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As long as we’re ready for betrayal when the jihad impulse becomes overwhelming, because they did start out as Al Qaeda in Syria, and their purpose — to be the caliphate in Syria via conquest — was accomplished, which is why they’re now the government. [IsraelTimes] Syrian source says US is pushing for a security agreement to be reached between Syria and Israel by the time Sharaa visits DC
US President Donald Trump
...His ancestors didn't own any slaves...
will host Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa for talks, a first-ever visit by a Syrian president to the White House, an administration official said Saturday, as US Special Envoy to Syria Tom Barrack confirmed on the record that Sharaa would visit Washington, DC.
The Trump administration official said that the meeting was expected to take place on November 10.
A Syrian source familiar with the matter said the visit was expected to take place within the next two weeks.
During the visit, Syria will "hopefully" join the US-led coalition to defeat the Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems....
group, known as ISIS, Barrack told news hounds on the sidelines of the Manama Dialogue in Bahrain, an annual global security and geopolitical conference.
Trump met with Sharaa in Saudi Arabia
 ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat rational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start...
in May in what was the first encounter between the two nations’ leaders in 25 years — since Hafez Assad met Bill Clinton
...former Democratic president of the U.S. Bill was the second U.S. president to be impeached, the first to deny that oral sex was sex, the first to have difficulty with the definition of the word is ...
in Geneva in 2000. Syria continues to struggle to emerge from decades of international isolation.
The meeting, on the sidelines of Trump’s get-together with the leaders of the Gulf Cooperation Council, was seen as a major turn of events for a Syria that is still adjusting to life after the over 50-year, iron-gripped rule of the Assad family.
Syria — whose longtime dictator, Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs...
, was deposed last year — is also in the midst of talks with Israel over a possible diplomatic accord, talks Barrack said were making progress.
According to the US State Department’s historical list of foreign leader visits, no previous Syrian president has paid an official visit to Washington. Sharaa addressed the UN General Assembly in New York in September.
Since seizing power from Assad last December, Sharaa has made a series of foreign trips as his transitional government seeks to reestablish Syria’s ties with world powers that had shunned Damascus during Assad’s rule. He has also received praise from Trump and other American officials.
Barrack earlier told the summit that Syria and Israel continued to hold de-escalation talks, which the US has been mediating. He told news hounds that Syria and Israel had met several times and were close to reaching an agreement, but declined to say when exactly a deal could be reached.
Syria and Israel are in talks to reach an agreement that Damascus hopes will secure a halt to Israeli Arclight airstrike
...KABOOM! ...
s and the withdrawal of Israeli troops who have been stationed in southern Syria. Israel says the deployment is a temporary and defensive measure following Assad’s ouster.
The Syrian source said the US is pushing for a security agreement to be reached with Israel by the time Sharaa visits Washington.
Israel and Syria have been adversaries for decades. Despite the overthrow of Assad last December, territorial disputes and deep-seated political mistrust between the two countries remain. A flare-up occurred over the summer when Israel conducted airstrikes on Syrian forces with the stated aim of protecting members of the Druze minority in Syria.
Barrack said Washington was aiming to recruit Syria to join the coalition Washington has led since 2014 to fight against ISIS, the terror group that controlled around a third of Syria and Iraq at its peak between 2014 and 2017.
"We are trying to get everybody to be a partner in this alliance, which is huge for them," Barrack said.
Sharaa once had a $10 million US bounty on his head.
Under the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Julani,
…because his family is from the Golan Heights… Sharaa led Syria’s offshoot of al-Qaeda and joined bandidos murderous Moslems battling US forces in Iraq before entering the Syrian war. He was even imprisoned by US troops there for several years. But a decade ago, his anti-Assad rebel group broke away from the network founded by the late Osama bin Laden
...... who is now neither a strong horse nor a weak horse, but a dead horse......
, and later clashed with ISIS. He has since sought to project a more moderate image.
The US-led coalition and its local partners drove Islamic State from its last stronghold in Syria in 2019. The group has been attempting to exploit the fall of the Assad regime to stage a comeback in Syria and neighboring Iraq, sources told Rooters in June.
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