Syria Today: The Spillover into Lebanon

Regime Says It Will Join International "Peace Conference"

Foreign Minister Walid Muallem has said that the regime has agreed "in principle to participate in the international conference which is supposed to be convened in Geneva" in June: "We think...that the international conference represents a good opportunity for a political solution to the crisis in Syria."

Muallem, during a sudden visit to Iraq, criticised foreign actors supporting the insurgency: "The regional countries that conspire against Syria are the same that support terrorism in Iraq."

Russian officials said earlier in the week that the Assad regime had agreed to take part in the conference. However, the opposition Syrian National Coalition has said that it wants guarantees that President Assad will step down during a transitional government.

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Middle East Today: Lebanon --- Two Rockets Hit Near Beirut

Iraq: At Least 11 Killed in Attacks

Gunmen and other attackers killed at least eleven people and wounded more than two dozen in attacks on Sunday.

In Kazimiyah district in northern Baghdad, gunmen in a speeding car killed three civilians and wounded another.

In the northern city of Mosul, a car bomb went off at a house early in the morning while a joint army-police unit was conducting door-to-door searches. The blast killed three policemen and one soldier. Twenty people, including four civilians, were wounded.

Attackers gunned down a policeman in his car in in central Mosul, about 360 kilometers (225 miles) northwest of Baghdad.

In the western province of Anbar, three soldiers were killed and five wounded in two separate attacks by roadside bombs.

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Middle East Today: Bahrain --- 10,000s Protest Raids by Security Forces

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Tens of thousands of Bahrainis have staged a sit-in to protest raids by security forces, including one on the home of the Kingdom's Shia cleric, Sheikh Isa Qassim.

The sit-in was called by Al Wefaq, Bahrain's largest opposition society, which has also suspended participation in a "National Dialogue" over the raids and detentions of dissenters.

Friday's sit-in took place in Diraz near Sheikh Qassim's mosque. An observer said police had made no attempt to stop protesters entering the town. A l Wefaq had called for a peaceful demonstration and there were no reports of violence.

Earlier in the day three pro-regime political societies issued a statement denouncing a meeting between Sheik Qassim and Rashad Hussain, a senior US State Department official, on Thursday.

The societies said the meeting, the first ever between a high-ranking American official and the Shia cleric, was evidence that "the position of the state department and the American government is increasingly exposed in its support for terrorist operations in Bahrain".

Syria Today: A "Plan B" If International Conference Fails?

Nasrallah: Should Syria fall, the resistance will be confined and Israel will enter Lebanon

In a televised speech on Saturday, Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah warned that "Israel is ready for war" against Lebanon and Syria.

Israel has threatened Lebanon every day since the Second Lebanon War in 2006, Nasrallah claimed, adding that the Jewish State has been mobilizing its troops on the border with Lebanon for months.

The Hezbollah leader claimed that Lebanon's army can fight against Israel like the "Resistance", but only if given proper arms.

Nasrallah went on to argue that the Resistance "has done a lot in Lebanon to face Israel ", and said that the Resistance is not only Hezbollah but all those who exerted efforts against Israel.

 

He added that should Hezbollah agree to hand over its weapons to the Lebanese state, those "weapons will lose their significance."

Nasrallah accused Israel of building settlements on its borders with Jordan, Syria and Lebanon and is  "recruiting Jews from all over the world as part of its military plan for the region."

Meanwhile, Nasrallah accused the international community of failing to act while Israel completed its "project in Palestine".

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Syria Analysis: Dissecting the "Iran Arms to Damascus" Video & Narrative

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This episode points to both the potential and the risks of drawing open-source intelligence from videos. Clips such as these can give clues to political and military developments, but those clues can be diversionary or misleading --- if the aim is to provide "truth", rather than spin or wishful thinking --- without contexts.

Contexts in this case would include the relationship between Hezbollah and Iran as well as between the Lebanese organisation and Damascus, the state of the conflict in Damascus Province, and the interests of the insurgents who have put out the video.

And there are wider contexts beyond this. The supply of arms by Iran and Hezbollah to Syrian forces is not one-sided. It takes place in a larger arena in which the "West", Turkey, and Arab States provide their own weaponry to the insurgency.

None of this is to deny the need to assess this video. It is an argument to assess it properly.

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Syria Today: Assad Plays the Pan-Arab Card

Anti-regime rally in Bustan al-Qasr section of Aleppo on Friday

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Insurgent Takeover of Regime Base

More claimed footage of the insurgent takeover of a major regime base in Idlib Province, noted in EA's coverage on Thursday:

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Middle East Today: Bahrain --- Amid Raids & Detentions, Opposition Suspends Participation in "National Dialogue"

Bahrain leading opposition society Al Wefaq has suspended its participation in the Kingdom's "national dialogue" after a wave of raids and detentions by security forces.

The Dialogue began in February, with the involvement of pro-regime and opposition groups, as well as Government ministers and MPs, in an attempt to resolve the issues of reform and justice highlighted by mass protests from February 2011.

However, other opposition factions have denounced the Dialogue as little more than a token gesture, and the discussions have made little progress.

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Syria Today: An Insurgent Victory in Idlib Province?

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Insurgents moving across the regime base in Idlib Province

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Demonstration in Raqqa

The rally in insurgent-held Raqqa, the largest city held by the opposition, last night:

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Syria Analysis: Creating the Latest Scare Story "Iranians Fighting Alongside Hezbollah"

A story of how US Government spin became headline "fact" by Wednesday morning.,,.

On Tuesday, the State Department set up a conference call with a "senior official" on Syria. In the midst of answering a question about the fighting in Qusayr near the Lebanese border, the official said:

It is the most visible effort we have seen of Hezbollah to engage directly in the fighting in Syria as a foreign force. We understand there are also Iranians up there. That is what the Free Syrian Army commanders are telling us. I think this is an important thing to note, the direct implication of foreigners fighting on Syrian soil now for the regime.

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Syria Today: The Battle for Qusayr Continues

Insurgents fighting in Qusayr

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Opposition Insists Assad Must Go

The opposition Syrian National Coalition has rejected Russian demands that, for an international conference, there should be no pre-condition of the departure of President Assad.

"We have been very clear that any transitional period must start with the departure of Assad and the heads of the security services," Khalid Saleh, the spokesman of the SNC, said Tuesday.

Saleh also said the Free Syrian Army must receive "major shipments of weapons" and "must be able to control more areas of Syria before we start thinking about the conference".

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