Syrian Conflict

Because of its extensive Mediterranean history, France had a particular responsibility when the Arab revolutions broke out in 2011. The strategies defined by Paris in Libya and Syria, implemented through foreign policy, have proved to be less effective than expected. Although distinct, both were pursuing the same aim: the expansion of friendly democratic regimes in the Southern European neighborhood bloc.

Oil corruption in Iraqi Kurdistan arose from US/UK and Turkish patronage systems and clientalism. This investigative paper examines how IOCs and other businesses began preparing the ground in northern Iraq to benefit themselves long before Saddam Hussein was overthrown in 2003. The people of the region have not benefited from the wealth generated by their own natural resources. The swindling has created 5000 new millionaires in Erbil and bolstered the pockets of US and UK politicians, ex-military and SAS personnel and corporate criminals.

The few works on the Yezidi Genocide that have appeared thus far have mainly focused on the violence perpetrated against the Yezidis and no work has attempted the construction of a general historical narrative covering the essential political dimensions of the Genocide and its aftermath. This chapter begins to address this need by providing a basic chronology and description of pivotal episodes in the political history of the Yazidi Genocide.

The Syrian war will allow Russia to recover its naval presence in the Mediterranean. The Russian Navy will have more facilities at the same time that the Chinese Navy will appear in this scenario. This new situation will give us a new world order; this period we call "Tens Calm". Something similar happened after Bismarck Era, the period called "Armed Peace" (1890-1914), when the global balance was broken. This pre-war environment in the media could have been avoided. Russia today tries to recover its old deployment in the Mediterranean to become a global power.

CAN ACUN, BÜNYAMIN KESKIN, BILAL SALAYMEH

EL-KAIDE’DEN HTŞ’YE: NUSRA CEPHESI
Suriye’de devlet otoritesinin aşınmasından dolayı ortaya çıkan boşluk devlet dışı silahlı aktörler tarafından doldurulmaya başlanmıştır. Bu gelişmeler yaşanırken kriz ve çatışma bölgelerinde söz konusu aktörler egemen devlet düzenini sarsarak alışılmış olan uluslararası sistemi tehdit etmeye devam etmiştir. Önce El-Kaide daha sonra DEAŞ gibi örgütler bu meydan okumanın baş aktörleri haline gelmiştir. Suriye’de yaşanan krizlerle birlikte “cihadi” ideolojiyi benimseyen bu örgütlerin bir uzantısı olarak Nusra Cephesi ortaya çıkmıştır. 2011 yılı itibarıyla Arap Baharı’nın bölgede yayılmasıyla birlikte cihadi örgütler kendilerine hakimiyet alanı arayışına girmişlerdir.
El-Kaide’nin Irak’taki kolu Irak İslam Devleti (IİD) örgütü 2007 yılından itibaren aldığı ağır darbelerden yeni toparlanmaya çalıştığı bir dönemde ABD Irak’tan çekilmiş ve bünyesinde Suriyelilerin de bulunduğu IİD lider kadrosu Suriye’de ortaya çıkan krizle yeni bir genişleme alanı oluşturacağını düşünmeye başlamıştır. IİD örgütünün o dönemler Musul bölgesinde komutanı olan Suriyeli Ahmed Hüseyin Şara (Ebu Muhammed Culani) IİD’nin yeni lideri Ebubekir Bağdadi’ye Suriye’de örgütlenilmesi teklifinde bulunmuştur.
Sonuç itibarıyla El-Kaide merkezinin onayıyla Suriye’ye yedi kişilik
bir ekiple 2011 yaz aylarında geçiş yapılmıştır. Bu çekirdek kadro Suriye’deki iç savaşı derinden etkilemiştir. Nusra Cephesi’nin kuruluşu ise 2012’nin Ocak ayında Culani tarafından yapılan bir açıklamayla duyurulmuştur. O günden bu yana farklı süreçlerden geçmek suretiyle evrimleşerek muhalifler arasında en güçlü gruplardan biri olan Heyet-i Tahriru’ş-Şam’a dönüşen yapıyı beraberinde getirmiştir.
Bu rapor Suriye sahasında etkin aktörlerden biri olan Nusra Cephesi’ni ele almaktadır. Raporun hazırlık aşamasında Nusra’nın güçlü olduğu çatışma bölgeleri başta olmak üzere Suriye’de saha çalışması gerçekleştirilmiş ve buralarda bazı isimlerle mülakatlar yapılmıştır. Grubun ideolojik gelişimi ve bunun ardında yatan sebepler de raporun konusunu oluşturmaktadır. Aynı zamanda raporda örgütün yönetim modeli ve örgütlenme biçimine dair bilgiler de yer almaktadır. Ayrıca çalışmanın sonunda Nusra’nın liderleri ve örgütte ön plana çıkan isimlerin profil bilgileri de sunulmuştur.

