antiwar.com is on the other side. Yet somehow we are not supposed to point this out lest some creature called "TLK" hops on and tosses insults at us in the name of the website! Outrageous.
Gordon Arnaut:
"A couple of years ago after the Honduras coup this website (and this same news writer) started running disgusting stories in support of the coup regime and demonizing Mel Zelaya…"
————————————
>Now I'm pithd off retroactively. Has there ever been a time when this site was not a PNAC subsidiary?
David, Lawrence, Maidhc and others:
Thanks for your solidarity…
I too started visiting this website at the time of the bogus Kosovo intervention…a civil war cooked up entirely by the US State Department…just like the dismemberment of Yugoslavia earlier…
At that time this website was solid…what has happened now is just unbelievable…
Since Kosovo we have had the Iraq invasion which surpasses Hitler’s invasion of Poland and Czechoslovakia in criminality (at least Hitler had a point about ethnic Germans in those countries being mistreated)…
Antiwar opposed the Iraq crime…Afghanistan too up to a point…
But what has happened since is just a complete betrayal of antiwar values…as many here have pointed out…
Libya was an exact replica of the Kosovo recipe…and now Syria is being replayed again…
How many times are we supposed to be fooled…?
Yet incredibly this website is on the side of regime-change…they are regurgitating point for point the MSM talking points…
It is absolutely disgusting…there is no other word…
I do give them credit for running my comments and other critiques…but that is not enough by a long shot to salvage their antiwar creds…
All I can say is let’s not be fooled anymore and let’s not support this website either financially or even with page visits…