Latest / UK Column Radio / Syria Podcast Episode 1

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Syria Podcast Episode 1 · UK Column Radio

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the UK column, joined today by Vanessa Billy.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Thank you for joining me, Vanessa. And obviously the last
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: five or six days has been pretty intense in Syria.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: As many people will know, you live in Damascus and
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: have been there for how many years now, it's.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: Coming up to it's sixth year actually, although of course
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: I've been working in Syria since twenty sixteen, so eight
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: years really.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: And twenty fifteen twenty sixteen that was sort of the
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: time when when we got into contact and I was
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: just looking at some of those really early UK column
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: news appearances. Yes, a lots changed since then, but what
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: hasn't changed is that Syria is still on the receiving
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: end of what we might describe as external interference, because
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: what's happened in the last five or six days is
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: that the terrorists who have been pretty much holed up
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: in their enclave and EdLib and also I presume correct
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: me if I'm wrong, but on the other side of
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: the Turkish border as well, and gas in tab and whatnot,
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: have managed to break out again. And of course we've
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: seen some really dre coverage or at least implications in
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: mainstream press of you know, effectively Syria collapsing and a
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: sad government about the fallover. What is the truth of it?
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, and I mean we even had I don't know,
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: the last four days have kind of disappeared into a blur,
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: but I think it was about forty eight hours ago
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: there were stories being put out on social media of
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: there being a coup and clashes between Syrian on the
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: Arab army factions in Damascus. Hence why I probably the
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: video of myself driving through Damascus to show that it's
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: perfectly calm, it's perfectly peaceful, and there is absolutely nothing
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: of the kind going on. And in fact, I think
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: I think it was today.
• 2:12
  Speaker 3: Or last night in Israeli.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: Media they were saying that Syrian so called rebels were
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: storming the presidential palace in Damascus, which is interesting because
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: that's at the point that the Iranian Foreign minister was
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: actually meeting with President Asad in the palace, So I'm
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: not quite sure how they thought they could possibly get
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: away with that kind of story. But that was Jerusalem
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: Post that was publishing that, So it's you know, it's
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: even getting into the kind of what I would call
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: the substrata of mainstream media, not only on social media,
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: and of course it is being picked up by the
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: likes of the BBC, in CNN and the usual culprit.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: Whenever we were covering Syria back in twenty sixteen, twenty
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: seventeen and so on, what we had to deal with
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: was a mainstream media which was completely brought into the
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: regime change narrative and was promoting that as hard as
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: they possibly could. And we can go into a bit
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: of detail about that in a second, but you know,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: we had people like you and Patrick Henningson and other people,
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: Eva Bartlett and all the people that were talking about Syria.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: From let's say our side of the discussion, you could
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: at least rely on what was being said. You could
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: believe what was being said. What has happened in the
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: meantime is, of course we've had this whole censorship agenda,
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: and which is not just about shadow banning and shutting
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: down freedom of speech, and so it's also about active
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: operations by seventy seven Brigade and similar agents of the
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: United Kingdom, the EU and the United States to push
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: out Chydro narratives which appear to be narratives which are
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: kniter to what their respective governments might want, but which
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: are then taken up by people on social media without
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: any without engaging their brains, and so actually people are
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: becoming part of the problem definitely.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: And I think, actually, I mean, we saw that very much,
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: I think during COVID, with the kind of hysteria that
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: was being generated by mainstream media but then also picked
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: up by social media, and you know, the adversarial aspect
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: of the whole of the COVID campaign was played out
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: very much on social medi and what we saw, particularly
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: in the first twenty four hours, I would say, and
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: of course the attack by the armed groups, both the
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: Turkish proxies in the north and the kind of Turkish
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: US Ukrainian Israeli proxies in the northwest.
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: Will come onto the Ukrainian role in a minute.
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: The attack came hours after the ceasefire came into effect
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: between Israel and Lubanon.
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: And then what actually happened.
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: Initially the reports were pretty sketchy and we weren't really
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: sure to what extent the terrorists had managed to breach
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: the army defenses to the west of Aleppo and so on, And.
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: Then suddenly there was this deluge.
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: Of information coming in and what had happened was the
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: sleeper The sleeper cells from the terrorist groups that had
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: remained in Aleppo after the liberation of all of the
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: kind of suburbs and periphery of Aleppo were triggered to
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: suddenly appear inside a lepo and carry out, you know.
• 6:13
  Speaker 3: Film themselves pulling stuff down off.
• 6:15
  Speaker 4: The walls, or four or five of them roaming the
• 6:20
  Speaker 4: streets of certain areas of Aleppo and then arriving in
• 6:24
  Speaker 4: the center and taking more selfies.
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: But if you actually looked at the content of the videos,
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: in many of the videos there were only one or
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: two people, you know.
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: Close zoomed in, so you couldn't you.
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: Couldn't see whether there was twenty or thirty others with them,
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: but I would guess no. And then the maximum I
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: think there was one photo in front of the citadel
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: where there were ten to fifteen, which is not a
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: big force, and some of them were not armed and
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: so on.
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: But these videos.
