Epstein Secrets

cy project fail. So no matter the original reasons for the war, in the end, it came down to this: Were America and its Iraqi allies going to defeat Al Qaeda and its allies in the heart of the Arab world or were Al Qaeda and its allies going to defeat them? Thanks to the Sunni Awakening movement in Iraq,

ct. Emblematic of his brutal rule was the crushing of the uprising in the city of Hama in 1982, in which tens of thousands of Syrians were killed. Hafez had originally designated his eldest and favorite son, Bassel, as his successor, and Bassel, the chief of presidential security, was perfect for th

understand him in the context EFTA_R1_01992731 EFTA02681516 33 of the Assad family's dominance of the Syrian political scene. Bashar's father, Hafez al-Assad, ruled Syria with an iron fist for three decades, including enforcing draconian emergency laws in 1963 that helped him eliminate political opponent

ch and to whom. The administration could change course and decide that living with Assad is better than the danger of a fragmented Syria overrun by Al Qaeda- backed jihadists. (Former CIA Director Michael Hayden endorsed that option last week, telling a Washington audience that it might be "the best ...

again dashing the hopes of pro-U.S. factions in the opposition. Meanwhile, other forces were competing for influence in the Syrian snake pit, too. Al Qaeda and its allies sponsored jihadist groups that imported aspiring terrorists from Iraq and other countries. Saudi Arabia and other wealthy Persian Gu

ians do." The Syrian-Russian relationship was always rather complicated, full of mutual suspicion and attempts by Moscow to impose an ideology that Hafez al-Assad didn't much care for, in exchange for military and intelligence assistance that Syria couldn't do without. But Damascus isn't just a resurrected st

a toug= stance and reject all compromises. These groups are affiliated with terror cells based in the Sinai Peninsula,=and some of them have ties to al-Qaida. In the past, they have already blo=ked the attempts of Egyptian intermediaries to broker a cease-fire. In the=days to come, Israel could face a si

ls against Mr. Assad's Al=wite sect and Syria's other religious minorities is growing every day. Following the rise to power of Mr. Assad's father, Hafez, in 1970, Alawit=s were transformed from a persecuted minority sect to the controlling forc= within the army and government. With a system of perks

triggered a campaign of violence from the majority Sunnis that includes a growing Islamist element and takes in Muslim Brotherhood, Salafi and even al-Qaeda- affiliated factions. Despite President Obama's "reset" policy, Russia continues to support [4] Bashar al-Assad's brutal regime. But in a rare admis

ly wrong: Assad's is an oppressive, minority-Alawi regime. It came to power via a 1970 coup. In 1982, the current dictator's father, then president Hafez al- Assad, brought artillery and killed over twenty thousand Islamist rebels in the town of Hama. The son is less efficient and likely to lose powe

nst his own people and remain almost indifferent to the same crimes EFTA00660824 when committed by Bashar al-Assad in Syria? Why knock off a dozen al Qaeda terrorists from the air, and release another group from Guantanamo? The answer, of course, is politics. Politics matters to any sane politician; bu

ck 2. The Daily Beast Syria: The Lost Bequest of Hafez Assad Fouad Ajami January 23, 2012 -- Bashar, son of Hafez Assad, has a son by the name of Hafez. But as the defiance and bloodletting in £yria would seem to suggest, Bashar needn't worry about training his son for future rulership. The house t

Kenneth M. Pollack February 27, 2011 -- On Feb. 11, 1979, Islamic revolutionaries took power in Tehran. On Sept. 11, 2001, Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda terrorists launched their attacks on New York and Washington, killing nearly 3,000 Americans. On Feb. 11, 2011, Hosni Mubarak resigned as president

rivacy of their homes. In the public space, there was now the cult of the rulers, the unbounded power of Saddam Hussein and Muammar el-Qaddafi and Hafez al-Assad in Syria and Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia. The traditional restraints on power had been swept away, and no new social contract between ruler

Kenneth M. Pollack February 27, 2011 -- On Feb. 11, 1979, Islamic revolutionaries took power in Tehran. On Sept. 11, 2001, Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda terrorists launched their attacks on New York and Washington, killing nearly 3,000 Americans. On Feb. 11, 2011, Hosni Mubarak resigned as president

privacy of their homes. In the public space, there was now the cult of the rulers, the unbounded power of Saddam Hussein and Muammar el-Qaddafi and Hafez al-Assad in Syria and Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia. The traditional restraints on power had been swept away, and no new social contract between ruler

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

as killed. With the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks a few weeks away, it's possible to use this evidence to sketch a vivid portrait of al- Qaeda, drawing on material contained in more than 100 computer storage devices, including thumb drives, DVDs and CDs, and more than a dozen computers or ha

rs from mistrust between his Egyptian faction of al-Qaeda and other operatives, such as Atiyah. • Bin Laden was suffering badly from drone attacks on al-Qaeda's base in the tribal areas of Pakistan. He called this the "intelligence war," and said it was "the only weapon that's hurting us." His cadres complain

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

billion and suffering several hundred allied deaths annually — 500 Americans dead last year, thousands more injured. All this to deal with 100 or so Al Qaeda fighters now in Afghanistan; and prevent the Afghan Taliban from controlling the Pashtun Afghan homeland- which was not the reason we went there afte

s. Take your pick of scary scenarios: HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_030075 --- PAGE BREAK --- 17 civil war, a Sunni fundamentalist takeover, or a new base for al Qaeda. Of course, there would also be an upside to Assad's demise. A brutal regime would have fallen; Iran would be denied an Arab patron and a critical wi

e Atlas Mountains and the Persian Gulf. Yet unlike the Muslim Brotherhood's rebellion in Hama, which shook the government of Bashar al-Assad's father Hafez in 1982, the Facebook rebellion seems curiously faceless. There are some signs of opposition violence with "plausible reports of security forces bein