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Diplomatic activism by Russia in Syria is producing speculation about the Kremlins possible willingness to encourage genuine peace talks and spur transition from corrupt, incompetent and brutal family rule toward something stabilizing and inclusive. If Russia proves genuinely interested in converting military success to a sustainable political settlement, it would put Moscow sharply at odds with Iran and with the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad. Is Russian President Vladimir Putin truly prepared to turn a page in Syria? The litmus test will be Moscows view of whether or not Assad rule should be restored to areas eventually liberated from the Islamic State group..

Russian air power and Iranian-led Shia foreign fighters saved Assad from military defeat. Intervening militarily in Syria allowed Putin to tell his countrymen that Russia was back as a great power; that Russia had thwarted a purported American regime-change campaign in Syria. Iran, on the other hand, has supported Assad because Assad alone, in a nationalistic Syria, is willing to be Irans servant on all matters having to do with Lebanons Hezbollah: the terrorist long arm of Iranian penetration into the Arab world.

Having saved Assad and all but declared military victory, Russia may be asking itself now if Assad is a liability for its longer-term interests in Syria. It would be an apt question.

Hypothetically, therefore, Russia might be interested in a political transition formula that gradually marginalizes Assad and vests executive power in a national unity government. Iran, however, would have no such interest. Tehran knows that, beyond the Assad family and entourage, there is no Syrian constituency accepting subordination to Iran and putting the Syrian state at the disposal of a Lebanese terror organization.

Well-informed Syrian opposition figures say they are hearing from Russians that they are disgusted with the undisciplined, looting Shia militiamen brought by Iran to Syria. These Shia militiasincluding Hezbollah advance Irans sectarian agenda and incite Sunni Islamist extremist backlash. They are kerosene on a fire Russia says it wants to extinguish.

Opposition representatives also claim to be finding Russian interest in helping them separate nationalist rebel forces from al-Qaidas Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, the former Nusra Front. The prerequisite for separation is a real cease-fire. When the nationalists and extremists are all under fire from Assad and Iran, they have no choice but to stick together. Enabling separation and the ultimate destruction of al-Qaida therefore requires Russia to keep a tight leash on the Assad regime and the Shia militias. But the regime and Irancontrary to Russiawant to target as terrorists all anti-Assad rebels: even the ones Moscow recently invited to Astana, Kazakhstan, to discuss peace.

So: Russia and Iran may have conflicting views about the future of Assad. But do they really? Would Russia actually be willing and able to neutralize Irans toxic presence in Syria by getting the Shia militias out and then marginalize the polarizing Assad clique?

If Russia is able and willing to do so, clearly it would be for its own interests: a stable, unified Syria closely aligned with Moscow; a place that can attract the reconstruction investment and assistance so sorely needed. What Putin might want from Washington is a commitment to assist with reconstruction once decent, non-Assad governance is in place. Otherwise, if Putin calculates that the Assad-Iran page must be turned for the interests of Russia, then clearly there is need for a geopolitical inducement from Washington.

Central and eastern Syria will likely provide the answer. The United States aims to liberate these areas from the other side of Syrias terrorist coin: ISIS. If Russia calls for Assad rule to be restored in areas liberated from ISISif Moscow wishes to reimpose the governance malpractice that made Syria safe for ISIS in the first placethen clearly it wants Assad and Iran in the Syrian saddle indefinitely, regardless of the consequences.

Speculation about Russia and Iran splitting over Assad is interesting. The truth will be found in Moscows view of what should follow ISIS. Washington is free now to elicit that view and answer the question.

Frederic C. Hof, director at the Atlantic Councils Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East, served as a special adviser for transition in Syria at the State Department in 2012.

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Russia and Iran: Split over Syria? - DefenseNews.com

JAKARTA

In a nondescript reception room within a mall in Kelapa Gading, a North Jakarta neighborhood largely populated by Chinese Indonesians, a congregation gathers to worship. The sermon: "Love your God and love your neighbor." The preacher: an evangelical Protestant refugee who fled Iran six years ago to avoid state persecution.

Welcome to the Persian Refugee Service, an evangelical Christian church by and largely for Iranian refugees in Jakarta.

Mohamed Rasool Bagherian, the preacher, left Iran with his family because they were Christian, but a number of the congregation actually converted to Christianity during their years-long purgatory in Indonesia, where refugees and asylum seekers are not allowed to work or go to school. A few of the regular attendees aren't even Christians, just refugees who enjoy the company of fellow Iranians and a hot meal.