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: Were then circulating across social media. People in Syria were
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: freaking out right, So that's where the irresponsibility of social
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: media comes in. And you know, I know, we talked
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: about this before, we're talking now, and the problem is
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: that while Social media is a tremendous tool for people
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: like us. I think it's been infiltrated to such an
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: extent by the likes of seventy seventh Brigade and all
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: manner of intelligence agencies that are effectively using it in one.
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: Way or another to.
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: Swarm global populations with misinformation or panic generating news.
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: And that was what was happening.
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: But the worst thing for me was the psychological warfare
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: against the Syrian people because they go on social media
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: to see what's happening to their country, and when they're
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: seeing the biggest influences on x or on Tale telling
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: them their city is falling, it's been invaded. The terrorists
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: have met with absolutely no defense. They've managed to get
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: you know, they've crossed various districts in Aleppo in a
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: matter of minutes. They're panicking from Aleppo down to Hammah,
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: to Homs to I had people calling me saying, is
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: that it? You know, do we need to prepare in Damascus?
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: Do we need to prepare in Homs Because if they've
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: got that far that fast in a Leppo, then they're
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: going to be with us any minute. So for me,
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: this demonstrates absolutely more than anything, the absolute danger of
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: social media and how it can be used to wage
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: a psychological war against its target audience. And that is
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: exactly what happened, because the problem is you have a
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: journalist like myself and I'm on the ground. But even
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: for me, it was a confusing situation, so I needed
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: time to actually kind of find out what was really
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: going on, to try and substantiate what I thought was
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: really going on.
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: But these people don't care.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: These social media influencers that are making money out of
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: content on X or Telegram or TikTok or wherever it is,
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: just want to get the sensationalist information out there because
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: that brings in the clicks, that brings in the money,
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: and so we're always catching up.
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: So to a.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: Degree, this infiltration of social media is damaging the good
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: social media users, the ones that are genuinely trying to
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: present at least evidenced and contextual information, and journalists who
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: are maybe taking a bit longer to actually gather the
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: facts and put a bigger picture together. They're all getting
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: marginalized and squeezed out of the picture. In the very
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: early moments of whatever event is ongoing.
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: I'm going to suggest that this is it is a
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: psychological attack. And I appreciate what you're saying about how
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: this has affected people in Syria, but this is affecting
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: every single one of us because this is driving opinion
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: in the West for the actions which are happening in Syria.
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: This is driving opinions in the West for the actions
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: which are happening in Gaza. It's driving opinions in the
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: West for the actions that are having happening in Ukraine.
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: That's one point to make. The other point to make
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: is that I you know, this term post truth world
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: appeared a number of years ago. Another term that began
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: to be used a number of years ago was trust
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: and it was clear that fewer and fewer people trust
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: the mainstream media and more and more people were trusting
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: independent voices who we're posting on social media among other places.
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: And what has happened is that, well, let's put it
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: this way. I would I would say that there are
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: four categories that are making use of social media at
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: the moment. One category is mainstream media, which is using
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: social media to push out their material that is clear,
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: it's in the open, it's there. The other another category
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: is independent journalists like UK column like Vanessipile, like Patrick
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: Kennison are out there doing what we're doing, and we,
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: I would hope, in most cases, are doing that with
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: at least a view that we are doing it with integrity.
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: Whether whether we always get it right or not is
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: another thing, but we're at least trying. There is a
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: category of social media user that is the consumer of
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: fear porn will jump on the latest bandwagon, whatever that
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: happens to be. They will look for stuff that gives
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: them that hit, that adrenaline hit, whatever it is, and
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: it'll just be shared without thinking. But they won't share
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: stuff from us, because, as you say, it's taken longer
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: to get there, it's taken longer for it to be posted,
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: because we are attempting to at least try to verify
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: what we're putting out.
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: And it's not sexy, and it's not sexy.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: And we don't do clickbit in this kind of stuff.
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: There's a fourth category, which is the professional agitator who
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: are either working directly for intelligence agencies or for think
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: tanks or whoever else is active in these areas that
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: are paid to be influencers, and they tend to be
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: posting anonymously, they tend be producing the clickbit in the
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: first place. And unless the people that are in that
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: third category, the people that are consuming social media content
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: from whichever source, learn discernment, this situation is only getting worse.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: And in fact, I would go as far as to
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: say they are part of the problem, very much part
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: of the problem. Now. I keep hearing this term, this,
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: this saying we are in a spiritual battle, and I
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: believe it's true. But from my point of view, it
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: starts with our own ability to rein in our worst impulses,
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: which we i in the UK on the UK columnies
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: and whatnot. We'll say to our audience, look, we need
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: you to be the algorithm and to share our material
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: because it's not because we're being so heavily censored by
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: the social media platforms. So this makes it very difficult
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: because in the course of this conversation, on one hand,
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: we're criticizing some people who are sharing with our discernment.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: On the other hand, we still need them to share material.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: So how do we find that balance?
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I don't know, because if I think about,
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: you know, some of the bigger platforms that were sharing
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: misinformation and We're obviously coming at it from a great
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: deal of ignorance on the history of the conflict in
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: Syria and so on, so they were not really providing
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: even the necessary context and so on, because again we
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: talked about.
