الكاتب: kafej

On Saturday, Bashar al-Assad, the head of the Syrian regime, gave a speech at the Arab-Islamic summit in Saudi Arabia. His call for an end to the war on Gaza sparked anger among activists in northwest Syria, who saw the denunciation of Israel as hypocritical.

Al-Assad criticised the “vicious circle” of allowing Israel to commit massacres then being content with providing humanitarian aid instead of protection for the Palestinian people.

“A right cannot be restored when the criminal has become a judge and the thief has become a referee,” he said, referring to the role of Western countries in the Israeli bombing campaign of Gaza.

Since the start of the Israel-Hamas conflict on October 7, Syrian activists have used the phrase “two sides of the same coin” to describe both the Syrian regime and Israel’s crimes against the Syrian and Palestinian peoples. They consider al-Assad’s accusations of crimes and impunity to also describe what he has done in Syria over the past 12 years.

Bombing under the radar

Munira Baloch, a 34-year-old journalist, said she believes that Assad was able to remain at the head of his regime despite his crimes because he obtained the “green light” to do what he wanted against the Syrian people.

She told Al Jazeera that the regime’s pattern of using flimsy pretexts to justify bombing and crimes, which the world condones, continues to this day.

During October, Gaza wasn’t the only area being bombed. Rather, Idlib witnessed the most intense military escalation in three years. Hundreds of sites, including civilian ones, were targeted by aerial and artillery attacks, leaving dozens of people killed and wounded, and causing a new wave of displacement.

“The policy is the same in both countries of using intense bombing to displace opponents,” said Baloch. She lived in Rankous in the Damascus countryside before being forced into repeated displacement then settling in Idlib six years ago. “We [Gaza and northwestern Syria] are both densely populated areas under siege and continuous bombing.”

Baloch still remembers the months she endured a siege by regime forces while living with six families in a two-room house with no electricity, water, or heating: “We ran out of bread crumbs until we accepted the displacement agreement to Idlib,” she said.

Political hypocrisy

During the past few weeks, there have been many scenes of Palestinians being displaced, on foot, from northern Gaza to the south.

That brought back painful memories for Ali al-Dalati, who was displaced with his family, in search of safety, about six years ago. In January 2017, the 26-year-old activist and his family walked eight kilometres (five miles) from the village of Bassemah – which was being bombed by regime forces with chemical weapons, incendiary phosphorus, and napalm – to the village of Deir Kanon in the Damascus countryside.

“I can’t forget,” he told Al Jazeera, about the scene of people gathering together to reach the safe zone, which “seemed like the Day of Judgment”.

During their displacement, those alongside him were targeted by snipers, similar to the Palestinians being targeted by Israel. Al-Dalati recalled that whoever was walking towards the safe zone could not approach any of the dead on the road. “My neighbour who came with us was killed, and then her son was killed because he tried to drag her body to bury it,” he said.

Al-Dalati, who arrived in Idlib on January 31, 2017, viewed the invitations of al-Assad, who he described as a “war criminal,” and Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, whose forces occupy four Arab countries (Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Yemen), to the summit as hypocritical and demonstrating an absence of actual intention to provide assistance to Palestinians.

Al-Dalati said he believes the current “popularity” of the Palestinian cause and the rising number of deaths is what fuels international interest, adding that condemning one crime and not the other is not acceptable.

Same killers

Talal al-Loush, a 61-year-old activist who was displaced from Homs to Idlib nine years ago, told Al Jazeera that he could not listen to Bashar al-Assad’s entire speech because he felt “nauseous”. He was astonished that the man responsible for the killing and arresting of hundreds of thousands and the displacement of millions would speak on behalf of Gaza.

“The killers are the same, but the one that pulls the trigger is different,” al-Loush said, recalling the crimes he witnessed in Homs between 2012 and 2013, when regime forces and allied Iranian and Shiite militias committed horrific massacres and forced civilians into displacement, similar to Israel’s actions in Gaza.

Al-Loush believes that Israel’s military superiority has enabled it to commit crimes within a shorter period than what was required by the Syrian regime. “The videos that show the extent of destruction and killing in Gaza are the same scenes we saw in Homs 10 years ago,” he said.

