Our Comments Analyzing an LA Times Article Today

Did anybody even bother to edit this BS article before posting it here? Or the Arabic lady who wrote it lacks basics of English language? Let’s see what she wrote in Basic English & comment on the content as well:

Obviously Mr. Erdogan of Turkey after being grilled by his own opposition 2 major parties in Turkey for the arrogant way addressing the southern neighbor with over 800 kms shared borders wanted to appear as a hero claiming credit for the removal of tanks from streets in Hama, Central Syria, the story the writer failed to point out while Mr. Erdogan himself stated, also, seems that the writer, obviously motivated by her political view of Syria alike the Hariri bloc in Lebanon, has also missed the harsh respond Mr. Erdogan’s firm message statement from Syrian officials, after the Prime Minister of Turkey stated that he’ll be dispatching his Foreign Minister Davut Uglo to Syria to deliver a ‘firm message’, received an instant reply from an aide of president Assad, Mrs. Shaaban: “If the Turkish envoy is coming to deliver a firm message, he will hear a more firm message from Syrian leadership condemning Turkey’s ignorance of facts”.

Mr. Uglo was received with frown faces as it was totally obvious in the footage the media displayed from all Syrian delegates in the meeting, President Mr. Assad, the Syrian FM Mr. Moallem, President’s Aide Mrs. Shaaban, and the 4^th delegate to the right of Mr. Assad, which explains that the Syrian leadership didn’t bend to Turkish pressure as claimed which also explains what the reporter mentioned of continuous security operations throughout the country with an exception of pulling armored vehicles from Hama after completing their tasks!

In her efforts to show that the regime in Syria as a bunch of criminals facing civilized communities within the country, the writer uses a very twisted language, she says: “According to the activists, 10,000 soldiers with 32 tanks entered the border area, broke into homes, looted personal belongings and arrested 25 youths” Now in this one sentence the reporter outdone herself in previous articles, or maybe it’s the experience she gained in writing in the same manner each time describing the Syrian Government Forces, how? Let’s take a closer look:

“According to activists”: Since the beginning of events in Syria we started to hear of activists covering the news for foreign media which was expelled due to intended bad conduct of reporting news exactly same like this article, what kind of activists is she referring to? If they are Human Rights Activists, then those HR activists should be recognized and accredited from known agencies, they should be following scientific practices in collecting the data which means they should have a presence in the country, conducting interviews, surveying, filling data forms, cross examining information and then reporting through an organizational method, while what everybody has noticed in the Syrian case, the so called activists are all of ‘one man show’ kiosk offices based abroad Syria, with no presence whatsoever on the ground, so how could they gather, analyze and cross examine the news before distributing their findings? How could so called activists, each leading a Human Rights Organization by himself with no other staff, all based outside the country, all comprised of opposition figures of the ruling government in Syria, and yet they can still from their offices abroad count 10,000 soldiers and 32 tanks! Unless these Activists are not of a Human Rights nature and could be of the same nature of ‘London Rioters’ if we can call them ‘London Activists’.

‘According to activists, 10,000 soldiers with 32 tanks entered the border area’: let’s accept that 10,000 soldiers were counted with their 32 tanks, although I don’t know how you can fit 10,000 soldiers in 32 tanks!! But let’s say they were counted, what does the reporter mean by border area? Is it an area outside the sovereignty of Syrian Government? Or within? If it’s outside then it entered another sovereign country’s land, in other words: invaded another country and in this case that other country is Turkey, as we all know there isn’t a no man zone between the two countries Syria & Turkey; and in case they were within the sovereign borders of Syria, what’s wrong with moving a national army within a country? Especially a country that is facing terrifying terrorist events from killing protesters and security forces at the same time by snipers to provoke a revolution and incite hatred between both, chopping and mutilating dead bodies of security officers and their families, in one case a brigadier in the army was attacked while he was shopping with his family, kidnapped with his 3 children, killed, chopped and all 4 of them sent in plastic bags to their family, such a country facing armed groups that entered from bordering countries attacking public and private properties, torching & looting it and erecting blockades in remote country sides, what would such a country do when these armed groups are armed with similar heavy weapons that the CIA usually provide to gangs it creates to destabilize countries opposing USA policies? Should the government in Damascus accept parts of the country under such threats? Would any country accept that? In UK, almost a 1000 teenagers were arrested, 4 killed and were all called rioters, gangs, mobs… and they weren’t even armed.

“broke into homes, looted personal belongings and arrested 25 youths”: This is remarkable, when a government body assigned a security preserving task they don’t “loot personal belongings” they confiscate suspicious materials. It’s good she used the word “arrested” as some of her colleagues use “kidnap” instead, and then we have “25 youths”: How on Earth did the reporter get the number and ages of those arrested? Activists? It would make more sense to arrest the activist reporting this story whose name is Oday Al Sayyed instead of letting him report this story if he is in the country in addition to those arrested, then how do you define youths? If Mr. Cameron Prime Minister of UK said: “if those committing the riots are capable of committing crimes then they are capable of facing justice” nothing different here.

“I think expanding their offensive along the border is a clear response – even more a challenge – to Turkey,” Al Sayyed said: Now our ‘activist’ has turned into a political analyst with a purpose of provoking a conflict between the two countries. If he does exist which we doubt, then he’s definitely not an HR activist and could be one of those committing crimes with the armed gangs in Syria, unless the writer have created this figure to serve her political alliance in neighboring country Lebanon, as she is also not in Syria.

The rest of the article is self-explained in contrary with the preceding of it, but it goes without saying that most people reading news they skim and mostly satisfied with the beginning part of the news article and do not continue to the end.


The article and our comment can be found here: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylonbeyond/2011/08/syria-regime-appears-to-shrug-off-turkish-guidance.html