FRANCE, the former colonial power in Syria, has expanded its military presence in the country, supporting the United States which is organising Kurdish forces in an attempt to lay the basis for partitioning the Arab country, and continuing the war with President Assad.
Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency reported on Sunday that French special forces had established six artillery batteries in eastern Syria along the border with Iraq, which are controlled by the so-called Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The US-led coalition confirmed that ‘artillery from France’ had already supported the SDF forces in an action, east of the Euphrates River in eastern Syria.
According to the Anadolu agency 50 French soldiers have arrived in the Syrian city of Manbij and were building a military base in the northern part of the province, and around 250 French troops are reportedly active in SDF-held regions in northern Syria, Anadolu said.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said earlier this month that the US-led military build-up in the eastern side of the Euphrates River was threatening Syria’s unity and was actually aimed at partitioning the country.
Israel is now an active party to the US operations inside Syria, mounting a number of air attacks since the transfer of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and Trump’s attacks on Iran.
The Syrian Ambassador to Moscow, Riad Haddad told reporters in the Russian city of Sevastopol on Saturday that Damascus views any Israeli attack on Syria as an act of ‘aggression’ and will confront it. ‘Our forces, including the air defence, protect the Syrian sky and land. We will repel any aggression against Syria, regardless where it will take place,’ he added.
The ambassador was commenting on a May 10 incident, in which Israel conducted what it called its most intensive airstrikes on Syria in decades. According to Russia’s Defence Ministry, Israel used 28 warplanes in the attack and fired 70 missiles. The Syrian army command said it had managed to destroy the biggest part of a ‘successive wave’ of Israeli rockets fired at military bases in the Arab country.
Tel Aviv has claimed that its assault was a response to a barrage of 20 rockets fired from Syria, by Hezbollah forces at Israeli military outposts in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights, which it blamed on Iran. Netanyahu flew to the Victory Day celebrations in Moscow on May 9th to have secret talks with Putin to try and make sure that the Israeli air assault on Syrian army and Hezbollah militia positions would not collide with Russian air and ground forces. He was welcomed by Putin who accompanied him at the parade.
US officials now say the administration of President Donald Trump will step up its activities in Kurdish-populated northeastern Syria, reinforcing fears of the Arab country’s partition and creating mounting tensions with Turkey, a fellow NATO member with the alliance’s second most powerful army. CBS News quoted US officials as saying on Friday that the US government had decided to shift its focus from terrorist-held northwestern Syria to the Kurdish-inhabited northeast.
CBS reported that tens of millions of dollars will be cut from previous US programmes to provide increased support for ‘US priorities in northeast Syria.’ The US is stepping up its alliance with Kurdish forces despite opposition by Turkey which is opposed to the formation of a Kurdish state on its borders, and may well break with NATO over the issue.
About 2,000 US troops are now deployed in northeast Syria in territories under the control of Kurdish militants. Both Moscow and Damascus have repeatedly warned that the illegal US presence in Syria is meant to disintegrate the country.
Meanwhile, Syria is now in full control of all of the regions around the capital Damascus, with the terrorists now concentrated in the north-west of the country. Workers in the West must stand with the Syrian people and government and support their demands that all uninvited foreign forces must now leave Syria, that the illegal occupation of the Golan Heights by Israel must end, and that only the Syrian people can decide who governs Syria, not the UK, US or French ruling classes!