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: This, you know, even with the UK Column audience.
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: How many years it almost ten years since we started
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: working together on exposing what was going on in Syria.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: But in that time, in particularly because it went relatively
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: quiet after twenty twenty when the majority of the country
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: was liberated, and as you said, most of the terrorists
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: that had been operating throughout Syria were kind of you know,
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: shoved up into the northwest into idleab and so therefore
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: I guess seventy percent of the country was living under
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: peacetime again. And then you had COVID come in and
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: suddenly you know, that was the rush then for information
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: to be got out and so on, and so I
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: know that UK Column's audience increased tremendously through that because
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: of the excellence of the work of UK Column and
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: exposing you know, the entire project, and still is. But
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: people kind of then lost touch with Syria. So now
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: the war is starting again and people are trying to
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: catch up. This is well, I don't understand what's going on.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: Why are Syrians fighting Syrians and so on and so forth.
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: You know, so we're almost back to one where we're
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: having to point out that no, this is propaganda.
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: I mean, for example, I'll give.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: You a very good example which is very typical of
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: what went on previously. There was a video put out
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: that showed, according to them, the terrorist tanks and armored
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: cars heading for Hobbs. The reality was they flipped the
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: video and it was actually Syrian army convoys of tanks
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: and armored cars that were coming from homes to Hamma
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: to strengthen the defense line in Humma, which is kind
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: of to the north of.
• 16:34
  Speaker 3: Hans, right. So this is the kind of thing that
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: people are not aware of.
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: We are used to it because we were covering all
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: this and we expose the White helmlets, we exposed their
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: fabricated chemical weapon attacks, we exposed their you know, incredible
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: propaganda methods.
• 16:53
  Speaker 3: But now that's all coming back.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: But people are not prepared for it, because there's been
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: that kind of high between COVID and now four years
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: and people.
• 17:04
  Speaker 3: Have either forgotten.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: And that is another point actually that I find quite interesting.
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: Is people have literally forgotten.
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: So it's like Syria before never happened, and now we're
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: starting again from square one.
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: Is it that people have forgotten or was it actually
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: the majority of people that are paying attention today never knew.
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: Maybe yeah, maybe because even among some of the Iranian
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: and Lebanese activists that I speak to, they were like
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: ten years old when the war against Syria started, so
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: even they don't have the grasp of the history of
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: it that some of US veteran journalists have.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: For example, the key thing that everybody needs to know
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: is that this was never a civil war.
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: And also, I think, in addition to that, Syrians are
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: not fighting Syrians. Syrians from all faith in religions and
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: communities inside Syria under the protection of the Syrian government
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: are fighting against Muslim brotherhood factions in Syria that have
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: been weaponized by the worst for more than.
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: Forty to fifty years in Syria.
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: And sorry, let's just make this point, because Muslim brotherhood
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: was a British creation.
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: Yes, in Egypt, and basically they were created in order
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: to be weaponized against target governments in the Middle.
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: East or in West Asia.
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: And when people say Syrians fighting against Syrians. So that's
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: the Syrian side of it, let's say, is the Muslim brotherhood.
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: But probably at least fifty percent of those that let's
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: say the government forces and their allies are fighting are
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: foreign mercenaries.
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: Where they're from Uzbek.
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: Afghanistan, we goas from China, Chechens, Albanians, Kosovars, Libyans, you know,
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: so they're not Serians.
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: One of the points that we were making all the
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: way through that time we were when we were covering
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: this up until the things settled down in twenty twenty.
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: All those years we were covering this, one of the
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: things we were covering was the sheer brutality of these people,
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: you know they are they at that time were beheading people,
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: they were beheading children, and in the last few days
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: they've been beheading Syrian army if any that they've captured, and.
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: Even the Kurds.
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: I mean, we'll get onto why the Curds are involved
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: in the defense of a lepo, because that's an interesting aspect,
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: but even the Curds that were captured, I think today
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: in the northeastern axis of the outskirts of Aleppo.
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: The videos that were put out were of the women
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: and the male captives being horribly mistreated.
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: But yeah, any Syrian Army officers or soldiers that have
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: been captured have been either executed on the spot or
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: horribly beheaded, as one video showed that I really wish
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: I hadn't watched. And you know from Aleppo itself, the
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: command was for all of the at risk communities, so
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: the Shia Muslim, the Alawhite Muslim, the security forces, police Army,
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: any one connected to the government in a lepo was
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: told to evacuate the minute the attack started, and that's
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: why Aleppo was left largely undefended, to protect those elements,
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: but also to prevent clashes between those elements and the
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: armed groups with civilians caught in the middle.
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: So it was a.
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: Deliberate employ by the army once they realized there had
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: potentially been a breach in the Syrian army defense lines
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: to withdraw far enough to leave a kind of buffer
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: zone around Aleppo where now the terrorists are gathering and
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: they are being bombed by Syrian and Russian warplanes. So
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: to withdraw to a certain distance and then behind the
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: new lines of the Syrian Arab Im either Russian and
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: Syrian planes are bombing the supply lines, the ammunition warehouses
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: at the drone manufacturing sites, the headquarters, the command centers,
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: and so on. I think also a lot of commentators
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: have a kind of video game idea of war, and
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: to be fair, if you've not experienced war.
