- Despite American warnings, in the last few days Damascus
has expedited the passage of volunteers wishing to join the Iraqis in their
war against the Americans. Thousands of volunteers, most of them Syrians,
are thronging to the Mosul and Kirkuk regions in north Iraq.
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- It started with a few dozen volunteers, mostly from the
Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon. Damascus allowed them to cross the
border to Iraq at the official border passes in its control. This went
on until one of the volunteers' buses was hit in Iraq by a missile from
an American plane, killing five passengers.
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- A few days ago American Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
accused Damascus of transferring weapons to Iraq, but did not mention the
volunteers. Yesterday the United States warned Syria and Iran again not
to cooperate with terrorism and with Saddam Hussein's regime.
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- U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said at the AIPAC
convention on Sunday that Syria will have to make a critical choice: "Syria
can continue direct support for terrorist groups and the dying regime of
Saddam Hussein, or it can embark on a different and more hopeful course.
Either way, Syria bears the responsibility for its choices, and for the
consequences."
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- The administration made it clear yesterday that since
that equipment delivery from Syria to Iraq - which according to Rumsfeld
consisted mainly of night-vision goggles - no further deliveries had been
observed.
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- The dozens of volunteers who first passed from Syria
to Iraq came mostly from Lebanon and from the Palestinian refugee camps
in it. Damascus let them cross into Iraq through the official border passes,
and became the first state bordering with Iraq to permit the passage of
volunteers. One of the buses driving the volunteers in Iraq was hit by
an American missile and five of its passengers were killed.
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- Recently, the Syrians invited journalists to two border
passes on the Iraqi border, claiming they are closed. Now it appears this
was a deception. The volunteers are brought to the border far away from
the official crossings and allowed to pass over on foot. Nearby, on the
Iraqi side of the border, trucks await them.
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- The trucks do not go east toward Baghdad but northeast,
to the Mosul and Kirkuk regions, on routes still free of American military
activity. It is not known who receives these people when they arrive, where
they stay or how they are organized.
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- At first, Palestinians and Lebanese were dominant among
the volunteers, but as their numbers increased, the number of Syrians among
them grew. Now the stream of volunteers is estimated at thousands. Iraqi
Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz said in an interview two days ago that
some 4,000 volunteers had arrived in Iraq from various Arab states. He
did not say where they came from, but it is known that the Iranians, Jordanians
and Turks do not permit the passage of volunteers to Iraq.
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- In the past, America has taken a lenient view of the
Syrian aid to Iraq. A few months ago, Haaretz first reported of the Syrian
military purchases for Iraq in various East European states. The equipment
and weapons reached Syria's Atkia harbor and were transferred in convoys
to Iraq. To this day, the exact quantities of arms, tank engines and planes
transferred to Iraq by the Syrians are not known.
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- Washington kept its criticism down because the CIA estimated
it was better to receive intelligence from Syria on Al-Qaida activities.
Apparently this information helped the Americans in the past to crack Al-Qaida
cells in Germany and Spain. After the war started, the Pentagon became
more critical toward Damascus and the displeasure was reflected in Rumsfeld's
accusations against Syria. However, it is not clear whether the Americans
will try to intercept the movement of volunteers to Iraq.
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