INTRODUCTION Despite a speculated assault by the Assad regime on opposition controlled the Idlib region, Turkey and Russia have reached an agreement that averted the attack. The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on the Stabilization of the Situation in Idlib’s De-escalation Zone was signed by Russian Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu and his Turkish counterpart Minister of National Defense Hulusi Akar following the Sochi summit held, in the Russian coastal city of Sochi, on September 17, 2018. In addition to its success in averting a humanitarian catastrophe, the Sochi accord will have several implications on the ground, and will further influence the future of the Idlib region and Syria in general. Yet, this accord would face several challenges in both short and long terms.

After having lost swathes of territory in the key regions of Aleppo and Damascus during the first half of the civil war, the Syrian Regime has been able to regain these areas in 2018 only after highly-destructive military incursions resulting in thousands of civilian casualties, and still only with ground and air support from Iran-backed militias and the Russian Air Force, respectively. While these successes are taken as evidence that the " regime forces " are set to be the victors of the 7-years-running Syrian Civil War, severe losses and erosion incurred by regime forces have raised legitimate doubts of its sustainability. Iranian support after 2013 in the face of rising regime losses as well as the introduction of Russian air support after the 2015 loss of Idlib has afforded the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) enough breathing room to recuperate and reclaim some of the territory it had lost. Despite this, there have been arguments that SAA is no longer a serious military force by itself, lacking the capacity to wrest control of the rest of the country in its entirety with its allies unwilling to incur the high cost of committing to this goal.

I remain wary of the academic industry that continues
to flourish around Palmyra. Yes, the archaeological adventurism and opportunism of the
early 20th century have been refashioned into new forms of international technocratic expertise.
But in fetishizing the arch, and indeed its copies, we also risk participating in the same discourses
that are being critiqued. More sobering still is that the topics that scholars formulate (and seek to
have funded) have simply been recalibrated to the insidious practice of ‘crisis chasing’ (Cabot
2019). The crisis is about salvage, albeit our own, since what is unfolding in Syria and Iraq
has inevitably saved and spawned myriad institutions, foundations, digital start-ups, initiatives
and research, with a new mission and moral charge. Perhaps now we should be considering
whether we are creating ever more hostages to fortune.

This study addresses the effectiveness of political advertising in an extreme context, during wartime. A self-administered cross-sectional survey was used to collect data during the 2016 parliamentary elections in Syria. Structural equation modelling was utilized to test the hypothetical model and its invariance related to political involvement. The results indicated that beliefs are a four-dimensional structure consisting of information, veracity, sarcasm, and cynicism. Furthermore, wartime perceptions were found to negatively affect attitude towards political advertising via sarcasm among less politically involved voters. Negative attitude was found to be linked to lower levels of veracity among such voters and to higher levels of cynicism for those who are highly involved in politics. Negative attitudes regarding political advertising were found for lowering the chances for watching advertisements, for supporting a candidate, and for willingness to vote. The results also revealed that paying attention to political advertising does not relate to voters' intention to vote. This study is the first of its kind to empirically validate a conceptual model predicting voters' turnout behaviour based on voters' wartime perceptions, beliefs and attitudes regarding political advertising in an authoritarian setting. In addition, this study investigates whether the effects of the proposed model may be moderated by voters' political involvement.

