Studying the publications of the Russian news agency TASS can be as exciting as reading the accounts of a barber. But sometimes TASS does deliver gems. The “press reports” in particular are sometimes interesting if you keep an eye on the overarching geopolitical theater and the backdrops set up for it. The Russian view of developments in the world is presented to the reader in a matter-of-fact tone and thus in a pleasant contrast to the vulgar, emotional shouting of Western media-liars and hack writers.
The TASS-“Press Release 1906803” dated 31.01.2025 stated, quoting some political analyst:
“On January 28, a Russian interagency delegation visited Syria for the first time since the change in leadership. ‚The visit was constructive. Immediately after the Russian diplomat’s trip, the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group (outlawed in Russia) was disbanded, while al-Sharaa assumed the presidency, taking on a civilian role. This gives hope that dialogue with him is possible. Cooperation with Bashar Assad faced serious hurdles last year; in many ways, it was at a standstill. In particular, Assad ignored all our proposals to strengthen ties with Turkey. The situation could change under the new government,‘ Akhmedov said.“ https://tass.com/pressreview/1906803
Read and be amazed!
Because Bashar from Damascus simply didn’t want to follow the Russian “proposals“, he’s now gone. It’s his own fault, of course! And Russia, which always and everywhere only wants the best, has had to make concessions to the new masters in view of the new realities in Syria, as they have now arisen, because Bashar from Damascus was not pliable enough for this world. Life goes on and wants to be shaped. Everyone understands that!
One should consider:
The “Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group (outlawed in Russia)” (TASS) is precisely the Al-Qaeda and ISIS spin-off that was led by the gentleman with the romantic battle name Abu Muhammad al-Julani (or Jolani). Until recently, the German-language version of “Wikipedia” still had the following to say about him: “Ahmad Husain ash-Shar’a […] has been the leader of the Syrian militia alliance Haiʾat Tahrir ash-Sham since 2017. He was the founder and, from 2012 to 2016, leader of the al-Nusra Front, which is classified as a terrorist organization by the United Nations Security Council.” (Note: This is the original text of the German-language Wikipedia. The Wikipedia article has since been revised: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahmed_al-Scharaa).
This “al-Nusra Front” is considered the ‚Syrian‘ Al-Qaeda. And Al-Qaeda, as every child knows thanks to the Western media, were the terrorists around Osma Bin Laden, who had killed many dear Americans in New York. In other words, they were the bad guys because of whom the USA and its allies had bombed Afghanistan and Iraq to dust. In Syria, however, just as in Libya shortly before, these bad guys were the good guys, i.e. “moderate rebels”, “freedom fighters” or “the Syrian opposition” (https://syrianews.cc/encyclopedia/moderate-rebels/), as which they were also officially supported by the FRG government. Since 2011, this ‚opposition‘ had become notorious for acts such as rapes, beheadings, terrorist attacks on civilians (https://syrianews.cc/real-news-from-syria-suicide-car-bomb-in-jaramana-damascus/), attacks on schools and hospitals, abductions, the murder of clerics (https://syrianews.cc/real-news-from-syria-orthodox-priest-kidnapped-and-executed-by-us-nato-sponsored-rebels/) and ransom extortion, extrajudicial killings, murder and manslaughter (https://syrianews.cc/real-news-from-syria-graphic-images-idleb-free-army-executed-more-than-15-civilians-in-cold-blood/). This can be known by anyone who wants to know; the website www.syrianews.cc has reported on this in hundreds of precisely researched articles since 2011 (see https://syrianews.cc/nato-terrorists-blow-up-civilian-bus-in-raqqa-thirteen-murdered/, https://syrianews.cc/terrorists-in-syria-detonate-vehicle-with-farmworkers-eight-murdered-30-injured/, https://syrianews.cc/nato-terrorists-bomb-electrical-feed-to-alouk-water-plant-in-syria/).
These kinds of ‚moderates‘ had now come to power in Syria and the Al-Qaeda-ISIS-HTS boss Al-Jolani – now just the Mr. “al-Sharaa” – had taken “the presidency” and “a civilian role” (TASS). The question of who authorized him acting as president of Syria and the Syrian people is, of course, once again being asked by the wrong people only.
Back to the TASS article: The stubborn Bashar from Damascus, i.e. the guy who had held the presidency before Mr. al-Sharaa, indeed authorized by the people in accordance with the constitution, had simply “ignored all our proposals to strengthen relations with Turkey“, which is why cooperation with him had faced “serious hurdles“ and had even come to a standstill “in many respects“. Every child understands that such stubborn intransigence must ultimately go wrong, and that Russia cannot help it.
