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Category: Politics

Even the Koch brothers weren’t as brazen as the tech billionaires

Even the Koch brothers weren’t as brazen as the tech billionaires

Ali Breland writes: Marc Andreessen has been feeling pretty good since Election Day, and at the end of November, he went on The Joe Rogan Experience to say as much. Sitting in the podcast studio, grinning, Andreessen told Rogan that he was “very happy” about the election and that it is now “Morning in America”—directly invoking the famous Ronald Reagan campaign ad. Andreessen, a billionaire co-founder of the storied venture-capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (also known as a16z), had put all…

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Assad’s ‘forever’ rule is over

Assad’s ‘forever’ rule is over

Kareem Shaheen writes: The last time I set foot on Syrian soil was in 2017, when I went to the town of Khan Sheikhun to report on a chemical attack carried out by the now-deposed regime of Bashar al-Assad. I remember sitting next to a man named Abdul Hamid al-Youssef, who had buried his wife and two infant children a day earlier. They had choked on poison gas while he rushed to help the wounded, fainting and waking up in…

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Tears of joy and sadness as ‘disappeared’ Syrians emerge from Assad’s prisons

Tears of joy and sadness as ‘disappeared’ Syrians emerge from Assad’s prisons

The Guardian reports: As Syrian rebels led by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) captured city after city on the road to Damascus, forcing Bashar al-Assad to flee the country, they also opened the doors of the regime’s notorious prisons, into which upwards of 100,000 people disappeared during nearly 14 years of civil war. Many emerged frail and emancipated into the bright December sunlight, greeted by weeping family members who had no idea they were still alive. Some struggled…

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Israeli ground forces cross into Syria

Israeli ground forces cross into Syria

The New York Times reports: Israeli ground forces advanced beyond the demilitarized zone on the Israel-Syria border over the weekend, marking their first overt entry into Syrian territory since the 1973 October War, according to two Israeli officials speaking anonymously to discuss sensitive developments. The Israeli deployment came amid a successful push by rebel groups in Syria to drive President Bashar al-Assad out of power and out of the country, prompting neighboring states to brace for more regional instability created…

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Israel bombs dozens of targets across Syria

Israel bombs dozens of targets across Syria

The Times of Israel reports: Israeli Air Force fighter jets on Sunday struck dozens of targets across Syria, taking out weaponry that Israel feared could fall into the hands of hostile forces, in light of the dramatic fall of the Bashar al-Assad regime some two weeks into a lightning offensive by rebel groups. Also on Sunday, the Israel Defense Forces seized control of a buffer zone between the Israel-Syria border in the Golan Heights, in what it described as a…

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Assad is in Moscow after ‘deal’ on military bases

Assad is in Moscow after ‘deal’ on military bases

Congratulations to the Russian Federation for accepting their first ever Syrian refugee: Bashar Al Assad. So progressive ❤️ — Karim (@Idlibie) November 30, 2024 Reuters reports: Syria’s former President Bashar al-Assad is in Moscow with his family after Russia granted them asylum on humanitarian grounds, a Kremlin source told Russian news agencies on Sunday, and a deal has been done to ensure the safety of Russian military bases. Russia’s Foreign Ministry said earlier that Assad had left Syria and given…

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Assad’s fall offers the possibility of change

Assad’s fall offers the possibility of change

Anne Applebaum writes: [A]fter a well-organized, highly motivated set of armed opponents took the city of Aleppo on November 29, many of the regime’s defenders abruptly stopped fighting. Assad vanished. The scenes that followed today in Damascus—the toppling of statues, the people taking selfies at the dictator’s palace—are the same ones that will unfold in Caracas, Tehran, or Moscow on the day the soldiers of those regimes lose their faith in the leadership, and the public loses their fear of…

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Why Tulsi Gabbard is unfit to become the Director of National Intelligence

Why Tulsi Gabbard is unfit to become the Director of National Intelligence

It’s time to end the illegal, counterproductive war to overthrow the Syrian government of Assad.https://t.co/c8oyV3QOWS — Tulsi Gabbard 🌺 (@TulsiGabbard) August 12, 2016 Timothy Snyder writes: Gabbard appears on the world stage as a defender of a million violent deaths. She is an apologist for two of the great atrocities of the century: the Russian-Syrian suppression of the Syrian opposition to the Bashar al-Assad dictatorship, which has taken about half a million lives, most of them civilians, some of them…