France’s position has been marginalized in Syria, more than eight years after the beginning of the crisis in 2011. Russia’s military intervention saved Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from being toppled by his contenders, some of whom have been supported by Paris. At present, whereas the military intensity of the conflict has deescalated, Russia has had the upper hand on the process of the political settlement and, in the meantime, seeks to promote the reconstruction agenda. Paris pays the cost of political choices and an uncompromising posture under the François Hollande administration. Nevertheless, the more realistic and
“deideologized” approach of President Emmanuel Macron has so far been able to avoid further tensions with Moscow on the Syrian context. Having few grips on the dynamics of the Syrian crisis, France is left with very few options: to put a high political price for its support in the reconstruction phase and to bet on an eventual clash between Iran and Russia in Syria.

The Sunni ‘ulama of Syria did not respond to the 2011 revolution in a unified fashion. Whereas top scholars gave full support to initial protests, others aligned themselves with the regime. Quietism was the preferred choice of a third group. Taking the Fatih Institute as a case study, this paper presents the differing positions of the Faith scholars with their pronounced rationales. Adopting textual and contextual analysis, the paper examines these views on the basis of Islamic sources on one hand and the realistic situation of the Syrian prolonged crisis on the other hand. The paper concludes that the Syrian regime was able to exploit religious institutions to propagate its narrative of events. Also, co-opted scholars widely vary in their acquiescence and response to the regime’s demand. More impotently, with the absence of the essentially geo-political, and social considerations, the pro-revolution camp failed to consider the present vs. the expected harm, which resulted in massive bloodshed and major upheaval in the Syrian society as a whole.

By getting involved in the “Arab Spring”, Qatar was determined to continue waging its foreign policy aimed at strengthening the positions of the country combined with the intention to create corresponding markets outside the country for Qatari gas. The
Russia-Iran-US agreement on the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons, along with the newly-emerging Iran-US approchement, urged Qatar to re-think its Syrian agenda, especially in light of the diplomatic blockade by the Gulf states. It is concluded in the article that after the Syrian crisis, Qatar will continue seeking gas markets in order to ensure its national
interests.

Iran and Russia achieved their short-term objective of keeping Bashar al-Assad in power by defeating the
opposition forces. However, the two countries have conflicting medium-term objectives regarding Syria.
• Russia’s approach to Iran is rather instrumental. Moscow needs Tehran as a leverage to achieve its
regional and global objectives.
• Although the Russian President Vladimir Putin called Iran as a strategic partner in 2015, their shared
position in Syria has not gone beyond a tactical cooperation and is far from a coalition.
• Russia’s relations with Israel, its plans regarding Syria’s reconstruction which includes obtaining
privileges from the Assad regime in this respect, the process of normalizing relations between Syria and
the other Arab countries and finally the cooperation between Russia and Turkey over the Syrian crisis are
Tehran’s major sources of distrust vis-à-vis Moscow.
• Although Russia’s ultimate aim is to curtail Iran’s influence in Syria, it does not presently want Iranian
military forces out of the country because of the significance of the latter’s land forces on the ground.
However, the inception of the political dialogue process in Syria will increase the disagreements between
the two countries.
Keywords: Iran, Russia, Syria, Regional Rivalry

In Turkey, it is obvious that there has been a huge academic gap in Syrian studies and scholars dealing with Syrian politics and foreign policy generally do not go over the pre-Baath period. The main objective of this book is to analyze a neglected period of Syrian foreign policy during the so-called pre-Baath period from 1946 to 1963 in a historical perspective.

In the book, it is argued that foreign policy behavior of Syrian politicians regardless of their class, ideology and political orientations depended on historically rooted pragmatism in which interest calculations, shifting alliances and external patronage had special importance. In this respect, the book yields insights into the roots of Syrian foreign policy in the decades preceding the al-Assad dynasty.

