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'The promotion of the idea of a Syrian régime that defends its Christians is carefully stage-managed. Any visit from an academic, MP, or lobbyist, with the potential to involve Syria's Christian groups, is always seized upon and exploited in news reports. Soon after the Ba'ath party came to power, its relationship with the Sunni majority turned sour. Very quickly, the régime targeted the Muslim Brotherhood, one of the only forces which could claim to constitute any sort of opposition. But it was the assumption of power by Hafez al-Assad in 1970, and the Syrian invasion of Lebanon in 1976, that lit the touch paper. Confrontation escalated: there were terrorist attacks and murders on one side, and arrests and torture on the other. Then, in 1979, a sectarian offshoot of the Brotherhood launched an attack against the Aleppo artillery academy. Eight-three cadets, all Alawis, were killed. The régime's revenge was ruthless. A full-scale civil war followed, which was little known in the West since no media were able to cover it. It ended with the crushing of the city of Hama in 1982. Tens of thousands of people were killed. Thousands more were deported to the Palmyra prison in the middle of the eastern desert, which effectively became an extermination camp. This massacre - which sparked little international protest - brought the régime three decades of relative internal peace, at a high price. The régime sent a number of Christian officers to the front line to crush the Hama insurgency. This was a Machiavellian way of sealing a blood pact with the Christian community. The message was clear: if one day the Sunni are in a position to take their revenge, they will avenge themselves on you as much as on us. Your fate now depends on our régime's survival.' [Chapter 1, Marketing Secularism, pp 2-3] http://notris.blogspot.com/2018/11/extracts-from-nicolas-henins-jihad.html _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
