The Syrian Chronicle by Interstices-Fajawat, January, 2, 2025

by | Jan 2, 2025 | Chronicle

CHRONICLE WRITTEN IN COLLABORATION WITH FRENCH COLLECTIVE/MEDIA “CONTRE ATTAQUE“

Our previous chronicle was published at a time when a large-scale military operation was being launched by HTS in Homs and Tartus regions to arrest a number of former officers and henchmen loyal to the deposed Assad regime. These militiamen, who had taken refuge in the predominantly Alawite coastal regions (the religious minority from which the Assad clan is descended), had in fact begun issuing threats and agitating the population against a backdrop of fake news, accusing HTS of having deliberately attacked and set fire to a sacred site for the Alawites in Aleppo. Although the holy site was indeed attacked on December 5 during the first assaults against the regime, HTS immediately condemned the action and promised to punish those responsible, which is quite different from what Assad’s nostalgic supporters claim, alleging that HTS was organizing ethnic cleansing of the Alawites. In fact, this cleansing has not taken place, even though images of violence have circulated, showing militiamen from the deposed regime being mistreated when arrested. At the same time, Alawite religious and civil leaders met with HTS officials and issued statements invalidating rumors of persecution.

These sectarian tensions make us forget that the majority of Syria’s Alawite population was also suffering under Assad’s dictatorship, and that an attempted insurrection started from the Alawite community in August 2023 (August 10th Movement: https://en.majalla.com/node/297431/politics/alawite-protest-movement-emerging-syrias-coastal-areas ; https://syriadirect.org/where-does-latakia-stand-on-suwaydas-movement/ ), immediately put down by the regime. For the past two weeks, we’ve also been struggling on social networks (when we clearly have other things to do) with Western and/or pro-Assad accounts spreading disinformation and rumors about the persecution and massacre of Christians in Syria, which is simply not true. It seems that part of the world doesn’t want to leave Syrians in peace and finds interest or pleasure in circulating images of atrocities, which deny our need to heal from decades of trauma. Our nightmares make their fantasies. To sort out what’s true from what’s not, and to deal with the rumors, we invite anyone to follow the @VeSyria / https://verify-sy.com/en account.

Still on the security front, Al-Shara’a continued to reward his lieutenants with responsibilities within the new military apparatus. A list of some 50 appointments to the new Ministry of Defense was made public, including at least seven foreign fighters, three of them Uighurs, one Turk, one Jordanian, one Egyptian and one Albanian. The Minister of Defense and the Head of Intelligence have also been appointed, all from HTS and the multiple Islamist factions that constitute it.

On the political front, the transitional authority has made progress. Last week, Ahmed Al-Shara’a (aka Al-Joulani) appointed the first woman to the government, Aisha Aldebs, as head of women’s affairs. What appeared to be an encouraging sign was immediately tarnished by her first, extremely conservative statements, which for the past week have sparked strong polemics in Syrian society, as well as virulent reactions in the media. In the aftermath, Al-Shara’a seems to have wanted to adjust the balance by appointing other women to positions of responsibility: Maysaa Sabrine, as Governor of the Syrian Central Bank, Diana Elias Al-Asmar (Christian) as Director of the Damascus University Children’s Hospital, and finally Mohsena Al-Maithawi (Druze), as Governor of the Suwayda region, which was a request from the Druze community. At the same time, freelance journalist Mohammed Al-Faisal was appointed spokesman for the transitional government.

Beyond this, Al-Shara’a also announced deadlines for the drafting of a new constitution and the holding of elections, stating that it would take between 3 and 4 years to guarantee the implementation of UN Resolution 2254 for a democratic transition in Syria. Given the catastrophic state of Syrian society and institutions, these timescales seem realistic, although there is still considerable concern about how the transitional government will manage public affairs over this long period. While Shara’a has rejected the federalist option and justified his choice of appointing only officials close to HTS, he has nevertheless reassured his interlocutors and detractors by promising the future dissolution of HTS within the framework of the National Conference for Dialogue due to begin on January 5. A preliminary meeting of the conference was held on December 28, but it was roundly criticized for the low participation of women (3 out of more than 100 people) and young people, as well as for the superficiality of the exchanges that took place. The way in which participants are chosen and invited remains vague. The Madaniyya network, made up of over 150 Syrian civil society organizations committed to the principles of the 2011 revolution, and which has already met with a number of foreign delegations, is waiting, for example, to be taken into consideration by the transitional government and the national conference for dialogue.