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U.S. has been in contact with rebel groups through Turkey and debating how extensively to engage them

U.S. has been in contact with rebel groups through Turkey and debating how extensively to engage them

The New York Times reports: The United States has been passing messages indirectly in recent days to the rebel groups that led the lightning offensive to topple President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, officials said. Now that the groups have taken Damascus and succeeded in pushing Mr. Assad out of power, President Biden and his top advisers are debating the extent to which they should engage directly with them going forward, the officials said. The United States started passing messages to…

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Assad flees

Assad flees

Reuters reports: Syrian rebels declared President Bashar al-Assad‘s ouster after seizing control of Damascus on Sunday, forcing him to flee and ending his family’s decades of rule after more than 13 years of civil war in a seismic moment for the Middle East. The Islamist rebels also dealt a major blow to the influence of Russia and Iran in Syria in the heart of the region, allies who propped up Assad during critical periods in the conflict. The rebels said…

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Syrian army flees Homs, cutting Assad off from coast

Syrian army flees Homs, cutting Assad off from coast

Reuters reports: Syrian government forces abandoned the key city of Homs on Saturday after less than a day of fighting, leaving President Bashar al-Assad’s 24-year rule dangling by a thread with insurgents also advancing towards the capital Damascus. Since the rebels’ sweep into Aleppo a week ago, government defences have crumbled at dizzying speed as rebels seized a string of major cities and reignited a rebellion in places it had long seemed dead. The fall of Homs and threat to…

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Assad regime’s collapse expected within days

Assad regime’s collapse expected within days

The Times of Israel reports: Syrian rebel forces on Saturday made major advances in their offensive against Syrian government forces, with reports saying rebels were closing in on the capital Damascus from the north, east, and south, as regime troops reportedly pulled back from bases around the country to fortify positions around the capital city. CNN reported Saturday that the US was increasingly believing that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime could collapse within days. Reuters similarly cited American and other…

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Gabbard could be the next Trump nominee to come under fire in the Senate

Gabbard could be the next Trump nominee to come under fire in the Senate

Politico reports: Tusli Gabbard looks likely to be the next of President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks to face a bumpy ride in the U.S. Senate. Two current and three former GOP Senate aides familiar with discussions over the national security nominations told POLITICO that the former Democratic congressperson and recent MAGA convert will face intense questioning and stiff resistance when her nomination as the next director of national intelligence comes before the Senate. While many cautioned it was still anyone’s…

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Democrats and Republicans in Congress were worried that Gabbard might leak information to Syria

Democrats and Republicans in Congress were worried that Gabbard might leak information to Syria

NBC News reports: In the spring of 2018, congressional staffers were anxious ahead of a House Foreign Affairs Committee meeting. A Syrian defector who had risked his life to expose atrocities committed by the Assad regime was due to appear behind closed doors at a private briefing for lawmakers. No cameras would be present, but congressional aides worried about one committee member, Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, who had repeatedly defended the Syrian regime and even met its leader, Bashar al-Assad,…

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A CEO’s killing echoes the political violence of the Gilded Age

A CEO’s killing echoes the political violence of the Gilded Age

Zeynep Tufekci writes: I’ve been studying social media for a long time, and I can’t think of any other incident when a murder [that of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson] in this country has been so openly celebrated. The conditions that gave rise to this outpouring of anger are in some ways specific to this moment. Today’s business culture enshrines the maximization of executive wealth and shareholder fortunes, and has succeeded in leveraging personal riches into untold political influence. New communication…

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How Trump’s transition delays could end up hamstringing his agenda

How Trump’s transition delays could end up hamstringing his agenda

Politico reports: President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team still has not sent policy advisers to coordinate with the federal agencies he is preparing to take over, delaying preparations that could be key to executing his ambitious agenda. The Trump transition signed an agreement Nov. 26 paving the way for those “landing teams” to begin work in the agencies. But before they can do that, the transition has to submit its lists of people who will serve on the teams to the…

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