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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Assad’s brother-in-law Assef Shawkat buried, report

2012-05-23

According to anti-Syrian regime activists, President Bashar al-Assad’s brother-in-law Assef Shawkat who was Syria’s deputy defense minister was buried on Wednesday in his hometown, which they identified as Madhale, near the Mediterranean coastal city of Tartous. Several activists quoted by Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya television said black flags were flying in Madhale in mourning. On their Syrian Revolution Facebook page, online anti-regime activists wrote that: “Assef Shawkat is being buried right now in his home town Madhale God curse him. He was poisoned.” They said Shawkat’s body was transported to a hospital near his hometown that was emptied of patients on Tuesday evening. Speculation over Shawkat’s fate first emerged on May 20 when Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya television broadcast an amateur video showing a man claiming responsibility on behalf of a rebel group for killing six regime stalwarts. They included Shawkat, Interior Minister Mohammed al-Shaar, Defence Minister Daoud Rajha, national security chief Hisham Bakhtiar and Hassan Turkmeni, assistant to the vice president. Turkmeni appeared on state television this week to dismiss the reports, while Shaar denied them in a telephone interview, accusing Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya of “lies and slander.” But Shawkat has not made any public appearance or personally denied the reports, though he rarely makes public statements. Abdul Halim Khaddam , the former vice president of Syria confirmed that Assef Shawkat was been killed on 19 May, 2012

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Syria jugs Hareth al-Dhari's kid

2011-05-27

[Iran Press TV] Syrian authorities have placed in durance vile the son of a senior Sunni holy man and Iraqi tribal leader on charges of involvement in terrorist activities in Iraq and Syria and having ties with the Israeli regime. Informed sources said on Thursday that Muthanna al-Dhari, son of the Chairman for the Association of Mohammedan Scholars Sheikh Harith Sulayman al-Dhari, has been placed in durance vile for terror activities and links to the Tel Aviv regime. Damascus ...The City of Jasmin is the oldest continuously-inhabited city in the world. It has not always been inhabited by the same set of fascisti... charged al-Dhari with involvement in provocative campaigns as well as cooperation with Israeli agents in their terrorist attacks. The suspect, who has set up a base in Jordan, had reportedly met with a representative of exiled former Syrian Vice President Abdul Halim Khaddam in Jordan and traveled to Syria a day later. Muthanna, whose father leads Iraqi Sunni Mohammedan tribe of 'Zoba', was also accused of contacts with beturbanned goon Salafi figures before his arrest. Israeli media outlets have repeatedly reported Muthanna al-Dhari's meetings with Israeli leaders in Tel Aviv while Israeli Channel 2 has broadcast a number of interviews with Khaddam.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Sayyed: Syrian Judiciary Has Issued 33 Arrest Warrants in Absentia in False Witnesses Case