One of the blind spots in this transition is therefore still the condition of women, as well as that of the thousands of detainees and forcebley disappeared people plus their relatives, who have not been offered any concrete support or any prospect of justice or reparation. Many associations and human rights groups have begun to denounce the fact that prisons and their archives have not been put under protection over the past two weeks, and have been subject to destruction and theft. This obvious negligence raises questions about the new government’s real desire to dig deep into the secrets of the deposed regime. Silence, too, on the fate of the Syrian communes occupied by Israel and Turkey, as well as that of the Druze community of Suwayda, which has enjoyed de facto autonomy for several years now and has so far neither been invited nor solicited by the new central authority in Damascus. Silence again on Russian military bases, whose total withdrawal is not mentioned, despite the fact that Russia has spent the last ten years bombing and participating in the massacre of Syrian communities. Al-Shara’a, on the other hand, has declared its desire to respect Russian strategic interests in the region, a priori on a level with those of Israel and the United States.

In conclusion, one of the main “Gordian knots” in post-Assad Syria remains the fate of the Kurdish population, and more specifically that of the autonomist Rojava project. The Syrian Democratic Forces are struggling to contain the onslaught of pro-Turkish militias on the banks of the Euphrates, and have even driven them back to the outskirts of Manbij, while the autonomous administration of north-eastern Syria has entered into negotiations with HTS, even considering demilitarization and the reunion of the SDF within the new national army. But not without serious guarantees from the new government in Damascus…

We Will Need Time: a podcast with The Final Straw Radio, Ashville, NC (USA)

by | Dec 29, 2024 | Levant

This podcast was made by THE FINAL STRAW RADIO, Asheville, NC, USA :

https://thefinalstrawradio.libsyn.com/we-will-need-time-two-libertarian-communist-perspectives-on-events-and-possibility-in-syria 

In this episode, you’ll hear Cedric and Khuzama, two libertarian communists with connections to Syria and editor contributors to the blog interstices-fajawat.org , speaking about their observations of what’s been going on leading up to and through the ouster of Bashar Al-Assad, as well as complications among various factions on the ground and the view from the Syrian diaspora. The situation on the ground is changing fast, so check the show notes for this episode on our website for links to news sources that can be helpful in keeping up.

And if you care to hear a perspective from an anarchist combatant affiliated with Tekosina Anarsist, which works with the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria affiliated with the SDF and Rojava Revolution, you can find our episode from December 22nd and the transcribed zine.

We Will Need Time: two libertarian communist perspectives on events and possibility in Syria

by The Final Straw Radio

The Syrian Chronicle by Interstices-Fajawat, December 26, 2024

by | Dec 26, 2024 | Chronicle

CHRONICLE WRITTEN IN COLLABORATION WITH FRENCH COLLECTIVE/MEDIA “CONTRE ATTAQUE“

Since the fall of the Assad regime, things have been moving fast.

Ahmed al-Shara’a (aka Al-Julani), leader of the rebel group Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) has immediately appointed a transitional government formed from the pre-existing Syrian Salvation Government in Idleb since 2017. The ministers are not military, but professionals in the fields entrusted to them. They are clearly not progressives, but rather conservative Islamists. However, no constitutional changes or decisions involving major societal changes without the consultation and agreement of the Syrians have yet been taken. At the end of its transitional mandate, the interim government is supposed to make way for a national conference representing all Syrian factions and minorities, to form the new Syrian state.

Shara’a has also appointed several warlords as provincial governors, which does not reassure everyone, but not all appointments have been made and readjustments are underway. In Suwayda, a southern province where over 90% of the population is Druze, a minority that cannot be suspected of Islamist sympathies, a regional council representing all local factions has proposed the nomination of a woman as governor, a first in the country’s history. In addition, a major meeting of the leaders of the various armed factions was held in Damascus to agree on the disarmament of all armed groups and the integration of their personnel into the future national army, on a voluntary basis. Shara’a announced the end of compulsory conscription.