Why Iranians become Christians

Against all odds, Christianity has exploded in popularity in Iran in recent years, even though apostasy, or leaving the Islamic faith, is punishable by death in the theocratic state. Beyond Armenian and Assyrian ethnic Christians, who have lived in Iran for centuries, there are growing numbers of Shia Muslims who convert to evangelical Christianity.

Watchdog groups estimate that there are between 300,000 and 500,000 Christians in Iran, from a population of 75 million. Evangelical Christianity proliferates in private "house churches," since preachers can be arrested.

Bagherian and his wife converted to Christianity in 2005. It was discouraged, but not dangerous, to become Christian in Tehran, where they lived at the time, he said. He himself maintained a house church for several years.

"But then [former Iranian president Mahmoud] Ahmedinajad started to ramp up the pressure against Christians, shortly after his election. I was arrested twice, in 2007 and 2010, and after that, we were basically forced to leave the country," he told VOA News. "We had a young child and feared for his life."

Their son, Ahura, is now eight years old and has only known life in Indonesia.

A community church

If Jakarta is an unnatural environment for this family, it doesn't show at their church. Bagherian is a charismatic preacher who slips between Farsi and English, punctuating his 90-minute sermon with droll PowerPoint slides. He speaks from a clear Lucite altar flanked by artificial purple flowers and electric candles.

The service starts with a long musical segment where everyone sings along to English and Farsi praise rock. Then, on a recent Sunday, Bagherian expounded on the parable of the alabaster jar, in which a poor woman anoints the feet of Jesus with her most expensive perfume.

"If you do something for God, it cannot have a price," Bagherian told the assembled crowd of about 30. I asked him later if he viewed his family's laborious transit for religious freedom through that lens. "Well," he said, "that's one way to look at it."

The Persian Refugee Service gets its meeting room from Abbalove Ministries, a 2,000-person Chinese Indonesian church that convenes in an adjacent hall, also on Sunday afternoons. Abbalove also provides boxed lunches and other services for the small congregation.

"Abbalove members are a great blessing," said Bagherian. "They even help my family rent a guesthouse in Kelapa Gading while we wait for updates on our refugee status."

The Bagherians used to worship in an Anglican church in Jakarta, but three years ago, their Australian pastor, Jeff Hammond, suggested they start a standalone Farsi service for the sizable refugee community.

"My daughter and I found this community when we came to Jakarta and we felt like we saw the light," said one middle-aged Iranian woman who was baptized last year in Jakarta. "You can't understand how terrible sharia was for us. Especially how it oppressed women. No, I haven't looked back after converting."

Tough cases for resettlement

Unlike Afghan refugees, who constitute about half of all refugees and asylum seekers in Indonesia, Iranian refugees make up only three percent, and tend to be educated, white-collar professionals who bristled under their home country's theocracy.

That makes it difficult for them to even obtain refugee cards from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), let alone advance in its waitlists. Whereas Afghan Hazara refugees have a broadly recognized claim to deadly persecution, Iran has a stable, albeit authoritarian, government.

That moves Iranians lower in priority for resettlement. And in fact, every year a small number of Iranian refugees, frustrated by the rejection of their refugee or asylum claims, opt for something called "voluntary repatriation" in which they turn themselves over to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), which books them a free flight back to Iran.

Nearly every refugee at the Sunday service expressed despair that President Donald Trump's recent travel ban, which includes Iran, and his suspension of refugee resettlement would eliminate the United States as a possible end destination for their journey.

Still, for each of the refugees who attended the service, it was no light decision to flee their home.

"I was arrested for playing music," said Reza, a young man who now plays the keyboard at the Sunday service. "Can you imagine? Music is haram in my country. I went to jail for that. I had to leave."

Abbalove is not the only social institution that serves Iranian refugees. The nondenominational Jakarta International Christian Fellowship also includes several refugees, and it has a dedicated Farsi service. Twelve Iranian children attend Roshan Learning Center, a school for refugees and asylum seekers in South Jakarta, and two young adults are teachers there.

Even if Indonesia is just a point of transit, many Iranians said they felt immensely relieved to be there.

"Here it's also an Islamic nation, but it's democratic," said Arash Ehteshamfar, who left Iran in 2011 to avoid religious persecution. "It's like night and day. And of course, we have this church this is our home in this country."

