Two days ago, Cathy said "We should walk over to join the crowd by the Syrian embassy and express our support for the protestors." I confessed to not knowing much about what's going on in Syria. My attention, such as it is, has been absorbed by the Republican freak show here as mostly white males whose sexual experiences run the gamut from celibate to promiscuous have offered their inflexible "thoughts" against women using birth control. Meanwhile Syria, a small country tucked along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean between Turkey and Lebanon, has been experiencing an uprising. It started almost a year ago with the Syrian people's protests against corruption and President Bashar al-Assad's one-party rule. Assad and his supporters increasingly have responded to the protests with bullets, leading to the deaths of many innocent people. Last month, the Arab League called for the UN Security Council to adopt its action plan for Syria, which included a request for Assad to step down. Two days after Groundhog's Day, Russia and China vetoed the subsequent UN Security Council resolution. Things are becoming ominous. The US closed its embassy this past week.
If you know as little as I do about this, here's at least an interactive timeline of the unrest as posted on Al Jazeera English. More to follow....
Oops....Well, this post began as my attempt to decrease my ignorance of Syria, and already I"m making mistakes. I apologize for calling Syria a "small" country. It's small only compared with Turkey to its north and Iraq to its east. It's bigger than its other neighbors Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan. It's also bigger than my entire home state of North Dakota.
ReplyDeleteBeen keeping up somewhat, but we are so hampered in our responses to this. So this is what it's like to lose our international preeminence.
ReplyDeleteI've been preoccupied with the b.c. stuff, too, but the Middle East is never too far behind as the continuing problems there could well invite our troops yet again. I live in a city where a lot of Syrian immigrants live.
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by!
ReplyDeleteIt seems to me that, whenever the USA gets involved in such skirmishes as you mention, we end up with egg on our faces. What good do we do when we support a revolt/rebellion when the succeeding regime/government is worse than the one that is replaced?
ReplyDeleteCop Car
Cop Car: Sounds like the good old US electoral cycle to me....
ReplyDeleteHave been following this from the beginning, primarily through PBS and AlJazerra. Good summary. Too bad their ruler who purportedly was educated in Europe, and somewhat sympathetic to human rights did not, or was unable (due to forces in his own government)to react in a supportive manner to his nation's people. Instead, the view of some is he may have been compelled to respond with a show of "strength"(?) in the manner of the previous ruler, his father.
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