Assad Gone at Last

Plus: AOC ascendant, China preps for tariffs, Haitian deportation, and more...

Looters in the palace: Rebels toppled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime over the weekend. The former dictator has received asylum in Moscow.

In the past, Russia "had intervened in Syria's 13-year civil war in an effort to keep [Assad] in power," per the BBC. This time, neither Russia nor Iran really came to Assad's aid, aside from that offer of refuge. Another Assad ally, the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah, was also distracted by its own recent conflicts.

The Islamist militant group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and a few other rebel factions are responsible for the Assad ouster. Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani, also known as Ahmed al-Sharaa, is widely seen as the leader of the main rebel group, HTS, which has gone through several rebrands after being affiliated with Al Qaeda.

The fall of Assad happened over the course of the last few weeks.

"An armed rebel alliance charged across Syria over 11 days," reports CNN, "sweeping through major cities and reigniting a conflict that had been largely static since a 2020 ceasefire agreement….Syrian and Russian jets had targeted rebels in Aleppo and Idlib but opposition forces seized a second major city of Hama and quickly advanced on Homs—the gateway to the capital Damascus." After Homs fell, the rebels came into Damascus and declared Assad desposed. Prisoners were freed across the country, and the presidential palace was ransacked. Border checkpoints were emptied of guards.

Assad was a brutal tyrant, but it is not clear that HTS, and the factions they're uniting, will be an improvement. The country has been plunged into greater chaos, and antagonists in the region are behaving opportunistically, as one might expect.

"Israeli ground forces advanced beyond the demilitarized zone on the Israel-Syria border over the weekend, marking Israel's first overt entry into Syrian territory since the early 1970s, officials said," reports The New York Times. Israeli authorities claim the incursion is temporary, "hoping to head off any threat that could emerge in the fallout of president Bashar al-Assad's overthrow," per Reuters, and that airstrikes in the area are aimed at stamping out remaining stores of weapons.

The Turkish military "fired on U.S.-backed Kurdish forces in northern Syria over the weekend," reports The New York Times. It adds that this "illustrates how the interests of Turkey and the United States diverge over support for the Kurds, who have been instrumental partners for the U.S. in fighting Islamic State."

Meanwhile in domestic politics: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D–N.Y.) announced Friday that she wants to be the top Democrat on the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, a vacant position that would customarily be filled by someone more senior—in this case, 74-year-old Rep. Gerald E. Connolly, an eight-term incumbent from Virginia. If she gets the job, Ocasio-Cortez would become the youngest Democrat to lead a House committee; the mere act of seeking the job signals that she's serious about rising, both within the House of Representatives and within her own party.

A third Democrat—California's Ro Khanna—said he had been mulling a run but that he would move aside to allow Ocasio-Cortez to lead.

"The Oversight Committee position became available after [Maryland Rep. Jamie] Raskin, 61, successfully challenged Representative Jerrold Nadler, 77, of New York for the top Democratic slot on the Judiciary Committee," reports The New York Times. 

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Scenes from New York: "A judge granted a motion from Manhattan prosecutors to dismiss the more serious charge of second-degree manslaughter against Daniel Penny on Friday in his trial over the chokehold death of Jordan Neely on a New York City subway last year," reports CNN. "The ruling clears the way for the jury to consider a remaining lesser charge of criminally negligent homicide. It came after a Manhattan jury said they were deadlocked twice on the manslaughter charge and Penny's defense attorneys renewed their motion for a mistrial."

It remains to be seen whether the jury can come to a consensus. More background on Penny and Neely here.

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QUICK HITS

• Did bitcoin win the election? Zach Weissmueller and I asked Nic Carter, a great and worthwhile follow if you're interested in this cluster of topics:

Genuinely clownish article by @amacker at WaPo, betrays total lack of expertise on the topic. Embarrassing "let's ask the critics and call them experts" kind of piece. https://t.co/cC1U5ssXFK

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• "China's top leaders plan to loosen monetary policy and expand fiscal spending in 2025, as Beijing braces for a trade war when Donald Trump takes office," reports Bloomberg. "Top officials on Monday also made direct pledges to 'stabilize property and stock markets' and for the first time promised 'extraordinary' counter-cyclical policy adjustment—Communist Party speak for more uncommon tools to boost the economy. Boosting consumption was given greater emphasis, something foreign officials including US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen have stressed is crucial."
• Haitians are being deported in the Dominican Republic, rounded up and put in cages meant for livestock.
• "A Missouri lawmaker wants to create a program which would give residents $1,000 payouts for reporting illegal immigrants in their communities to authorities," reports Newsweek. Forgive me, but I don't think giving normal people incentives to become bounty-hunting vigilantes will be a net positive for liberty.
• Will they ever learn?

"Democrats began their meeting on Thursday with a "land acknowledgement," a symbolic gesture that grants that the land a person is standing on previously belonged to Native Americans…" https://t.co/RsMgAorS16

— Anthony LaMesa (@ajlamesa) December 8, 2024