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June 22nd, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda
His government has so far managed to prevent the wave of diplomatic defections
that heralded the fall of the Libyan dictator Col Muammar Gaddafi.
However, a senior US official in Washington said some of those closest to the
Syrian leader were now preparing to flee. “We are seeing members of Bashar
al-Assad’s inner circle make plans to leave,” the official said.
This has even included moving large sums of money offshore into Lebanese and
Chinese banks and making contact with opposition elements and Western
governments.
Syrian opposition groups confirmed that they were actively courting American
help to encourage more defections.
One senior opposition source said: “I know for sure there are some
high-ranking officers who are waiting for the right chance to defect.
“We have names of people in the presidential palace. There are rumours that
there is one who is really close to the president and we are expecting to
see him out of the country soon.”
The defection yesterday of Col Hassan Merei al-Hamade raised opposition hopes
that it could provoke the start of the exodus.
He was granted political asylum by Jordan only hours after landing his jet at
the King Hussein air base in Mafraq, taking off his air force tags and
kneeling on the tarmac in prayer.
The air force is considered fiercely loyal to the Assad regime and opposition
activists said the escape of Colonel al-Hamade represented a sign that its
growing international isolation was starting to test the military’s
loyalties.
“He and three other MiGs were on a mission to bomb [southern rebel stronghold
of] Dera’a. He has risked his life,” an activist told The Daily Telegraph.
“There was talk about defections, but the three other fighter planes did not
because they were afraid and because they were unsure how they will be
received in Jordan.”
The White House said the Obama administration “welcomed this pilot’s decision
to do the right thing”.
Victoria Nuland, a State Department spokesman, said “This is how these things
start. It is obviously a significant moment when a guy takes a $25 million
plane and flies it to another country.”
But Syria’s defence ministry called the pilot a “traitor to his country and
his military honour”.
More than 100,000 Syrians have fled to Jordan since the uprising began,
including military defectors who are kept in a compound for their own safety.
Brig Gen Mostafa Ahmad al-Sheik, who fled to Turkey in January, is so far the
highest ranking Syrian officer to defect. In late August, Adnan Bakkour, the
attorney-general of the central city of Hama, appeared in a video announcing
he had defected.
Col Ahmed Nemaa, the head of the opposition forces in Dera’a, claimed that
other senior figures were planning to follow suit, but had been told to stay
put for the time being. “We have asked many military personnel who are
planning to defect to stay within the Syrian army so we can use them at the
right time. This includes some of the top commanders of Syrian army,” he
said.
Opposition groups claim that the Assad regime has managed to prevent
widespread defections with a carefully orchestrated campaign in which the
families of diplomats and high-level figures are used to blackmail them to
remain loyal.
Reports have emerged of the government running detention centres in Damascus
where the family members of diplomats are being held under the watch of the
mukhabarat, or secret police. Old laws requiring all military personnel to
receive a stamp of approval from the mukhabarat before leaving the county,
which until recently had been observed only in the breach, are now all being
strictly enforced again, according to one source in Damascus.
Switzerland said yesterday it had been in contact with the team of Kofi Annan,
the UN-Arab League envoy to Syria, about hosting an international
conference. It came after senior British sources said that Mr Assad could be
offered safe passage to the country to take part in peace talks under a
Western plan to convince him to relinquish his hold on power.
Elsewhere yesterday, the Syrian army maintained its bombardment of Homs even
though a temporary truce had been agreed to allow aid workers to evacuate
the sick and wounded. The International Committee of the Red Cross said its
aid workers had been forced to turn back.
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