2010-10-05

[An Nahar] Former head of General Security Maj. Gen. Jamil Sayyed has been informed by his lawyer in Syria that "the first investigating judge in Damascus has issued 33 arrest warrants in absentia in the false witnesses case for judges, officers, politicians, journalists and individuals of Lebanese, Arab and foreign nationalities," Sayyed's press office announced Sunday. Detlev Mehlis, former head of the U.N. commission investigating ex-PM Rafik Hariri's murder, and his aide Gerhard Lehmann are among the 33 people named by the Syrian warrants, Sayyed's press office noted. Leb's state-run National News Agency reported that the individuals whom arrest warrants have been issued for are: MP Marwan Hamade, ex-minister Charles Rizk; ex-MPs Bassem Sabaa and Elias Atallah; State Prosecutor Saeed Mirza; Judges Elias Eid and Saqr Saqr; Internal Security Forces chief Maj. Gen. Ashraf Rifi; Head of ISF's Intelligence Bureau Col. Wissam al-Hasan; Premier Saad Hariri's advisor Hani Hammoud; Col. Hussam al-Tannoukhi; Lt. Col. Samir Shehadeh; ambassador Johnny Abdou; former Syrian vice president Abdul Halim Khaddam; retired Col. Mohammed Farshoukh; Adnan al-Baba; Khaled Hammoud; journalists Hasan Sabra, Fares Khashan, Nuhad al-Ghaderi (Syrian), Abdul Salam Moussa, Ayman Sharrouf, Omar Harqous, Ahmed Jarallah (Kuwaiti), Zahra Badran, Nadim al-Munla, Hamid al-Gheriafi; former head of the U.N. commission investigating ex-PM Rafik Hariri's murder, Detlev Mehlis, and his aide Gerhard Lehmann; and witnesses Ibrahim Michel Jarjoura, Akram Shakib Murad, Mohammed Zuheir Siddiq and Abdul Baset Bani Audeh. On September 25, the Lebanese daily Ad Diyar reported that the Syrian judiciary was waiting for the appropriate time to send the warrants to its Lebanese counterpart. "If the Lebanese judiciary does not comply with the Syrian demand, then Syria will take the appropriate measures to have Interpol issue arrest warrants for those individuals," the newspaper added. Sayyed has accused international powers of standing behind claims that Hizbullah murdered ex-PM Rafik Hariri. "The game is bigger than (Premier) Saad Hariri. It is related to international schemes, starting from the new Middle East, which used Rafik Hariri's blood to strike Syria," Sayyed said in remarks published Sunday by the Syrian daily al-Watan. "But today, after failure of the plot, they moved to accuse the Resistance That'd be the Hezbullies, natch... seeking a new scheme based on creating a Sunni-Shiite strife to divert attention from the struggle against the Israeli enemy and transfer this conflict to one between Arabs and Mohammedans themselves instead of having Israel as their common enemy. " Sayyed said "some" surrounding Hariri from Leb and "a large portion" from outside the country convinced the prime minister that Syria and its allies in Leb are the ones who killed his father. "This is why he (Hariri) allowed, contributed to, turned a blind eye and supported a political, media, judicial and security structure of his advisers who chose Syrian false witnesses picked from Lebanese prisons, and provided them with temptations, particularly Zuhair Siddiq, Hussam Hussam and others, to accuse Syria and the four Lebanese officers (Sayyed one of them)," said the former detainee who was jailed for nearly four years in Leb for alleged involvement in Hariri's killing. "But soon after our release and the fall of the hypothesis that Syria is behind the killing, they shifted their accusation within a month from Syria to Hizbullah, and this is no coincidence, of course, where police intelligence under Col. Wissam al-Hasan began arresting Israeli spy networks immediately after the release of the four generals in April 2009." Sayyed said the Government of national unity agreed to finance the Special Tribunal for Leb "because we thought we were paying for justice and truth, not for an international tribunal looking for politics." "But we found out four years later that the international law used the money to hit Syria and a portion of Lebanese through the false witnesses," he said. Describing Druze leader Walid Jumblat as "unstable," Sayyed said he has no faith in the Progressive Socialist Party chief. "I don't believe everything Walid Jumblat says, whether he is with us or against us, because he changes his positions from one moment to another," Sayyed said.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Siddiq Claims He Has Documents Proving Hizbullah Involvement in Hariri's Murder

