Showing posts with label Middle East. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Middle East. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 1, 2014
Saturday, June 28, 2014
Watch How Giving Allegiance to Antichrist is Beginning to Take Root
By Walid Shoebat (Shoebat Exclusive)
The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS), known locally as DA’ISH. The final “S” in the acronym “ISIS” relates to the Arabic word “Sham” which refers to establishing the Caliphate in the Levant or Eastern Mediterranean including Cyprus, Palestine, Jordan, Syria, and southern Turkey.
Recently, ISIS has just announced that Raqqa, the only one of 14 Governorates it controls in Syria, is now the “Capital” of their emerging “Caliphate”, which so far is a swathe of territory encompassing much of eastern and northern Syria and western and northern Iraq.
The Emir (The Prince) is to be their military strategist and leader and successor of Abu Mus’ab Zarqawi, Dr. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
DA’ISH focuses exclusively on recapturing Jerusalem and destroying the Zionist regime occupying Palestine through DA’ISH’s “Al Quds Unit” (AQU) or the Jerusalem Unit, which is currently working to broaden its influence in more than 60 Palestinian camps and gatherings from Gaza, Judea and to Jordan, and Lebanon up to the north of Syria seeking to gain allegiances as it prepares to liberate “Jerusalem” and “Palestine”.
The White House estimates that approximately six million Iraqi Sunni have recently given allegiance to DA’ISH which has become the richest terrorist organization in the world.
The world should not ignore this emerging threat. Islam grew from a handful of converts to later have the entire region give allegiance to Islam and threaten the world, and Da’ish has the similar objective titling itself as the “revolution of the oppressed.”
And now with the theft of the bank in Mosul, Da’ish has half a billion dollars and has grand plans to invade Jordan to begin tightening the noose on the Zionist state. To Dai’sh, Jordan was an invention of the British who planned to tighten the noose around the Jewish state of Israel. And within Jordan, Da’ish gains much support in Ma’an and in the north many Salafists Jordanians from Palestinian origins support Da’ish. In addition, the Naqshbandi Sufi Muslims and several Al-Nusra leaders have given a “mubaya’at” (allegiance) to Da’ish.
We urge everyone to study our report on how the Sufi Muslims are joining Da’ish in which one can see how full-fledged demonism has taken control and how the Sufis encompass one fifth of the Muslim world including the most major Muslim nation in the world; Turkey.
Everyone should learn what Islam coined as Mubaya’at or “Bay’at“, was Sharia commanded giving an allegiance to the Prince of the Faithful, which currently Al-Baghdadi, Da’ish’s leader pledged to establish the Caliphate.”
In the Bible, a “beast” stands for a threat to the Jews and Christians. Giving allegiance to the “beast” is to give allegiance to what threatens us all. Da’ish is seeking the allegiance of all Muslims. Here is an example of such an allegiance (see video HERE - start 1:07):
“Say I pledge my allegiance to the Prince of the Faithful, to hear and obey, in hardship and in blessings, to establish the religion of Allah, and to enforce Allah’s Sharia, and to expand the order of Allah, to establish the global Islamic state.”
Such allegiance is also given in masse: (Video)
Even many tribes have given such allegiance. The Hadideen tribes in Allepo Syria here can be seen giving allegiance to the Caliphate: (Video)
Even in Gaza, terrorists can be seen giving allegiance to Da’ish:(Video)
Refusing to give allegiance, as the Bible stated, is punishable by death. When Mosul was occupied by Da’ish, 12 religious leaders were executed for refusing to give such allegiance.
We are definitely beginning to see some interesting and troubling signs that “in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power.”
As we stated before, these verses are not regarding gothic atheist metal heads. It speaks of a people “having a form of godliness”. They have a facade of religion. They do forms of worship and service evil as if it was to God. They are cruel. They kill. They blaspheme God the Holy Spirit and the Trinity. They are unloving towards fellow man. They are traitors to everything decent. They use gullible women promising them heaven in order to use them sexually. They would even disobey their parents who try to stop them or reason with them to the point that they would even kill them. One in Kerkuk, Iraq, even sprayed his father with several rounds of bullets killing him for not giving allegiance to Da’ish and in Sa’dieh, 3 brothers were executed for the same reason.