What did these Russian “proposals” look like?
Here are a few samples:
- Russia’s foreign minister Lavrov and his colleagues talked about Syria in the “Astana format” – without Syria’s participation. That’s just how it’s done. And this is by all means colonialism and a violation of the Charter of the United Nations. The agreements reached on Syria without Syria were imposed on the legitimate Syrian government under Russian de facto blackmail (threat of complete withdrawal of Russian troops).
- In the “Doha Forum”, Lavrov and his colleagues from Iran and Turkey chatted about Syria – without Syria’s participation. The last meeting of these gentlemen took place in the Qatari capital on December 6, 2024. That was two days before Damascus fell into the hands of the Turkish-Israeli-American head-cutters of HTS. The Turkish foreign minister who discussed Syria’s fate with Lavrov and his Iranian counterpart is Hakan Fidan (https://www.mfa.gov.tr/minister-of-fa-info.en.mfa). This Hakan Fidan had demanded that President Assad give Turkey’s moderate head-cutters in Syria the greatest possible autonomy. This inevitably meant a transformation of Syria from a centralized state to a loose federation along the lines of NATO’s Bosnian offspring.(https://korybko.substack.com/p/this-weekends-astana-summit-is-likely?utm_source=publication-search). In this federalized Syria, Turkey would have gained massive influence through its tens of thousands of AlQada-HTs terrorists, which would have extended to the central power. Whom would that have served? From 2010-2023, exactly during the period of the Turkish aggression against Syria, Mr. Fidan was head of the Turkish secret service “MIT” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hakan_Fidan) and as such jointly responsible for the Turkish terror against Syria and President al-Assad. Mr. Fidan also has that special kind of humor that seems to be peculiar to politicians and diplomats: after the victory of the Turkish-Israeli auxiliary forces in Syria, after the murder of hundreds of thousands of Syrians, the destruction of Syrian infrastructure and thus the living conditions of millions of people via the Al-Qaeda-HTS, this gentleman talks about Ankara’s “commitment to Syria’s stability and regional security” (https://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/fm-highlights-ankaras-commitment-to-syrian-stability-regional-peace-204381). Isn’t that nice!
- Meanwhile, Russian diplomats were already working with representatives of the US government on a completely new constitution for Syria which would remove key powers from the president and supposedly strengthen the role of regional and local administrations (https://syrianews.cc/constitution-russia-usa-syria/). Who would benefit from THAT in the event of war? The current Syrian constitution (from 2012), which was confirmed by the Syrian people, was ignored by Russia and the US. That’s just the way it is done, and it is by all means colonialism in blatant violation of the UN Charter.
Let’s just imagine that what Russia, together with the USA and Turkey, had decided ON Syria and its legitimate leadership FOR Syria, had been decided for the USA by alien powers and imposed on the USA… I think you understand the pattern of my thought: that would be utterly unthinkable. But in the case of Syria, this arrogant and brutal colonialism and pact-making of Syria’s supposed ally with Syria’s proven enemies, with the very powers that had brought the terror war on Syria, had been the normal case.
- Meanwhile, the Turkish army and also the USA and also “Israel” bombed the Syrian Arab Army. Turkey reinforced the terror brigades of the HTS in Idlib, the Turkish-terrorist enclave inside Syria, whose formation Syria owed mainly to the influence of Russia. Turkish and Russian soldiers carried out joint controls and prevented the SAA from exterminating the Al-Qaeda-HTS terror plague in Idlib. From Idlib, however, the Turkish-VSA-NATO-EU-backed Al-Qaeda-HTS bandits regularly launched their attacks, e.g. on Aleppo. “Israeli” jets regularly flew attacks on the SAA and, to a greater extent, on civilians in Syria (https://syrianews.cc/israel-bombs-damascus-apartment-house-murders-nine/, https://syrianews.cc/israel-bombs-aleppo-intl-airport-2nd-such-war-crime-this-month/). After Syria gave up its chemical weapons in 2014, which had been designed as a deterrent, the West thanked it by stepping up the bombing of women, children and civilian infrastructure as well as the unbridled continuation of chemical weapons lies in the corrupt media and at the United Nations (https://syrianews.cc/chemical-file-fetishists-hold-99th-bathhouse-meeting-to-lie-about-syria/).
- The S-300 air defense system ordered by Syria back in 2010 and approved by Russia was never used until the end because it never existed in Syria’s hands – while Turkey, after all a member of the aggressive war-alliance NATO that performs a proxy-war against Russia in Ukraine, received a fancy new S-400 from Moscow as soon as it was ordered. Yes, that’s how you deal with allies, isn’t it?