Torture in the name of Palestine

The crimes of the Syrian regime affected Palestinians and Syrians alike, according to Muhammad Taha, a 25-year-old Palestinian who lived through the two-year siege in the Yarmouk Camp neighbourhood, south of Damascus. There, dozens died of hunger.

Taha, who was born in Damascus and now lives in Idlib after being displaced, believes that the Syrian regime and the leaders of the countries surrounding Palestine are mere shields for Israel. He said he was not surprised by the similarities of the crimes committed against civilians by the Syrian regime and Israel’s attacks on Gaza, such as the bombing of civilians, hospitals, mosques, churches, civil defence teams, and ambulances.

Standing with the Palestinians is a false claim by the Syrian regime, Taha said. He points to the “Palestine Branch”, the notorious military intelligence division in Damascus known for its brutal torture of detainees, as evidence. “No Palestinian family in Syria was spared” having at least one of its members being detained at the facility, he said.

The military says the cause is under investigation, but there are no indications of any hostile activity involved.

Five American service members have been killed in a military plane crash over the eastern Mediterranean Sea during a training exercise.

The US European Command (EUCOM) on Sunday said all five crew members were killed when the aircraft went down on Friday evening “during a routine air refuelling mission as part of military training.”

The military first announced the crash on Saturday and said the cause is under investigation, but there were no indications of any hostile activity involved. It said on Sunday that “search and rescue efforts began immediately, including nearby US military aircraft and ships”.

EUCOM said that out of respect for the families of the service members and in line with US Department of Defense policy, the identities of the crew members are being withheld until 24 hours after the next of kin notifications are completed.

The agency did not specify the type of plane or where it was flying from, but the US has deployed a carrier strike group to the area as part of efforts to prevent the Israel-Hamas war from spiralling into a regional conflict.

Washington rushed military support to Israel and bolstered its forces in the region – including with the USS Gerald R Ford aircraft carrier and other warships – after Hamas, the group that rules the Gaza Strip, carried out a surprise cross-border attack on October 7 that Israeli officials say killed about 1,200 people.

Israel’s military responded with a relentless air, land and naval assault on Gaza that has killed more than 11,000 people in what independent observers have termed a genocide.

The US forces in the region have also faced a spike in attacks linked to the conflict in recent weeks and have been targeted more than 40 times since mid-October, leaving several American personnel with minor injuries.

Washington has blamed Iran-backed groups for the violence and has carried out three strikes against Tehran-linked sites in Syria – two on October 26 and one on Wednesday.

There have been multiple other crashes of US military aircraft in recent years, including an F-35 stealth warplane that went down in September, with the pilot able to eject.

In March, two US Army helicopters crashed during a nighttime training mission in Kentucky, killing all nine soldiers on board.

The chief surgeon for the International Committee of the Red Cross has given a harrowing account of an amputation his team performed at a hospital in southern Gaza in a video diary shared with Sky News.

Dr Tom Potokar said his team had to amputate the hand of a six-year-old child with “very deep burn injuries”.

He said the boy’s hand had been “charred” and was the cause of ongoing infection which was making him very unwell.

The child remains in a critical condition.

Follow updates: Israel-Gaza latest

Dr Potokar sent the eyewitness account from the European Gaza Hospital in southern Gaza.

He described “another very busy day” in theatre where his team were dealing with “very limited resources, very limited monitoring and really far from ideal circumstances anesthetising patients”.

They are, nevertheless, able to get patients in a position where they can operate on them, thanks to the “amazing” work of his anaesthetist, he said.

Israel has been urging civilians in northern Gaza to travel to the south as it continues to push forward with its ground operations following the 7 October attacks.

However, bombardments have continued in the south.

Dr Potokar said patients are still arriving at the hospital where colleagues are dealing with “many burns”, complicated blast injuries with extensive tissue loss and bone injury.

A nursing staff shortage was presenting a major challenge due to the large number of dressing changes they are having to contend with, he said.

They are also “inundated with internally displaced people”, he added.

