Comments on: Sanctions on Syria

By: Maya

Maya — Tue, 18 May 2004 00:15:49 +0000

On behalf of all of my aunts & uncles, all my freinds’& their new borns babies, Thanks. All true peace loving people are a true gift to any family. A christian, Syrian Born Canadian.

By: Nat Whilk

Nat Whilk — Thu, 13 May 2004 14:59:04 +0000

Matt Weiner wrote: “I’m sure all my Lebanese-American friends are delighted at anything that makes it harder for my Syrian-American barber to visit his family.” Ha, Ha. That’s a good one. Might your Lebanese-American friends, instead, support the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003 because they think, in some small way, it might contribute to Lebanese Sovereignty? BTW, here are the names of the 12 brave souls in the House and the Senate who stood athwart history and yelled “Stop!” when this pernicious legislation came up for a vote: Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) Sen. John Chafee (R-RI) Sen. Michael Enzi (R-WY) Sen. Jim Jeffords (I-VT) Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) Rep. John Dingell (D-MI) Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA) Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) Rep. Nick Rahall (D-WV) Rep. Pete Stark (D-CA)

By: Jonathan Edelstein

Jonathan Edelstein — Thu, 13 May 2004 14:56:36 +0000

The truth is again more nuanced: there’s more ethnic and religious tolerance in that country than in all of its neighbours — including Israel. That’s what you get when it’s the formerly-oppressed minorities running the show. Hmmm, not sure I’d go that far. There’s one minority, the Kurds, that is pointedly excluded from the Syrian grand coalition for much the same reason as Muslim Arabs are kept out of the Israeli political mainstream – i.e., connections (or perceived connections) to a rival nationalism transcending Syrian borders. Also, the politics of exclusion in Syria tends to be much more thorough than in Israel – you won’t see any Kurdish judges in Syrian courts, for instance, or affirmative action for Kurds in the civil service the way there is for Israeli Arabs. Religious tolerance: The Syrian record in that regard has been somewhat spotty with respect to Jews, but I’ll concede for argument’s sake that this is more of a political issue than a religious one. More to the point, Syria and Israel take essentially the same approach to religious affairs – both countries (and also Jordan) use a leftover Ottoman millet system in which minority religions have their own personal law and religious authorities. With the exception noted above, the Syrians have a pretty good track record of respecting freedom of worship, but so do the Israelis; the State Department gives them good marks while noting certain problem areas resulting from the interplay of religion and nationalism. The bottom line is that it’s a stretch to characterize Syria as having greater religious and ethnic tolerance than Israel. Maybe it’s roughly equivalent to Israel, but I wouldn’t even say that.

By: raj

raj — Thu, 13 May 2004 12:30:17 +0000

>Are the insurgents allegedly crossing the border from Syria at all supported by the Syrian regime…. It doesn’t matter, actually. If the Americans don’t want insurgents to cross the border from Syria into Iraq, the Americans presumably are in as good a position to seal the border as the Syrians. There are two sides to the border, after all. It was reported that the sanctions do not include cell phone technology and aircraft parts. Of course, both are important industries for the Republican party.

By: MFB

MFB — Thu, 13 May 2004 10:59:38 +0000

Sanctions are a step towards the long-term goal of invasion and occupation of Syria. Thus leaving Israel and Turkey happier. At least it will cost fewer lives than the next goal (invasion and occupation of Iran).

By: Jack

Jack — Thu, 13 May 2004 08:42:42 +0000

Are the insurgents allegedly crossing the border from Syria at all supported by the Syrian regime or in fact more likely to be related to the political organisations the regime gets such a bad rap for supressing? Is it at all a practical proposition for Syria to seal its border? Are we not able to achieve the same thing on the other side? Are similar things happening from Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Iran? If not, really? If so, why the sanctions on Syria? Given that we were recently cooperating closely enough with Syria to send them canadians to interrogate, what has gone wrong in the mean time? Supposing that the regime is indeed uncooperative and that it is ruled by an undemocratic regime only interested in self preservation, what has happened to make being uncooperative arational choice? If it is democratic, how have we alienated the people? Finally, as raised above how do we suggest the Syrians handle the Muslim Brotherhood and other Sunni revolutionaries? I suppose that there is an outside chance that there are good answers to these questions but I have yet to see them. I have no doubt that Saddam and the Assads should have done much better but we are now fighting the people they have been supressing ourselves. There is an element of hypocrisy in all this. When we have the problem, the recalcitrance of Sadr & co is a justification for our abandoning standards that have taken us centuries to achieve. When Saddam uses brutal methods to solve the problem it is proof that he is evil. I don’t think we do anyone any favours if we do not give the devil his due. Failure to do so is no doubt why we are fighting the very people we wee supposed to be liberating. Even Cheney or Rumsfeld could not argue that Sadr was an ally of Saddam’s. The worst is it is not like we didn’t know all this, it is why we chickened out of getting rid of Saddam on two previous occasions, both more auspicious than last year.