Russia had forced President Assad to accept the Al-Qaeda-HTS terror cell in Idlib. Al-Qaeda-HTS thus gained control of an entire Syrian governorate. Russia had created the conditions for this: wherever the SAA threatened to eliminate a terrorist group militarily, the Russians came, stopped the SAA and offered these terrorists (murderers of women and children, rapists, decapitators, looters) a safe exit to Idlib with their light weapons (the famous green buses, remember?). There, Turkey (Hakan Fidan’s MIT) took care of the new arrivals, supplied them with heavy weapons, trained them and strengthened their ranks with specialists in plundering, raping and murdering newly recruited from all corners of the planet. The SAA was allowed to look into the blue. - Russia had repeatedly called on President Assad to meet with Turkish President Erdogan. Erdogan has played a decisive role in the terror war waged by the West and the Arab potentates against Russia’s ally Syria. Hundreds of thousands of Syrians have fallen victim to this proxy war through terrorism, which has devastated the civilisation of that nation. It was also Erdogan who had dozens of factories in Aleppo looted by his Al-Qaeda friends and had the looted goods transported to Turkey as stolen goods.
- It was also Erdogan who had the Syrian oil stolen by ISIS (DAESH) (https://www.reuters.com/article/world/russia-says-it-has-proof-turkey-involved-in-islamic-state-oil-trade-idUSKBN0TL19Q/), before this job was taken over by the USA under President Trump (https://www.bbc.com/news/50464561).
President Assad had always responded to the “proposal” to meet with Erdogan with the demand that Turkish troops must first be withdrawn from Syria (https://syrianews.cc/assad-no-meeting-with-erdogan-without-turkish-withdrawal-from-syria/). After Turkey’s terrible deeds in Syria, which can probably be summarized as “looting, destroying, murdering, occupying, annexing”, this demand was a military-tactical necessity. By no means President Assad has “ignored” the Kremlin’s so-called “proposals”, but has responded to them with a comprehensible condition. TASS is telling fairy tales (to avoid the harsh word “lies”).
I think the examples of Russian “proposals” illustrates what has been perfectly clear to anyone who has been monitoring the war against Syria since at least 2016. Russia did not abandon Syria in 2024 – for whatever reason – after the alleged collapse of the SAA. Russia betrayed its only ally in Arabia long before that in several diplomatic and political initiatives and in close cooperation with Syria’s enemies against Syria (https://syrianews.cc/geopolitical-confabulation-ides-march/).
Russia has not only failed to achieve the goals of the military operation in Syria announced by President Putin himself – the destruction of terrorism within Syria https://syrianews.cc/after-damascus-tehran-and-moscow-are-next/). Russia’s actions have contributed to bringing to power in Syria precisely those terrorists who have been unleashed on Syria by the USA, EU, NATO and Arab potentates since 2011 in order to eliminate the Syrian Arab Republic as resistance against “Israel” and as an ally of Russia. The terrible consequences of the current situation for millions of Syrians in Syria seem to be irrelevant to all those involved in the game.
Finally, TASS writes, quoting a Russian analyst: “‘The situation could change under the new government’[…].”
And, voila!, it already has: Recently, the HTS gang, now calling itself the “government”, terminated the Russian-Syrian lease on the port of Tartus. This can prove to be fatal: “The Tartus port, Syria’s second-largest after Latakia, is a critical Mediterranean hub […] and home to Russia’s only naval base in the region. Established in 1971 by the Soviet Union and later expanded in 2017, the base has served as a strategic outpost for Russian military operations in the Middle East.“ (https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/damascus-authorities-terminates-russian-contract-for-tartus). Bashar from Damascus in 2019 waived Russia’s lease and gave up 65% of the port’s revenues in favor of a Russian investment in its expansion. What an obstinate man.
Russia’s leadership has betrayed a close friend who had sacrificed himself to protect Russia’s interests (https://www.patreon.com/posts/all-syria-needed-118263983)
It takes a very special kind of intelligence to understand such actions as strategic foresight in Russia’s interests (https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2024/12/19/is-putin-capable-of-strategic-thinking/).
Those who have observed and analyzed the terror war against Syria since 2011 must feel vindicated if what has been denied by Putin’s admirers is now confirmed.
The nations should take a closer look and learn.
Stefan H. Heuer, M.A.
historian, born in 1964, has worked as a lecturer in adult education and, among others,
in Human resources development for a US-American company in Germany.