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: I'm not a military expert.
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: I don't pretend to be, but I have lived through
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: and experienced and witnessed a lot of military situations, So
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: I think I do have a kind of an idea
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: that it's incredibly complex, Mistakes can be made, and often
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: it'll be weeks, if not years, after that you actually
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: get to find out exactly, piece by piece what really happened.
• 22:12
  Speaker 3: And that's my point.
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: You know, all these people that go on and sort
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: of say, well Aleppo fell and start criticizing the Syrian
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: Army because they surrendered, they ran away.
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: They withdrew, that's it. The state has fallen.
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: That's literally the extent to which people were sensationalizing what
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: was going on. It was quite extraordinary forgetting that the
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: Syrian Army has defended Syria for fourteen years very successfully,
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: despite going through similar very grave times before let's say
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: twenty fifteen, when Russia actually came into help the Syrian
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: Army was fighting on more than one hundred fronts at
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: that point.
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: It's completely insane to me that people would be jumping
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: to these conclusions because, you know, the only people that
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: know what the strategy and the tactics of any military
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: operation are are the commanders that organizing it. They're the
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: only people that know. Everything else is sheer speculation. We
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: can analyze, we can, we can provide analysis, intelligent analysis
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: based on information that is discovered. But but to just
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: jump to a conclusion this happened in thirty seconds later,
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: it's because they ran away. This is this is the
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: right now. The other thing that I wanted to ask
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: about was I've seen on social media this photograph of
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: the Turkish flag being held being hung over a wall.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: Is is that real? Is that? Is that? Because? Yeah, sorry, sorry,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: there were a couple of things that struck me. But
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: first of all, was it taken in the last day
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: or two? Can anybody prove that? Second of all, who
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: was holding the flag? Was it a terrorist?
• 23:49
  Speaker 3: Well?
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: You remember Paris Shahabi, who you know, we spoke to
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: I think on a number of occasions.
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: Who was then during the early.
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: Years of the war and before liberation of Eastern Apo.
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: He was the head of the Chamber of Commerce in Aleppo,
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: and as one of the industrialists in a Lepo, he
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: didn't abandon the country.
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: He stayed in Aleppo throughout the war.
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: And was often on Channel four challenging their narratives, much
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: to their distaste. But just to let you know, I mean,
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: he basically escaped within seconds, really with his life, because
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: when the attack happened, he went to the western reaches
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: where his factories are, and he took a selfie and
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: he posted it on x and he told me afterwards,
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: like after he posted it, they entered his factory and
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: he managed to escape literally by a side door minutes
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: before they came to the room or to the roof,
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: because he was actually on the roof taking the photo.
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: And he then was part of those that was evacuated
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: from Aleppo because his house is basically in an area
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: that would have been very easy for them to reach.
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: So he evacuated because you know, he's high risk. I mean,
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: they would love to get hold of him, and God
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: knows what they would do to him if they did.
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: Well, I don't say it doesn't take much imagination, but.
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: Exactly so, thank god he got out, but he actually
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: was sending me these images of the Turkish flag being
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: hung over the walls of the Citadel, which, of course,
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: as you know, is the iconic castle in the center
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: of Aleppo, which is on a sort of i don't
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: know what you would call it, a huge mound. That
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: basically the army managed to hold the castle throughout the
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: occupation of the eastern sectors of Aleppo, despite coming under
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: multiple attacks in the terrorists tunneled under the castle and
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: came up in the grounds of the castle at one point,
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: but they repelled all attacks. So it's a very important symbol.
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: So the idea of someone hanging the Turkish flag over
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: the Citadel of Aleppo has huge importance.
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: For Syrians and of course for the Turks. For Erduwan
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: because right from the beginning of the regime change war
• 26:15
  Speaker 3: in twenty.
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: Twelve, it was Erdouwan who dispatched his Al Taweed brigades,
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: the Turkish back brigades into the eastern sectors and into
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: the industrial sectors to take over a Lepo.
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: This has been Erduwan's kind of neo Ottoman.
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: Dream since pre two thousand and eleven. So that's the
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: symbolism of that image. But whether you know, is it
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: one person hanging the flag over the battlements for the
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: photoshop I mean for the photo op.
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: Sorry, you know what I mean.
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: That's what I'm talking about.
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: That's what I'm talking about.
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: It it's like it's always only one person, like they
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: had he sent me another with a Turkish presenter walking
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: around with a microphone and saying, you know, now this
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: is Turkey, will bring electricity, will do this, We'll do that,
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: and so on.
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: But it's insane.
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: It's just one person and there's no civilians around. Because
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: the civilians are basically under curfew.
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: They can only come out in the morning.
