For the First Time, a Zionized Billionaire Discloses the UAE's Goals in Syria

The aforementioned article – if we put aside the extensive praise of the UAE sheikhs like poet laureates and like the “authority’s intellectuals” – in its essence focuses on a number of points that we illustrate through quotes from it. The quotes are rather long, but the reasons behind that will become subsequently clear:

• “Despite the disastrous nature of this earthquake, it may help realign the ‘tectonic plates’ of permanent Arab interests: that is, strengthening the force of the Arab consensus and weakening Iran’s influence in the region, by welcoming the return of Syria to its Arab surroundings and foster environment”.
• “The UAE Foreign Minister raised the issue of humanitarian aid crossing the Turkish border into Syria with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. The next day, Griffiths met President al-Assad in Damascus, and the UN announced the decision of allowing aid to cross directly”.
• “If Biden’s foreign policy team is more focused on the Indian-Pacific instead of the Middle East, it can entrust the Syrian file to the UAE, which has shown high willingness and readiness to perform its duties”.
• “Any Emirati efforts to reintegrate Syria into the Arab world should be part of a long-term plan and not an attempt to pressure Damascus to cut ties with Tehran immediately”.
• “Any development or strengthening of relations between the UAE and Syria will undoubtedly serve the interests of both sides. If the UAE is able to include Syria in the Abraham Accords, it will achieve what no peace mediator, not even former President Bill Clinton, could achieve”.
• “Other motives [for closer relations between the UAE and Syria] include luring Syria away from Iran and paving the way for Emirati-mediated Syrian-Israeli peace talks”.
• “An Emirati-Syrian alliance, especially if the UAE gets support from Washington and the West, will mean holding peace talks between Damascus and Tel Aviv. Israel is well aware that peace with Syria is a very important matter, and it can do without more Iranian expansion in it, and the direct threat and imminent danger on it therefrom. As for Syria, it first wants to get back the Golan, and this may seem difficult, but negotiation may lead the two sides to satisfactory solutions. Thus, there are old points of contention that can be negotiated, and an understanding formula can be found just like Egypt and Jordan did previously. There are also future interests, so any understanding with Israel will mean Damascus’s engagement in the international community, good relations with the West, and aid to rise again, without giving up sovereignty and independence of decision”.

A Reminder…

Perhaps the importance of this article stems from being the first public disclosure – albeit unofficial – of the real goals on which the UAE is working through its attempts to engage in Syrian affairs. It was not difficult to understand these goals at an early stage, and Kassioun had devoted dozens of articles to this particular issue over the past three years, in which it sought to clarify the connection between a set of regional projects under Zionist-American management, and a set of slogans that concern Syria more than others. By this, we mean the following:

• “The Arab gas pipeline”.
• The “changing the regime’s behavior” slogan instead of toppling it, which first appeared in 2016 from the West’s political poison lab: Britain.
• The “step for step” project, which formally was UN-led, but in essence it had to reach an agreement under the table against Russia, Iran, and Turkey, and naturally against the Syrian people.
• “Easing sanctions” and recycling the “border crossings policy”, as signs of “good faith”.
• The “Jordanian initiative”, which seems to be another regional agent performing its role within a pre-arranged role-distribution process.

As mentioned above, Kassioun had recognized early on the West’s shift from trying to implement the Libyan model in Syria, to a model of military attrition, and then a model of “changing the regime’s behavior”, which aims to prolong the crisis on the one hand (turning Syria into a quagmire), as well as hoping to reach a new arrangement for the entire region in which “Israel” is the controlling center.

Before the conclusions, following are relevant quotes from previous Kassioun articles:

• “Saying it more clearly: extracting Syria from the anti-Zionist stance is the essence of the practical translation of the slogan ‘changing the regime’s behavior’.” (What Does the West’s Behavior Change Towards the Regime Mean?, 30 September 2021)
• “Rearranging the region within this meaning bears clear headings: The mobilization of the normalizing and non-normalizing Arab regimes in one field against Iran, Turkey and Russia; and the integration of the Zionist into this system as an ally”. (Same article)
• “What the Gulf and Arab media call the process of ‘changing the regime’s behavior’ and ‘normalization with the regime’ is not intended in any way to open the door to sound relations between Syria, as a state, and other Arab states, and it is also not intended to get Syria out of its crisis or improve the conditions of its people. Rather, what is clearly intended is to gradually (but quickly) pull Syria out of its historical alignment, towards a new alignment in which it becomes not economically Western in terms of the big dominant and corrupt rulers therewithin (regime and opposition), but also overtly politically Western, within the new eastern-western polarization, whose main tool is to get everyone in a war against each other within the peoples of the region, while ensuring that any war, or even any battle, stays away from ‘Israel’.” (Operation Alpha, Version II: Why “Normalization with the Regime” and Why “Normalization”?, 14 November 2021)
• “At the same time, a distinction should be made between this type of Western schemes, and the necessity of restoring sound relations between the Syrian state and the Arab states. Such relations cannot be established in a true and equal manner without a comprehensive political solution based on UNSC Resolution 2254, that allows Syria to restore its people’s sovereignty and territorial sovereignty, as well as its regional role which was anchored by geopolitics, but before that was anchored by its founding fathers, starting with the martyr Youssef Al-Azma”. (Same article)
• “Western endeavors towards ‘normalization’, in which, as we said, the UAE plays an advanced role, also falls within the framework of creating specific alignments that will ultimately give something for free to the Zionists, not to mention deepening and prolonging the crisis in Syria. The Emirati regime and those following suit in these ‘efforts’ have not hidden that their goal is to distance Syria from both Iran and Turkey, and to place it in an opposing position to them, all under the title of ‘Arabism’. It is no secret today, and even throughout at least the past three years, that the nature of the alignment required by America is represented by the slogan the ‘Arab NATO’, which is ‘Arab’, but its center is ‘Israel’. In the same context came the ‘Arab’ gas pipeline project, which was supported by the Americans and their International Bank”. (“Normalizing Relations with Syria”: One Slogan and Two Contradictory Contents (Arabic), 5 September 2022)
• “On the opposite side, and under the leadership of Algeria at the Arab level, and Russia with Astana at the international level, there is a completely different type of call for settling differences and ‘normalizing relations with Syria’. This pattern is not intended to strengthen the de facto sides in Syria and prolong their life and the crisis with them. It is also not intended to put Syria in alliances and enmities that ultimately serve Western and Zionist interests. Quite the opposite. What is required of this pattern is to break the siege on Syria, and end the coordinates of destruction by recognizing that the political solution in Syria does not pass through delegitimizing any of the main sides in the regime and the opposition, but rather by recognizing them, and through recognition that leads to these sides recognizing each other at the table of direct negotiations, that is not subject to economic suffocation and Western political extortion, leading to the full implementation of UNSC Resolution 2254”. (Same article)
• “The link is deep, as the facts show, between the so-called ‘normalization with the regime’ and ‘behavior change’ and between normalization, that is, normalization with the Zionist. Perhaps the most important indicators of this are that the two most prominent sponsors of what the West calls ‘normalization with the regime’ are the same two most prominent sponsors of the process of normalization with the Zionist entity, and we mean the UAE and Jordan, which are advancing by proxy to play roles that are much larger than their size and weight”. (Where is the Process of “Changing the Regime’s Behavior”? Context… Tools… Results, 21 December 2021)

Conclusion

There is not much we can add to what Kassioun had previously said years ago about “Emirati efforts”. What is new is the current circumstance and what it means: 1) the Saudi-Iranian reconciliation; 2) Astana getting closer to achieve a Syrian-Turkish settlement; 3) increased pressure on American presence in Syria, and the increased desire of Americans themselves to leave Syria due to their forces retreating and the enormity of the battle they are fighting internationally; and above all, 4) the Zionist entity’s growing internal and external crisis.

All these factors lead to a clear conclusion: the luxury of waiting and cooking poison on a low fire is no longer an option and is no longer possible. What is required now is to move the cooking pot from under the table to above it, and whatever happens happens. Either it happens or other options are put forth – if any – including “war”, or rather threating with it. This is because it is not certain that the Zionist entity is able to bear the burdens of war in these circumstances, and if foolishness leads it towards it, it is not certain that it will be able to launch any other war after that.

In conclusion, it is worth reminding that there is a fundamental difference between the two tracks in restoring Syria to its normal situation in the sense of international relations. There is the track in which the Zionists are the center and in which the Emiratis and Jordanians participate as agents. This track does not aim to achieve stability in Syria, but rather aims to complete achieving the goals of the war launched in Syria, i.e., to completely end Syria’s functional role. There is also a contradictory track, led prominently and clearly by the Astana group along with China, as well as key Arab countries, led by Algeria. This track seeks to end sanctions and siege on Syria, in parallel with opening the way to achieving real stability therein, which cannot happen without a comprehensive political solution based on UNSC Resolution 2254, that is, it cannot happen without a comprehensive radical change in the interest of the Syrian people.

It should also be noted that there is a possibility that recently opened up, with the major changes taking place globally and regionally, especially after the Saudi-Iranian reconciliation. By this we mean that the UAE itself may have begun to recalculate things regarding acting as an agent for the Zionists, as this has become a direct threat to it, and it will not be long before it isolates it from the changing reality. Out of pure pragmatism and opportunism, it is not unlikely that the UAE will try with time to wash off itself the soils of normalization. In any case, whether the UAE maintains this role or seeks to back down from it, its weight regarding the Syrian situation has no value in itself, but rather its significance comes from those on behalf of whom the UAE is acting, and the weight of those themselves is declining in all arenas, including in Syria.

(النسخة العربية)