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Iranian Refugees Find Community in a Jakarta Church - Voice of America

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani delivers a speech at a ceremony attended by ambassadors and foreign envoys in Tehran, February 9, 2017. (Photo by president.ir)

Iranian President Hassan Rouhanihas stressed that Irans military might is merely meant for self-defense as the country has never interferedin the domestic affairsofother statesand has no plans to do so in the future.

Irans military power is solely meant for defending the country, Rouhani said in a meeting with ambassadors and foreign envoys in Tehran on Thursday duringa ceremony held on the eve of the 38th anniversary of the victory of Irans 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The Islamic Republic has never invaded any country and has no such intention. Our weapons are meant to defendthe country and [we] should not allow certain parties to spread illusions in order to create unhealthy conditions in the region and the world, addedthe president.

Rouhani further stated that Iran favors close bonds among nations, saying that governments are duty-bound to help bring nations closer in order to take advantage of common interests.

Some 38 years ago, the greatest revolution in the region and the world became victorious in Iran through mere reliance on the people and despite the support offered to the past dictatorial regime of Iran by many countries, the Iranian chief executive added.

On Friday, millions of Iranianswill pour onto the streets across the country to mark the victory of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, which put an end to the monarchical rule of the US-backed Pahlavi regime.

The rallies come at a time of increased belligerence against Iran by the new US administration under President Donald Trump.

The US officials have recently ratcheted up theirhostile remarks toward the Islamic Republic using Iran's recent missile tests as excuse.

Iran arguesthat its missile program is an inalienable right of the Iranian nation under the international law and the United Nations Charter. The Islamic Republic has always stressed that its military might poses no threat to other countries and is in line with the countrys plan to boost its deterrence power.

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Iran's military power only meant for self-defense: Rouhani - Press TV

The battle to retake Mosul, Iraqs second-largest city, from ISIS is underway. Iraqi forces with backing from the U.S. have retaken the east bank of the city. A renewed push to take back the more heavily populated west bank will begin soon.

Fighting is expected to be ferocious, with heavy casualties among civilians and Iraqi soldiers, and destruction of the citys infrastructure.

The liberation of Mosul will not be complete with the military operations that oust ISIS. Failing to get the civilian response right risks a short-term pyrrhic victory and widening civil war in Iraq.

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This should concern the U.S., as instability in Iraq threatens U.S. foreign policy interests in the Middle East and violence that continues to create large numbers of refugees.

Steps are required to manage the needs of displaced civilians and get them back home. Since the start of the conflict with ISIS, a peak of 3.4 million Iraqi civilians were displaced by violence, and 3 million remain displaced today. An additional half million people may be displaced during the fight to take back remaining parts of Mosul.

On our recent trips to Erbil and Baghdad, where the military and humanitarian responses to Mosul are being managed, we spoke with numerous stakeholders and identified key challenges that will need to be resolved to stabilize Mosul and get its civilians back home.

Related: Trump: Iraq launched Mosul offensive to make Hillary look good

The government of Iraq is sending displaced persons from Mosul into camps instead of allowing them to move to other urban areas due to concerns that there might be ISIS collaborators among the displaced.

The civilians identification documents are taken from them for as long as they stay in the camp. They are permitted to return to their homes when it is considered safe, but widespread destruction of public, residential, commercial and agricultural infrastructure means that it may be years before they can go home.

While security concerns are understandable, a solution must be found that respects international norms against holding displaced civilians in detention.

We visited two emergency camps a short distance from Mosul. Khazer is a tent city of over 32,000 people, next to Hassan Sham with a similar number. Despite the valiant efforts of aid workers to supply basic needs, these emergency camps are not equipped to house Iraqis for more than a few months.

Girls cover their ears as a helicopter strafes nearby buildings in a street behind the frontline in the Intisar neighborhood of Mosul, Iraq, on November 13, 2016. Shelly Culbertson and Linda Robinson write that 3 million displaced Iraqis are living in flimsy tents without electricity, only outdoor pumps for water, no 24-hour health care services and no spaces, where people could prepare hot food, community activities and psychosocial treatment. These traumatized people fear for their futures. Chris McGrath/Getty

In addition to the flimsy tents without electricity, only outdoor pumps for water, no 24-hour healthcare services, and no spaces where people could prepare hot food, community activities and psychosocial treatment is lacking for these traumatized people who fear for their futures.