Over the past two weeks, social networks have been pouring out conflicting reports of violence against minorities and extrajudicial executions on the Alawite-majority coast, but none of this has taken place in the areas liberated from the former regime by the HTS rebels. In Tartus and Latakia, on the contrary, Alawites welcomed the fall of the regime with the same enthusiasm as everywhere else. Nonetheless, many accounts claiming to be well-informed are spreading false information and unsourced, undated images on a daily basis to legitimize and incite inter-community tensions, despite the fact that the transitional authorities have done everything in their power to ensure that there are no reprisals or acts of violence against minorities.

Incidents took place, including the burning of a Christmas tree in Suqaylabiyah, on the outskirts of Hama, an act whose perpetrators were arrested by HTS, which undertook to repair the damage and declared Christmas an official Syrian holiday. Foreign fighters, in particular Uighurs, Chechens and Kazakhs, have been singled out and demonstrations have taken place (without incident) to demand their disarmament and expulsion from the country. These demonstrations come a week after a demonstration in the heart of Damascus in favor of secularism, which met with a wave of criticism because its main organizers were defenders of the Assad regime before its fall, but also because of the conspicuous absence of Syrian revolutionary flags. The necessary struggle for a new regime that guarantees secularism and the protection of minorities, including atheists, was thus discredited by this lamentable recuperation by personalities seeking to redeem themselves with Syrians. Moreover, the polemics surrounding this demonstration overshadowed another demonstration called in Homs by women’s groups in favor of secularism and the protection of freedoms.

In terms of international politics, the daily choreography of foreign delegations coming to speak with Syria’s new strongman is breathtaking. Each one seems to be keen to set conditions, demand its due or obtain guarantees, while Turkey appears to be the big winner in this regime change. Indeed, it has been quick to invest in the Syrian economy, announcing the imminent reopening of the air route between the two countries and the restoration of the railroads abandoned since 2012. There’s no doubt that this renewed interest in Syria on the part of foreign states is motivated by the lure of profit, insofar as Shara’a has announced the country’s reconnection with the market economy. Germany, in addition to being clearly in favor of the genocide of the Palestinians, was among the first states to suspend Syrian asylum applications and to rush to Erdogan’s side to congratulate him and remind us of what a first-rate partner he has been in terms of migration management… Rapacious.

For its part, Israel continues to militarily occupy villages in the provinces of Dera’a, Quneitra and rural Damascus: at present, nearly thirty villages have been annexed, affecting almost 50,000 Syrian residents. Israeli officials are delighted to have taken possession of Mount Hermon, which accounts for 30% of Syria’s water resources and 40% of those of Jordan. While Shara’a cautiously avoids criticizing Israel, the population did not wait to express its hostility towards the Israeli army, which opened fire and wounded several people before withdrawing from the village of Al-Suwaisa (Quneitra). Residents of the Druze village of Hader also publicly declared their refusal to be annexed by Israel, thereby responding to the rumors and fake news propagated by Zionists and Islamists falsely accusing the Druze of being pro-Israel.

Finally, the Kurdish question will also be decisive, depending on US decisions and the outcome of ongoing negotiations between Shara’a, the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the autonomous Rojava administration. On December 14, the truce in the Kobane and Manbij regions agreed two days earlier was immediately violated by Turkey, prompting the SDF to retaliate against the pro-Turkish militias of the Syrian National Army (SNA). Let’s not forget that if the war is not over, the fault lies largely with the colonial and imperialist aspirations of Erdogan, who is neither the liberator nor the friend of the Syrians. As for the SDF, over 60% of its members are Syrian Arabs, which does not make it a Kurdish force as some claim. The simplification of power relations and the ethnocultural characteristics of the regions east of the Euphrates are partly responsible for the indifference of many Syrians to what is currently happening there, and therefore for a form of denial regarding the crimes committed by the pro-Turkish forces.

The situation therefore remains extremely uncertain, even if we are generally confident about future developments, as a number of progressive, democratic and secular popular initiatives have already been launched, demonstrating that Syrian society will not allow itself to be imposed with a new military or religious dictatorship. Whatever may happen in the coming weeks, what has been happening in Syria over the past two weeks is an unprecedented demonstration of collective resilience.

Call to all Syrian progressive forces !

by | Dec 12, 2024 | Levant

Apart from the accomplices of the Assad regime and the civilian populations still being targeted in the North and East of Syria, all Syrians are happy with the liberation of Syria thanks to the offensive of the Syrian rebels and the support of many Syrian communities who were only waiting for a signal to participate in the liberation.

