Thursday night, Aug. 11, US President Barack Obama and Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan agreed to set Syrian President Bashar Assad the deadline of Aug. 27 for extinguishing the popular uprising against his rule and starting to implement genuine democratic reforms. This decision followed Erdogan's report to Obama on the Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu's six-hour conversation with Assad Tuesday, Aug. 9. Turkey has called up reserves for transfer to the Syrian border.

As his tanks and artillery stormed the eastern Syrian town of Deir al-Zour, killing 100 civilians in one day, the US and Turkey Sunday night, Aug. 7 began to turn the screw on President Bashar Assad: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asked Turkey's foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu to press Syria to "return its military to the barracks," during his visit to Syria Tuesday. The Syrian ruler with Iranian backing spurned the ultimatum even before the minister reached Damascus.

Russia has threatened to freeze the "reset" ties with the United States, which recently produced valuable cooperation and friendly understandings between the two powers in vital global arenas. debkafile's Moscow sources report the areas most affected are likely to be the Israel-Palestinian dispute, Moscow's effort to broker an end to the Libyan war and the Russian supply route for US forces fighting in Afghanistan.
Moscow's ire was sparked by a US travel ban on officials implicated in the Magnitsky affair.

As US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Friday, July 15, informed the Libya Contact Group in Istanbul that the US recognized the rebel National Transitional Council (TNC) "until a fully representational interim government can be established," Muammar Qaddafi declared "We aim for victory – not compromise!" and launched his troops on a new operation against rebels in the west. His object was to improve his bargaining position in peace negotiations debkafile reports are underway with the US through Moscow.

If Aleppo finally throws its weight against the anti-government opposition, Bashar Assad's days will be numbered – especially after his elite troops failed to break the back of the uprising and he blew his only shot at national dialogue by disinviting influential opposition leaders.

Monday, July 11, after a pro-Assad mob invaded the US embassy in Damascus, a personal attack on Syrian President Bashar Assad was heard in Washington for the first time. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Assad "is not indispensible and we have absolutely nothing invested in him remaining in power," after US embassy staff were forced to shelter in a fortified wing of the mission as Assad's militiamen rampaged through the building and raised the Syrian flag.

Far from dispensing with electronic devices and Internet connections as widely reported, photos of Osama bin Laden's  fortress-villa in Abbottabad, Pakistan, prove it was equipped with both and therefore vulnerable to penetration and surveillance. Puzzling questions include: Why did the US and Pakistan who must have known where he was not lay hands on him sooner?  Why was May 1, 2011 chosen for the operation? And why did US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tie it in with the Arab uprising?

Profound disagreements among three allies and within their administrations are hampering progress in the Libyan operation. NATO and Arab props crumple.

Washington has excellent relations with the Egyptian military rulers but their control of the country is extremely limited. The soldiers would rather desert than obey orders. The police are off the streets and the civilian government goes its own way.

 Ahead of the first Day of Anger planned in Saudi Arabia for March 11, a senior Iranian figure close to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad warned Riyadh Wednesday, March 2, against launching preventive security measures against, or cracking down on, the kingdom's two million Shiites who live and work in the oil regions of the east. In Washington, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accused Iran of using its Lebanese surrogate Hizballah to shape events in the Arab world.

The US is weighing military intervention to break the standoff between Muammar Qaddafi's army and rebel forces over the towns commanding the roads to the capital Tripoli where Qaddafi is barricaded. Pentagon spokesman Col. David Lapan stated Monday, Feb. 28 that the US "is repositioning its naval and air forces around Libya." His reference to "various contingency plans" related to the USS Enterprise and USS Kearsarge with 1,800 marines aboard soon to be redeployed off Libya.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had the thankless task of writing finis on the Obama administration's two-year effort to persuade Israelis and Palestinians to talk peace. It was time "to grapple with the core issues of this conflict" - borders, refugees, settlements, water and Jerusalem – she said, without mentioning timetables. debkafile reports the administration has now turned to a new plan for employing Turkey - first to broker a deal with Iran, then an Israeli-Syrian accord.

Obama administration officials deny Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu came away from his marathon meeting with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Nov. 11 with a pledged package of major incentives for a 90-day settlement construction freeze, debkafile's Jerusalem and Washington sources report. The scale of US benefits as presented by the prime minister to Israel's security and foreign affairs cabinet and the full cabinet is seen in Washington as misleading.

Analyzing the new US military buildup around Iran, DEBKA-Net-Weekly - in its latest issue out Friday - evaluates where Hillary Clinton's whirlwind trips to Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia starting July 1 fit into Washington's overall Iran strategy. How much cooperation can Washington expect from Moscow in a Caspian-based operation?
For some answers, subscribe to DEBKA-Net-Weekly, click here

President Barack Obama has given up on tough UN Security Council sanctions on Iran over its nuclear drive, and gone back on the longstanding American commitment assuring Israel of recognized and defensible borders in any future accommodation with its Arab neighbors.
In congratulating Israel on its 62nd Day of Independence, US Secretary of state Hillary Clinton mentions "recognized borders" while omitting the traditional qualifier "defensible."

 

Russia's decision to finish and activate Iran's atomic reactor in Bushehr - despite prime minister Vladimir Putin's promises to President Barak Obama and prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu - hit secretary of state Hillary Clinton when she arrived in Moscow, Thursday, March 18. This was the second contretemps of her trip after she failed to bring Russia aboard on tough sanctions for Iran.

 

Barack Obama is still going easy on Iran and Syria after both their presidents publicly ridiculed
his administration and secretary of state Hillary Clinton's appeal for Damascus to loosen its ties with Tehran.

The White House is going through with a decision to post the first US ambassador to Damascus in five years, while berating Israel day after day for the past week.
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