COMMENTARY / OPINION
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December 21, 2024
The Sunnis can smell blood Nadav Shragai
Middle East scholar Mordechai Kedar lays out the opportunities developing in Syria and the potential Sunni wave that may topple Iran—with Israeli help.
Dec 21, 2024, 8:13 PM (GMT+2) Israel National News – ( JNS) A few months ago, some of the rebel leaders in Syria contacted Mordechai Kedar, a renowned Israeli scholar of the Middle East, specializing in Arab culture (who earlier in his career, wrote a weekly op-ed for Arutz Sheva, ed.). They proposed that he come to the Idlib region in northwestern Syria, where they had been spearheading their activity and preparations for the final push towards the great revolution.
“Come to Turkey, and we’ll pick you up from there,” they suggested.
Kedar was keen to meet them. His contacts sought coordination and ties with Israel. They saw in Kedar, a feisty academic with whom they were familiar from his frequent appearances on the Qatari TV channel Al Jazeera, a potential go-between between themselves and the Israeli establishment.
However, the way to the rebel stronghold passed through Turkey, with a connecting flight from Istanbul. Kedar, who has often lambasted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in his articles, was told that it might be wiser for him to avoid getting involved in such an adventure. So he eventually decided to give up on the idea.
A few days before the rebels defeated the regime of Bashar al-Assad and the masses toppled his statues across Damascus and Homs, once again Kedar received messages from the rebel organizations. The first one came from Muhammad A, one of the members of the National Coordination Committee for Democratic Change, who wrote to him as follows: “We shall build a relationship of friendship, love, and brotherhood with our brothers and sisters in Israel and shall be a role model for all the regional states.”
The second message was from Fahad al-Masri, a member of the Syrian National Salvation Front and one of the rebel leaders, currently in France. Al-Masri wrote that the Israeli flag would soon be flying over the Iranian embassy in Damascus and Beirut.
Kedar passed on these overtures to the political and security establishment in Israel. Only a few days later, he gazed in wonder at the lightning-fast fall of the Assad regime and the ensuing flight of its soldiers.
Did Israel play a part in the rebels’ victory? Kedar said he doesn’t know, but noted that “the routing of Hezbollah, the rebels’ biggest enemy, considerably helped them.”
‘The Sunnis can smell blood’
Mordechai Kedar is 72 years old, a reserve lieutenant colonel who served for 25 years in the Israel Defense Forces’ now famous military intelligence Unit 8200. He is now closely monitoring the developments in Syria.
Q: More than a decade ago, the current leader of the rebels, Abu Mohammed al-Julani, in conjunction with others, founded a branch of ISIL in Syria, as well as a Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda, Jabhat al-Nusra. In 2013, the United States offered a bounty of $10 million for him. This does not exactly dovetail with the spirit of moderation and reconciliation in the messages that you’ve been receiving. (Ed. Note: The US has since removed the bounty.)
A: You’re absolutely right, and so we really need to wait and judge the developments based on the reality of the situation and their actions. At least from al-Julani’s initial announcements, he appears to be trying to portray an image of a new and legitimate Syrian leader. He has asked his men not to fire in the air so as not to injure anybody. He has also asked them to refrain from burning down government ministries as these offices are “the property of the Syrian people.” He has left Assad’s government intact, cognizant of the fact that the state and its civil institutions—sewage, electricity, the health system and hospitals—need to continue to function.
So far, he has behaved in a relatively rational manner. On the other hand, there have already been incidents of rebels abducting women, murdering and abusing supporters of the fallen regime; and they even destroyed a church. We must be ready for any eventuality.
Q: You and other experts have described the recent events in Syria as another heavy blow to Iran, which has now lost an additional hub of power and influence. What should Israel do now?
A: I believe that this event will see Iran withdrawing further into itself. Iran has abandoned its proxies—Hamas, Hezbollah and Assad. The glue that has held the Shi’ite alliance together is now disintegrating, and the Sunnis can smell blood. The Sunnis are about to open a can of worms. I sense that Iraq, too, might disavow the Iranian presence there in the not-too-distant future, and we could even witness the fall of the Houthis in Yemen. The events in Syria have provided a real boost to the Sunnis everywhere, encouraging them to get organized against the Iranian presence. This ripple effect might even have an impact inside Iran too, mainly due to the active social media there and the ensuing potential for division.
Q: What is our place in the picture that you are portraying?
A: Together with others, we need to encourage the minorities in Iran to rise up against the Persian hegemony, both the religious leadership under the mullahs and also the secular leadership dating back to the period of the Shah of Iran [Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi].
