Headlines on 17 December 2024

1 Israel’s Plan to Conquer the Middle East is Unfolding Before Our Eyes in Syria

Will Syria’s collapse pave the way for Israel’s “Greater Israel” project and broader turmoil across the Middle East?

2 Never thought I’d see a former Isis and Al Qaeda leader installed as head of a state and then romanticized by western correspondents bc he’s softspoken, wears a civilized blazer and doesn’t do tirades against Israel.

It shows, again, that they never cared about human rights in Syria. They just wanted the tyrant in charge to give up hostility to Israel and the US and oppose Iran.

Those are the rules. If you meet them, they’ll help with your makeover from brutal sectarian Al Qaeda murderer to respectable statesman.

3 On Monday, a group of HTS militants stormed into the home of a Syrian Armenian woman in Aleppo, shattering the fragile silence of her sanctuary. The heavily armed, multinational fighters had been hunting for the home of a wealthy businessman, but instead, they found a lone woman standing in her kitchen, frozen in terror. Her heart raced as the men—faces obscured, voices sharp—swept through her house, their presence a violent reminder of the lawlessness that continues to plague Syria.

Though the militants ultimately left her unharmed, the psychological scars of that moment will not fade easily. For this woman, the nightmare is all too familiar. In 2023, she was forcibly displaced from Nagorno-Karabakh by Azerbaijan, torn from her home and forced to seek refuge in a place she hoped would be safer. But instead of peace, she now finds herself surrounded once again by chaos—again under the rule of Erdogan-backed radicals.

4You are insulting the Jewish people

by denouncing, in their name, criticisms of atrocities carried out in the name of Zionism, a repugnant ideology supported by many awful antisemites and opposed staunchly by the most progressive Jews.

5 Two of @georgegalloway’s sons are Arab.

Their grandfather’s grave in South Lebanon was smashed by Israeli invaders.

As Workers Party leader, Galloway will NEVER abandon Palestine or Arab resistance. But slave Arabs—sectarian bootlickers kneeling to imperial masters? He’s DONE with them. You’ve chosen servitude. He’s chosen justice.

6 In Syria’s Hama countryside. The people of Taiba Al-Imam have been classified into three categories:

1- Slaughtering

2- Lifetime deportation

3- Deportation for ten years.

This is the new “Free Syria”

7 When will the UK recognise Palestine as a state, and join the 146 other countries currently doing so?

When it is “conducive” to peace, foreign minister Hamish Falconer told parliament yesterday.

This probably means: when it is acceptable to Israel.

8 Islamic Sharia.” – Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, HTS Islamist leader and new ruler of Syria

Forcing Christians to become second-class citizens and be extorted through a protection tax is not moderate.

9 800 AND COUNTING!

Israel is continuing to bomb Syria a week after longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad was ousted from power. According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Israeli forces have launched over 800 strikes on Syria over the past week. Meanwhile, the Israeli government has approved a plan to expand illegal settlements in the occupied Golan Heights. “Israel is setting new precedents in the Middle East,” says Al Jazeera senior political analyst Marwan Bishara. “It’s acting so lawlessly against Syria, as a rogue state basically.”