And now the threat expands. The Jordanian borders to Israel are the longest and most difficult to protect for Israel.
A realization needs to take place within the Prophecy community as to the nature of Antichrist and his expansions to see the real perspective we find on the ground. Many who expect Jordan to fall under the hands of the Antichrist believe that the reason Antichrist spares Jordan is the fact that King Abdullah II is descendant of the prophet Mohammed which gives him incredible influence in the world of Islam. But such an analogy is flawed since Muhammad killed his own relatives like Abu Jahl who did not live up to code and the Muslims even murdered Muhammad’s grandsons later.
Many presume that Israel will flee to Petra, but the Bible does not explicitly state that a remnant in Israel will escape to Petra. With air travel, any place can be prepared in the desert wilderness for fleeing Jews, and Nevada could qualify. Such a major threat will force Israel to send civilians out of the country and “on the wings of eagles”, could likely mean that this would be a flight of Israeli Jews:
We perceive that the whole story of Da’ish is a master plan with Turkey working alongside Iran to divide the region.
First of all, the evidence to use Da’ish for such sinister plans was revealed during the Turkish incursions into Syria when an anonymous YouTube account presented a recording of intelligence of the top movers and shakers in Turkey of a possible military operation against Syria and, if needed, creating a staged terror attack, in coordination between Turkish intelligence and the very ISIS terrorists who invaded Iraq. In Syria, such coordinated plan between the ISIS and Turkey was to destroy a Turkish historic monument the Suleiman Shah burial place to create an excuse and spark a war in Syria. Many in the prophecy arena felt that Isaiah 17 was around the corner when Syria went into chaos. But we must wait for Syria to be in the full control of Islam.
It was Turkey that aided the ISIS in the northeastern parts of Syria when terrorists like the ISIS continue to organize the theft of oil to be shipped towards Turkey and sold cheaply which funded over $800 million to terrorists including the ISIS; all this banditry under the guise of a European’s decision to allow for the “Syrian opposition” to export stolen oil.
The evidence is even bolstered when then we had Iran’s Hassan Rouhani’s surprising visit to Ankara, which is no coincidence. As soon as this visit took place the ISIS was on the move into Iraq, and Iran never blamed Turkey for aiding the ISIS, instead moved into Iraq asking the U.S. to give the green light to clean Iraq from the ISIS.
Iran’s visit to Turkey during June 9-10 was all about deceit while dubbing it as “boosting economic ties” which was simply a cover. When ISIS raided Turkey’s Mosul consulate and took 49 hostages, including the consul general, it was not only a plan to push Ankara and Tehran closer politically, but it mimics the similar concocted plan that was exposed when Erdoğan’s government was planning a false flag attack to be executed by the ISIS against the tomb of Suleiman Shah in Syria as to justify the intervention of the Turkish army in Syria, therefore making an excuse to invade Syria.
It all makes sense and has the trademark of a neo-Ottoman conspiracy. If Turkey’s plans were proven from the leaked recording of the top full birds of Turkey regarding Syria, is no conspiracy theory, we can then conclude that the expansion of ISIS into Iraq, Syria and Lebanon by the ISIS is a plausible Turkish or even Iranian-Turkish plan.
The story of Da’ish (ISIS) is the story of a beginning embryo into the world of this developing Antichrist system.
END OF ARTICLE
....and then there is this: Obama seeks $500 million from Congress to help moderate Syrian rebels
The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS), known locally as DA’ISH. The final “S” in the acronym “ISIS” relates to the Arabic word “Sham” which refers to establishing the Caliphate in the Levant or Eastern Mediterranean including Cyprus, Palestine, Jordan, Syria, and southern Turkey.
Recently, ISIS has just announced that Raqqa, the only one of 14 Governorates it controls in Syria, is now the “Capital” of their emerging “Caliphate”, which so far is a swathe of territory encompassing much of eastern and northern Syria and western and northern Iraq.
The Emir (The Prince) is to be their military strategist and leader and successor of Abu Mus’ab Zarqawi, Dr. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
DA’ISH focuses exclusively on recapturing Jerusalem and destroying the Zionist regime occupying Palestine through DA’ISH’s “Al Quds Unit” (AQU) or the Jerusalem Unit, which is currently working to broaden its influence in more than 60 Palestinian camps and gatherings from Gaza, Judea and to Jordan, and Lebanon up to the north of Syria seeking to gain allegiances as it prepares to liberate “Jerusalem” and “Palestine”.