Meanwhile, Dr Potokar said bombardment continues every night, including “one very close at 1.30am this morning which whistled over the top of the building”.

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To the north, Israeli strikes have been pounding Gaza City as ground forces battle Hamas fighters near its largest hospital.

Health officials said medics, patients and displaced people were trapped in the al Shifa Hospital with no electricity and dwindling supplies.

Israel claims the al Shifa hospital is a command centre for Hamas, a claim the group – which the UK has designated a proscribed terrorist organisation – has denied.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected growing international calls for a ceasefire, saying Israel’s battle to crush Hamas militants will continue with “full force”.

Former Ghana striker Raphael Dwamena has died at the age of 28 after collapsing during a match in Albania.

Dwamena lost consciousness while playing for the local Egnatia team on Saturday in the country’s Super League, the Albanian Football Federation said in a statement.

Footage on social media appeared to show the player by himself and then falling over on the field in the 24th minute of the match with Partizani.

First aid was administered before he was rushed to hospital.

“Despite the immediate intervention of specialist doctors and all efforts to bring him back to life, the footballer unfortunately passed away,” the federation said.

No cause of death was given.

The game was halted at 1-1 with no further play. All games scheduled in Albania this week have been postponed, the federation added.

Dwamena was diagnosed with a heart condition in 2017. A proposed £14m transfer to Brighton that year fell through after he failed a medical.

He collapsed on the pitch during a 2021 game in Austria between his side Blau-Weiss Linz and Hartberg but recovered and continued his playing career.

Dwamena went on to play for Levante in the Spanish La Liga for one season as well as Real Zaragoza on loan in 2019-20. His career also included stints in Denmark and Switzerland.

Levante paid tribute to Dwamena on social media, saying: “We would like to express our deepest condolences for the passing of our former player, Raphael Dwamena.

“Our thoughts are with his family and loved ones at this difficult time. His legacy at our club will always endure.”

Zaragoza said on X, formerly known as Twitter: “We are devastated by the sad news of the passing of our former player Raphael Dwamena. You will always be in the memory of Zaragoza’s fans. Rest in peace.”

Dwamena made nine appearances for Ghana and scored two goals.

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“He served his country well and showed class anytime he represented Ghana,” Ghana Football Association President Kurt Edwin Simeon Okraku said in a statement.

He had also been the leading scorer in the Albanian league this season with nine goals.

Hezbollah says it fired on an Israeli team installing ‘eavesdropping and spying devices’ near the border.     

Israel says its fighter jets have pounded Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon after an incoming antitank missile wounded Israelis near the border.

The Israeli army on Sunday said “a number of civilians were wounded” in the antitank missile strike near the village of Dovev, just 800 metres (0.5 miles) from the frontier with Lebanon.

The Israel Electric Corporation said the missile from Lebanon “hit employees” who were in Dovev to repair power lines downed by earlier strikes.

Iran-backed Hezbollah group claimed responsibility and said it had fired on an Israeli team installing “eavesdropping and spying devices” near the border.

Since the October 7 Hamas attack followed by Israel’s offensive on Gaza, Israel has also traded fire with armed groups in southern Lebanon on a near-daily basis.

Israel has killed more than 11,000 people – 74 percent of them women and children – as the Gaza assault forces the displacement of 1.7 million people over the past five weeks.

In addition to Hezbollah, Hamas’s Lebanese branch has also launched attacks into southern Israel in recent weeks.

The Israeli army said 15 rockets were fired towards northern Israel from Lebanon on Sunday, with four intercepted by a missile defence system.

The Lebanese branch of Qassam Brigades claimed responsibility for the attacks targeting the Israeli cities of Haifa, Nahariya and Shlomi in response to “massacres and aggression” in Gaza. Israeli medics said at least 10 people were injured.

Cross-border attacks from Lebanon have killed at least six Israeli soldiers and two civilians, according to the army and paramedics.

Israeli leaders have warned Hezbollah against launching a full-scale attack on Israel, saying it could suffer a similar fate to besieged Gaza if it enters the war.

Israel and Hezbollah fought a monthlong war in 2006.