Voici la première étude sur la guerre civile syrienne faite à partir d’entretiens réalisés en Syrie même et dans les pays voisins. 2011 : des centaines de milliers de Syriens de toutes confessions et origines ethniques manifestent pacifiquement pour réclamer la démocratisation du régime. La violence de la répression les contraint à prendre les armes, à organiser une contre-société et à regrouper des unités militaires improvisées au sein de l’Armée syrienne libre.
Après 2013, cette logique inclusive et unanimiste cède progres- sivement devant la montée des groupes transnationaux comme le PKK et l’État islamique, marginalisant les groupes les plus modérés.
Comment se structure l’économie de guerre? Quels sont les effets de la guerre sur la société syrienne? Quelles nouvelles hiérarchies communautaires et sociales résultent de la violence généralisée? Comment les trajectoires sociales des Syriens sont-elles affectées?
Un livre unique qui combine une recherche de terrain – rare sur le conflit syrien – et une réflexion théorique novatrice sur les situations de guerre civile.

The challenges and constraints to visibility in a perpetual state of emergency are what underwrite and impel the content and form of – door open – (2019), a three-channel film installation by ZouZou Group. This collective is formed of two anonymous female artists, one living in Syria, the other in England, who have shared video clips and photographs with each other that were recorded between 2014 and 2018 in Damascus and countries that impacted the course of the Syrian civil war, such as England, Germany and Russia. The various difficulties the two artists encountered in their exchange have come to determine the visual language, structure and substance of this artwork. Therefore, without showing violence, – door open – exposes the dangerous conditions of its creation by manifesting the effects of warfare on the formal processes of its production.

The aim of the study is the problem of protecting cultural and historic properties in the cities, that have been affected and damaged as a result of war. It is shown that the properties of cultural and historical heritage are significantly damaged, threatening their preservation, which can lead to their complete loss. In each case, the primary concern has been the impact of the reconstruction on the values for which the property was inscribed as a World Heritage site. The urgency of the problem is determined by the fact that cultural heritage sites that are not on the UNESCO list remain outside the attention of the authorities, the professional community and the public, which, as a result of reconstruction process, can lead to their loss, loss of urban identity, and not only negative humanitarian consequences, but also reduce significant economic potential. Materials and methods. The studies are based on a retrospective analysis of the territory, which can be used to identify the boundaries of the city, which have historical and cultural significance. The systematic approach and cartography method are used to determine the location of the historic center of Homs city and historical heritage objects within, which is necessary to assess their value and to face all the challenges and prevent further damages loss of cultural significance that was caused by the military conflict. Special approaches were proposed for protecting the objects which have historical and cultural significance. Also, a several points of weakness were presented in the reconstruction process of cities affected by the war. Results. Applying cartography method based on retrospective analysis of the city affected by military conflicts in our case Homs city. Both methods can help detecting the boundaries of the territory, which has signs of historical and cultural significance. Also, a recommendation mechanism was proposed for reconstruction process in the historical cities affected by military actions based on the preservation of their historical potential and urban identity, aimed at implementing the concept of sustainable development. Conclusions. The study of post-conflict reconstruction of historic cities, shown the necessity of using special urban planning techniques for the restoration process in the territories with historical and cultural significance.

The documentary depicts the journey of a teenage girl and her mother who move to California in 2012 because of the Syrian civil war. Together they learn to live in a different culture and face challenges to their traditions - ­all while endeavoring to build a better future.

I. PROSPECTS FOR PEACE OR WAR II. MAJOR TRENDS IN FORCE STRENGTH III. COMPARATIVE LAND FORCE STRENGTH: ACTIVE VERSUS MOBILIZED STRENGTH IV. COMPARATIVE AIR STRENGTH: QUALITY OVER QUANTITY V. COMPARATIVE NAVAL STRENGTH: PERIPHERAL MISSIONS VI. TOTAL RESOURCES: RECAPITALIZATION, FORCE MODERNIZATION, AND IMPACT ON EFFECTIVENESS VII. THE MILITARY FORCES OF ISRAEL VIII. THE MILITARY FORCES OF SYRIA IX. WAR ON THE GOLAN HEIGHTS X. CONTINUING EXTERNAL ASYMMETRIC WARS SOURCES AND METHODS OTHER BOOKS BY ANTHONY H. CORDESMAN

Pour qu’un conflit se termine, il faut soit qu’il se résolve par une entente plus ou moins satisfaisante entre les parties, soit que l’une des parties s’impose aux autres qui abandonnent leur opposition, de guerre lasse ou par manque de moyens. Il y a donc une nécessaire dichotomie à opérer entre trois éléments du conflit: la transformation politique, l'intensité de la belligérance et la rivalité stratégique.