The White House estimates that approximately six million Iraqi Sunni have recently given allegiance to DA’ISH which has become the richest terrorist organization in the world.
The world should not ignore this emerging threat. Islam grew from a handful of converts to later have the entire region give allegiance to Islam and threaten the world, and Da’ish has the similar objective titling itself as the “revolution of the oppressed.”
And now with the theft of the bank in Mosul, Da’ish has half a billion dollars and has grand plans to invade Jordan to begin tightening the noose on the Zionist state. To Dai’sh, Jordan was an invention of the British who planned to tighten the noose around the Jewish state of Israel. And within Jordan, Da’ish gains much support in Ma’an and in the north many Salafists Jordanians from Palestinian origins support Da’ish. In addition, the Naqshbandi Sufi Muslims and several Al-Nusra leaders have given a “mubaya’at” (allegiance) to Da’ish.
We urge everyone to study our report on how the Sufi Muslims are joining Da’ish in which one can see how full-fledged demonism has taken control and how the Sufis encompass one fifth of the Muslim world including the most major Muslim nation in the world; Turkey.
Everyone should learn what Islam coined as Mubaya’at or “Bay’at“, was Sharia commanded giving an allegiance to the Prince of the Faithful, which currently Al-Baghdadi, Da’ish’s leader pledged to establish the Caliphate.”
In the Bible, a “beast” stands for a threat to the Jews and Christians. Giving allegiance to the “beast” is to give allegiance to what threatens us all. Da’ish is seeking the allegiance of all Muslims. Here is an example of such an allegiance (see video HERE - start 1:07):
“Say I pledge my allegiance to the Prince of the Faithful, to hear and obey, in hardship and in blessings, to establish the religion of Allah, and to enforce Allah’s Sharia, and to expand the order of Allah, to establish the global Islamic state.”
Such allegiance is also given in masse: (Video)
Even many tribes have given such allegiance. The Hadideen tribes in Allepo Syria here can be seen giving allegiance to the Caliphate: (Video)
Even in Gaza, terrorists can be seen giving allegiance to Da’ish:(Video)
Refusing to give allegiance, as the Bible stated, is punishable by death. When Mosul was occupied by Da’ish, 12 religious leaders were executed for refusing to give such allegiance.
We are definitely beginning to see some interesting and troubling signs that “in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power.”
As we stated before, these verses are not regarding gothic atheist metal heads. It speaks of a people “having a form of godliness”. They have a facade of religion. They do forms of worship and service evil as if it was to God. They are cruel. They kill. They blaspheme God the Holy Spirit and the Trinity. They are unloving towards fellow man. They are traitors to everything decent. They use gullible women promising them heaven in order to use them sexually. They would even disobey their parents who try to stop them or reason with them to the point that they would even kill them. One in Kerkuk, Iraq, even sprayed his father with several rounds of bullets killing him for not giving allegiance to Da’ish and in Sa’dieh, 3 brothers were executed for the same reason.
And now the threat expands. The Jordanian borders to Israel are the longest and most difficult to protect for Israel.
A realization needs to take place within the Prophecy community as to the nature of Antichrist and his expansions to see the real perspective we find on the ground. Many who expect Jordan to fall under the hands of the Antichrist believe that the reason Antichrist spares Jordan is the fact that King Abdullah II is descendant of the prophet Mohammed which gives him incredible influence in the world of Islam. But such an analogy is flawed since Muhammad killed his own relatives like Abu Jahl who did not live up to code and the Muslims even murdered Muhammad’s grandsons later.
Many presume that Israel will flee to Petra, but the Bible does not explicitly state that a remnant in Israel will escape to Petra. With air travel, any place can be prepared in the desert wilderness for fleeing Jews, and Nevada could qualify. Such a major threat will force Israel to send civilians out of the country and “on the wings of eagles”, could likely mean that this would be a flight of Israeli Jews:
But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint. (Isaiah 40:30-31)Will Israel flee as result of Da’ish? Unlikely. Which is more reason to believe that what is transpiring in the Middle East is part of a much larger picture. We have reported on Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan who has warned the U.S. of the risks of launching air strikes against the Da’ish (ISIS) in Iraq claiming concern about the fate of dozens of Turkish citizens captured last week by the ISIS. But all this is a ruse; Turkey cares less about the dozens of captured Turkish citizens when it was Turkey who aided the ISIS in the first place.
