Internecine Syria
Treacherous ambush by remnants of the criminal regime, No sanctions relief for HTS, America First: Foreign Aid in the Trump Administration.
Erdogan says YPG ‘will be buried’ in Syria if it doesn’t lay down arms
Ankara has repeatedly insisted that the Kurdish YPG militia must disband and called on the US to stop supporting it.
Following al-Assad’s ouster on December 8, Ankara has repeatedly insisted that the Kurdish YPG militia must disband, asserting that the group has no place in Syria’s future.
The change in Syria’s leadership has left the country’s main Kurdish factions on the back foot.
“The separatist murderers will either bid farewell to their weapons, or they will be buried in Syrian lands along with their weapons,” Erdogan told lawmakers from his ruling AK Party in parliament on Wednesday.
“We will eradicate the terrorist organisation that is trying to weave a wall of blood between us and our Kurdish siblings,” he added.
Turkiye views the YPG militia – the main component of the United States-allied Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – as an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militia, which has waged a rebellion against the Turkish state since 1984.
The PKK is designated a terrorist organisation by Turkiye, the US and the European Union. Ankara has repeatedly called on its NATO ally Washington and others to stop supporting the YPG.
Al Jazeera’s Sinem Koseoglu, reporting from Istanbul, said this is not a surprising statement by Erdogan “as it is the official rhetoric of the Turkish government”.
Since the YPG is considered “the Syrian branch of the PKK, Ankara believes that they should either lay down arms, or they should fight and they will be defeated,” Koseoglu said.
Earlier, Turkiye’s defence ministry said the armed forces had killed 21 YPG-PKK fighters in northern Syria and Iraq.
SDF commander Mazloum Abdi acknowledged last week the presence of PKK fighters in Syria for the first time, saying they had helped battle ISIL (also known as ISIS) fighters and would return home if a total ceasefire was agreed with Turkiye, a core demand from Ankara.
He denied any organisational ties with the PKK.
Erdogan also said Turkiye would soon open its consulate in Aleppo, adding that Ankara expected an increase in traffic at its borders in the summer of next year as some of the millions of Syrian migrants it hosts begin to return to their homes.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/12/25/erdogan-says-ypg-will-be-buried-in-syria-if-it-doesnt-lay-down-arms
Syria says 14 'interior ministry personnel' killed in 'ambush'
Interior Minister Mohammed Abdel Rahman called the attack a 'treacherous ambush by remnants of the criminal regime' in Tartus province 'while performing their tasks of maintaining security and safety.'
Syria's new interior minister said Wednesday, December 25, that 14 personnel were killed by "remnants" of toppled leader Bashar al-Assad's "regime" in Tartus province, after a war monitor reported deadly clashes in the region.
Interior Minister Mohammed Abdel Rahman said in a statement that "14 interior ministry personnel were killed and 10 others wounded after ... a treacherous ambush by remnants of the criminal regime" in Tartus province "while performing their tasks of maintaining security and safety."
A Syria war monitor had initially said nine people were killed Wednesday in clashes in Tartus province after security forces sought to arrest an officer under deposed leader Bashar al-Assad who was linked to a notorious prison.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said "six members of the General Security force" of Syria's new authorities were killed, along with "three armed men" in Khirbet al-Maaza, after forces sought to arrest an officer who was among "those responsible for the crimes of the Saydnaya prison."
The doors of Syria's prisons were flung open after rebels led by Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ousted Assad this month, more than 13 years after his brutal repression of anti-government protests triggered a war that has killed more than 500,000 people.
An HTS official confirmed to AFP that clashes erupted between the new authorities' security forces and supporters of the former government in Tartus province – a stronghold of Assad's Alawite minority – without commenting on the reason for the clashes.
Several members of the security forces were killed, the official said, requesting anonymity as he was not authorized to brief the media.
The Observatory said the wanted man was "an officer in the former regime forces who held the position of director of the military justice department and field court chief," without identifying him by name.
It said he "issued death sentences and arbitrary judgments against thousands of prisoners."
The clashes erupted after "a number of residents refused to allow their houses to be searched," said the Britain-based Observatory, which relies on a network of sources inside Syria.
The officer's brother and armed men intercepted the security forces and "targeted one of the patrol vehicles," the Observatory said, resulting in the deaths. It added that "dozens of people" were arrested in the village.
Read more French intelligence fears Islamic State revival in Syria
The notorious Saydnaya complex, the site of extrajudicial executions, torture and forced disappearances, epitomized the atrocities committed against Assad's opponents.
The fate of tens of thousands of prisoners and missing people remains one of the most harrowing legacies of the conflict.
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2024/12/25/syria-monitor-says-9-dead-in-clashes-over-attempted-arrest-of-assad-era-officer_6736444_4.html
No sanctions relief for Syria until HTS proves it is done with jihadism - opinion
Our approach should be humanitarian aid, yes, but no to US reconstruction aid or sanctions relief until Syria is unambiguously not jihadist.
DECEMBER 25, 2024 03:01
A New York Times editorial disguised as a front-page news article demanded, “The West must ease financial controls to help the [Syrian] economy… the way forward starts with sanctions relief.” The writer, Patricia Cohen, claims “there is widespread agreement… the single most important step in rebuilding Syria’s economy can be taken only by the United States: Lift the punishing layers of sanctions.”
Last week, US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Barbara Leaf met with Hayʼat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) leader Ahmed al-Sharaa (Abu Mohammed al-Julani).
She said, “We discussed the critical need to ensure terrorist groups cannot pose a threat inside Syria or externally, including to the US and our partners in the region. Based on our discussion, I told him that we would not be pursuing the Rewards for Justice reward offered.” According to AP, “She told reporters that al-Sharaa had committed to renouncing terrorism.”
Mr. President, taking the $10 million terrorist bounty (Rewards for Justice) off the HTS rebel leader’s head does not magically change his historical record as the leader of a radical jihadist organization with blood on his hands.
The record of Sunni jihadists taking control of authoritarian states and promising moderation and tolerance for Western acceptance is not encouraging. Look at the Taliban in Afghanistan, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, as well as the ongoing chaos in Libya post-Gaddafi.
As the Washington Institute’s Counterintelligence and Terrorism expert Matthew Levitt wrote, “America’s Syria policy going forward should be based not on trusting new Syrian officials’ words but on verifying their actions… before considering the removal of sanctions.”
Even more damaging to our security interests, one expert featured in the NYT article suggested that our Syrian Kurdish ally (SDF/YPG) abandon its oil field revenue to the jihadist rebels who will lead the next government in Damascus.
“Oil previously provided around half of the country’s revenues, said Joshua Landis, co-director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma. Those fields, he said, belong to the government in Damascus and should be returned to its control.”
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-834753
America First: Foreign Aid in the Trump Administration
América Primeiro: ajuda externa na administração do Trump
Abstract
The US has led the way building the international development cooperation system and been the largest single donor for the last seven decades. Foreign aid has gone through different phases during the post-World War II period and remains an important geopolitical and geo-economic tool for 21st century USA. The Bush and Obama administrations, despite different nuances in terms of discourse and aid practices, invested in reforms to modernise aid programmes, increased funding for USAID, and created new global health, food security, and climate change programmes. Contrary to the historical trend, the Trump administration submitted budget requisitions characterised by a 30% reduction for State Department and USAID allocations. It is noteworthy that the Trump administration questioned the costs of global leadership, criticised international organizations and the sectoral allocation of funds, and made threats of cuts in aid to countries that opposed Washington’s interests. The purpose of this article is to understand how the strategy of ‘America First’ changed the strategic tripod of defence, diplomacy, and development, by analysing changes in US foreign aid in terms of available resources, recipient countries, aid modalities, and multilateral engagement.
Keywords foreign aid; international cooperation; development; United States; Trump
Resumo
Os EUA têm liderado a construção do sistema internacional de cooperação para o desenvolvimento e têm sido o maior doador individual durante as últimas sete décadas. A ajuda externa passou por diferentes fases durante o período pós Segunda Guerra Mundial e continua a ser um importante instrumento geopolítico e geoeconômico para os EUA do século XXI. As administrações Bush e Obama, apesar das diferentes nuances em termos de discurso e práticas de ajuda, investiram em reformas para modernizar os programas de ajuda, aumentaram o financiamento para a USAID, e criaram novos programas globais de saúde, segurança alimentar, e alterações climáticas. Ao contrário da tendência histórica, a administração Trump apresentou requisições orçamentais caracterizadas por uma redução de 30% nas dotações do Departamento de Estado e da USAID. É de notar que a administração Trump questionou os custos da liderança global, criticou as organizações internacionais e a atribuição setorial de fundos, e fez ameaças de cortes na ajuda a países que se opunham aos interesses de Washington. O objetivo deste artigo é compreender como a estratégia de ‘America First’ mudou o tripé estratégico da defesa, diplomacia e desenvolvimento, analisando as mudanças na ajuda externa dos EUA em termos de recursos disponíveis, países beneficiários, modalidades de ajuda, e compromisso multilateral.
Palavras-chave ajuda externa; cooperação internacional; desenvolvimento; Estados Unidos; Trump
Introduction
This article seeks to understand how the Trump administration (2017-2021) structured its foreign aid agenda by identifying changes and continuities vis-à-vis the contemporary dynamics of American foreign policy. It considers the extent to which the America First strategy altered the guidelines and the agenda of American foreign aid, based on the combination of principles and motivations, identification of the main international challenges, and the reframing of bilateral and multilateral relationship patterns.
Foreign aid comprises a series of economic, political and military cooperation mechanisms with the express goal to promote international stability and development. In practice, it constitutes a foreign policy tool that serves multiple purposes, from reputation building, a commitment to humanitarianism, and the provision of global public goods, to securing commercial and diplomatic interests (: 10). States’ motivations to provide international assistance are thus distributed on a continuum between solidarity and interest that is inserted into a complex field of normative disputes around practices and modalities of engagement, influenced by both domestic and international economic and political dimensions (Milani 2018).
For ), the US’s main motivations for foreign aid involves diplomatic and development objectives, bringing about a multifaceted portfolio guided both by external demands and by Washington’s strategic determinants. In this sense, foreign aid has historically served the purposes of strengthening alliances, rewarding desirable behaviours, and ensuring the US’s presence in relevant scenarios ().
In the post-World War II period, foreign aid helped to contain communism and maintain the US’s political and economic sphere of influence in a scenario of bipolar competition and decolonisation, thereby consolidating the strategy of financial assistance for building economic and social infrastructure and sending humanitarian or military aid to dozens of third-world countries (: 135). With the end of the Cold War, major objectives include promoting democratic governance, mitigating climate problems, mediating conflicts, and managing post-conflict transitions, as well as fighting against international terrorism in the 2000s (: 8). External aid thus conforms to the structural component of US foreign policy since the mid-20th Century.
In parallel with the correlation between foreign aid and US foreign policy and security objectives, it is important to consider the domestic determinants that affect agenda design and decision-making in formulating foreign aid. ) emphasize the importance of ideological components and the political-party game, including the budget process and consequently the incidence of lobbying in Congress, for the definition of US foreign aid policy. Here we adopt the framework proposed by : 18-23) that refers to four elements of the domestic scenario that affect foreign aid: ideas, interests, institutions, and bureaucracies.
Thus, we will seek to identify the changes processed in the ideational framework of foreign aid during the Trump administration: what worldviews and principles guide the construction of the agenda and the justifications underlying the policies adopted. This aspect is captured through strategic documents – the , the Strategic Plan (2018-2022) and the – as well as official statements from the representatives of the presidency that criticise aid programmes in previous administrations and that emphasise the expectation of reciprocity from recipients of aid and the importance of accountability to American citizens.
In the field of political institutions and the interests that affect the decision-making process, it is worth noting the distance between the Trump administration’s proposals and the maintenance of historical patterns of aid guaranteed by the American legislature that enjoy broad support from interest groups, i.e., civil society organisations, activist networks, and sectors of the traditional bureaucracy.
The Trump administration repeatedly sought to reduce the foreign aid budget and encountered clear resistance in both houses of Congress, particularly in the budget and international policy committees that did not sign off the proposed cuts to diplomatic activities and international assistance. These aspects were analysed through the Congressional Budget Justification – Foreign Operations and the aggregate American foreign aid data displayed in the interactive tool known as the . The four years of the Trump administration were particularly illustrative of the importance of domestic interests and institutional dynamics in the definition of American foreign aid (), as they led to a mismatch between the executive and the legislature that contrasted with the convergence achieved in recent decades.
The 9/11 terrorist attacks provided new motivation for Washington’s commitments to development cooperation, humanitarian relief, security assistance (including military aid), and massive reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq. During the Bush II and Obama administrations, the valuation of foreign aid as part of the strategic tripod (defence, diplomacy and development) took place with the support of Congress and civil society interest groups, culminating in a budget jump of US$16 billion to US$50 billion (FAE 2020).
It is also noteworthy the Trump administration’s attempt to reduce foreign aid bureaucratic scope in proposing to reshape the organizational structure of aid programs into just two major portfolios: economic assistance and humanitarian aid. Such a move would reduce the complexity and budgetary freedom in the composition of the portfolio available to the bureaucracies involved in the provision of US international assistance. As a counterpoint, it is worth remembering the important bureaucratic reforms carried out since 2005, which ensured greater cohesion in the relationship between the Department of State (USDS) and the US Agency for International Development (USAID), as well as stimulating the creation of new presidential initiatives – such as the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and the Millennium Challenge Corporation during the Bush administration and the Feed the Future, Global Health Initiative and the Global Climate Change Initiative during the Obama administration ().
Budget limits and the low profile of foreign aid during the Trump administration called into question the central role that the US had played in the international development cooperation system since the mid-20th century. It is therefore of interest to learn how the process of stagnation of investments in foreign aid and the limits of the US leadership as the largest provider of bilateral and multilateral assistance were also able to influence the broader context of wear and tear on US foreign policy.
The article will seek to map the symbolic, political, and material structures arranged in the aid agenda during the Trump administration, in the context of a foreign policy characterised by selective engagement, competition, and revisionism. It, ultimately, investigates whether the Trump administration represented only a brief hiatus in the recent history of US foreign aid, which appears to be the case since the Biden presidency has given signals in terms of the strategical resizing and budgetary allocations to international aid through USAID and cooperation programmes for key partners.
