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This article first appeared on the Atlantic Council site.

Six years ago, Syrian President Bashar al Assad betrayed his country by authorizing lethal fire on peaceful protesters.

As war in Syria enters its seventh year, the price for the political preservation of one man, one family and one entourage has been staggering, in Syria and far beyond.

Observers numbed by the enormity of a humanitarian catastrophe are periodically jolted by new revelations, such as the regime bombing spree that deprived 5.5 million people in Damascus of running water: a likely war crime, per the United Nations Commission of Inquiry.

Just how relevant is this murderous crew to the future of Syria?

The view here is that Syria has no future if Team Assad remains positioned to do its worst. This is not to say that the regime lacks accomplices in Syrias march to failed statehood. ISIS is an obscenity whose erasure is long overdue. Jabhat Fateh al-Sham Al Qaedas former Nusra Front fights Assad even as it seeks to eliminate nationalist alternatives to Syrias main destroyer.

Suicide bombers in Damascus are as contemptible as they are cowardly. But a regime that emptied its jails of violent Islamist extremists to pollute its opposition while pursuing a political survival strategy of mass homicide has been in a class of its own.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad receiving Iranian President Mohammad Khatami May 14, 2003 in Damascus, Syria. Frederic Hof writes that if its man Assad rules supreme in useful Syria that part of the country containing the major cities, fronting on the Mediterranean Sea and bordering Lebanon - Syria can remain a smoking pit as far as Tehran is concerned. SANA/Getty

Some Syrians who oppose Assad no longer expect or demand his immediate departure from Syria. They are acutely aware that Russia and Iran, for independent but compatible reasons, have saved Assad militarily and secured him diplomatically.

As they survey the forces unleashed on Syrians by a regime willing to do literally anything to survive, their thoughts transcend the status of an illegitimate president and focus instead on saving Syria itself. The conclusion some of them reach is that ways must be found to dine with Syrias principal destroyer while preventing him from eating everything and killing his fellow diners.

Opposition figures in this camp are speaking with Russia. They have, as yet, no idea of how the Trump administration will approach Syria. They watched in amazement as the Obama administration accomplished a self-destructive diplomatic tour-de-force that left Syrian civilians undefended, bad actors empowered and the United States sidelined.

They, like Turkey, concluded two things: Russia in Syria is a potentially treatable illness; Iran in Syria is sure death. Both chose to work with Russia to see if the patient might be saved.

For Moscow, Bashar al Assad served an important domestic political purpose. He was the face of a state that Russia succeeded in saving from an alleged Barack Obama regime change campaign. In an era of fake news, accusing Mr. Obama of trying violently to unseat Assad is particularly inventive. Indeed, it was Moscows sure knowledge of the oceanic gap between administration rhetoric and action that enabled it to intervene militarily without fear of negative consequences.

For Tehran, Assad is more than a poster boy for a state preservation. He is the lifeline to what truly matters to the Islamic Republic: Hezbollah in Lebanon. Like Russia, Iran has no illusions about Team Assad: its corruption, incompetence and brutality are well-known. But Tehran knows something else: beyond Assad there is no Syrian appetite for subordinating the country to Irans Supreme Leader and to Hezbollahs Secretary-General.

Russia would love to see Assad transformed into a unifying healer capable of spearheading the countrys reconciliation and reconstruction. But it, too, knows its client. It knows that for Syria to survive as a unitary state, to dig out of massive destruction and to be a useful regional platform for the projection of Russian influence, others including many who have opposed the regime must get on board and pull on the oars.

Moscow realizes this cannot happen with Team Assad free to kill, torture, starve and terrorize.

Iran, however, has no interest in Assads methodology being challenged. If its man rules supreme in useful Syria that part of the country containing the major cities, fronting on the Mediterranean Sea and bordering Lebanon - Syria can remain a smoking pit as far as Tehran is concerned.

Knowing that its client will not live forever, Iran is building Hezbollah-like militia structures to dominate what is left of Syria, as it does in Lebanon. Indeed, Iranian-led foreign fighters from as far away as Afghanistan directly challenge all attempts at a comprehensive ceasefire.

Six years ago, Bashar al Assad set in motion a process that thoroughly undermined his ability to rule Syria as he and has father had for the previous 40 years. Yet he, his family and his entourage remain relevant. As Irans client, he is the main obstacle to Syrias resurrection. Moscow knows this to be the case. Will it act? Can it act?

These are questions to which patriotic, nationalistic Syrians urgently seek answers. That they do so is the inevitable result of Americas self-imposed absence.

Frederic C. Hof is the director of the Atlantic Council's Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East.