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: The army has issued instructions for them, the civilians, to
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: stay away from big gatherings of Nusra Front because they're
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: going to be bombing them, and they have been bombing
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: them in the outskirts of Aleppo and a couple of
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: strikes sort of more centrally, but as far as I know,
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: there have been no civilian casualties from the reaction of
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: the Syrians and Russians in a Lepo. And that was
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: the point to some degree, when they saw that they
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: were potentially going to not be able to hold the
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: city itself. I'm assuming that's when they went to Plan
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: B or Plan C or whatever it was, and then
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: withdrew to the era that I was speaking about.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: Let's just remind yourselves a little bit about For some people,
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: as we said, this won't be a reminder, it will
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: be the first time you've heard this, but let's just
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: remind yourselves about the media operation that was running all
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: the way through the Syrian conflict, and hopefully that helps
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: people discern what's going on today, because I think on
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: Friday morning, I was heading into the office and surprise, surprise,
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: who did the BBC have on? They had a representative
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: of the White Helmets on, of course, right, because of
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: course they have been cheerleaders for that organization from the beginning.
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: And aside from that, we have mentioned many many times
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: on UK column that BBC Media Action, this charity was
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: working in Syria from two in two thousand and four,
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: so seven or eight years before the conflict again, and
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: they were actively looking for opposition within the country, within
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: the government and actively working with them for them to
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: become change agents or regime change agents. But as well
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: as that, they were working with media companies or media
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: journalists in Syria. And then what we saw was that
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: people that had been trained by the BBC were then
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: being used by Channel four, for example, as voices from
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: the ground, voices journalists, local journalists who and it was
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: never declared to us in the West that these people
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: had been trained. So we were getting a narrative presentatives
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: by the BBC and by Channel four and so on
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: in the UK based on stories being told by people
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: that they had trained in the first place. On top
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: of that, then they of course were amplifying the messages
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: of the White Helmets. And so we're going to see
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: that again. Undoubtedly.
• 30:05
  Speaker 3: Oh we're seeing it. It's already started.
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: But I mean it there I have to, you know,
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: hats off to us, really because now when the White
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: Helmets are producing their usual one kid in their arms
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: running towards the camera, they.
• 30:21
  Speaker 3: Haven't changed much. People are really attacking them on social media,
• 30:26
  Speaker 3: I mean really going after them.
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: And I would also say a lot of because I
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: saw god oh In Jones is back on the scene
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: attacking a sad and attacking you know, Syria generally, because
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: if you remember when I was in Aleppo in December
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: twenty sixteen and I was following the Army as it
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: was liberating various districts of East Aleppo. Ohing Jones was
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: trumpeting in The Guardian that the Syrian Arabami were raping
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: women and executing people in the streets. And I remember
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: literally going on our tea and saying, I have no
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: idea what he's talking about. As the Syrian Army soldiers
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: whose family lived in easti Leppo were carrying them out
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: of the buildings, hugging them, falling on their knees.
• 31:19
  Speaker 3: In front of their relatives and things like that. It
• 31:21
  Speaker 3: was appalling, you know. And so these people, I.
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: Mean, I don't know, they're just they're absolute, they're parasites really,
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: And you know, he's back on it again now. It's
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: like the whole lot of them have just been retriggered,
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: and it's like they're just back to business as.
• 31:40
  Speaker 3: Normal now with Syria.
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: But what is really interesting, until twenty sixteen, it was
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: it was very difficult to push back against those dominant narratives. Now,
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: what I'm seeing on social media, ninety five percent of
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: the comments are are you stupid?
• 31:57
  Speaker 3: Basically people are pushing.
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: Back, so that at least is a sign of the
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: degree of success we had Finally in demonstrating to people
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: what was going on, and you know, I'm sort of
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: very pleased to see that that is a degree of encouragement.
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: Really, who are the people that are pushing back in
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: that way and what makes them different to the people
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: that were amplifying the bogus narratives over the last few days.
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: I think you put your finger on it when you
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: said there are elements within social media that have been
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: established and allowed to flourish and grow to ridiculous levels,
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: who are being controlled, whether it's by you know, intelligence
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: agencies of their country, media.
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: Agencies, whatever it is. These people are.
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: There to literally miss in form or to mislead, and
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: they've been given because of course they're not shadow band,
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: they're not banned on YouTube. They're allowed to monetize to
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: the nth degree, even though apparently they are following our
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: narratives and they're being controversial.
• 33:17
  Speaker 3: But funnily enough, they never get censored.
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm hideously shadow bands on x Iva Bartler
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: is you are You've been kicked off YouTube? Have forgotten
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: how many times I'm constantly being struck off on YouTube
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: and having my two week bands and so on. So
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: there's no way on earth, we can grow our audiences
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: to the level that these people do, and they're there
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: for that reason.
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: And the other thing about them is they appear very quickly.
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: They get these big audiences almost apparently overnight. Does that happen.
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: Because they're they're they're given, they're managed. Basically, they're managed
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: and funded and then managed and funded to stay on message,
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: whatever that message may be. And they're allowed to you know, well, no,
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: they're not even allowed to that. They're engineered to be
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: controversial on certain subjects in order to achieve the credibility
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: that they need. Although sometimes I do wonder, you know,
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: how people jump on these kind of narcissist bandwagons that
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: are literally being that social media is being absolutely infiltrated with,
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: and how people don't see that this account is utterly managed, control, superficial.
