Epstein Secrets

tions, nor a clear outcome of the struggle. All the elements of civil war were present, including geographic split between status-quo government in Tripoli and rebel government in Benghazi. Yemen's troubles were embodied in its autocrat of three decades, Al i Abdullah Saleh. When he seemed an obstacle

me of the Al-Assads does not believe in freedom of information. An American journalist friend of mine, in Damascus during the regime of the father, Hafez, witnessed a failed attempt to assassinate that president, and he accordingly filed a report to his wire service. He was then arrested, interrogat

The PLO is expelled from Jordan. President Gamal Abdel Nasser dies and is replaced by Vice President Anwar al-Sadat. Syria’s Minister of Defense, Hafez al-Assad, leads the “Correctionist Movement’ military coup. Hafez al-Assad is elected President of Syria in a referendum. October or Yom Kippur War. Egypt

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have in fact challenged the fundamentals of Syria's security state, a harsh system of controls over every aspect of society, put in place by the late Hafez al-Assad, Bashar's father, who ruled for 30 years from 1970 to his death in 2000. By all accounts, the debate HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_030032 --- PAGE BREAK --- 4 ab

ce more the specter of civil war and making more difficult the task of forming a new government, a job President Michel Suleiman has entrusted to the Tripoli notable, Najib Mikati. If Syria were overrun with internal strife, Hezbollah would be deprived of a valuable ally -- no doubt to Israel's great satis

924 --- PAGE BREAK --- 13 Article 3. The Financial Times Why Assad need not fear Gaddafi's fate Ed Husain August 23, 2011 -- The dramatic scenes in Tripoli are already being seized upon by those keen to depose other despotic regimes. Taken alongside the unstable situation in Syria, there is now a risk of

s mustard gas -- to advanced nerve agents such as sarin and possibly persistent nerve agents, such as VX gas. In the hands of Assad -- and his father Hafez before him -- these weapons have been an ace-in-the-hole deterrent against Israel's nuclear capability. The Assad regime, however, has never openly b