After 58 years of one of the most ferocious dictatorships, and not 13 or 24 years as suggested by the Western media, Syrians needed at least 48 hours to breathe and share their infinite happiness, their cries, their joy, but also their tears of relief and sorrow too long contained.

Many abroad have not respected this need, continuing to infantilize Syrians and scorn their democratic and secular aspirations, constantly brandishing the Islamist threat in front of our faces since the start of the rebel offensive (which we refuse to reduce to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, because hundreds of other factions have joined the operation).

We didn’t need to be told. We were among the first to suffer this threat, which has been with us for years, but we also know that jihadist criminal groups didn’t just spring up. They were born out of the chaos produced by decades of colonization, armed invasion and indiscriminate bombing.

Having celebrated, Syria’s progressive forces must now act fast and not relax too early. The threats of a reactionary and fundamentalist backlash are real.

That’s why we want to share a few essential demands with you, to be widely disseminated within ALL Syrian communities and passed on to those who will ensure the political transition in Syria.

We must:

END THE VIOLENCE

  • Put an immediate end to all military intervention in the areas of Idleb, Aleppo, Raqqa, Deir Ez-Zor and Hasakeh and implement ceasefire agreements between rebel forces and YPG/SDF armed forces;
  • Condemn and put a definitive end to foreign bombing raids on Syrian soil;
  • Demand the liberation of Syrian territories and civilian communities held hostage by neighboring states and armed groups serving their interests, in particular Israel and Turkey in the Golan, Quneitra, West Damascus, Idleb, Aleppo, Raqqa and Hasakeh regions;
  • Disarm non-Syrian armed fighters and ask them to leave the country, return home or apply for asylum in Syria, to be considered in the light of serious investigations into the crimes committed by the armed groups to which they belonged;
  • Guarantee access to Syrian territory for humanitarian NGOs and journalists;

IMPLEMENT A RESTORATIVE JUSTICE PROCESS:

  • Protect and analyze the archives of the Assad regime’s security services, then make them available for consultation by those concerned, to enable grieving and reparation for the crimes, as well as prosecution of the perpetrators;
  • Protect and allow full access to the lists of detainees and victims of the Assad regime for the families of victims searching for missing persons;
  • List those complicit in slanderous denunciations and protect their identity to prevent personal vengeance and ensure fair judicial procedures, which may involve transformative and restorative, rather than punitive, modes of justice;
  • Arrest and detain in humanitarian conditions all army, security service or armed militia personnel suspected of direct involvement in the commission of crimes against civilians and war crimes;
  • Prevent any public humiliation or execution, and initiate justice processes that respect international conventions against the death penalty;
  • Enable the establishment of alternative systems of conflict resolution and justice, allowing defendants to choose under which justice system they wish to be tried, while prohibiting the use of penalties involving corporal punishment or the death penalty;

GUARANTEE POLITICAL TRANSITION:

  • Prevent the establishment of a political regime based on religious or ethnic affiliations, to prevent a sectarian division of Syria;
  • Prevent the use of symbols of armed groups, as well as flags associated with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, and other Islamist groups, in the public institutions of the new political regime;
  • Organize a political transition to a confederal regime allowing egalitarian and non-segregative representation of the different ethno-religious communities of Syrian society that represent at least 1% of Syrian society: Sunni Arabs, Shiite Arabs, Christian Arabs, Druze, Alawites, Kurds and Assyrians. Ethnic communities representing less than 1% of the Syrian population must be given proportional representation in order to ensure respect for their specific identities and related rights: Turkmen, Circassians, Bedouins, Armenians, Mizrahim Jews, Yezids, Palestinians, Romanis, Aramaic/Syriacs;
  • Freeze all cooperation with a neighboring state that does not guarantee full freedom for populations belonging to at least one of the above-mentioned Syrian communities;
  • Restore full and unrestricted political and religious freedoms, as well as freedom of association, freedom of assembly, freedom of expression and freedom of the press;
  • Guarantee the freedom and protection of the rights of women and sexual minorities;

Without the implementation of all these demands, the self-determination of Syrians is not guaranteed, and the resurgence of authoritarian powers is to be feared. We must mobilize en masse to prevent history repeating itself and autocratic or reactionary ambitions compromising the democratic and secular Syrian revolution.