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: And just literally directing narratives.
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: And this is one thing that I struggle to understand
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: how people don't see through this. The people who are
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: pushing back against the narrative. I would say, I've certainly
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: seen a number of UK columns members. But also I think,
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: you know, I guess you're right, it's an age thing.
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: The people who were not around when Syria first started,
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: and Iraq and Libya and san it's perhaps harder for
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: them to catch up. They're perhaps even more attracted to
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: the whole technocratic tyranny narratives because that's something that appeals
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: more to their generation, to their age group, and so on.
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: Potentially that I'm just thinking out loud, but I think,
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: you know, UK column played a huge part in pushing
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: back against it.
• 35:40
  Speaker 3: But I think now we're almost in a position.
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: Where we need to really remind people of it and
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: to start demonstrating that the same thing is happening again
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: and not to fall for it again. I think I'm
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: hoping the period of time for them to understand what's
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: going on is going to be much shorter than it
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: was before, because it took what was it nearly five
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: years before really the public consensus started to shift after
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: the liberation of a Lapper at the end of twenty sixteen.
• 36:08
  Speaker 3: That's for me, that was kind of the watershed moment.
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: I suppose. The thing can that sort of makes me
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: uncomfortable about this conversation as we've had it so far,
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: is that the criticisms that we have for high social
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: media is being used echo the criticisms that the mainstream
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: used to justify the creation of the Online Safety Act.
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: For example, I think we've got a I'm not sure
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: what we do about it, but we've got to urge
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: people to think about how they're using social media and
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: to think about I mean, is it an unfair rule
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: of thumb to say that the more sensationalist and clickbait
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: a post is, the more skepticism you should viewed with
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: a Would that be a good basic rule of thumb.
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: I think it's a good start. I'm trying to think.
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: I mean, that is what the majority of these accounts.
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: Tend to do.
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: You know, they know how to manage the algorithm, they
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: know how to manage the audience.
• 37:22
  Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean that is certainly one rule of thumb.
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: I think, for me the best bit of advice, and
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: I give it to myself because.
• 37:35
  Speaker 3: I'm not going to lie.
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: I was also, let's say, at least confused, and I
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: was very affected by the fear that had been instilled
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: in Syrians that I was speaking to. So even for me,
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: I was struggling in those first at least twenty four
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: hours and plus some of the military high level had
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: gone dark, and this was also very very disturbing for us,
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: because these are leaders and commanders who've really been in
• 38:07
  Speaker 2: charge of the war from day one, and they kind
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: of disappeared off the radar. Now we did here today
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: that there was potential that the terrorists when they came in,
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: using probably Ukrainian, Israeli or even Turkish technology, had managed
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: to jam all of the communication systems. So I was
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: because in the beginning I was told there was an
• 38:30
  Speaker 2: absolute breakdown in communication between the different brigades, and that
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: had also led to confusion.
• 38:37
  Speaker 3: But now it appears.
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: That there was a possibility that they had used these
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: communication jamming techniques used of course, we think by Hamas
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: on October the seventh, to jam the Israeli surveillance systems,
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: for example. That's what some reports have said that, So
• 38:55
  Speaker 2: that would kind of explain these stories of breakdown in communication.
• 39:01
  Speaker 3: The command didn't know what was going on.
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: The soldiers had no idea what was going on that
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: was being said in the first twenty four hours.
• 39:09
  Speaker 3: So that's what I'm saying. You know, you have to
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: wait to piece.
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: Together the bits of information that you can extract from
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: a situation.
• 39:19
  Speaker 3: And what I would.
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: Advise people is please don't go for those people who've
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: made a conclusion in the first five minutes, because that
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: is impossible. It's impossible, doesn't matter who they are, it's
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: not possible.
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: As I said, it takes time.
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: And even now, as you said, who will have the
• 39:38
  Speaker 2: full picture would be people in high level command, and
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: they're not going to be sharing that information with anyone.
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: We can only speculate, but at least let speculate with
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: some of.
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: The facts from on the ground, not.
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: From knee jerk reaction accounts that want to amplify one.
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: Aspect of the story or another.
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: Syria is falling or as sad, as gone as sad,
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: as they fled the country and gone to Russia.
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: I mean, that was like another one that was gathering
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: a lot of traction.
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: Right, It's like, just take a deep breath, you know,
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: you don't need to know right now what's happening other
• 40:18
  Speaker 2: than the basics. But there's no point in trying to
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: speculate on what might have gone wrong, what might have
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: gone right?
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: Was this a tract? Was this a strategy? You can't
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: say that.
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: Even I can't fully say exactly what happened.
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: I can't. It's impossible.
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: I mean, you know, We've now got people that evacuated
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: from Aleppo here in Damascus, so potentially I can go
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: and talk to them and at least get an idea
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: from them, But even from them, it's only going to
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: be one percentage of the overall perspective for us. Here.
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: We've got to recognize that there are people out there
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: who have the intention of causing stress and angst. They
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: are there specifically to wind people up and generated.
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: Moralized moralized you know, that's very important, demoralized people.
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: So we've got we've got to learn to take a
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: step back and just be a bit cautious about what
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: we're looking at.
