Epstein Secrets

as made it difficult to discuss sectarian prejudice in public, which has sometimes kept hatreds bottled up. Some in the Sunni majority perceive the Assads as representatives of their sect and resent the entire community by extension. None of this makes sectarian conflict inevitable. Class and regiona

since the ascension of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Justice and Development Party (AKP) in Turkey EFTA_R1_02029349 EFTA02689724 17 and Bashar al-Assad's inheritance of the Syrian presidency, relations have dramatically improved. Turkey invested enormous financial and political capital in Syria, esta

political capital in Syria, establishing a Levantine free trade zone and distancing itself from Israel. Erdogan extracted promises of reform from Bashar at the onset of the protests and then watched with increasingly visible consternation as the promises were broken. He warned Syria repeatedly again

en furiously buying smuggled weapons since the crisis began. Last week for the first time, anti-regime activists reported that people in Rastan and Talbiseh were meeting tanks with rocket-propelled grenades. Some of the conflicting reports from Jisr al-Shaghour, the besieged town near the northwestern b

travel bans and to freeze the assets of President Assad and nine other Syrian senior officials. Within da

mposed sanctions on the Syrian leadership earlier in May, the EU foreign ministers agreed to impose travel bans and to freeze the assets of President Assad and nine other Syrian senior officials. Within days of the EU announcement, Canada invoked similar travel and economic sanctions. While Russia blocke

tempt to end the protests. Tens of people were killed or wounded over the weekend and tanks have entered two suburbs of the city of Homs, Rastan, and Talbiseh. The heavy-handed repression by police and military officials may lead demonstrators to consider a recourse to arms. The government is cracking down

The Islamic State has not replaced its black flag with a white one= nor has it shrunk appreciably in size. Obama's attempt to unsea= Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad has not produced much either, other than in=reased violence and chaos in the poor, benighted country. The Pentag=n's effort to train and re-insert

The Rus=ian government claims that it is targeting the Islamic State, but many of =he air strikes appear to have hit other rebel groups fighting the Assad re=ime. And in the 11 EFTA_R1_00006487 EFTA01732892 short period that the air strikes have taken place, =hey've predictably generated the usual

hort period that the air strikes have taken place, =hey've predictably generated the usual reports of "collateral =amage," including 17 civilians in Talbiseh at the very outset on =eptember 30. =p class="MsoNormal">The Russian moves, if only because they=represent something fundamentally different in a c