On the surface, what happened in Venezuela appears to be a victory for the US—the strong, dominant power that strikes wherever and whenever it wishes and imposes its will by various means, including iron and fire, military coups, and criminality. At a deeper level, however, the real picture is exactly the opposite, and it can be discerned by considering the following coordinates:

On February 17, 2011, in Damascus’s al-Hariqa market—before any foreign interventions, before any influx of money or weapons, and as a natural, spontaneous result of the accumulated oppression, injustice, and anger—crowds of Syrians chanted in the face of the authorities and their representatives: “Thieves! Thieves!” They also chanted: “The Syrian people will not be humiliated”.

Last Thursday, December 19, while celebrating “Hanukkah” at the White House, Trump made a number of statements regarding the occupied Syrian Golan, boasting that he had “given it to Israel”, describing it as land rich enough to be worth trillions of dollars. In doing so, he reminded everyone of the decision he took during his first term—specifically on March 25, 2019—when he signed a US presidential decree recognizing “full Israeli sovereignty over the Syrian Golan Heights”.

Despite the great efforts to create a festive atmosphere around the current Syrian situation, it seems – according to the popular saying – like “sprinkling sugar on death”. The facts are clear and stark about the depth of the accumulated and worsening tragedy. Starting with the general political situation, in which Syria is still a set of regions governed by different authorities and in which multiple economic spaces prevail, and the catastrophic economic conditions and liberal measures and orientations hostile to the interests of more than 90% of Syrians and are consistent with the IMF and t…

“Today, a dark page in the history of Syria and the Syrian people has been turned. It was a page in which an entire people were squeezed into its narrow margins, enduring every form of suffering, oppression, deprivation, pain, displacement, poverty, and imprisonment—while its entire center was occupied by tyranny, corruption, plundering, and encroachment on people’s rights and dignity.

Over the past weeks, the noise of sectarian rhetoric—both in its “peaceful” and violent forms—has grown louder. This has been accompanied by an intensified division of Syrians into opposing and polarized groups, through demonstrations and marches, repeating the miserable scene the country lived through during the Assad era. All this has unfolded in parallel with increasing foreign interventions and attacks on Syria—mainly, the “Israeli” assaults, the latest of which occurred in Beit Jinn in Damascus Countryside, where a group of young men confronted Zionist aggression, reaffirming that “Israe…