If the HTS leader stays true to his form of recent years then we might already assume that certain levers will remain available by virtue of his attention to his own image, and the degree of pragmatism demonstrated in the past. In areas of Syria they've long controlled, they were sensitive to complaints about own internal security forces, and citizens making comparisons to the previous regimes hated internal security. But the extent to which they genuinely addressed those concerns as opposed to simple airbrushing, isnt completely clear to me. I believe he did once disband an internal security force that was subject to accusations of brutality, but whether what it was replaced with was any better is something I dont know.
Who is the we here, the British state ? You want a discussion about what the British state should be doing ?
anfenglishmobile.com
tempestmag.org
.Interview with Joseph Daher
Understanding the rebellion in Syria
Tempest asks Swiss-Syrian socialist Joseph Daher about the process that led to the fall of Bashar al-Assad's rule.
rojavainformationcenter.org
threadreaderapp.com
Over the past week, almost all attention on Syria has been directed at the HTS/opposition vs. Assad dynamic -- and the change of power in Damascus.
Meanwhile, the SDF in northeast Syria has been dealt a tough hand of cards -- a:
As the anti-Assad advance gained steam in western Syria, the Arab tribal component of the SDF sought to take the fight to Assad in the east. That happened in Deir ez Zour, but it was hard at times, and complex. It frayed some Arab-YPG ties.
The SDF also found itself assuming control of resource-intensive areas in Hasakeh & Raqqa abandoned by Assad -- good in theory, but it stretched resources while the Turkey-backed SNA launched offensive moves into Tel Rifat & then Manbij.
With multiple axes in play, driven by differing motivations & needs, the SDF has allegedly drawn manpower away from several prisons holding ISIS detainees in Hasakeh -- while also ceasing anti-ISIS operations in Deir ez Zour altogether. Not good, for now.
Strategically, the SDF is more vulnerable now than at any point of its 9yr existence -- as Turkey now has zero restrictions on its potential desire to make a move on it along its border with Syria.
Not sure if I can put up with hitmouse music for the car journey tbhI was hoping for kebabking to take the lead of a moderate U75 delegation ideally consisting also of yourself, hitmouse and zahir to hopefully get an audience with al-Jolani, before the general secretary of the Iranian winemakers' guild can press his claims.
I'm sure everything will be cleared up after you guys talk him through this thread, and patiently explain the urgency of being nice in a gradual evolution towards a socialist society.
(I'm not a Syria expert at all so not commenting, but you are not human if you don't feel joy at some of the scenes of celebration since that horror Assad hightailed it to Russia, as his "regime" melted like snow in April. Even in 2024, tyrants always fall.)
If the Russian position collpases there (some juicy reportage as Lavrov and the Iranian delegation looking peevish and humilated as Assad's regime collapsed behind them) then so much the better. If only Lukashenka and Putin would fall as easily.
threadreaderapp.com
The authoritarian regime in Damascus is no more.13 years, 8 months, and 23 days after the “Day of Rage,” and while the final bullet of the Syria's Civil War has yet to be shot, a Caliph crowned himself in Sham—a :
1/ "Horror is the removal of masks."The fall of Assad’s regime is a moment of euphoria. The streets erupt in celebration. Prisons swing open, unearthing the true depth of the regime's depravity and brutal cruelty. Every hour, new stories of horror surface. Like this one:
2/ Michel Kilo once recounted a story of a woman giving birth in Assad’s dungeons—a tale once dismissed as fiction. Today, it’s no longer “just a story.” Over 70 children, raised in regime prisons, have been found. Just like the one in the picture.
3/ That baby, born in a dungeon, grew up in that dungeon. For 3 years, he knew nothing but concrete, cold, and fear. But this week, that child stepped into the light for the first time in his life. Not because of the UN, not because of diplomacy, not because of "justice."
4/ It happened because one man made it happen. Abu Mohammad Jolani. And he did it with an army. His army. No protests. No UN decrees. Just war. A war led from the heart of Al-Fath al-Mubin (الفَتح المُبين) operation room.
5/ There’s a scene in Game of Thrones that comes to mind. Jon Snow, a bastard, is crowned King in the North—not for his birthright, but because he avenged the Red Wedding. Jolani has done the same for Syria. For many Syrians, he has avenged 50 years of Ba'athist oppression.
6/ As the dominoes fall in Syria and various actors scramble to grab what they can, they are merely reacting to the calculated moves of one faction: Jolani's HTS. For they have not only seized land — they have seized the state's institutions.
7/ Before entering Damascus, Jolani ordered his militias NOT to touch the Ba'athist institutions left behind as the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) retreated. No looting. No torching. No "purges." Instead, their goal was to occupy them intact. But why?
8/ HTS had been engaged in secret talks with Syria’s Prime Minister for days. When the SAA retreated, it wasn’t a collapse — it was a handover. HTS militants escorted Assad’s Prime Minister as he delivered the government’s authority directly to Jolani in the military operations room.
9/ What is HTS building? Not the “local councils” Jolani promised, nor “decentralization.” Those were lies. If HTS sought local autonomy, they’d dismantle Ba’athist institutions—not inherit them. Jolani isn’t tearing down Syria’s state—he’s becoming it.
10/ There's a precedent. ISIS did the same. People forget: ISIS wasn’t just jihadists and foreign fighters. It was built by Saddam’s ex-Ba’athist generals, spies, and intelligence chiefs—they repurposed Iraq’s bureaucracy for ISIS’s “state. Jolani is now doing the same in Syria.
Just to be clear. I'm not part of this "we" you speak of.
Interesting. I notice Lister makes no mention of the psychopath Maher Assad, the now fled ex-president's younger bother. he just makes mention of his wife. A few months ago there was a rumour, quite a large one actually as it had people dancing in the streets that Maher had been killed in an Israeli airstrike on a villa just outside of Damascus. And now Lister is making mention of just his wife. Was he actually killed in the airstrike (I never found out for sure despite searching every now and again) or has he like his brother, fled?