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: And because you know, this is going to be a
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: very long war and we have absolutely no idea what
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: other factions are going to be involved. I mean that
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: there was a statement put out by a former military
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: intelligence guy at Mordecai Kidar today on one of the
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: Israeli media channels, and basically he was saying that he
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: had direct communication with the terrorist factions and they were
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: saying in return for normalization with Israel, the terrorist factions
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: would normalize with Israel officially. Of course, they already are.
• 41:51
  Speaker 2: They want Israel to supply armed.
• 41:54
  Speaker 3: Supply weapons, supply technology.
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: And we know that Ukraine has been training the terrorists
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: in the Northwest under the command of Abamahama Trolani for
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: some time, and it's Ukrainian drugs that are being used
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: against the Syrian Arabami at the moment.
• 42:12
  Speaker 3: And the interesting thing is some of the.
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: Armed groups I've noticed are wearing bright yellow ribbons around
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: their helmets and around their sleeve and I can only assume,
• 42:24
  Speaker 2: because I've never seen it before in any of the groups,
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: that this is related to Ukraine because they wouldn't use
• 42:33
  Speaker 2: yellow normally because it's a Hezbla.
• 42:35
  Speaker 3: It's the Hezeala flag is yellow.
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: We're seeing exactly who's playing in this at the moment, Turkey, Israel,
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: Israel immediately after the ceasefire, the pivot to Syria, and
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: I think I spoke about that on the.
• 42:49
  Speaker 3: Last UK column News that this is what was going
• 42:52
  Speaker 3: to happen.
• 42:53
  Speaker 2: And you know, why should Israel or Turkey expend their
• 42:58
  Speaker 2: expend their own forces when they can use their proxies.
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: You know, Israel can direct the terrorists to take vital
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: supply roots, to destroy research and development centers, to take
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: control of the borders with Lebanon, Israel doesn't have to
• 43:15
  Speaker 2: lift a finger. It just provides the weapon and potentially
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: the air support. What we might see is if there's
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: a major counter offensive which is now being prepared against
• 43:25
  Speaker 2: the terrorists that have come from Aleppo down the western
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: routes into the northern Hama area. And you will remember
• 43:35
  Speaker 2: when I've spoken often about the Syrian Christian towns of
• 43:39
  Speaker 2: Sclbia and Mahade that are now back under threat. But
• 43:43
  Speaker 2: the Syrian army now has sent massive reinforcements to the
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: Hama front. They're bombing those terrorists that have come from
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: a leper and are now basically being cattled in a
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: certain area.
• 43:56
  Speaker 3: They're bombing them. There's Russian heavy artillery.
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: And one thing, because one of the rumors that were
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: circulating was.
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: That there had been a degree of betrayal.
• 44:07
  Speaker 2: Or mismanagement, let's say, from the commander of the Russian forces,
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: who was Sege Kessel.
• 44:14
  Speaker 3: Now after a sad's visit.
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: To Moscow on Friday, he was dismissed and Alexander Chako
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: is coming back immediately as the commander, and he was
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: the commander during the last battles for Hamar and all
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: of this southern Idla region, and he's known to be
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: extremely effective. So this is another kind of pointer that
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: there may have been even a problem with the Russian
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: command for example. Right again, I can't this is speculation
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: but based on the sequence of events, but the fact
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: that Chaiko is back here also reassures Syria to a
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: large degree because he's well trusted by this armed forces.
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: I think the point we've got to make, just to
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: end is that this isn't and this is not a
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: separate thing from the rest of what's going on in
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: the world. Syria was never a separate thing, and this
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: I have to say, this is one of the things
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: that people didn't get in in the mid twenty tens,
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: you know, twenty fifteen, twenty sixteen, all around that time.
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: They didn't get that this was part of a much
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: broader geopolitical action. Yeah, and we can't separate it from Libya,
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: we can't separate it from Ukraine. Now, we can't separate it.
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: In fact, we can't even really separate it from Iraq,
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: and we certainly can't separate it from the fact that
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: Iran is on the target list for the West. And
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: we can't separate it for from the fact that Russia's
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: on the target list for the West, so so you know,
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: we've got to we've got to try to place what's
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: going on in Syria in this broader the wars with
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: an s is actually the war because this is a
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: global conflict now really because everybody's involved. I mean you've
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: just you earlier listed the number of countries that are
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: that are there as proxies against the SAD in Syria, right,
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: and we're seeing the same types of actors in fighting
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: for the Ukrainian side, and the weapons have come from
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: Libya and from other places as well, so you know
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: this is not a local conflict.
• 46:40
  Speaker 3: No, absolutely not.
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: And you know the exchange for Ukraine supplying drones and
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: technology and training to Jilani's terrorist forces was for Jiolani
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: to hand pig terrorists to go and fight in Ukraine
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: against Russia. So yes, you know, the wars are are
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: now blatantly sorry connected, And a few people have spoken
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: to me, including the Venezuela Ambasta, of the possibility that
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: Trump does want to and he was elected on ending
• 47:17
  Speaker 2: the war in Ukraine, right, so to some degree he's
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: going to have to follow through on that, and he's
• 47:22
  Speaker 2: been allowed to be elected on that. So we have
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: to assume that those that are actually controlling and pulling
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: the strings do for some reason want to pull out
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: of Ukraine or at least you know, move on to
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: another war theater, which is of course potentially China, I
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: think is the ultimate end game.
