In Washington, some of the same “terrorists” who are bad enough to justify Israel’s land grab in Syria are considered good enough to run a U.S. puppet regime, says Caitlin Johnstone.
U.S. State Department Spokesman Matt Miller with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel in October. (U.S. Embassy Jerusalem, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0)
By Caitlin Johnstone
CaitlinJohnstone.com.au
Listen to Tim Foley reading this article.
The U.S. government is simultaneously (A) justifying Israel’s land grab in Syria by saying the nation has been taken over by terrorists, and (B) talking about removing those same forces from its list of designated terrorist organizations.
The people running the U.S. podium have pivoted seamlessly from celebrating the liberation of the Syrian people in the removal of President Bashar al-Assad to citing the fact that the nation is now overrun with terrorist factions in defense of Israel’s rapid move to militarily occupy large swathes of Syrian land while hammering Syria with hundreds of airstrikes.
At a Monday press conference, State Department Spokesman Matthew Miller said these moves by Israel “are temporary to defend its borders” and that Assad’s ouster “potentially creates a vacuum that could have been filled by terrorist organizations that would threaten the state of Israel and would threaten civilians inside Israel.”
“Every country has the right to take action against terrorist organizations,” Miller added.
US Government: It is great and wonderful that the dictator Assad has been deposed and the people of Syria have been freed!
Press gallery: Do you oppose Israel grabbing Syrian land?
US government: No way man, don't you know Syria's just been taken over by a bunch of terrorists? pic.twitter.com/zfilinDn4L
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) December 10, 2024
During a Tuesday press conference Miller further clarified the U.S. position on Israel’s land grab, saying,
“What precipitated their move into the buffer zone was the withdrawal of the Syrian armed forces, which, as I said yesterday, creates potentially a vacuum that could be filled by any one of the numerous terrorist organizations that continue to operate inside Syria that have sworn to the destruction of the state of Israel.”
During the same Tuesday press conference Miller also stated that “there is no legal barrier to us speaking to a designated terrorist group” such as Hayat Tahrir al-Sham or HTS, the group which led the run on Damascus whose leader has been an official in both ISIS and al-Qaeda.
And as it happens the U.S. government has now taken a sudden interest in removing HTS from its listing as a designated terrorist organization, with Politico reporting that there is now “a furious debate playing out in Washington” as to whether or not the group should be removed from the list immediately. Somehow I doubt the debate is actually all that “furious”.
So according to one narrative Syria has been liberated by brave freedom fighters and that’s wonderful, but according to another concurrent narrative Israel obviously needs to invade Syria because the nation has just been taken over by evil terrorists, and by yet another concurrent narrative those evil terrorists aren’t evil terrorists anymore because they’re going to be running a U.S. puppet regime.
These are the kinds of contradictions you run into when your policies are guided by the blind pursuit of planetary domination instead of by truth and morality.
US Considering Removing HTS From Terror List After Syria Takeover
US officials say they're in contact with the al-Qaeda-linked group
by Dave DeCamp@DecampDave #Syria #HTS #AlQaeda #BasharAlAssad #AbuMohammedAlJulani https://t.co/ddZoePMsim pic.twitter.com/IBr0H0xDyr— Antiwar.com (@Antiwarcom) December 9, 2024
In reality, “terrorist organization” is a political designation, not a behavioral one. It has a lot less to do with how an organization acts and operates and a lot more to do with whether or not they advance the strategic interests of the U.S. empire.
Pick any group of non-state actors who fight against the U.S. and its allies and you’ll find them on the U.S. government’s list of terrorist organizations. Hamas. Hezbollah. They’ll even put official state militaries on there like Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
They used to list the East Turkistan Islamic Movement as a terrorist faction back when the U.S. was expanding its global military presence under the banner of the “war on terror,” but they were removed from this listing at the tail end of the Trump administration because the Uyghur Islamist group was fighting Assad in Syria and could prove useful in the empire’s Cold War aggressions against China.
Even now the U.S. House of Representatives is moving to ban the U.S. government from using the statistics of Gaza’s Health Ministry to calculate deaths from Israel’s genocidal atrocities in the enclave on the basis that the ministry is run by Hamas, a designated terrorist organization. They need to do this because the Gaza Health Ministry’s death toll is considered so reliable that the U.S. State Department has been using those stats in their own reports.
The group that is committing the genocide necessitating such analysis is of course not a designated terrorist organization.
This is because the label “terrorist organization” is nothing more than a tool of imperial narrative control. In empire language it just means “disobedient population who need bombs dropped on them.” If they are determined to no longer be disobedient then they no longer need bombs dropped on them, so they are no longer considered terrorists.
You can kill all the civilians you want using whatever methods you want without being considered a terrorist organization, so long as you are a friend of the U.S. empire.