We must therefore loudly proclaim our solidarity with the Palestinian, Lebanese and Kurdish peoples in the face of oppression and unjustified violence. It’s not a question of supporting armed groups who carry their voice, but of sending a clear message to our brother peoples and to civilians who don’t deserve to suffer the repercussions of colonial wars.

We only want peace and democracy in Syria and the surrounding region.

Interstices-Fajawat Initiative

The situation in Syria was never black or white: How the foreign interests converge

by | Dec 11, 2024 | Levant

If you think Syrian rebels are only a tool of Israel and the USA,

If you think that Russia and Israel are enemies,

If you-think that Assad and Iran were the brave “Axis of Resistance to Israel” and that you cannot support Palestinian people AND Syrian people,

If you think that it’s a matter of Black or White and Block against Block,

If you think that the Syrians weren’t uniting all together to throw down one of the most horrendous and genocidal regimes in the world,

READ OUR FOLLOWING ANALYSIS:

 

1.     TURKEY

Erdogan wanted -to occupy and expel the Kurds from-all Syrian territory above the M4 road, and continue to supply Israel with 30% of its oil via the BTC pipeline.

We believe that Turkey needed an armed force, the Syrian National Army (SNA) made up of docile Islamist and foreign mercenaries to carry-out its colonial and ethnic cleansing plans north of the M4 road, while another armed force made up of Syrian rebels motivated by the liberation of their country, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) provided a diversion to the south.

We also ‘believe that Turkey was not particularly interested in-what the Syrian rebels would do south of Aleppo, and was potentially surprised by the weakness and rout of the Syrian army, the speed with which the rebels reconquered western and southern Syria, but also the massive support for the offensive from the rebels in Suwayda and Deraa.

After the third day of offensive, Erdogan called Assad and the rebels to find a settlement.

2.     ISRAEL

Netanyahu needed Turkey-to continue providing 30% of its oil to continue-the genocide of Palestinians.

Israel wanted also to drive Hezbollah and pro-lranian militias out of all Syria and protect its northern borders, i.e., the stolen Syrian Golan lands, by establishing a buffer zone on Syrian soil.

We think Israel has no interest in waging a war into Syria and won’t get any support for this. Furthermore, Israel is facing a huge economic, social and political crisis that would not be helped by opening a new front of war.

Israel’s targeting of all Syrian military zones and arms depots immediately after the fall of Assad demonstrates that Israel did not feel threatened by the Assad regime: Israel-had never bombed the Syrian army before, but only Hezbollah officials in Syria.

Israeli intelligence officers declared the past week that they need Assad to maintain the status quo guaranteeing the security of Israel.

3.     RUSSIA

Putin and Assad had made agreements with Israel in 2016 to guarantee the security of Israel’s. northern border and keep Hezbollah away from it. By 2018, the Russians had established control over the Deraa region by integrating former rebels into its 5th ‘Army Corps (8th Awda Battalion).

Russia and the USA had made agreements back in 2015 as part of the “deconfliction line” allowing them both to use Syrian skies to carry out their attacks against ISIS without their aircraft colliding.

Russia has been considerably weakened by the war in Ukraine since 2022 and had substantially reduced its presence in Syria. The relentless bombardment of the rebel zone of Idleb and the energies deployed to keep the feckless Assad regime in place since 2015 were no longer worth the effort.

Russia actively engaged with Turkey and the UN in the Astana agreements to get out of Syria without being humiliated.

4.     THE USA

After the 2011 revolution and the-takeover of ISIS in 2013, USA wanted to-gain and retain control of the areas east of the Euphrates (Deir ez-Zor and Al-Hasakeh) where 75% of Syria’s oil reserves are -located*, without engaging American troops on the Syrian soil and without supporting Kurdish socialist YPG/PYD affiliated to the PKK.

Thus, the US backed and trained the Syrian Democratic Forces (FDS) to repel ISIS and keep. the East of Syria out of Assad-or Iranian control.

The US also kept a military base on Syrian soil (al-Tanf) that was never threatened by Assad, and never a threat for Assad. The Americans NEVER attacked the Syrian army.

Russia and the USA had made agreements back in 2015 as part-of the “deconfliction line” allowing them both to use Syrian skies to carry out their attacks against the Islamic State without their aircraft colliding. The US Command Center is located at Al-Ubaid in Qatar.

