Battle for Aleppo

The dominant narrative in the battle for control of Aleppo – once the most populated city in Syria – has been that of President Bashar al-Assad and his Russian allies bombing the city into oblivion and that is certainly part of the story.  In the past four years Assad and all the other actors in the conflict, both in Aleppo and around the country, have been equally culpable for turning Syria into a vast killing field which imperial powers are using to fight their proxy wars. What was initially an internal war quickly turned into a global war. The strategic importance of Syria and the larger Middle East attracted the rapacious attention of the West and Russia. Just as they had done in Iraq, the US and its Western allies – as always claiming to act in the interest of human rights – have carried out indiscriminate air strikes that have killed thousands of civilians and they, along with Middle Eastern states like Saudi Arabia and Qatar, armed and funded militant groups. Russia and Iran have been on Assad’s side throughout while the Islamic State has been aided by outside militant groups. This convergence of proxy wars has led to nearly half a million deaths and the world’s largest humanitarian crisis. The outpouring of condemnation and solidarity with civilians now that the Assad regime is about to retake Aleppo reeks of hypocrisy when such worries were never mentioned when it was the allies of the West who were massacring civilians. The propaganda war too has been mostly one-sided.

Parts of Eastern Aleppo are still being held by rebel forces, primarily the Al-Nusra Front, which now calls itself the Jabhat Fateh al Sham to obscure the fact that it is supported by militant groups like Al-Qaeda. Syria and Russia have tried to evacuate these parts of Aleppo so that civilians can be given safe passage but there is an understandable lack of trust on all sides.    That was only underscored by Syria suspending the evacuation in under a day after a series of bombings – which both sides have blamed on the other – targeted those being evacuated.     That was only underscored by Syria suspending the evacuation in under a day after a series of bombings – which both sides have blamed on the other – targeted those being evacuated. The rebel groups, egged on by Western powers, have carried out artillery attacks in those Assad-controlled areas which are most heavily populated while aerial bombings by Assad and Russia have also targeted civilians. Both sides seem to have particularly targeted hospitals, which has only compounded the humanitarian disaster. All this bloodshed has done nothing to bring an end to the civil war any closer. Assad still cannot be dislodged from power and the various rebel and militant groups are not about to give up fighting. The most local and international aid organisations can do is evacuate a few hundred people from the scene of the worst violence. There is not a single actor in Syria who has shown any concern beyond its own aims and the end result has been the devastation of millions of people who are mere pawns in an imperialistic war.