• 47:44
  Speaker 3: And so.
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: There is a possibility that Trump or Trump's spokespeople or
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: whatever or advisors are already speaking to put In in
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: order to come to some kind of deal on Ukraine,
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: in it change potentially for something in Syria.
• 48:03
  Speaker 3: And so, you know, are we going to.
• 48:06
  Speaker 2: See for example, we know that the Kurds that are
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: now working under the Syrian Arabami command are only going
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: to do that if they feel the US is going
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: to abandon them. That's the only time that the Curds
• 48:20
  Speaker 2: will come and negotiate something with Damascus. So is it
• 48:26
  Speaker 2: potential that Trump is saying, all right, okay, I'll withdraw
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: out of northeastern Syria because in his mind, we can
• 48:35
  Speaker 2: use the terrorists and Turkey and Israel can control the terrorists,
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: and we can use them to cut the supply of lines,
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: to destroy the defense manufacturing capability of.
• 48:46
  Speaker 3: Syria, to take control of the borders.
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: We don't actually need to do this, and we don't
• 48:52
  Speaker 2: really need the oil. We can take our troops out
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: of there, because then the job is done for Israel.
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: We don't need to do anymore, right, and then we'll
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: keep the Altanif base, which is the biggest base on
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: the border with Jordan and Iraq, in case, you know,
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: where needed in the future, and we can keep incubating
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: terrorists there and to keep the pressure on a sad.
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: There is potential for Israel to invade in the south.
• 49:18
  Speaker 3: We've been talking about that for some time, and so
• 49:22
  Speaker 3: you know, then that's kind.
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: Of job done in Syria, I think from their perspective,
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: so they'll leave them with their oil because who cares. Basically,
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: they don't need to further weaken the state. I'm not
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: saying this is going to happen, but I'm just saying
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: maybe that's how he's thinking, and then.
• 49:38
  Speaker 3: That frees him.
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: He still has all his bases in Iraq, that frees
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: him to pivot towards Iran or China. I mean, this
• 49:45
  Speaker 2: is again, as I said, this is just me thinking
• 49:48
  Speaker 2: out loud, and some people have said to me they
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: think there are conversations going on already between Putain and Trump.
• 49:55
  Speaker 2: But you know the fact that Russia now is definitely
• 49:59
  Speaker 2: standing by Syria. It's not going to I don't think
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: it would allow that level of terrorist infiltration. And I
• 50:07
  Speaker 2: think Russia sees ending the terrorist's presence, as does President A.
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: Sad inside Syria. So you know, we've got, as you said,
• 50:20
  Speaker 3: a huge number of very.
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: Powerful players involved in all the region, not only in Syria,
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: in Palestine, in Lebanon definitely. I mean, why did the
• 50:32
  Speaker 2: ceasefire happen because the US was engineering internal strife in
• 50:37
  Speaker 2: Lobanon itself and putting pressure on Hesbala because Israel started
• 50:41
  Speaker 2: bombing other sectors of Beirute that were not related to Hesbala.
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: So I don't think they had any choice but to
• 50:48
  Speaker 2: accept the seasefly.
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: Putin has to support the Syrian government against the terrorists
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: because Putin has very much drawn a line in the
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: sand in Ukraine with respect to extremist elements there with
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: the Nazis as he called them and so on. He
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: can't take that position in Ukraine and then allow extremist
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: activity in Syria and maintain any kind of credibility exactly.
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: But I do think you'll see under Trump, I do
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: think you'll see the foot off the pedal in Ukraine
• 51:22
  Speaker 2: and a pivot east.
• 51:26
  Speaker 3: I do kind of think that's what's coming.
• 51:29
  Speaker 2: And I think that's why you're also seeing now the
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: color Revolution in Georgia gathering momentum, because again that's one
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: I think it's a bargaining chip, because look, you know,
• 51:41
  Speaker 2: we'll create problems in Georgia again if you don't come
• 51:45
  Speaker 2: to the table about Ukraine and so on.
• 51:47
  Speaker 3: See what I mean. So everything is connected, everything that's going.
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: On at the moment, and we all need to keep
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: that in mind and be a bit more discerning with
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: our social media activity.
• 52:00
  Speaker 2: Because I mean, really genuinely, it has such a detrimental
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: psychological warfare effect on the on the countries and the
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: people of the countries that are in the eye of
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: the storm. It really does, and we need to remember.
• 52:16
  Speaker 3: That, you know, when when when we're attracted to sensationalism.
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: And on ourselves, Vanessa, people are people are very fractious
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: at the moment because people are under a lot of
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: stress everywhere, and so were we are killing ourselves in
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: the process as well. Absolutely, anyway, we will leave that
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: there for today. Thank you very much for joining me.
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: We will follow up on this.
• 52:42
  Speaker 3: Thanks Mike,