Also, after the USA gave carte blanche to Turkey to bomb the Kurds in 2019, SDF began to look towards Russia…

5.     IRAN

Iran has been Syria’s ally since the Lebanon war (1982) and needed Syrian territory as a lifeline to supply its Hezbollah militia with arms and money. Iran controlled the entire road network linking Iraq to Lebanon, and in particular the Bukamal and Al-Qusair crossing points, as well as the key area of Palmyra and the right bank of the Euphrates.

In return for the support of Iran and its Lebanese, Iraqi, Pakistani and Afghan militias, Assad allowed Iran to build commercial links-inside Syria, transforming it into a giant captagon factory and the Syrian regime into a narco-state, headed by his brother Maher.

After Israel had destroyed Hezbollah’s infrastructure and worn down its forces in Syria, Iran no longer had any interest in supporting the Assad regime and risking the destruction of its Iraqi militias in a confrontation with the Syrian rebels. It therefore preferred to fall back-on controlling Iraq. In addition, Iran was also involved in the Astana process with Turkey and Russia.

6.     THE SYRIAN NON-STATE OPPOSITION ARMED GROUPS

HTS have clearly entered negotiations with the YPG/SDF on the outskirts of Aleppo from the first days of the offensive, and the Sheikh Maqsood and Ashrafiye neighborhoods are still under YPG/SDF control. Moreover, their desire to protect religious minorities is not just a statement: there are no reports of HTS persecuting civilians since November 27th, and Syrian communities are welcoming the offensive, even if many people also worry about the coming weeks. HTS immediately opened the prisons and restored the water and electricity services that had been cut off and rationed for years by the regime, allowing foreign journalists into the country for the first time in decades. Moreover, HTS’s leader Al Joulani, who has severed his ties with al-Qaeda and has been in conflict with the SNA for several years, declared before the end of the offensive that he plans to dissolve the HTS and to leave the governance of Syria to a transition authority made from a coalition of groups representing the diversity of Syrian society.

Meanwhile, the turkey-backed SNA are indeed organizing the ethnic cleansing of northern Syria, with the aim of carrying out Erdogan’s plans. This aim is obviously not the liberation of the Syrians, and the conquest of the Tall Rif’at and Manbij districts, as well as the ongoing aggression in the Ayn al-Arab/Kobane district with the help of the Turkish air force, is associated with number of abuses and crimes against Kurdish civilian populations. Moreover, the most radical elements of the jihadist groups are affiliated to SNA, making it a major threat to the future stability of the whole of Syria.

Regarding the SDF, we think their compromises with the US on one hand and with the Assad regime and Russia on the other hand, but also their disrespect for Arab communities’ customs and demands in many regards (in Manbij, in Deir ez-Zor and other parts of Jazira/Rojava region) made them too unpopular to gain sympathy from other Syrians. Even so, it’s not fair to consider them allies of the Assad regime, their main concerns since 2015 having been to protect themselves from the serious risks of genocide represented by ISIS and to defend their autonomy, itself seen as a means of separating and protecting themselves from Assad’s dictatorial central power. Thus, SDF and Kurdish communities should enter into negotiations with the Syrian transitional authority to retain their autonomy, while proposing to be integrated into a new federal-type system enabling them to benefit from the same rights and guarantees as other Syrians.

There are many other rebel groups who took part in the HTS offensive but are not affiliated to HTS. This is notably the case of the Druze of Rijal al-Karami from the Suwayda district, who have resisted the central power since 2011 and massively obstructed the recruitment of 50,000 young Druze by the regime’s army, refusing to go and kill other Syrians. Over the past few years, Rijal al-Karami has been engaged in an uphill battle against criminal gangs affiliated to Maher al-Assad’s 4th Armored Division and Hezbollah, who have developed a number of trafficking operations in the Suwayda region that enable the regime to replenish its coffers, in particular that of captagon.

***

If, after reading this analysis, you still think that the Syrians were incapable of liberating themselves on their own and without foreign intervention, and that you support Assad and Hezbollah because you think they are in solidarity with the Palestinians, read our article addressed to the Western campist left following this link: https://interstices-fajawat.org/western-leftist-comrades-you-failed-your-arab-fellows/