Geneva Call´s project ´Towards Improved Protection of Civilians in the Armed Conflict in Syria´ was generally found to have been relevant to the situation, implemented in an effective manner and to have built on good relations with a number of ANSAs in both North West and North East Syria. While its impact is difficult to measure this is partly due to the difficulties of establishing causality in such type of normative projects and also due to some confusion or differences of opinion as to how its outputs are intended to translate into outcomes.  The sustainability of the project requires continued donor support and Geneva Call needs to become better at documenting and reporting on its work. This report highlights areas where it could improve, which the following Recommendations seek to address: 

Recommendations
• Geneva Call should develop better monitoring and evaluation (M&E) mechanisms to measure the impact of its work and become better at reporting on project activities.
• Geneva Call should invest more in staff support and management and ensure that all new staff receive adequate inductions and training into its strategy and methodology.
• Geneva Call should give more attention to ensuring that it properly archives all material – and develops a protocol for its security and safety – and is better at developing and maintaining an institutional memory. 
• Geneva Call should place more emphasis on accountability mechanisms in future training and particularly stress concepts such as command-responsibility, the ´positive obligations´ of commanders and the mutually reinforcing obligations of international humanitarian law, international criminal law and international human rights law.  Training courses should also stress that ANSA members are potential victims and witnesses to violations of some humanitarian norms and need to understand how to document and report these.
• Geneva Call should develop more Syria-specific scenario-based, interactive training material for its courses and include the research time necessary for this in future grant proposals. 
• Geneva Call should better integrate itself into the protection work of other human rights and humanitarian protection agencies.
• Geneva Call should develop a new training module on monitoring, reporting and advocacy for non-governmental organisations and civil society organisations, as part of a strategy to improve its own monitoring and advocacy with ANSAs and facilitate their interactions with civil society.
• Geneva Call should develop more Training of Trainers materials for ANSA commanders. 
• Geneva Call should expand its range of global contacts with donors, networks and intergovernmental organisations working on rule of law in conflict and post-conflict settings.

This edited volume investigates the political and socioeconomic impact of the Syrian refugee crisis on Lebanon and Jordan, and these countries’ mechanisms to cope with the rapid influx of refugees. The sudden population increase has resulted in severe pressures on infrastructures and services, as well as growing social tensions between the refugees and host communities. These chapters use a transdisciplinary approach to analyse the repercussions of the humanitarian tragedy at three different levels: 1) the changing governmental policies of the two countries towards the crisis; 2) the different perceptions of the Jordanian and Lebanese local communities on the Syrian refugees; and 3) the role played by NGOs and the civil society in both countries in dealing with protracted humanitarian emergencies.

Основой для анализа является теория гражданских войн, в рамках которой были проанализированы текущие военные конфликты в Афганистане, Ираке, Ливии, Сирии и на Украине с самого начала боевых действий в этих странах. Выявлено, что бои в Афганистане, Ираке, Ливии и Сирии в разные периоды времени представляли собой разные по сущности войны, а сущность войны на Украине не менялась от ее начала и до настоящего времени.

This report documents experiences of the WFP Lebanon Country Office with ground up participatory action learning on gender mainstreaming . The Lebanon Country office is the first WFP country office where field staff are working on gender mainstreaming in an emergency response using ‘ground-up’ participatory action learning. This provided a unique opportunity for testing whether and how this approach can work in humanitarian emergency settings. During this workshop, staff from the Lebanon Country office shared their experiences utilising PAL.

The proxy conflicts in the Syrian civil war are an example of a general trend: because of outside actors, civil wars are lasting longer and are increasingly likely to end with a one-sided victory rather than a negotiated settlement. This follows a brief period, from the fall of the Berlin Wall until the 9/11 attacks, when, for the first time in history, most civil wars ended in negotiation.