In practice, there is no Iranian people. There are Persians and other large groups, such as Baluchis, Arabs, Kurds, Azeris and Turkmen, alongside an additional 40 or so smaller groups. For years, there have been a large number of separatist groups trying to dismantle the Iranian state. We should attempt to encourage a similar process as that which deconstructed Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union, which were divided on an ethnic basis.
I believe that in Iran today, at least 80 million out of the 90 million people there are over the moon about what has been happening in Syria, as this is a blow to the Iranian government and its plans to spread out over the entire Middle East.
Q: Is there also room for Israeli intervention in the new Syria, which is taking shape before our very eyes?
A: The answer is yes, but everything should be done with the utmost caution. The gigantic proportions of events there are opening up opportunities for us. We already have excellent ties with the Druze in southern Syria, and they are not hiding this fact. The Kurds, too, with whom we had links in the past, are also a group with good potential.
Winners and losers
Among those set to profit from the new order in Syria and across the Middle East, which is currently being re-molded in front of our very eyes, Kedar lists the citizens of Syria, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, the government of Yemen, Erdoğan and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Among the losers—Iran, former U.S. President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris—”I intentionally listed Obama first as he invested heavily in the Iranians and Hezbollah”—Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Houthis in Yemen, the Shi’ite militias in Iraq and Russia.
Kedar wrote his PhD dissertation (which he then turned into a book, titled “Assad in Search of Legitimacy”) on Syria under Hafiz al-Assad (Bashar’s father).
“The question arose among academic scholars as to just how popular Assad was among the masses,” Kedar explained. “All that both Assad the father and his son ever did was an attempt to generate legitimacy for themselves, when it is now clear to all and sundry that all their actions were as far from legitimacy as you can get. … Many people regarded Assad as a man who succeeded in having stabilized his country. That is how he managed to buy legitimacy for himself. I bitterly disagreed with them,” he said.
Kedar mapped out the sequence of events that have taken place in the “New Middle East” that is currently taking shape, and what perhaps is yet to come.
“It began with Hamas, then progressed to Lebanon, Hezbollah, Syria, and could apparently continue to Iraq and then further inland into Iran itself, to whose eventual dissolution we too here in Israel can certainly contribute,” he said.
Nadav Shragai is a veteran Israeli journalist.
Chanukah Guide for the Perplexed, 2024 Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger
December 21, 2024
1. A bust of Judah the Maccabee is displayed at West Point Military Academy, along with those of Joshua, David, Alexander the Great, Hector, Julius Caesar, King Arthur, Charlemagne and Godfrey of Bouillon – “the Nine Worthies.” In 1777, Chanukah candles were lit during the Valley Forge encampment, the turning point of the Revolutionary War, which solidified the victory of George Washington’s Continental Army over the British monarchy. Benjamin Rush, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and a player in the ratification of the US Constitution, paving the road to the Boston Tea Party, 1773: “What shining examples of patriotism do we behold in Joshua, Samuel, the Maccabees and the illustrious princes and prophets among the Jews…” On December 6, 2013, Ambassador Hank Cooper, a former Director of the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization, wrote: “We need modern day Maccabees to preserve the heritage of liberty for our posterity….”
2. NBC news, December 13, 2022: “An ancient treasure trove of silver coins dating back 2,200 years, found in a desert cave in Israel, could add crucial new evidence to support a story of Jewish rebellion…. The 15 silver coins were hidden [during] the Maccabean revolt from 167-160 B.C., when Jewish warriors rebelled against the Seleucid [Syrian] Empire….”
3.Chanukah (evening of December 25, 2024–January 2, 2025) is the only Jewish holiday that commemorates an ancient national liberation struggle in the Land of Israel, unlike the national liberation holidays, Passover, Sukkot/Tabernacles and Shavu’ot/Pentecost, which commemorate the liberation from slavery in Egypt to independence in the land of Israel, and unlike Purim, which commemorates liberation from a Persian attempt to annihilate the Jewish people.
4. According to Israel’s Founding Father, David Ben Gurion: Chanukah commemorates “the struggle of the Maccabees, which was one of the most dramatic clashes of civilizations in human history, not merely a political-military struggle against foreign oppression…. Unlike many peoples, the meager Jewish people did not assimilate. The Jewish people prevailed, won, sustained and enhanced their independence and unique civilization…. It was the spirit of the people, rather than the failed spirit of the establishment, which enabled the Hasmoneans to overcome one of the most magnificent spiritual, political and military challenges in Jewish history….” (Uniqueness and Destiny, pp 20-22, David Ben Gurion, IDF Publishing, 1953).
