Union for Communist Reconstruction (URC, France)
Since the flight of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, declarations from French political representatives on the right and far right, as well as on the “left”, have multiplied to congratulate themselves on the “liberation” of the Syrian people. But are we really in the presence of a liberation that the peoples of the world could welcome because it would herald a better tomorrow for the Syrian people? On the contrary, aren’t we in the presence of a new novel masking the essence of reality, like those about the “liberation” of the Iraqi or Libyan people? Communists, for their part, stick to the facts, their contextualization and the lessons of history.
The facts are, first and foremost, the nature of the pseudo-liberators. The main player in this pseudo-liberation is the “Hayat Tahrir al-Sham” group [Levant Liberation Organization], whose main component [the former Al-Nosra Front] was affiliated to the notoriously barbaric Al-Qaeda organization. The second is the Syrian National Army, also claiming to be “jihadist” and sponsored by the Turkish government. With such “liberators”, the Syrian people can expect no better tomorrow.
The facts are also the announcement by the US government of its intention to maintain its illegal military occupation of part of Syrian territory, where oil and wheat are produced for the Syrian people taken hostage, and the entry of Israeli troops into Syria, already illegally occupying the Golan Heights, and their annexation of part of Syrian territory in defiance of international law, as well as the control of several regions by the Turkish army and/or its local auxiliaries. The “liberation” hailed by the entire political class and our media is in fact nothing more than the balkanization and chaotic break-up of the Syrian nation.
Finally, the facts are the first public executions, targeting not only supporters of the old regime, but scientists and even anti-terrorist Muslim scholars, which our media hailing the “liberation” are careful not to show us.
Contextualizing these facts is a reminder that our world, from the Ukraine to the Sahel, from the Americas to the China Sea, etc., is engaged in a fierce struggle between US hegemonism and its Western allies on the one hand, and numerous countries and nations refusing this domination and aspiring to a multipolar world on the other. Contextualization also means recalling the evolution of the war in Ukraine, which makes it necessary for the Western alliance to force Russia to fight on several fronts in order to disperse its forces. Contextualization also means recalling the murderous military aggressions since 2011 and the murderous economic blockade imposed on the Syrian people by US imperialism, as well as the plundering of its oil in the so-called “liberated” zones. As in the case of 40 other countries around the world, the United States has imposed “sanctions” on this country, which have only one result: to starve its people and destroy its health and education services.
Contextualization means, last but not least, the resistance of the Palestinian people, who for a year have been facing the first televised genocide in the history of mankind, with total impunity from the Zionist genocidal state. This relentless resistance led the Zionist state to attack Lebanon and wage all-out war for two months. The impossibility of achieving the main goal of the war, the destruction of Hezbollah, led the Zionists and their allies to change tactics and decide to attack Syria, which was the rear base of support for the Palestinian and Lebanese resistance in the region.
The lessons of history are the balance sheets of previous “liberations” promoted directly by Western imperialist armed intervention, or supported indirectly and applauded by the same political and media forces as those who speak of “Syrian liberation”: Sudan, shattered and at war; Libya, just as atomized and the site of confrontations between several foreign powers; Iraq, durably bled dry by the scale of the human hecatomb and the destruction of infrastructure, etc. These are the “liberations” of the past. Such are the “liberations” in the Arab world, as elsewhere in the world, that accompany the predatory interests of the imperialists.
Facts, contextualization and the lessons of history all help to characterize the tragic events unfolding in Syria. Far from being a “liberation”, this tragedy of the Syrian people is first and foremost the work of the United States, Israel and Turkey, all three of whom have a vested interest in the balkanization of Syria, the strengthening of the Zionist state as local manager of the interests of the imperialist system, the weakening of Iran until it can be balkanized in its turn, and the isolation of the resistance and the Palestinian people as a condition for the project of their annihilation. These different objectives are tools for the control of this strategic region due to its geographical location [at the intersection of three continents] and its oil and gas wealth, on the one hand, and to weaken the multipolar world project supported by countries as diverse as China, Russia, India and Venezuela, on the other.
Far from being a “liberation”, the current Syrian reality is a severe blow firstly for the Syrian people, then for the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples, and finally for progressive and anti-imperialist forces the world over. This is why we Communists pledge our solidarity with all political forces mobilizing to preserve Syria’s territorial integrity. The Syrian Communist Party, aware of the dangers of balkanization and its effects on its people and the region as a whole, has already set itself this objective in its December 9 communiqué. This is also why we will continue to mobilize all our forces in support of the Palestinian resistance, which remains intrepid and exemplary.
History is a series of advances and retreats, of victories and defeats, which enable peoples to gain experience and prepare the way for victory. “The night is never as dark as before dawn”.
The struggle continues, and the peoples of the world will rise to the challenge!