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Russia and Iran Are Scrapping Over Assad's Corpse. Where's Trump? - Newsweek

The United Nations accuses Israel of being an apartheid state, then quickly retracts itdamage done.

On March 15, the United Nations published a report in which scholarly inquiry claimed to prove with overwhelming evidence that Israel was in fact an apartheid state. It was a breathtaking, heavy claim and one that got the attention of UN Secretary General Antnio Guterres. By Friday, two days later, the report was removed from the UNs official website and disavowed by the secretary general.

Condemnation of the report from the United States and Israel came swiftly. Daniel Danon, Israels UN ambassador, said, The attempt to smear and falsely label the only true democracy in the Middle East by creating a false analogy is despicable and constitutes a blatant lie. Nikki Halley, Americas ambassador, called it anti-Israel propaganda.

And yet, in the two days while the report remained on the UNs website, it caused significant damage.

The Washington Post picked up the story and ran the headline Is Israel an Apartheid State? The answer, apparently dogmatic, was that This UN Report Says Yes. The Independent told its readers that Israel is imposing apartheid regime on Palestinians, according to a UN agency. Al Jazeera gloated that although the report was removed, the questions raised will become impossible to avoid.

UN Under-Secretary General Rima Khalaf, who led the report, resigned after it was disavowed, saying she felt it was her duty to stick by her personal views. We expected, of course, that Israel and its allies would put huge pressure on the secretary general of the UN so that he would disavow the report, she told Agency France-Presse. In recognition of her courage and support of his people, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas awarded her with the Medal of the Highest Honor.

The report was commissioned by the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (escwa), which represents 18 countries in the region. To those unfamiliar with the process, it would seem to be very official, weighty, representative of the entire region, and (with the most effective adjective of all) scholarly.

You can find scholarly treatises proving the necessity of using eugenics, that the Holocaust never happened, that the Earth is flat, that communism would have irresistible benefits, or pretty much anything else. Nevertheless, we turn to Commentarys Jonathan S. Tobin for a defence, who argued that:

[The report] dismisses the obvious differences between what happened in South Africawhere a tiny white majority denied all rights to the black majorityand Israel, a Jewish-majority country where the Arab minority has full rights, including suffrage, representation, and equality under the law. It similarly considers irrelevant the fact that the standoff over the disputed territory of the West Bank is the result of Palestinian unwillingness to recognize Israels right to exist within any borders, stubbornly maintained through repeated refusals of peace offers that would have created a Palestinian state.

In reality, the report is merely the opinions of the two people who wrote it. Yes, two people. They also happen to be Americans: Richard Falk, a Princeton law professor emeritus, and Virginia Tilley, from the University of Southern Illinois. Falk is a 9/11 truther and was one of the many duped by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1979, where he wrote that Khomeinis entourage was uniformly composed of moderate, progressive individuals. Tilleys book The One-State Solution suggests that Israel should give up its commitment to maintaining a Jewish-majority state.

When Democracy Now! interviewed Mr. Falk on the report, it brought up the fact that it had been commissioned by a number of overtly anti-Israel nations:

NERMEEN SHAIKH: The membership of this agency, there are 18 Arab members, a number of whom dont recognize Israel. So, do you think that that might raise questions about the legitimacy of the report?

RICHARD FALK: Well, all thethese Arab members of escwa did was to ask that such a report be prepared. And Virginia Tilley, professor at the University of Southern Illinois, and myself were asked to prepare this report on a contract basis. And there is a kind of disclaimer that the UNthis UN commission made, that the report doesnt necessarily represent even escwas views. It is the views of the two of us who prepared the report.

Thus, what looks like a comprehensive UN report (and dont expect journalists to explain the disclaimer) was instead the escwa appointing two scholars, wholly sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, to smear Israel with the accusation of apartheid. Even Falk admits it was just the views of the two of us who prepared it.

In the meantime, prestigious newspapers like the Washington Post run pieces that take the UN report at its word, and Palestinian propagandists gather more ammunition, accusing those who demanded that the report be taken down of covering up the truth.

Tobin continued, predicting the future uses of the report:

[Palestinians] unwillingness to make compromises will only be strengthened by a report that encourages them to regard Israel as having no rights whatsoever. They are likely to make Falks and Tilleys findings the basis for renewed efforts to sue Israel in the International Criminal Court, as well as for renewed provocations in other UN bodies such as the Human Rights Council or even unesco, which in the past year has taken up measures that denied the historical Jewish ties to Jerusalem and some of Judaisms holiest sites.

