http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/robert-fisk-john-kerry-wants-the-gulf-to-support-the-syrian-rebels-but-which-rebels-the-soft-safe-ones-or-those-horrible-terrorist-islamists-8521531.html
Robert Fisk: John Kerry wants the Gulf to support the Syrian
rebels. But which rebels? The soft, safe ones? Or those horrible, 'terrorist'
Islamists?
John Kerry has had a
miserable time of it in the Gulf. He has to love them all – the kings and princes
and emirs – and he needs their support against Bashar al-Assad of Syria. Because,
of course, they are sending cash and weapons to the rebels. But which rebels?
The soft, secular safe guys of the Free Syrian Army or the horrible ‘terrorist’
Islamists who are also fighting Assad and who, give and take a few thousands
square yards, have just captured the Syrian provincial capital of Raqa?
In Qatar
yesterday, the US Secretary
of State vouchsafed to tell the world that he now had “greater guarantees” that
arms were being sent to “moderate” groups in Syria. Such guarantees may exist –
but they are worthless. If Saudi Arabia
and Qatar
are sending guns to the opposition, how can they possibly label them ‘Not for
al-Nusra or other Islamist groups’? And since the Saudi royal family are
Wahabis – like many of the Islamist fighters in Syria
and, indeed, the 9/11 killers in America
– why shouldn’t the Saudis arm their favourite anti-Shiite militia in Syria?
Mr Kerry seemed to have no idea. “Bashar Assad has lost legitimacy,”
he announced – wasn’t that supposed to have happened two years ago? – “and
there is no way he will restore that.” But if the Saudis and the Qataris are
pouring weapons into Syria
and the Americans cannot – let us tell the truth here – control who gets them,
who will be the ‘legitimate’ rulers of post-Bashar Syria. All in the Gulf are agreed
that Bashar is a very nasty piece of work. But do Saudi
Arabia and Qatar
– famed for their freedoms, parliamentary democracies and human rights – intend
to install a western-style democracy in Damascus?
The Saudis have been raging about Assad’s Scuds. “This
cannot go on,” Saudi foreign minister Prince Saud al-Feisal told Kerry of the
continuing Syrian government ballistic missile attacks on Aleppo. And so say all of us. But the attacks
are going on – and the Saudis and the Qataris and the Americans and, I suppose,
the British, can’t do anything about them. When Kerry was asked in Riyadh on
Monday whether Saudi weapons supplies to the rebels were a concern, he blandly
replied by talking about Russian, Iranian and Hezbollah weapons supplies to the
Assad regime.
In a world which has no institutional memory, no one asked
why the Hezbollah should be giving weapons to the Assad regime when the
Israelis are still boasting that only last month they bombed a weapons convoy
going from Assad to the Hezbollah. Confusing, isn’t it?
And then there’s Kerry’s wonderful remark in Riyadh that “the United States will continue to work
with our friends to empower the Syrian opposition to hopefully be able to bring
about a peaceful revolution.” Forget the split infinitive. Forget the fact that
the Americans claim to be sending only money and bandages and the Brits are
only planning to send ‘non-lethal' armoured vehicles. Schoolchildren should be
asked to parse this nonsense. ‘Friends’? ‘Empower’? ‘Hopefully’? ‘Peaceful’? No
wonder Bashar al-Assad sounds so confident.