As the new president-elect begins to weigh the carrots and sticks he can employ when dealing with the Middle East, he will run into the question of how to handle Syria. Bashar al-Asad was the first to reach out with a telegram to Mr. Obama on November 7 that “expressed hope for constructive dialogue so that the difficulties can be overcome which have hampered the advance of peace, stability and progress in the Middle East.” The following is a blog I wrote for the American Foreign Policy Council. The original is available here on their website.
Although the last Syrian troops left Lebanon on April 26, 2005, Syria still has countless horses in the Lebanese race. The Syrian regime - along with Iran - supports Hezbollah and Amal, and it backs various secular Sunni groups, in addition to the largely Christian Free Patriotic Movement headed by General Michel Aoun. Along with the Syrian Ba’ath Party, Syrian Social Nationalist Party, and the Nasserite Popular Movement, these groups form the nucleus of Lebanon’s March 8 coalition.
Together, they have posed a serious challenge to the pro-Western, anti-Syrian March 14 coalition. That group includes the Future Movement headed by Sa’ad Hariri, the son and political heir of the slain nationalist politician Rafiq Hariri; Druze leader Walid Jumblatt’s Progressive Socialist Party; the Democratic Gathering Bloc, and; Samir Ja’ja’s Lebanese Forces.
Adding to this unstable political mix are over 400,000 Palestinians confined to refugee camps throughout Lebanon, who remain largely outside of state authority. There are currently some 15 active Palestinian factions, which range politically from the Marxist far left to the Islamist and jihadist far right - many of whom operate with the support and encouragement of Damascus.
“Terrorist aggression” is what Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Mu’allim termed the U.S. raid into Syria that either captured or killed Abu Ghadiya. The daylight attack took place five miles inside Syria in the town of Sukkariya near Abu Kamal. Syrian television claimed nine people were killed and 14 were wounded in the operation. A native of Mosul, Iraq, the 32-year old Ghadiya has been in charge of al-Qaeda’s extensive Syria network since 2005, when the organization declared an Islamic Emirate in Al Qaim along the Iraqi border. In February, U.S. intelligence sources named Badran Turki Hishan al-Mazidih (a.k.a. Abu Ghadiya) as al-Qaeda in Iraq’s top operative in Syria, tasked with funneling foreign fighters, weapons, and cash into Iraq.
Haaretz reports 
Torture takes many forms. We take it and we hand it out, we live with it and we live with ourselves knowing that we may be subjecting our loved ones to it, that our loved ones may be engaging in it, that innocent people on every side may be torture's direct victims. 
