Press TV has conducted an interview with Dr. Randy Short, a political commentator from Washington, about the issue of extensive al-Qaeda camps in Syria intensifying their campaign against both Christian and Muslim areas given confidence by the US beating its drums of wars to also attack Syria.
The following is an approximate transcript of the interview.

Press TV: The issue mentioned in our report (preceding the debate) and that we’re questioning as part of this debate is the claims that have been made by Secretary of state John Kerry and by US allies they are maintaining that the terrorists and the extremist groups do not have a strong presence in Syria and basically you can distinguish these groups from the Free Syrian army and those groups who are not terrorists. Do you agree with that?

Short: That’s totally laughable. German intelligence and other reports have shown all along that this opposition group has been hijacked by the Takfiris, by the Salafists, by people given money by Prince Bandar from Saudi Arabia. This has virtually nothing to do with the movement to get change for the people of Syria.

This is a subversive, wicked, maniacal, sectarian destructive cancer in Syria that benefits Israel, the European Union and the US that have strategic and energy interests in Syria. It has nothing to do with the people in Syria who have fled the country by the millions; that are in refugee camps; that are hungry; that are dying.

This is a civil war and civil wars always have unfortunate atrocities. What needs to happen is that this issue [should] not be exacerbated by outside wicked forces that care nothing for the people of Syria, nor do they really care about democratic change or reform.

And Kerry he is a liar. He was in Skull and Bones like George Bush - it’s a fraudulent wicked organization dating back over one hundred years doing horrible things on a global basis.

Press TV: Our other guest Mr. John Hajjar in Boston is saying if there are terrorists on this side, there are also terrorists on that side.

What would you say about this kind of observation? Our guest was saying that Hezbollah, that the Syrian government forces, they are also considered terrorists.

Short: Terrorism is something in the eyes of the beholder. I don’t see Hezbollah as anything other than the honor of Lebanon - to quote Dr. Norman Finkelstein. They have protected their country and showed that there is dignity among Lebanese people that will fight for the freedom.

So I respect Hezbollah in terms of what it has done to protect Lebanon from foreign invaders.
Several months ago German intelligence came out with a figure that over 90 percent of the people in Syria fighting against the government were foreigners. And we know that Prince Bandar is the money man, the ‘bag man’, bringing in people from all over the world.

People are being released from jail in Saudi Arabia with promises that their sentences will be commuted if they kill people.
The people who are fighting, they’re fighting for their homes. You can’t call a man who’s fighting to protect his home from rapists and robbers a terrorist if he happens to deter and uses defensive violence.

It’s very clear. And if anyone mentions Chechnya, we know that that is funded by the United States and Saudi Arabia. Iran has nothing to gain by making an enemy with Russia - they need Russia’s support to counter weight the extreme Zionist and imperialistic forces of the United States and the European Union.

And if we’re honest, most of the people that have been killed in Syria have been Allawite, disproportionately people who are in the base of President Assad. Why would they murder their own people when they are a minority that need everyone in their small 30 percent that’s non-Sunni to stand together against many people who are Sunni that are against the Bashar regime based on sectarian values alone?
And most Syrians support the government of Syria over having a situation like Libya or Iraq. They do not want that.
So I believe many if not 70-80 percent of the population supports Assad no matter what misgivings they have had in the past because they know the future with these people who are killers and who kill priests and women and have done all sorts of things... They don’t want them. They really don’t want them. That‘s not what they call change.

Press TV: Our guest John Hajjar is saying that Bashar al-Assad is responsible for the death of 100,000 of his people and that now a no-fly zone is required - What is your response?

Short: That’s not true. Half of the civilians or more have been killed by these terrorists. Assad isn’t killing Christians and Kurds and Allawites and he’s not killing supporting Sunnis. All along they’ve documented - Syrian human rights groups and others - that people who are seen as loyal to the Assad government have been murdered...

So it’s very simple. And to blame Iran, that just fits into this whole Zionist endgame to get rid of all of the countries that are strong in the region. Tehran has a right to have a sphere of influence the same way the United States thinks every country is its backyard. So there will be strong Muslim countries whether Western countries like it or not.

Above and beyond that, there needs to be a no-fly zone, but it needs to be over southern Lebanon so Israel will stop violating the airspace of Lebanon; violating agreements and treaties.

We don’t need a no-fly zone over Syria. What we need to do is agree no more arms to be sent to al-Nusra and the other terrorists. Hezbollah doesn’t want to be outside of Lebanon, they’re worried about Israel.

None of this stuff needs to happen and if anything the problem that I see is that Iran is not allowed to be a legitimate peace broker. They are the one power in the region that could bring all the parties to the table as well as checkmate the tottering House of Saud, which is a burning condemned whore house that will one day collapse under its own weight of corruption and false Islam.

Press TV: We were hearing a lot said today of the consequences of action versus the consequences of inaction. John Kerry was saying that if we don’t act, Iran, Hezbollah and the enemies of the United States are going to get chemical weapons, nuclear weapons etc and this is directly linked to the United States national interests.

Short: Iran doesn’t have nuclear weapons and they’re afraid of North Korea.

This country (US) has always fought against the rights of folks: it supported genocide in Rwanda, in Indonesia, in Vietnam; they have attacked countries, they have not defended; they gave chemical weapons to Saddam Hussein to kill tens of thousands of Iranians.

The people in Iran overall like their government. And this gentlemen (John Hajjar) is not aware of the Fatwa issued Ayatollah Khomeini (PBUH) who said that Iran would not use nuclear weapons.

In fact, in my point of view if Iran did have nuclear weapons, people would stop doing these sanctions and funding MKO and Jundallah and terrorizing the Iranian people and their friends, which is what’s happening to Syria.

So - John Kerry - he is a liar, he is a fraud; he pretended he didn’t support the acts of genocide against the Vietnamese in 1971 an now he’s doing this.

I mean, we don’t need any wars, America needs to put its swords down and save this country (the US) where people are hungry and people are homeless. No more war. War, to quote Marvin Gaye, is not the answer, it’s never the answer.

By Press TV

 

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