5. Chanukah and the Land of Israel. When ordered by Emperor Antiochus IV Epiphanes of the Seleucid region to end the Jewish “occupation” of Jerusalem, Jaffa, Gaza, Gezer and Akron, Shimon the Maccabee responded: “We have not occupied a foreign land…. We have liberated the land of our forefathers from foreign occupation (Book of Maccabees A: 15:33).”
Chanukah highlights the centrality of the Land of Israel in the formation of Judaism and the Jewish people. The mountain ridges of Judea and Southern Samaria (the West Bank) – the cradle of Jewish history, religion, culture and language – were the platform for the Maccabean military battles: Mitzpah (the burial site of the Prophet Samuel, overlooking Jerusalem), Beit El (the site of the Ark of the Covenant and Judah the Maccabee’s initial headquarters), Beit Horon (Judah’s victory over Seron), Hadashah (Judah’s victory over Nicanor), Beit Zur (Judah’s victory over Lysias), Ma’aleh Levona (Judah’s victory over Apolonius), Adora’yim (a Maccabean fortress), Eleazar (named after Mattityahu’s youngest Maccabee son), Beit Zachariya (Judah’s first defeat), Ba’al Hatzor (where Judah was defeated and killed), Te’qoah, Mikhmash and Gophnah (bases of Shimon and Yonatan), the Judean Desert, etc.
6. Chanukah’s historical context is narrated in the four Books of the Maccabees, The Scroll of Antiochus and The Wars of the Jews.
In 323 BCE, following the death of Alexander the Great (Alexander III) who held Judaism in high esteem, the Greek Empire was split into three independent and rival mini-empires: Greece, Seleucid/Syria and Ptolemaic/Egypt.
In 175 BCE, the Seleucid/Syrian Emperor Antiochus (IV) Epiphanes claimed the Land of Israel. He suspected that the Jews were allies of his Ptolemaic/Egyptian enemy. The Seleucid emperor was known for eccentric behavior, hence his name, Epiphanes, which means “divine manifestation.” He aimed to exterminate Judaism and convert Jews to Hellenism. In 169 BCE, he devastated Jerusalem, attempting to decimate the Jewish population, and outlaw the practice of Judaism.
In 166/7 BCE, a Jewish rebellion was led by the non-establishment Hasmonean (Maccabee) family from the rural town of Modi’in, half-way between Jerusalem and the Mediterranean. The rebellion was headed by Mattityahu, the priest, and his five sons, Yochanan, Judah, Shimon, Yonatan and Eleazar, who fought the Seleucid occupier and restored Jewish independence. The Hasmonean dynasty was replete with external and internal wars and lasted until 37 BCE, when Herod the Great (a proxy of Rome) defeated Antigonus II Mattathias.
The reputation of Jews as superb warriors was reaffirmed by the success of the Maccabees on the battlefield. In fact, they were frequently hired as mercenaries by Egypt, Syria, Carthage, Rome and other global and regional powers.
7.Chanukah celebrates the Maccabean-led national liberation by conducting in-house family education and lighting candles – in a 9-branch-candelabrum – for 8 days in commemoration of the re-inauguration of Jerusalem’s Jewish Temple and its Menorah (candelabrum).
The Hebrew words Chanukah (חנוכה), inauguration (חנוכ) and education ((חנוך possess an identical root.
8. As was prophesized by the Prophet Hagai in 520 BCE, the re-inauguration of the Temple took place on the 25th day of the Jewish month of Kislev, which is the month of miracles, such as the post-flood appearance of Noah’s rainbow, the completion of the construction of the Holy Ark by Moses, the laying of the foundations of the Second Temple by Nehemiah, etc.
The 25th Hebrew word in Genesis is “light,” and the 25th stop during the Exodus was Hashmona (the same Hebrew spelling as Hasmonean-Maccabees).
9. Chanukah highlights the defeat of darkness, disbelief, forgetfulness and pessimism, and the victory of light, faith, commemoration, defiance of odds, can-do mentality and optimism. The first day of Chanukah is celebrated when daylight hours are equal to darkness hours – and when moonlight is hardly noticed – ushering in brighter days.
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December 20, 2024 The Mark Levin Show
On Friday’s Mark Levin Show, the latest spending bill has passed in the House. This is good news, but we need to do something about the massive budget.
[Ed.:
