Author: Steven Sahiounie

Yury Veselov, military observer More details about the military incident involving a Turkish convoy on August 19 are becoming available. Jet fighters of the Syrian Air Forces and the Russian Aerospace Forces delivered a preventive air strike near the Turkish convoy on the outskirts of the town of Maarat al-Numan, 15 kilometers northwards Khan Shaikhoun. The convoy consisted of more than 50 wheeled armored vehicles and trucks which carried up to 10 tanks and a large quantity of ammunition. According to the Turkish Ministry of Defense, before the convoy was dispatched the Russian side had been notified that the military…

By Andrew Korybko The Mainstream Media reported earlier this month on an intelligence bulletin released by the FBI’s Phoenix office back in May alleging that a connection exists between so-called “conspiracy theories” and domestic terrorism, and while there have veritably been some people who hold such controversially defined beliefs and then ended up killing others, it’s anti-American to suspect that people who don’t believe the official narrative about various events automatically qualify as potential terrorists. The de-facto criminalization of free speech is an ongoing trend in American society that’s already pressured a lot of people to self-censor their beliefs in public in order to…

BY PEPE ESCOBAR Complex doesn’t even begin to describe the positioning of Iran-Russia in the geopolitical chessboard. What’s clear in our current, volatile moment is that they’re partners, as I previously reported. Although not strategic partners, as in the Russia-China tie-up, Russia-China-Iran remain the crucial triad in the ongoing, multi-layered, long-term Eurasia integration process. A few days after our Asia Times report, an article – based on “senior sources close to the Iranian regime” and crammed with fear-mongering, baseless accusations of corruption and outright ignorance about key military issues – claimed that Russia would turn the Iranian ports of Bandar Abbas and Chabahar into forward…

BY RICK STERLING It may be a new low in propaganda. National Public Radio (NPR) used the news that Syrian First Lady Asma Assad had overcome breast cancer to mock her and continue the information war against Syria.  They interviewed a Human Rights Watch staffer named Lama Fakih who is an American from Michigan now based in Beirut. Do you believe Ms. Fakih in Beirut or do you believe people who live in Syria who say we are being lied to? Lilly Martin is such a person. Although she is American from Fresno California, Lilly has lived in Syria for nearly 25 years.…

By Andrew Korybko Saudi Arabia and the UAE, increasingly wary allies of one another in the War on Yemen, are poised to sharpen their competition in the Red Sea-Horn of Africa region to the point of becoming “frenemies” amidst both parties’ efforts to forge different coalitions in this strategic space through which the vast majority of European-Asian trade traverses. Most observers agree that the UAE’s planned military drawdown from Yemen sharpened the competition between that country and its Saudi allies in the war, but the fact of the matter is that the general dynamic of these two GCC countries becoming rivals of one…

By Mark Taliano When we play their game, we will always lose, and they will always win. “They” are the largely unelected “Permanent State”, sometimes called the “Deep State”. “They” are the publicly bailed-out transnational, corporate monopolies and their political fronts that destroy domestic and foreign economies with their supranational “trade” agreements, their parasitical “neoliberal”, publicly bailed-out “privatization” schemes, their permanent warmaking, and their terrorism. A large part of their game is indoctrination. They are experts at war propaganda. They can make broad-based domestic audiences believe almost anything. And they are doing it now. They have largely succeeded in fabricating Canadian…

By Miri Wood Syrian security forces have deprived terrorists of more than 400,000 Captagon pills. On 17 August, authorities in the suburbs of Damascus seized a truck with hidden compartments filled with a large quantity of this Amphetamine-type Stimulant (ATS) known as Captagon. Captagon pills with other drugs were confiscated by the Syrian security who were monitoring the truck heading from Central Syria at the Lebanese borders towards the south of Syria, most likely towards Jordanian borders. Upon careful inspection, the well-experienced officers discovered hidden compartments built within the container body of the large truck loaded with thousands and thousands of Captagon…

Steven Sahiounie, Middle East observer It has been six years since Manar Nakour’s brother died August 17, 2013, in Marmarita, Syria. The hurt, loss, and shock came flooding back when he saw the National Geographic Documentary Films’ Hell on Earth: The Fall of Syria and the Rise of ISIS, by Academy Award-nominated filmmaker and best-selling author Sebastian Junger and his Emmy-winning producing partner, Nick Quested. Manar was shocked to see his brother’s name, Amin Nakrour, and photo used in the film, prominently and emotionally used under the title “In Memoriam MAYA BARSHINI AMIN NAKROUR ATALLA ABBOUD IBRAHIM SAADI Killed by…

By Sarah Abed A new study published by McKinsey & Co on Tuesday found that one of the contributing factors to the U.S. racial wealth gap is the lack of banks in predominantly African American communities. Lack of access to mainstream financial services makes it difficult for African American’s to accumulate savings.  According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities the wealth gap is wider than the income gap but because incomes are easier to tax the income gap gets more traction in political discussions. Let’s first differentiate between the terms income gap and wealth gap. Income gap refers to the gap in earnings between two groups…

Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan, who currently leads Sudan’s Transitional Military Council (TMC), will head the Sovereign Council, a transitional national administration, for the first 21 months after its creation, the TMC said on Saturday. “Lt. Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan will be the head of the Sovereign Council during the first period of its work. It [the council] will also include his deputy, Muhammad Hamdan Dagalo”, a TMC spokesman told the Sky News Arabia TV channel. Meanwhile, Burhan said on Saturday, after signing the power-sharing deal with the opposition, that Sudan is entering a new, constructive, period in its development. “I stand before you…