We perceive that the whole story of Da’ish is a master plan with Turkey working alongside Iran to divide the region.
First of all, the evidence to use Da’ish for such sinister plans was revealed during the Turkish incursions into Syria when an anonymous YouTube account presented a recording of intelligence of the top movers and shakers in Turkey of a possible military operation against Syria and, if needed, creating a staged terror attack, in coordination between Turkish intelligence and the very ISIS terrorists who invaded Iraq. In Syria, such coordinated plan between the ISIS and Turkey was to destroy a Turkish historic monument the Suleiman Shah burial place to create an excuse and spark a war in Syria. Many in the prophecy arena felt that Isaiah 17 was around the corner when Syria went into chaos. But we must wait for Syria to be in the full control of Islam.
It was Turkey that aided the ISIS in the northeastern parts of Syria when terrorists like the ISIS continue to organize the theft of oil to be shipped towards Turkey and sold cheaply which funded over $800 million to terrorists including the ISIS; all this banditry under the guise of a European’s decision to allow for the “Syrian opposition” to export stolen oil.
The evidence is even bolstered when then we had Iran’s Hassan Rouhani’s surprising visit to Ankara, which is no coincidence. As soon as this visit took place the ISIS was on the move into Iraq, and Iran never blamed Turkey for aiding the ISIS, instead moved into Iraq asking the U.S. to give the green light to clean Iraq from the ISIS.
Iran’s visit to Turkey during June 9-10 was all about deceit while dubbing it as “boosting economic ties” which was simply a cover. When ISIS raided Turkey’s Mosul consulate and took 49 hostages, including the consul general, it was not only a plan to push Ankara and Tehran closer politically, but it mimics the similar concocted plan that was exposed when Erdoğan’s government was planning a false flag attack to be executed by the ISIS against the tomb of Suleiman Shah in Syria as to justify the intervention of the Turkish army in Syria, therefore making an excuse to invade Syria.
It all makes sense and has the trademark of a neo-Ottoman conspiracy. If Turkey’s plans were proven from the leaked recording of the top full birds of Turkey regarding Syria, is no conspiracy theory, we can then conclude that the expansion of ISIS into Iraq, Syria and Lebanon by the ISIS is a plausible Turkish or even Iranian-Turkish plan.
The story of Da’ish (ISIS) is the story of a beginning embryo into the world of this developing Antichrist system.
END OF ARTICLE
....and then there is this: Obama seeks $500 million from Congress to help moderate Syrian rebels
Friday, June 27, 2014
Birth Pangs & Clues - Middle East
NEWS:
For original article, pictures and very short videos click on the title below.
We Are Entering The Beginning Of Birth Pangs
By Walid and Maria Shoebat (Shoebat Exclusive)
In December of 2010, the middle east was changing forever when the so-called Arab Spring sparked a series of uprisings. The world was fooled to think this is an end of a dictatorial era and a new jump-start to democracy and freedom. We warned, but the world was not listening. Then by December 2013, what seemed to be the powers holding the spirit of Antichrist at bay, was being taken out of the way, as Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yemen were toppled and then plunged into a dark quagmire of terrorism and sectarian violence. The hopefuls were blamed and the villans got away with all the evil they can muster.
There were the religious clergy spewing hatred and injecting poison into the minds of the masses. The Muslim fundamentalist blamed the secularist while the secularist who hated the Muslim fundamentalist blamed what they termed, the Ameri-Zionist conspiracy, and the entire Middle East was even more infected to even hate us forevermore.
Other civil uprisings with the same infection had erupted in Bahrain and Syria; major protests had broken out in Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, and sudan. Also minor protests had occurred in Mauritania, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Djibouti, Wester Sahara, and the never ending land of Jew-hatred, the Palestinian territories.
America and Israel has never been hated as much as now.
Today we see what held Islam in check, is being taken out of the way, and a type of lawlessness with an ora of a strange evil never imagined before is gripping the very nations that so much struggled to abolish the very dictatorial leaders they so much abhorred.