At the end of the day, a UN report that was pulled wont be the straw that breaks Israels back. The UN, which is not an institution the Trumpet has praised much in the past, did the right thing in withdrawing it from its website. However, the damage is done. Al-Jazeera is right to suggest the false analogy of Israel and South Africa will continue to haunt the Jews. Falk and Tilleys research gives Israels enemies another bullet in their magazine.

In the March issue of the Trumpet magazine, we posed the question, As united Jerusalem turns 50 will it make it to 51? See our answer from our Jerusalem correspondent in City of Pieces.

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Iran's Miracle Economic Recovery - theTrumpet.com

ZTE has pleaded guilty to violating sanctions against shipping US technology to Iran and agreed to pay up to $1.2 billion in fines and forfeiture.

ZTE has agreed to pay up to $1.2 billion in fines as part of a guilty plea to violating sanctions prohibiting sales of US technology to Iran.

The Chinese telecommunications equipment maker agreed to pay $892 million in fines and forfeitures for violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and obstruction of justice, the US Department of Justice said Wednesday. The company will face an additional $300 million in penalties if it violates the terms of the agreement.

Restrictions against tech exports to Iran have been in place since the early 1980s when the US broke off diplomatic relations with Iran. However, many sanctions have recently been imposed on Iran over its controversial nuclear program.

ZTE has been in the doghouse with US authorities since March 2016 when the Commerce Department accused it of violating rules restricting exports of US technology to Iran. The US government slapped the company with sanctions that hurt the Chinese company's ability to get access to US technology needed for its telecommunications products.

The US government lifted those sanctions in August, allowing the company to continue working with US technology suppliers.

Batteries Not Included: The CNET team shares experiences that remind us why tech stuff is cool.

CNET Magazine: Check out a sampling of the stories you'll find in CNET's newsstand edition.

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China's ZTE pleads guilty to selling US tech to Iran - CNET

The launching of an Iranian Ghadr ballistic missile. Photo: Mahmood Hosseini via Wikimedia Commons.

WhenIran launches major missile tests, major protests from Western countries inevitablyfollow.

Theinternational community is rightfully concerned about the dangers of Irans ballistic missile program, and as such, the United Nations Security Council passed resolution 2231 in July 2015, banningIran from testing ballistic missiles capable of delivering a nuclear payload. More recently, after Iran tested missiles multiple times, the Trump administration slapped new sanctions on Tehran.

Yes, the Islamic Republicpays a heavyprice for testing long-range missiles.

March 23, 2017 8:05 am

But, how accurate are Irans claims of its capabilities? How real are the threats of its supposed new, advanced weaponry? And why would the mullahs continue to engage in these missile tests when they pay for it on the world stage every time they do?

Several months ago, Iran announced the manufacturing of three missiles theKhorramshahr, Qadir and Sejil claiming they hadhigh-level accuracy, landing less than 10 meters away from their intended targets. On Jan. 29, Tehran test-launched an intermediate-range Khorramshahr ballistic missile, but technicians were forced to self-destruct the vessel, as therange-error was proven to be embarrassinglysignificant (the projectile washeaded fordozens of kilometers off target)andthreatened to cause civilian casualties. This was the fate of a missile that Iran boasted had pinpoint accuracy.

Iran also bloviatesabout manufacturingtheFajr missile series,which arenothing but replicas of Russian World War II designs. The notion that those missiles could have pinpoint accuracy is far-fetched, as they areuseless in todays world.

The truth is that Iran is facing major domestic crises andforeign challengesthroughout the Middle East, making itall the more necessary for its leaders to use military tests, including stagingdifferent Revolutionary Guards (IRGC)drillsand engaging in variousmissile launches. Then, asnew sanctions were imposed, Iran understood itcould no longer repeat major ballistic missile tests, and instead resorted to usingterms likesmart rockets with precision accuracy or anti-helicopter mines. Too bad we live in a world in which helicopters are targeted using state-of-the-art laser-guided missiles, not mines.

Iran received a major blow from thenucleardeal sealed with the international community, which forced itto exhibit strength and engage in these over-blown missile tests. The irony is that the dealalso forced theregimes Foreign Ministry to insist that the Iranianmissile program is entirely defensive in nature, taking the bite out of the mullahs posturing about power.

However, there are parties benefiting from Iransrocketprogram, namely the regimes proxy militia groups, including the Lebanese Hezbollah, the Badr Organization, Asaeb a-l Haq and Kataeb Hezbollah in Iraq, the Houthis inYemenand many others. TheIRGC, which controls Irans missile drives, recently established underground missile-production factories for Hezbollah, which sits close to Israels northern border. This is all part of Iransdestabilizingcampaign in the region.

