Syrian Regime Cancels Opposition Conference in Damascus

Traffic in Damascus (AFP)
Traffic in Damascus (AFP)
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Syrian Regime Cancels Opposition Conference in Damascus

Traffic in Damascus (AFP)
Traffic in Damascus (AFP)

The Syrian regime canceled the founding conference of the opposition National Democratic Front after security services stormed into the venue, banning anyone from entering.

Preparatory committee sources said that security agents contacted the Secretary-General of the Arab Democratic Socialist Union Party, Ahmed al-Asrawi, on Friday and informed him that the founding conference is canceled, unless they obtained the necessary green light from the competent authorities, after submitting a request to the Minister of Interior.

The General Coordinator of the National Coordination Committee, Hassan Abdulazim, announced the conference was postponed because the authorities also sent the state security agents and police forces to the site and banned the media from covering the developments.

The media office of the conference’s preparatory committee announced that the Syrian regime canceled the founding conference, which was set to be held on Saturday morning in Damascus.

In its statement, the committee asserted it will continue to hold meetings to take the appropriate decision regarding the formation of the National Democratic Front.

The committee also considered the regime’s ban of its peaceful civil action a "repressive criminal act" in violation of human rights and international law.

It held the regime, the states supporting it, and influential parties responsible for the security and safety of the comrades and colleagues, calling for “diplomatic, international, and UN intervention” to ensure their security.

The statement explained that security agents contacted the participants on Friday night, and warned them that the security authorities will stop the conference from taking place under the pretext that it does not have a license from the so-called “party affairs committee.”

The preparatory committee also called on all Syrians to boycott the presidential elections in June, describing them as illegal.

Earlier, Abdulazim called for boycotting the presidential election, scheduled for the summer, saying it was “illegal” and a “farce.”

Asharq Al-Awsat published a draft statement of the conference, which called for the “restructuring of the security agencies and building of a national army” and the “withdrawal of all non-Syrian armies and militias”.

The document presented a set of proposals including a radical regime change and removal of all foreign forces and militias from Syria.

It also called for a political solution based on the international legitimacy - Geneva 1 and UN Resolution 2254 - to form a transitional governing body with full executive powers that allows for the establishment of a new constitution and holds fair elections under UN supervision, which results in a civil state.

The National Coordination body that called for the conference, includes the National Democratic Rally, most notably the Democratic Arab Socialist Union.

It had announced, through foreign media, its intention to hold a founding conference, the first of its kind in Damascus in nine years, to launch a new political alliance called the National Democratic Front.



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.