Masses run to and fro in total confusion victimizing while being themselves victimized.But it wasn’t only the bizarre in man that manifested a strange phenomenon, the heavens was spewing out some strange beings. On January 28, 2011, what was mistakenly thought to be a light orb or UFO appeared in the Middle East. A closer look seems to show what appeared from the heavens was perhaps a seraphim, a fiery angel, or a winged solar disk, with its piercing glowing florescent light. It was forming wings while it hovered as if observing or proclaiming its presence over the holiest site man ever knew in Jerusalem, on top of Mount Zion, and at the Temple Mount, even on the tip of the crescent moon atop the Dome of the Rock. It had a more of a bird like display as one can clearly see it hovering with its sharp wing tips and then it suddenly bolted upwards into the heavens, in a twinkling of an eye. Many amateurs tried to debunk it but no serious agency came forth to issue any statements to call this occurrence a manmade hoax.
Was it good or was it evil? Or perhaps it was proclaiming judgment upon the land, we would never know. What we do know is that this winged being was seen and depicted in ancient history.
From the end of 2011 to 2013, even until now, we have experienced many phenomenal occurrences; millions of dead fish washed up along the shores of the Chesapeake Bay, hundreds of tons of dead fish in Brazil, velvet crabs washing up on the coast of Great Britain, penguins dying and littering the beaches of New Zealand and even crows falling out of the sky in Sweden and thousands of turtle Doves falling dead to the ground in Italy.
The world, while it wasn’t able to show previous records of such phenomenons, tried to make excuses, that the fish are very sensitive to the Earth’s magnetic field and that fish were dying as result of the earth releasing deadly gasses all of the sudden and that bird-haters were shooting fireworks into bird roosts. More conspiracy theories were issued that of chemical and biological warfare testing by the U.S. government that were carried out in a variety of circumstances.
We are definitely beginning to see some interesting and troubling signs, not just in nature itself, but in the nature of men. Who could imagine years ago that we would witness the horrific and the unthinkable ways the ISIS are killing people and in styles that makes Al-Qaeda seem merciful. Who would even think of such an institution that would use beheading as law, amputations, slavery, concubinage, to even re-institute ancient Roman laws as Crucifixion:
These are desensitized demons who kill with remorseless brutality as if they were human-sharks having dark emotionless masscarad cold eyes, killing the old, the lame, the woman, and the child in cold blood:
But all this is only the beginning of sorrows. You will not notice as you see more shock after shock scenes of so many bizarre happenings that you too, without notice become desensitized to the utmost forms of cruelty.
Decades ago, Americans would have never imagined that even in the U.S., we would see the sick homosexual movement attacking the very basic principles of natural law. In the past we had normal sin in which one was ashamed for stealing a chicken, but today, they would teach that having sex with a chicken as absolutely normal. Today we see a rise of more irresponsible citizens demanding free benefits as if its a right, electing who will steal from the working to serve the winebibber and the lazy.
We are definitely beginning to see some interesting and troubling signs, not just in nature itself, but in the nature of men, that “in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power.”
The Bible tells us “And from such people turn away! For of this sort are those who creep into households and make captives of gullible women loaded down with sins, led away by various lusts, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.”
No, these verses are not regarding gothic atheist metal heads. It speaks of a people “having a form of godliness”. They have a facade of religion. They do forms of worship and service evil as if it was to God. They are cruel. They kill. They blaspheme the Holy Spirit and the Trinity. They are unloving towards fellow man. They are traitors to everything decent. They use gullible women promising them heaven in order to use them sexually. They would even disobey their parents who try to stop them or reason with them to the point that they would kill them. It remind me of the days when we said “I give up my father and my mother O Prophet of Allah”. All for the sake of a dead man, denying the One who died, rose from the dead and lives forevermore.
Monday, February 20, 2012
Christians in Syria
I plead guilty to falling woefully short of remembering our fellow Christians in other parts of the world, many of whom are going through terrible times, persecution, and even death to God's glory during these harsh days. Our prayers will result in comfort and sustenance to them.
