US Muslim group decries Gallant’s trip to Washington, DC
The statement from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) came as the Times of Israel reported that former Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant is due in the US capital later on Sunday.
CAIR said the only international trip that Gallant “should take is a flight to The Hague to answer the charges against him”.
“Although our government wrongly refuses to accept the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC), the State Department should at the very least bar this fugitive war criminal from setting foot on American soil,” CAIR added in a statement on X.
Gallant and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are wanted by the ICC for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including using “starvation as a method of warfare”.
Netanyahu says Israel is closely watching Syria developments
“We are constantly watching events in Syria. We are determined to defend the vital interests of Israel and to maintain the achievements of war,” Netanyahu said, visiting new military recruits at a base in central Israel.
Fighters swept into the Syrian city of Aleppo, east of Idlib province, on Friday night, forcing the army to redeploy in the biggest challenge to President Bashar al-Assad in years.
Syrian and Russian jets step up strikes on rebels after opposition seize much of Aleppo
https://www.cnn.com/2024/12/01/middleeast/syrian-regime-airstrikes-opposition-forces-intl/index.html
Syrian and Russian jets are stepping up strikes on opposition forces in northern Syria in retaliation for the sudden offensive that has cost the regime control of the country’s second largest city, Aleppo.
The offensive has also led to the capture by the rebel alliance of an important military base east of Aleppo and large areas of both Aleppo and Idlib provinces. It has met little resistance on the ground from regime forces and also comes at a time when Syria’s key backers - Iran and Russia - are focusing on their own conflicts.
The rebels’ sweeping success has posed the biggest challenge in eight years to President Bashar al-Assad, when Russian air power helped reverse rebel gains in the civil war.
The newly formed rebel coalition, which calls itself the Military Operations Command, has captured key sites across Aleppo, including the airport, where video verified by CNN showed camo-clad fighters inside the main terminal.
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The rebel offensive has reignited Syria’s long-running civil war, which killed more than 300,000 people and created nearly 6 million refugees. The conflict never formally ended and the flare-up is the most significant since 2020, when Russia and Turkey reached a ceasefire in Idlib.
The rebels are led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a former al Qaeda affiliate in Syria that used to go by the name Al-Nusra Front, along with groups backed by Turkey and others previously supported by the US.
This presents a dilemma for Western governments, Asli Aydintasbas, a Visiting Fellow at Brookings Institution, told CNN. “Should they be cheering the opposition taking over Syria’s second-largest city Aleppo, or should they actually worry about the city falling under Islamist rule?” she said.
Aydintasbas believes the events that have unfolded in Syria show a new balance of power in the country, with Turkey emerging as a “major actor,” while Russia’s power is weakened and Iran is “on its back foot.”
