Reuters on Wednesday conveyed statements from the UK-based Observatory for Human Rights assessing – per the outlet – that ‘more Syrians have been killed in the three weeks since peace talks began than at any other time in the civil war,’ amid an ongoing offensive that has seen Hezbollah-backed Syrian troops consolidating control...

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The Associated Press reported yesterday that renewed peace talks between Syria’s Bashar al-Assad regime and opposition groups stumbled almost as soon as they began on Monday, with each side blaming the other for a spate of violence that has seen hundreds killed in just the last few days. Both Damascus and extremist...

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Statements recently made a top Hezbollah figure and published Friday by Hezbollah’s Al-Manar media outlet risk accelerating a wave of sectarian strife that, having been largely imported from the nearly three-year conflict in neighboring Syria, has increasingly generated open fighting between various factions and a wave of car bombs targeting Hezbollah in retaliation for...

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Secretary of State John Kerry this week condemned the use of so-called barrel bombs by Syria’s Bashar al-Assad regime, blasting Damascus for the repeated use of the shrapnel packed IEDs against Syrian civilians. The attacks, in which the bombs are dropped out of helicopters, have in recent days generated a wave...

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By the end of 2013 Israeli hospitals had treated at least 200 Syrians wounded in that country’s war, garnering international attention – including from analysts at U.S. think tanks – highlighting Israel’s nearly singular role in directly alleviating Syrian suffering: Mira Eli, the nurse in charge of the maternity delivery...

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Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday told a group of 15 U.S. congressmen that the Obama administration’s policy toward Syria had failed – and that Washington must rush to arm relatively moderate rebel elements as to offset both Al Qaeda-linked radicals and the Iran-backed Bashar al-Assad regime – according to Sens....

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Internationally sponsored talks between Syria’s Bashar al-Assad regime and opposition elements seeking its overthrow ended Friday without any progress and with “the key positions… still very wide apart,” according to statements made by United Nations-Arab League Special Representative Lakhdar Brahimi to a Geneva press conference. The New York Times noted that Secretary...

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The Obama administration on Thursday explicitly accused the Bashar al-Assad regime of deliberately stalling on its obligations to turn over its chemical weapons arsenal, putting the White House at risk of both domestic political fallout. Robert P. Mikulak, the U.S. ambassador to the international organization that is overseeing the collection and destruction of...

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Geneva II peace talks continue between the Bashar al-Assad regime, which has made Assad’s continued rule a red line, and opposition elements, who have all but conditioned the talks’ success on his removal. There are also global powers involved who are to greater and lesser extents aligned with one of...

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Syria retains the vast majority of its chemical arsenal, can likely weaponize biological agents, and has restored the pace of its missile production to pre-war levels, according to a stream of analysis and reporting published on Tuesday and Wednesday. A written statement by James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence, disclosed that U.S. intelligence...

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