The price of regime change
By David Warren, Ottawa Citizen February 18, 2012
There are millions of Christians in Syria, who probably have the Russians and Chinese to thank that they may live there a little longer. The Security Council vetoes, a fortnight ago, on a resolution calling upon Syria's dictator to step down, and supporting an Arab-sponsored plan to "end the violence," put paid to any immediate prospect of western intervention.
The outrage expressed by Hillary Clinton, William Hague, and other western foreign ministers, probably concealed a little relief, for the vetoes provided the excuse they needed to avoid the issue, while continuing to posture about "humanitarianism" and "democracy."
Let me be clear: I carry no brief for Putin's Russia, or the PRC, let alone the Assad family's monstrous regime in Damascus. The obvious needs restating from time to time: that many, perhaps most of the world's governments are in the hands of evil tyrants (if gentle reader will forgive the pleonasm). Thus it often happens that we must appear to support one evil, in order to obviate a worse. This necessarily involves taking heat from utopian slogan-chanters.
That the Russians have ulterior motives, in supporting Bashar al-Assad, could almost go without saying. They have a naval base at Tartus: an interesting relic of the Soviet evil empire. It was their last supply and maintenance facility in the Mediterranean. Over the last few years, this port has been dredged, renovated, and expanded to accommodate nuclear-armed warships, as Vladimir Putin revives Russia's old imperial dreams. He inherited the Soviet special relationship with the Assad family, and Syria remains a major customer for Russian military hardware, too.
China's covering veto was almost certainly a cynical quid-pro-quo, for Russian energy supplies.
Nor does the horrific violence in Syria please anyone who is sane.
Though here, it is important to grasp that we are getting the same stilted information that comes with all "Arab Spring" reporting. Media both East and West, for different reasons, have taken a partisan position, and assigned white and black hats to the respective contestants for power. The opposition to Assad is presented as if it were a unified "resistance movement," of an "oppressed people."
The truth is we do not know much about what is happening inside Syria - just as we knew and know little about Libya, where, now that Gadhafi is dead, "the show is over" for the western audience. Journalists who (courageously) enter Syria are seldom in a position to check the hearsay they must forward as breaking news to deadline. As an old editor, it distresses me to see things as specific as body counts reported, from places where there are no disinterested observers.
It should also be remembered that all governments, even the most angelic, try to maintain order. When rebels seize bastions in Homs or elsewhere, overpowering local authorities, of course the state's soldiers will go in. To present the Syrian regime's defensive efforts, as if it were shelling for the sheer gratuitous pleasure of demolishing old towns, is to overstate the case for the opposition.
We have received little hints that indeed, al-Qaeda and other terrorist Islamists are engaged in that opposition. The very existence of a "Free Syrian Army," in support of a "Syrian National Council" suggests the violence is not confined to one side; and many of the victims of this violence are likely to be (as in Libya, again) unarmed people loyal to the regime, who become targets for vengeance when the regime's soldiers are out of reach.
No reliable census has been conducted, or even attempted in Syria, since the days of the French mandate; all demographic reports are crude estimates. Perhaps three-infive of a population above 20 million are Arab Sunni Muslims. Almost all the rest have some interest in the preservation of the Assad family's rule - not for any love of the regime, but because they can see the alternative.
Assad's extended family and inner core are Alawites - a Shia Islamic sect, long associated with the Mediterranean port of Latakia and its environs. They have a reputation as fierce fighters, going back a thousand years, through which they have resisted many attempts at forcible conversion to Sunni Islam. The links they forged with Syriac Christians (a sizable community going back 2,000 years), Armenian Christians, the Druze, the Kurds, Syrian Turkmen, and others, bespeaks a remarkable (if seldom edifying) story of survival.
Christians were as common in Syria as in Egypt, before their numbers were immensely swelled by refugees from Iraq - well over a million fleeing up the Euphrates River valley, from anti-Christian persecution by Iraq's Islamists. By now, there could be more than four million Christians within Syria's borders.
When the Assad regime falls, it will be open season on them, on the Alawites, and all the other minorities. Granted, Assad is a monster who has earned an ugly fate. But at what expense should we indulge the fleeting satisfaction of deposing him?
David Warren's columns appear Sundays, Wednesdays and Saturdays.
© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen
Read more: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/price%2Bregime%2Bchange/6173293/story.html#ixzz1mtTX1cid
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