Casually: "How were those assassinations carried out? Was it the Israelis? Was it the Americans? How was it done?"

Saturday 28 July 2012

Casually: "How were those assassinations carried out? Was it the Israelis? Was it the Americans? How was it done?"

Via FLC

'Assad's days are numbered'

Diane Rehm interviewed Martin Indyk, Aram Nerguizian and Karim Sadjadpour on an episode of her National Public Radio show discussing recent events in Syria. (Audio). She asks an intriguing question regarding the recent assassinations. It wasn't the question itself that surprised me, it was that she asked it.

Rehm: Martin Indyk, we continue to hear those within Damascus throughout Syria saying, where is the United States? What is the United States doing? What more can it do?
Indyk: Well, I think that those who are calling for U.S. military intervention are likely to continue to be disappointed. The heart of the matter is that the president wants to run on a campaign platform of ending wars in the Middle East, not starting new ones, and that is broadly popular in the United States..... Simply put, the American people are war-weary after 10 years of war in the greater Middle East.
Rehm: Mm hmm.
Indyk: And so that kind of military intervention is unlikely. So the focus is much more on helping to support the opposition, perhaps now training them, supporting Saudi Arabia and Qataris....., .........
Rehm: Of course, the question becomes, how were those assassinations carried out? Was it the Israelis? Was it the Americans? How was it done?
Sadjadpour: Perhaps Aram knows more than I do. What I've read about the assassinations are is it's conflicting because the Syrian regime claims that there were suicide bombings conducted by terrorists. But journalists who went to the scene (and Sadjapour the 'expert' is talking about a most important HQ in Damascus, after this decapitation attempt) didn't see any signs of major explosions.....
Rehm: Aram.
Nerguizian: Well, I don't argue with Karim. You don't have a reliable set of narratives..... it's still an ongoing story. I don't think we have a clear picture. There's talk of involvement of Jordanian intelligence, potentially Turkish intelligence, but it's all heresy at this point.
Rehm: Martin Indyk.
Indyk: I think that if we look at the longer term trends in this battle, we can draw some more interesting conclusions which is that, first of all, ... we are witnessing is the last months -- I'm not sure about last days -- of this regime."