It is very challenging to reach conclusions about the reality behind the mullahsrhetoric, of the true character of the movesthey make. But,ifthe international community is truly serious about taking significant and meaningful action to curband ultimately uproot the Iranian missile threat, designating the IRGC as a foreign terrorist organization is thecorrect path forward.Such a stepwouldquickly curb Irans missile threat and bring the entire Middle East closer to peace and stability.

The rest is here:
Iran's Missile Charade - Algemeiner

Ankara:Iran is sending advanced weapons and military advisers to Yemen, stepping up support for its Shiite ally in a civil war whose outcome could sway the balance of power in the Middle East, regional and Western sources say.

Iran's enemy Saudi Arabia is leading a nine-country Sunni Arabcoalition supported by the US,against the Houthis in the impoverished state on the tip of the Arabian peninsula.

Sources with knowledge of the military movements, who declined to be identified, said that in recent months Iran has taken a greater role in the two-year-old conflict by stepping up arms supplies and other support to the Houthimovement. This mirrors the strategy it has used to support its Lebanese ally Hezbollah in Syria.

A senior Iranian official said Major General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Qods Force - the external arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps - met top IRGC officials in Tehran last month to look at ways to "empower" the Houthis.

"At this meeting, they agreed to increase the amount of help, through training, arms and financial support," the official said.

"Yemen is where the real proxy war is going on and winning the battle in Yemen will help define the balance of power in the Middle East."

Iran rejects accusations from Saudi Arabia that it is giving financial and military support to the Houthis, blaming the deepening crisis on the Saudi government.

But Iran's actions in Yemen seem to reflect the growing influence of hardliners in Tehran, keen to pre-empt a tougher policy towards Iran signalled by US President Donald Trump.

Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri, spokesman for the Arab coalition fighting the Houthis, said: "We don't lack information or evidence that the Iranians, by various means, are smuggling weapons into the area.

"We observe that the Kornet anti-tank weapon is on the ground, whereas before it wasn't in the arsenal of the Yemeni army or of the Houthis. It came later."

A Houthi leader said coalition accusations that Iran was smuggling weapons into Yemen were an attempt to cover up Saudi Arabia's failure to prevail in an intractable war in which at least 10,000 people have been killed and the country is on the brink of famine.

"The Saudis don't want to admit their failings so they are searching for false justifications ... after two years of the aggression that the United States and Britain are involved in," the Houthi leader, who declined to be named, said.

Iran's activities have alarmed Sunni Muslim countries in the Middle East, with one senior official from a neighbouring country saying: "We want Iran to stop exporting Shiism in the region, whether in Yemen or elsewhere".

Saudi Arabia intervened in Yemen's civil war in 2015 to back President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi after he was ousted from the capital Sanaa by the Houthis. Government forces in the south and east hold most of Yemen's territory, while the Houthis control most population centres in the north-west, including Sanaa.

A former senior Iranian security official said Iran's hardline rulers planned to empower Houthi militia in Yemen to "strengthen their hand in the region".

"They are planning to create a Hezbollah-like militia in Yemen. To confront Riyadh's hostile policies ... Iran needs to use all its cards," the former official said.

A Western diplomat in the Middle East agreed: "Iran has long been trying to cultivate portions of the Houthi militias as a disruptive force in Yemen.

"This is not to say that the Houthis are Hezbollah, but they do not need to be to achieve Iran's goals, which is to encircle the Saudis, expand its influence and power projection in the region and develop levers of unconventional pressure."

A spokeswoman for Britain's Foreign Office said it was "concerned by Iranian support to the Houthis, including reports that Iran has transferred weapons to Yemen which would be contrary to a UN Security Council Resolution 2216 and the Security Council's embargo on the export of weapons by Iran".

Sources say Iran is also using ships to deliver supplies to Yemen either directly or via Somalia, bypassing coalition efforts to intercept shipments.

Western sources say once the ships arrive in the region, the cargoes are transferred to small fishing boats, which are hard to spot because they are so common in these waters.

The coalition ejected al Qaeda from the area last year, but still cannot prevent the smuggling of weapons and people, according to sources familiar with the waters.

The Arab coalition's General Asseri acknowledged the difficulties of policing 2700 kilometres of coastline around Yemen.

"You cannot observe this length of coast even if you bring in all the navies of the world," he said. "If we stop movement of those small boats, this will affect fishing by normal people."

From September 2015 until March 2016, the French and Australian navies frequently intercepted weapons which officials said were most likely bound for the Houthis.

A USdefence official said Iranian weapons smuggling to the Houthis had continued apace since March last year, when the seizures stopped. The equipment included long-range ballistic missiles capable of reaching deep into Saudi Arabia.

Reuters

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War in Yemen: Iran steps up support for Houthis - The Sydney Morning Herald