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Thursday, August 6, 2015

Where There’s Smoke, There’s Syrian Diplomacy

Where There’s Smoke, There’s Syrian Diplomacy

Rami G. Khouri
The old adage that “where there’s smoke, there’s fire” must now be updated in Middle Eastern diplomatic terms to read, “where Saudi Arabian, American, and Russian foreign ministers meet to discuss Syria, there’s Syrian smoke.”

Certainly the most fascinating diplomatic move this week was the tripartite meeting in Doha Monday among the American, Russian and Saudi foreign ministers to discuss the situation in Syria. This means they also must have discussed—take a deep breath here—Iran, Lebanon, Hezbollah, Turkey, Yemen, Iraq, three different Kurdish political/military organizations, Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), Hamas, Al-Qaeda, the United Arab Emirates military, Qatar, Jordan, Egypt and half a dozen other regional players who now play some role in the situation in and around Syria.

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