Caitlin Johnstone’s work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, following her on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud, YouTube, or throwing some money into her tip jar on Ko-fi, Patreon or Paypal. If you want to read more you can buy her books. The best way to make sure you see the stuff she publishes is to subscribe to the mailing list at her website or on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything she publishes. For more info on who she is, where she stands and what she’s trying to do with her platform, click here. All works are co-authored with her American husband Tim Foley.
This article is from CaitlinJohnstone.com.au and re-published with permission.
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
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Terror is the primary tool of the US-driven collective west – it comes in many forms, not just obvious ones. Instilling fear by various means, sometimes directly, but also using proxies – as in real hardcore killer terror cells, such as Al-Qaeda.
But instilling fear, induces loathing, which in turn induces real terrorism – in a direct reaction. So, it becomes a vicious cycle, that only stops when the west stops.
The only decent thing about the Syrian debacle is it lets you know which groups supposedly supporting the Palestinians are full of crap. I have unsubscribed to Jewish Voice for Peace and an American Muslim organization because they are supporting the terrorist takeover of Syria. This lets me know that they are controlled opposition and really don’t give a damn about West Asia. So bloody sick of liberals and their 1) naivete, or 2) knavery. How can you tell liberal organizations? They always want you to call your senators and congressmen, a totally meaningless activity.
I knew that the ending chapter of US (and Western governments) hegemony was going to be messy, but it’s gotten much worse than I thought possible. Ukraine for starters, add in Gaza, and now Syria. Washington DC is currently involved in wars in Ukraine, Gaza, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Iran, and Yemen. I might have missed one. Biden, Blinken, Sullivan, and Vicky should go into the history books as the most inept, destructive negotiators in US history. But Madeline Albright was given a big DC send off, so these 4 are expecting, and probably will get, the same. Mind blowing hypocrisy on display.
The reality is that what Israel takes it never returns – and always the borders have to be protected by security zones – which have to be expanded because of security threats. And on and on towards Greater Israel.
Meanwhile, the UK continues to redefine what constitutes a terrorist :
Jewish anti-genocide and anti-apartheid writer and campaigner Tony Greenstein is being charged under terror legislation for a comment supporting the right of Palestinians to resist Israel’s occupation.
Greenstein was made to appear at Brighton police station for the charge to be read to him but will be formally charged at Westminster Magistrates’ Court at 10am on Thursday 19 December at 10am with supporting a proscribed organisation under section 12 (1A) of the Terrorism Act 2000.
The ‘offence’ carries a prison sentence of up to fourteen years if convicted.
Greenstein’s arrest and charging is the latest in the Starmer regime’s abuse of anti-terror laws in an escalating war on pro-Palestine speech, activism and journalism in the UK – while Starmer claims to be protecting journalists against oppression and persecution.
hxxps://skwawkbox.org/2024/12/12/greenstein-to-be-formally-charged-under-terror-act-heres-where-to-be-to-support-him/
(As an aside, I’ve filmed a number of pro-Palestine events locally, and uploaded them to Youtube. I’m now wondering how long it will be before doing so will be defined as support for terrorism, because they’re full of people who, like Greenstein, support the right of Palestinians to resist Israel’s occupation.)
At a Monday press conference, State Department Spokesman Matthew Miller said these moves by Israel “are temporary to defend its borders” and that Assad’s ouster “potentially creates a vacuum that could have been filled by terrorist organizations that would threaten the state of Israel and would threaten civilians inside Israel.”
*
It is worth pointing out that Mr. Miller in his observations omits the true, pertinent factual nature of the Israeli bombing campaign: Under international law, Israel’s massive bombing of Syria fully meets the legal definition: illegal war of aggression.
Wikipedia: A war of aggression, sometimes also war of conquest, is a military conflict waged without the justification of self-defense, usually for territorial gain and subjugation, in contrast with the concept of a just war.
(…) In the judgment of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, which followed World War II, “War is essentially an evil thing. Its consequences are not confined to the belligerent states alone but affect the whole world. To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.”
GW Bush famously pronounced, “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”
More accurately, “If you are with US, you are with the terrorists.”
“O, it is excellent
To have a giant’s strenght, but it is tyrannous to use it like a giant.”
thank you Caitlin! If only there were more like you here in the U.S. Even progressive friends fly off the handle when I say “another war” in Syrian. I am verbally attacked for not realizing Asad killed thousands of people. So more killings now from the groups taking over there. The deep state is super active before Trump gets into office.
Same thing here. To criticize our part in the Syrian debacle means I love Assad. To recognize Russia’s valid security concerns and our part in the Ukraine debacle means I love Putin. To criticize Israel’s outsized response to Oct 7 and its current Syria land grab means I support Hamas and hate Jewish people.
Quite agree. Well put.
A ” War on Terror “… an emotion , really ?
Richard B. Cheney has been the prominent terra-rist in my lifetime.