SUMMARY: Fighting between Turkey and Syria in Idlib has driven hundreds of thousands of refugees toward Syria’s border with Turkey. What obligation does NATO have to help member nation Turkey handle the ensuing humanitarian crisis? Nick Schifrin talks to Ben Wallace, the United Kingdom’s secretary of defense, about that, Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei, and the U.S.-Taliban deal in Afghanistan.
For the first time that I can remember (I'm 74) I witnessed an American President betray an ally and the American people. In 2018 Trump promised the Kurds we would protect them if they fought ISIS as our ally. Trump has absolutely no honer.
SUMMARY: In the days since the announced withdrawal of U.S. troops from northern Syria, the country’s map is being redrawn. Both Turkey and the Russia-backed Syrian regime made territorial advances, and U.S.-partner Syrian Democratic Forces turned to Damascus for support. As a result, an estimated 130,000 civilians have fled their homes, and imprisoned ISIS fighters have escaped. Nick Schifrin reports.
SUMMARY:President Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. forces from northern Syria has profound implications for stability both within Syria and throughout the Middle East. Nick Schifrin talks to the University of Oklahoma’s Joshua Landis and career diplomat Ted Kattouf of Amideast about how Trump has handled the move and what it means for Syrian Kurds, Russian President Vladimir Putin and other U.S. allies.
SUMMARY: In 2012, the Syrian city of Manbij joined nation-wide protests. In 2014, those Syrian rebels lost the city to the Islamic State group. In 2016, the U.S. fought back with the help of Kurdish forces, liberating the city. In 2018, U.S. troops arrived to help stabilize Manbij as it recovered. But last week the U.S. started to withdraw, and a free-for-all began. Nick Schifrin reports.
SUMMARY: Vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara on Thursday about Turkey’s military offensive in northern Syria. They agreed to a five-day pause in the operation, but disagreed about whether or not it constitutes a "cease-fire." Judy Woodruff reports and sits down with Serdar Kilic, Turkish ambassador to the U.S., to discuss.
SUMMARY: The battleground in northeastern Syria appears to be quieting, after a cease-fire between Turkish forces and Kurdish fighters got off to a rocky start. But will Turkey keep its word -- and was the U.S. pullout from the region appropriate? President Trump's decision to withdraw troops has drawn bipartisan condemnation, with Sen. Mitch McConnell calling it a “grave mistake.” Amna Nawaz reports.
SUMMARY:As Kurdish fighters evacuated areas of Syria near the Turkish border on Sunday, a U.S. official said American forces in the region will be redeployed to Iraq to conduct operations against the Islamic State. Those developments came as Lebanon’s prime minister agreed to reforms amid widespread protests. Associated Press reporter Sarah El Deeb joins Alison Stewart from Beirut to discuss.
SUMMARY:The White House announced Wednesday that the U.S. will not sell billions of dollars of next-generation fighter planes to Turkey, after the NATO ally purchased advanced Russian surface-to-air missiles. Amna Nawaz talks to Admiral James Stavridis, who served as NATO's top military officer from 2009 to 2013, about what these latest developments mean for U.S.-Turkey relations that were already tense.
SUMMARY:Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu slammed the United States’ Syria strategy and Middle East peace plan, saying Wednesday that one was underdeveloped and the other might not exist.
“It seems that there is no clear strategy yet” by the U.S. to dial back its military presence in Syria, Cavusoglu said in an interview with PBS NewsHour anchor and managing editor Judy Woodruff.
Cavusoglu said Turkey was getting different signals from President Donald Trump and other U.S. departments, including the military. Trump tweeted last December that the United States was withdrawing all of its troops from Syria, but since then he has gradually dialed back that declaration and committed to keeping a residual force in the country.
Turkey’s foreign minister also said he doubted the existence of a U.S. peace plan for Israel and the Palestinians — an effort that Trump’s son-in-law and White House adviser Jared Kushner has been leading for the U.S.. “Until today, there is no peace plan,” Cavusoglu said. “We are not sure whether there will be.”
He added that Trump’s decision to move the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem showed the President’s bias towards Israel. Trump’s recent policy change recognizing Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which Israel seized from Syria during the Six-Day war in 1967, was another decision that “everybody has been concerned about,” Cavusoglu said.
“Everybody believes the U.S. is no longer a balanced or objective” leader on the world stage, he said.
SUMMARY:ISIS claimed responsibility for a deadly attack in northern Syria's Manbij that killed four Americans, countering the Trump administration's assessment that the terrorist group had been defeated. While Vice President Pence repeated that the U.S. is now able to "hand off" that fight to allies, other officials expressed concern that withdrawal plans have enlivened the enemy. Nick Schifrin reports.
SUMMARY: Russia and Turkey agreed Monday to create a demilitarized zone in Idlib province between the Syrian opposition and areas under the Assad's regime control. The agreement seems to save the region from a military assault and averts what was expected to be a humanitarian disaster. Nick Schifrin reports.
I am Retired U.S. Navy (22yrs) and a Vietnam Veteran. After my Navy retirement I was in the computer related industry, now retired. In 2000 I was a registered Republican and voted for George W. Bush. Six months of having Bush in the Whitehouse forced me to re-evaluate my political stance. I had always thought of myself as a Moderate Republican, but was a Republican by "default" NOT because of close examination of the GOP. Due to what has happened in America since 2000, I now consider myself a progressive, and registered as a Non-Affiliated voter.
*Anti-First Amendment policies that attempt to turn America into a theocracy by enshrining ANY religious belief as law.
* Any attempt to suppress human or Constitutional rights.
* Any law or policy that supports discrimination based on religion, ethnicity, race/color, gender, sexual orientation, or any law that does NOT support Equal Treatment under the law.
*Any law or policy that attempts to suppress Freedom of the Press or Free Speech.
LINK DISCLAIMER:
There is no guarantee that any link provided in this blog will always work, especially for older links. The validity of any link is governed by the source-site policies. Some sites will archive articles and require subscription to access. Very small sites, such as a local town newspaper, may not archive at all.