By: Jack

Jack — Thu, 13 May 2004 08:04:52 +0000

Pepi, just a hypothesis but one that seems to be falsified by the enormous size of Iraq’s public debt and by the way Rumsfeld completely ignored most of the plans (General Zinni’s plan for example) it did come up with in the 12 years or so since the previous invasion. I mean come on, the airforce didn’t even have to fly to Iran this time. I think paying off the generals did help but I’m not sure that helps the hypothesis much. Are you really claiming that the invasion went so well because of the hihg quality of our intelligence and some programme, news to me, of thousands of assasinations? Things just get better all the time.

By: Dan Simon

Dan Simon — Thu, 13 May 2004 07:25:22 +0000

Grand Moff Texan: Good point—I should have thought of all the Syrians who haven’t been brutally murdered or tortured by their government, and who’ve merely been terrorized into quiescent silence by those who were. Then surely I wouldn’t have been so quick to call the Syrian government “brutal”. Thanks for setting me straight. Roger: You answered your own question. The sanctions aren’t intended to make a moral statement about Syria’s dictatorship—I brought up the Syrian regime’s brutality only to cast doubt on the idea that ordinary Syrians would be outraged by American actions against the Syrian government. From the Americans’ point of view, though, the purpose of the sanctions is clear: to put pressure on the Syrian government to stop supporting anti-US insurgents in Iraq. That’s a perfectly sensible foreign policy objective, and sanctions are a perfectly sensible means by which to attempt to achieve it.

By: nick

nick — Thu, 13 May 2004 07:05:09 +0000

Nick and Daniel—I thought I might encounter some disagreement with my comment, but it really never even occurred to me that the one point of dispute would be whether Syria was, in fact, a brutal dictatorship. No, Dan, you appear to be incapable of making a proper assessment of the situation, as ‘grand moff texan’ and Roger make clear: my point of dispute was your facile contention that Syria’s political climate can be resolved down to ‘mostly Sunni Muslims suffering under a brutal Alawi-dominated dictatorship’. The reality is more subtle, given that the coalition of Alawite, Shia, Druze and Christian minorities that make up the Syrian political elite are an admittedly ruthless bulwark against a vocal Wahhabi minority that would like to mobilise Sunnis into… well, joining in a mass slaughter of the heretics. Rwanda-stylee. That’s to say, I dispute the notion of a ‘mostly suffering Sunni’ majority in Syria. The truth is again more nuanced: there’s more ethnic and religious tolerance in that country than in all of its neighbours—including Israel. That’s what you get when it’s the formerly-oppressed minorities running the show. Now, political tolerance is another thing entirely, and only a fool would say that ‘Scott Evil’ Assad’s regime is tolerant of Sunni opposition groups. But since the US has spent the last three years or so trying to obliterate radical Sunni political movements… well, it’s just an interesting position for you to hold, Dan. But, like I said, you obviously know nothng about Syria.

By: Steve

Steve — Thu, 13 May 2004 05:29:41 +0000

Didn’t the Muslim Brotherhood begin its existance as a pan-Arabist, anti-Israeli (or anti-Zionist; I’m not sure of the time frame), largely secular terrorist movement before it was driven underground by Egypt? Or am I conflating it with another group?

By: roger

roger — Thu, 13 May 2004 04:08:38 +0000

Dan, Actually, it is hard to believe sanctions have to do with dictatorship—otherwise, we would be forced to conclude that Bush actually thinks Gadaffi was democratically elected recently. The sanctions have to do, instead, with the supposed refusal of the Syrians to close seal their borders with Iraq to the point of impenetrability. Hmm, this is not a condition that seems to weigh on our relations with Saudi Arabia—but then again, there aren’t a lot of Syrian businessmen in partnership with various members of the Bush family. The great crime of the current family that rules in Syria was in suppressing, with maximum force (to the tune, I’ve read, of 40,000 casualties) the Moslem Brotherhood. But here is a nice dilemma for you—the Moslem Brotherhood was an especially eager jihadist group. We have rewarded the Egyptian government for repressing the group on a more minor scale. So what are the sanctions supposed to do?

By: Grand Moff Texan

Grand Moff Texan — Thu, 13 May 2004 03:22:48 +0000

“Tough”: find a way to do away with your “if.” Then we can talk.

By: Grand Moff Texan

Grand Moff Texan — Thu, 13 May 2004 03:19:31 +0000

The objection, Dan, was to the notion that the entire nation was suffering under a brutal dictatorship. I suspect that you know this and are hoping others are less subtle. We’ve also shipped folks to be tortured in Saudi. For that matter, we might even use Turkey. Shall we target them as well? I thought not. But please, remind us all of the Brown Threat again. Please.

By: Matt Weiner

Matt Weiner — Thu, 13 May 2004 03:15:02 +0000

Nat, I’m sure all my Lebanese-American friends are delighted at anything that makes it harder for my Syrian-American barber to visit his family.

By: toughgametheory

toughgametheory — Thu, 13 May 2004 02:14:31 +0000

There is one problem that the lefties have to deal with, which is this: Suppose someone on the “racist” right manages to prove that America being racist/intolerant/bigots (if you f$$$ with us we will f$$$ you up) is in the best interests of the country. -there is some historical and political research on this issue. What are you going to do then? Choose a path which makes the country weaker? Is that not a tad unpatriotic? So by being soft towards Syria you undermine your own position.