Syria

The Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has invited representatives of the incoming Trump administration to the upcoming Syria peace talks in Kazakhstan. Speaking in Moscow on Tuesday Lavrov said he believes US and UN representatives should be invited to the meeting. Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif is against any US participation in the talks that are to be held in Astana on 1/23/17. He told Iran’s Tasnim news agency: “We are opposed to US presence (in the Astana meeting)”. “We have not invited the US and are against their presence,” he said.

The United States is increasing airdrops of weapons, ammunition and other supplies to foreign-backed militants in the Syrian city of Raqqa. The weapons are intended for opposition forces to “fight ISIS”  as they close in on the groups self-proclaimed capital of Raqqa in Syria, according to US media reports citing the country’s military. Gen.

A Syrian opposition group have called for Israeli intervention in Syria to help overthrow President Bashar al-Assad The group comprised of certain foreign-based oppositionists have openly pleaded with Israel to directly confront Assad Press TV reports: The so-called National Salvation Front in Syria, which represents certain members of the anti-Damascus  opposition in diaspora, including some who are based in France and Belgium, also proposed a “roadmap” for closer relations with Tel Aviv, the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) reported on Monday.

Back in 2013, the catalyst used by the US to intervene in the Syrian conflict which started in the aftermath of the Arab Spring (which according to some was inspired by CIA intervention), was a YouTube clip allegedly showing a sarin gas attack by Assad troops on his own people in the town of Ghouta, which reportedly led to hundreds of casualties. Subsequently, the video was shown to have been a hoax, but by then it was too late as the US was actively involved in the proxy war, which in the summer of 2013 nearly escalated to a naval conflict between the US and Russia.

Just as the Syrian proxy war showed some hopeful signs of finally dying down, the Syrian army command said on Friday that Israeli jets have bombed the Mezzeh military airport west of Damascus, accusing Tel Aviv of supporting terrorism, and warned Tel Aviv of repercussions of what it called a "flagrant" attack. Syrian state TV quoted the army as saying several rockets were fired from an area near Lake Tiberias in northern Israel just after midnight which landed in the compound of the airport, a major facility for elite Republican Guards and special forces.