2010-09-16

[An Nahar] Mohammed Zuheir Siddiq, a former witness in the inquiry into the assassination of ex-PM Rafik Hariri, said Ghazi Kanaan -- long-time head of Syria's security apparatus in Leb -- handed him documents that prove Hizbullah's involvement in Hariri's Murder. Kanaan was Syria's Interior Minister from 2004 to 2005. His violent death during an investigation into Hariris' murder drew international attention. Kanaan died in his office, by a gunshot (some say three shots) through the mouth, in Damascus on October 12, 2005. After a one-day examination, Syrian authorities closed the case, Prosecutor Mohammed al-Luaji stating: "Examination of the body and fingerprints as well as testimony from employees, including senior aide General Walid Abaza, indicated that it was a suicide by gunshot." Siddiq said Kanaan "handed me documents written in his own hand that prove Hizbullah's involvement in Premier Rafik Hariri's assassination." "After the disclosure of their content 'in time' Hizbullah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah and all his allies in Leb will not be able to raise their heads," Siddiq said in an interview published Wednesday by the Kuwaiti newspaper Assyiassa. He denied press reports that said Siddiq was subject to an assassination attempt or that he had sought political asylum in France. Siqqid accused the late Hizbullah commander Imad Mughniyeh of crimes such as Hariri's murder and Mufti Hasan Khaled as well as other Paleostinian symbols living in Leb, in addition to Ramzi Irani. Siddiq said Mughniyeh was also behind the 1988 hijacking of a Kuwaiti jet and an attempt to nail Syrian Vice President Abdul Halim Khaddam during his time in power. He said Hariri's assassination was blessed by Hizbullah, adding that Syrian officers were in Beirut's southern suburbs prior to the crime. Siddiq pointed out that Hizbullah initially denied the officers' presence in the southern suburbs, but then withdrew its denial when the officers testified before the U.N.-backed investigation committee. He announced that he gave Hizbullah names to the international committee. Siddiq questioned about Hizbullah's knowledge of the presence of "Israeli spy" Ghassan al-Jidd at the crime scene. "How did Hizbullah know that Jidd was at the crime site if it did not have elements watching Hariri's movements?" Siddiq asked. Siddiq confirmed that he is a suspect and not a witness. He admitted that he "carried out orders before and after the crime," including the transport of Maj. Gen. Bahjat Suleiman from the crime scene to Aley, adding that he did not know that the target was Hariri.(photo courtesy of Assiyassa)

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Syria sentences self-exiled VP to hard labor

2008-09-01

Self-exiled former Vice President of Syria Abdul-Halim Khaddam has been found guilty by a military court of lying to U.N. investigators about the assassination of Lebanon's former prime minister, and was sentenced to hard labor for life. "Judge Mohammed Kaddour Assad of the Damascus first military criminal court has handed Abdel Halim Khaddam 13 sentences, including hard labor for life," lawyer Hossam Eddine al-Habash said. The court has ordered that Khaddam, in his seventies, be stripped of his civil rights and prevented from residing in Damascus or Tartus, his native town, Habash said. Khaddam, who resigned as Syria's vice president in 2005 to join the opposition and now lives in Paris, is accused of "slandering the Syrian leadership and lying before an international tribunal regarding the killing of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri," according to the charge sheet obtained by AFP. He is also accused of "conspiracy to unlawfully seize political power" and of having "illegitimate links with the Zionist enemy, undermining the prestige of the state and of national sentiment and worst of all, plotting with a foreign country to launch an aggression against Syria." According to Habash, Syrian authorities will ask Interpol to cooperate in a bid to bring Khaddam to face the courts at home. Contacted by AFP in Paris, Khaddam's family said they were not aware of the court ruling. In 2006, Khaddam charged that Syrian agents implicated by a U.N. probe into the February 2005 assassination of Hariri could not have acted without Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's approval. The Damascus regime in turn accused Khaddam of treason, with parliament passing a motion calling for him to be brought to justice and tried for high treason.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Were Syrian officers involved in Mugniyah killing?

2008-04-13

Hizbullah's top military commander Imad Mugniyah, mysteriously killed in a blast two months ago, has been the subject of lively discussion in the Arab press in recent days. Lebanon's Al-Shiraa magazine reported Saturday that two weeks ago Syrian intelligence broke into the houses of two Syrian officers in Damascus and executed them with shots to the head, apparently due to their involvement in Mugniyah's assasination. That's a little sloppy. I'd have waited until they came in to work and arranged for them to fall down the stairs. I think they wanted to send a message, and 'shot in the head at home in bed' does that better than 'tripped and fell down the stairs elebenteen times at the coppe shoppe' ... The officers' families were reportedly warned not to inform anyone of what had happened. You don't leave witnesses behind The story came in the wake of a barrage of recent reports involving the Head of Syrian Military Intelligence, Assaf Shawkat. Former Syrian Vice President, Abdul Halim Khaddam claimed that Shawkat, President Bashar al-Assad's brother-in-law, was placed under house arrest after revealing information about the circumstances of Mugniyah's death. This I've heard elsewere Other reports claimed that Shawkat's wife fled the country along with Assad's sister in order to seek political asylum in France or one of the Arab countries. French officials denied the country's involvement in the issue. Al-Shiraa further reported that intelligence officers this week opened fire on a military vehicle driven by an officer who was reportedly in league with Shawkat. The officer was not injured. More sloppy work. Perhaps they've run out of field operatives. Or the pros are staying out of it. On Sunday Syria was scheduled to release for publication the conclusions of the investigation into Mugniyah's death, but officials said the statement was delayed due to the large-scale home front drill that took place in Israel. The officials did not provide a new date for the report's release.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Assad scheming to 'provoke internal strife, torpedo tribunal'