Choosing and structuring a word, making a statement, and comprehending the formulated statement require complexprinciples andprocesses. Within this context, complicated procedures and processes might be faced in the second language learning as well. Learning a second language means grasping the syntacticprinciples of a language and transforming these principles into language skills. In our very specific study, ten Syrian primary school students comingfrom diverse psychological and sociological backgrounds, and being at varying ages were investigated. The participants were asked to narrate the pictured book Frog, Where Are You? by Mercer Mayer in Turkish language and the narrations were audio-taped by the researchers. Based on a descriptive research design, the data were collected and analysed qualitatively. As a result of this study which investigated the morphosyntactic developmental features of Syrian primary school students, diverse and common morpho-syntactic features were detec...

In recent years, virtual reality (VR) has gained traction in humanitarian communication through its utopian promises of co-presence, experiential immediacy, and transcendence. I analyze three communication texts that engage with the Syrian refugee crisis. Two were made using immersive technology, while one is a traditional documentary. The paper argues that while VR brings new techniques of experiential immediacy to the practice of humanitarian communication, it also utilizes meaning-making codes in the simulations of other peoples and spaces. Therefore, VR remains subject to the operations of dominant ideologies. Comparing these artifacts, the paper demonstrates that although immersive technologies foreground the primacy of non-mediation, ignoring the structures of representation defangs the political possibilities of humanitarian communication.

“Let´s communalize Energy, water and land – Let´s build up a free society”

The American Libertarian Socialist and Ecologist, Murray Bookchin, defined the ideal economy as a municipally led, moral economy that is under democratic control. He argued that the Communes’ control over the economy represents the highest developed form of Confederalism. These same principles are being applied in the economy in Rojava, the mainly Kurdish, autonomous regions of Northern Syria. The political philosopher and imprisoned chairperson of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, Abdullah Öcalan, has linked Bookchin's theories of social ecology to the historical development of communal life in the long history of the Middle East. The idea is to empower emancipatory forces within society that exist in rural structures and have not been commodified by capitalism and state society.

International security has been facing a new threat of the modern world peace. During the Wesphalian era of Roman Empire, international threats come from the aggressive intervention of powerful state that eager to conquer another states. As the result, the common wars that happen in that age were mostly inter-state wars. Therefore, Westphalian Treaty was made to defend state’s sovereignty and prevent external intervention in the internal affair of a state. But the changing of international dynamics has created a challenge into international security. Civil war, arms conflict, humanitarian violation, poverty, and clash of civilization have become the main issues in international politics. War was no longer occurred between states, but inside the state. Threats have come from the weak or failed states that were unable to sustain their national stability. State’s national security has been changing in fighting against rebels, terrorist, and organized criminal. This new dynamics has rise the question about the validity of Westphalian system in maintaining world peace. Hence, in this paper I would like to analyze the relevant of Wesphalian system towards international security using the case conflict of Syria.

Viewed from a normative standpoint, the Libyan and Syrian conflicts may be read as the moment of inflection in the liberal normative order pioneered and diffused by the "West," with the traditional recalcitrance of the "Rest" now becoming normatively consequential. The Libya intervention is the final flames of a liberal Western order; the Syrian conflict is the incipient signs of a post-liberal polycentric world. And yet the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) all endorsed, in different shades, the imperative of stopping the bloodshed and protecting civilians in both Libya and Syria. Furthermore, within Europe and the United States too, there has been no consensus on intervention in Syria. What thus do the stories of Libya and Syria tell us about normative evolution at the global level when it comes to key notions like civilian protection, intervention, and state sovereignty? At face value, the Libyan and Syrian crises suggest a tipping of the scales in the international system from the "West" to the "Rest." However, this paper argues that a situated and multifaceted analysis of power reveals that Western and BRICS countries alike played crucial roles in determining the overall international responses to both crises. In doing so, all major international actors involved contributed to the ongoing global normative conversation about when and how to respond to mass atrocities, with likely long-term implications for the responsibility to protect.