Syria’s War Has Cost $327 Billion

 Aleppo, June, 2016. (AFP / Karam Al-masri)
Aleppo, June, 2016. (AFP / Karam Al-masri)
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Syria’s War Has Cost $327 Billion

 Aleppo, June, 2016. (AFP / Karam Al-masri)
Aleppo, June, 2016. (AFP / Karam Al-masri)

Moscow is in a hurry to discuss the file of Syria’s reconstruction as western and regional powers link their involvement in the reconstruction process to “finding a genius political solution” to the war-torn country.

According to the National Agenda for the Future of Syria (NAFS) initiated by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (UN-ESCWA) and which is run by Syrian and international experts, the cost of the Syrian war has reached $327.5 billion including $227 billion lost on unemployment and $100 billion on ruin.

According to NAFS, the level of destruction reached 30 percent in the residential sector, while it was near 18 percent in the industrial sector, 9 percent in the electricity and water sectors and 7 percent in the agricultural sector.

Those numbers do not involve the level of destruction in the two cities of Deir Ezzor and Raqqa.

Meanwhile, Russian Defense Minister sent a letter to UN special envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura to encourage him on launching “the humanitarian reconstruction” in Syria.

The file of rebuilding Syria was also brought up by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov during his visit to Oman.

Observers expect that the issue of Syria’s reconstruction will be tackled during the meetings of the UN General Assembly in New York.

On the other hand, several western countries were still linking their contribution in the reconstruction process to achieving “a genius political solution” based on UNSC Resolution 2254.

Gareth Bayley, Britain's special representative for Syria wrote on his twitter account on Wednesday that the “EU reconstruction aid to Syria will be achieved only when a genuine, comprehensive, and inclusive transition is firmly under way, and not before.”

For its part, Iran seeks to preserve its share in the reconstruction of Syria after signing with Damascus an agreement to repair parts of the country's power grid.

According to SANA, the two countries signed a memorandum of understanding on Tuesday during a visit by the regime’s electricity minister to Tehran, including building a power plant in the coastal province of Latakia with a capacity of 540 megawatts.



Israeli Likud Party Ministers Urge Netanyahu to Annex West Bank

Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
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Israeli Likud Party Ministers Urge Netanyahu to Annex West Bank

Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)

Cabinet ministers in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party called on Wednesday for Israel to annex the Israeli-occupied West Bank before the Knesset recesses at the end of the month.

They issued a petition ahead of Netanyahu's meeting next week with US President Donald Trump, where discussions are expected to center on a potential 60-day Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal with Hamas.

The petition was signed by 15 cabinet ministers and Amir Ohana, speaker of the Knesset, Israel's parliament.

There was no immediate response from the prime minister's office. Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, long a confidant of Netanyahu, did not sign the petition. He has been in Washington since Monday for talks on Iran and Gaza.

"We ministers and members of Knesset call for applying Israeli sovereignty and law immediately on Judea and Samaria," they wrote, using the biblical names for the West Bank captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.

Their petition cited Israel's recent achievements against both Iran and Iran's allies and the opportunity afforded by the strategic partnership with the US and support of Trump.

It said the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel demonstrated that the concept of Jewish settlement blocs alongside the establishment of a Palestinian state poses an existential threat to Israel.

"The task must be completed, the existential threat removed from within, and another massacre in the heart of the country must be prevented," the petition stated.

Most countries regard Jewish settlements in the West Bank, many of which cut off Palestinian communities from one another, as a violation of international law.

With each advance of Israeli settlements and roads, the West Bank becomes more fractured, further undermining prospects for a contiguous land on which Palestinians could build a sovereign state long envisaged in Middle East peacemaking.

Israel's pro-settler politicians have been emboldened by the return to the White House of Trump, who has proposed Palestinians leave Gaza, a suggestion widely condemned across the Middle East and beyond.