2007-11-07

Former Syrian Vice President Abdul Halim Khaddam accused Syrian President Bashar Assad of seeking to hamper Lebanese presidential elections to torpedo the international tribunal that would try suspects in the 2005 assassination of Lebanon's former prime minister Rafik Hariri and related crimes. Khaddam said Assad's scheme was also designed to provoke internal civil strife and create a power vacuum. "The Lebanon crisis is not one among the Lebanese, neither it is due to disputes over the presidential candidate," Khaddam said in remarks published on Tuesday. "The major reason for the crisis comes from outside Lebanon, from the alliance between the Iranian and Syrian regimes. This alliance wants a president (for Lebanon) that would serve their strategies from one side and helps torpedo the international court." He said Assad uses his allies as well as secret agents to hamper the Lebanese election.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Former Syrian VP: 'Assad is a joke'

2007-09-21

"The Syrian regime cannot respond to what Israel did and is incapable of defending Syria," former Syrian vice president and current opposition member Abdul Halim Khaddam said in an interview published Thursday in the Nazareth-based A-Sinara. When asked about the recent praise Prime Minister Ehud Olmert gave Syrian President Bashar Assad, Khaddam said that "Olmert's words are an insult to Assad's intelligence. [Olmert] tells him, 'I respect you and your policy,' and at the same time uses force against [Assad's] country. Is this the great respect? This is mockery, and why is Assad so silent in his turn?" Khaddam went on to say that Assad was "a kid and a joke, and [the Israelis] want to laugh at him." He added that Assad was incapable of responding: "He is incapable of anything except oppressing the Syrian people." Khaddam, living in exile since the summer of 2005, heads the Front for Saving the Nation, an exiled Syrian opposition movement. In the interview, given in Berlin on the sidelines of a conference of Syrian opposition members, Khaddam said the alleged Israeli action was an act of aggression against Syria. "The Syrians are worrying more and more, because the regime does not supply the means to protect Syria in air, sea and land," he said. Khaddam claimed the Syrian decision to avoid responding was not a consequence of military weakness, but a political decision in line with past decisions to overlook Israeli breaches of Syria's sovereignty. "The regime has the ability to respond, but not the will to respond ... and it is avoiding making a decision to respond and protect the motherland," he said. According to Khaddam, Syria could have responded if it had had a democratic government, but "when the regime shakes up national unity and is not dealing with economic crises, the factors that make up the ability to respond to aggression are not there."

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

'Assad regime is on brink of collapse'

2006-10-23

An exiled former Syrian vice president said Sunday that President Bashar Assad's regime is on the brink of collapse and called on Syrians to prepare for the day when he will be overthrown. Abdul-Halim Khaddam, who is wanted in Syria on treason charges, said in an address to the Syrian people that Assad's "oppressive" regime will soon be replaced with a democratic civil government, but he did not elaborate. "After six years of his taking over the administration of the country, what has Bashar Assad done except spread corruption, increase suffering and make wrong decisions that have led to weakening national unity and subjecting Syria to Arab and international isolation." His address was on the occasion of Eid al-Fitr, the Islamic feast marking the end of the fasting month of Ramadan, and was broadcast on Lebanon's Future TV, an anti-Syrian station owned by the family of slain former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. "Ask yourselves, my brothers, after six years of his taking over the administration of the country, what has Bashar Assad done except spread corruption, increase suffering and (take) wrong decisions that have led to weakening national unity and subjecting Syria to Arab and international isolation," Khaddam said. "I assure you that the corrupt and tyrannical regime is on the brink of collapse and in the near future, the ruler will see the opportunists and hypocrites that rallied around him fleeing. He and his corrupt family and entourage will find themselves in the hands of justice," he added.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Syria asks France to extradite Khaddam

2006-05-15

DAMASCUS - Syria has asked the French bureau of Interpol to hand over a former vice president who defected to France from Syria last year so that he can face questioning on corruption charges, a prosecutor said on Sunday. The summons demands that Abdul-Halim Khaddam be transferred to Syria to appear before a court on a number of charges, including ”instigating a foreign country to launch an attack against Syria.” A grave crime in any totalitarian state. Attorney Hossam Al Deen Habash told Deutsche Presse-Agentur that if the French do not heed the Syrian call, Khaddam would be tried in absentia. And then they'll find a way to carry the sentence out in absentia. He, however, expressed hopes that France, “which is a school in the national law worldwide and is an example for its respect of international justice and for its refusal to harbour wanted persons on its lands,” would respond positively. Translation: they're pretty confident, knowing the lack of morals in France, that they can get their man. A top member of Syria’s ruling elite for nearly 30 years, Khaddam, 73, provoked an outcry in December when he told a pan-Arab satellite channel that Syrian President Bashar Assad had threatened former Lebanese premier Rafik Hariri months before Hariri was assassinated last year. Assad has denied the allegation.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

'Former VP plotting to overthrow govt'

2006-04-10

A military court has charged former Vice President Abdul Halim Khaddam, who defected last year, with inciting a foreign attack against Syria and plotting to take power, an official close to the court told The Associated Press on Sunday. A top member of Syria's ruling elite for nearly 30 years, Khaddam — who lives in France — provoked an outcry in December when he alleged that Syrian President Bashar Assad threatened former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri months before Hariri's assassination in February 2005. From France, Khaddam has also called for the overthrow of the Syrian regime. The court issued seven charges against Khaddam, including inciting a foreign country "to launch a direct aggression against Syria", a charge that carries life imprisonment at hard labour, the official said. Another charge was "conspiring to seize political and civil power", which also entails a possible life prison sentence, the official said. I'd guess the more likely penalty would be having his car blow up some Sunday morning.

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Home Front: Culture Wars

Hollywood Arabs by Amir Taheri

2006-03-01

THE would-be ruler of an oil-rich Arab state is planning a policy reform that includes allowing girls to go to school and signing an oil contract with China. But days before he takes over, he is assassinated when a remote-controlled bomb destroys his bulletproof limousine in the middle of the desert. Who would want such an enlightened prince out of the way? The answer given in "Syriana," the Hollywood blockbuster starring George Clooney, is simple: The murder was planned and carried out by the CIA, the dirty-tricks arm of the United States of America. But why would the Americans want an enlightened Arab leader murdered at a time that President Bush is publicly calling for such leaders to emerge in the Arab world? Again, the scriptwriters' answer is straightforward: the U.S. government is controlled by Texas oil interests that cannot allow any Arab state to sign an oil contract with China. I saw the film in New York last month and did not expect a pirated videocassette version to be already available throughout the Arab world. Yet, in the past week or so, I have received more than a dozen e-mails from Arab friends throughout the Middle East citing the film as (in the words of one) another "sure proof" that the United States will never tolerate democratic leaders in that neck of the wood. THE old saying tells us that one can never convince anyone who doesn't wish to be convinced. The makers of "Syriana" are preaching to the converted, if only because an extraordinarily large number of Arabs are comfortable in the certainty of their victimhood. Long before "Syriana" hit the screen, those Arabs were convinced that whatever misfortune has befallen them is due to some conspiracy by a perfidious Western power. In North Africa, where France ruled for more than a century, every shortcoming, and every major crime, is blamed on the French. From Egypt to the Indian Ocean, all was the fault of the British . . . until the Americans emerged as a more convincing protagonist in the fantasyland of conspiracy theories. In Libya, where Italy ruled for a while last century, even the fact that the telephones don't work in 2006 is blamed on the Italians. Would it change anything if one were to remind the conspiracy theorists that none of the two dozen or so high-profile political murders in the Arab world over the past century had anything to do with the United States or any other foreign power? Start with the murder last February of Rafik Hariri, Lebanon's former prime minister. Was he killed by the CIA or — as Abdul-Halim Khaddam, Syria's former vice president, now asserts — by a criminal coterie in Damascus? The list of Arab leaders murdered since 1900 is a long one. It includes six prime ministers, three kings, an Imam (of Yemen), seven presidents of the republic and dozens of ministers, parliamentarians and senior military officials. Every single one of them was killed either by Islamist militants (often from the Muslim Brotherhood) or by pan-Arab nationalists. THAT many Arabs should welcome the suggestion that their tragedies are due to evil doings by foreigners may be understandable. It is less understandable when so many Americans come together to make a film to portray their nation as evil incarnate. "Syriana" is not only about a single political murder. It also depicts the United States as the power behind much of the terrorism coming from the Middle East. The film shows U.S. oil companies as employers of Asian slave labor, while the CIA is the key source of supply for bombs used by terrorists. Why would any self-respecting American want to write or direct or play in "Syriana"? If the United States is as evil as they suggest, should they not be ashamed of themselves? And if the oil companies control the U.S. government, presumably including Congress, should we conclude that Hollywood is the last bastion of American freedom? One answer to why anyone might want to make such a film is, of course, the very American desire to make money. As things stand today, there is a large market for dissent in the United States. In a recent trip there, I noticed that unless you took a dig at the Americans no one would even listen to you. In one session, when I politely suggested that George W. Bush might be a better choice than either Mullah Omar or Saddam Hussein, I was nearly booed by my American interlocutors. The truth is that there is a market for self-loathing in America today and many, including the producers of "Syriana," are determined to cash in on it. Here is how the incomparable Evelyn Waugh described the present American situation when the makers of "Syriana" were still nothing but glimmers in their daddies' eyes: "There is no more agreeable position than that of dissident from a stable democratic society." The reason is simple: In a stable democratic society — in which you are protected by the law — you can lie, cheat and mislead, all in the name of political dissent, and be rewarded with fame and fortune. The fact that the CIA is little more than a costly leaking device used by rival groups within the U.S. establishment to launch accusations and counter-accusations at each other need not bother the makers of "Syriana." The CIA's masters, for their part, would be pleased with "Syriana" if only because it claims that they can do anything at all. AS for the American self- loathing party, its members would do well to ponder the second part of that quotation from Waugh: "The more elaborate the society, the more vulnerable it is to attack, and the more complete its collapse in case of defeat." The self-loathing party in the United States, which includes a disturbingly large part of the elite, is doing three things. First, it says that America, being the evil power it is, is a legitimate target for revenge attacks by Arab radicals and others. Second, it tells the American people that all this talk about democracy is nonsense, if only because major decisions are ultimately taken by a cabal of businessmen, and politicians and lawyers in their pay. Lastly, and perhaps without realizing it, the self-loathing Americans reduce the Arabs to the level of mere objects in their history. In the "Syriana" view, it is the almighty America that decides every single detail of Arab life with the Arabs as, at best, onlookers and, at worst, victims of American violence. The Arabs are even denied the dignity of their own terrorist acts as "Syriana" shows that it is not they but the CIA that decides who kills whom and where. Pretending to be sympathetic to the "Arab victims of American Imperialism," the film is, in fact, an example of ethno-centrism gone wild. Its message is: The Arabs are nothing, not even self-motivated terrorists, but mere puppets manipulated by us in the United States. By suggesting that America has stolen Arabs' oil and their decision-making process, the filmmakers are, in fact, trying to rob the Arabs of something more important: their history. The amazing thing is that so many Arabs appear to be ready to help the thief. OR perhaps it is not so amazing after all. Adversaries in history often end up resembling each other. So it need not be surprising that the Arabs are learning the art of victimhood from the Americans, while the Americans develop a taste for Arab-style conspiracy theories. Iranian author Amir Taheri is a member of Benador Associates.

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