Indeed, conditions in parts of Mosul and nearby liberated villages are not safe for civilians to return to because of the heavy levels of explosive remnants of war. ISIS heavily mined public buildings, homes and fields. We heard anecdotes of baby cribs with booby-traps. One village of 450 families had 550 mines.

The water treatment plant in Bartallah is so heavily mined that it will need to be detonated rather than cleared. Demining is an expensive and dangerous process. U.N. agencies and the U.S.government are funding demining in targeted ways, but greater investment in demining is essential to promote early and safe return of civilians.

In Mosul and nearby villages, basic public services, such as water and sanitation, healthcare and education, need to resume. Yet destroyed infrastructure and the thousands of public sector employees who fled mean that resumption will be no quick or easy task.

For example, six of Mosuls 12 hospitals have been destroyed. Many health care workers and teachers have fled. While United Nations agencies and implementing nongovernmental organizations have labored intensely to meet basic needs with temporary assistance, we see a gap in supporting Iraqi government services. For example, hospitals treating trauma in the nearby city of Erbil are overflowing to the extent that they cannot provide treatment in a timely manner for their own city residents.

After the immediate humanitarian needs are met, it will be important to shift responsibility, assistance and capacity building to Iraqi institutions, so that they have the means to take over and care for their own.

Finally, resumption of normality and daily life depends on civilians feeling safe and repairing relations among different ethnic communities. This requires a trained and adequately staffed police force that can maintain security in the street, behave according to standard principles of community policing, and gain the trust of fellow citizens that they will not behave in retaliatory or arbitrary ways.

The officials that we interviewed noted a need for at least 25,000 trained Iraqi police to fulfill these duties in Mosul. However only 12,000 have received any sort of training at all.

Security among the population also depends upon a reconciliation process among differing communities from Mosuls multiethnic communities. Less than 3 percent of the stabilization program funded by the U.S. and coalition partners is devoted to social cohesion efforts. A priest who runs a settlement of displaced Christians told us that very few if any of them anticipate going home because of fears of relations with other communities.

Meeting all of these challenges in a way that sets the city of Mosul and its surroundings on a path to stability and future prosperity is a tall order.

It depends upon just and competent leadership from the government of Iraq.

It requires security forces to comport themselves in ways that respect human rights. It depends on United Nations leadership to manage many of the technical issues of stabilization.

And it also depends upon the intellectual and diplomatic leadership of the U.S., a role that no other entity can fill.

At a time when it may be easier for the U.S. to focus its attention within its own borders, it is important to remember that U.S. leadership can make a difference to these displaced civilians while protecting U.S. national interests.

Shelly Culbertson is a policy analyst and Linda Robinson is a senior international policy analyst at the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation.

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What Will Trump Do About Iraq's Displaced Millions? - Newsweek

When President Donald Trump signed an executive order that imposed a temporary ban on travelers entering the U.S. from Iraq and six other predominantly Muslim nations, the move reminded Alex Almanza of another presidents fateful decision.

In 2008, five years into the Iraq War, President George W. Bush declared U.S. forces would withdraw from the country by the end of 2011. The news came during Almanzas second tour in Iraq with the Army and elicited a bemused reaction from Iraqi soldiers.

I remember them feeling a sense of betrayal, said Almanza, 48, who retired from the military in 2013 and lives in Edinburg. You could see it in their eyes: Everything weve been doing is for nothing.

Military veterans in South Texas who trained Iraqi troops warned of similar and potentially lasting effects from Trumps actions, even after a federal judges ruling last week suspended the travel order. (An appeals court heard arguments Tuesday and will decide whether to keep or lift the injunction.)

Those who served in Iraq contend the ban and the presidents anti-Islamic rhetoric could erode the resolve of Iraqi troops, deter civilians from cooperating with government forces and supply fresh recruiting fodder for terror groups.

Almanza, who first deployed to Iraq in 2003, recalled the early efforts of U.S. troops to build up the countrys military during the eight-year war. The Americans taught Iraqi soldiers how to fire artillery, set up checkpoints and conduct raids, and the daily interaction forged a kinship born of common purpose.

The Iraqis who fought beside us were just as important to me as my guys, he said. They were willing to die right beside us. Thats the kind of commitment that can only come from hope. But if were now telling them that theyre not welcome in our country, it gives them more reason to doubt our commitment. It will dampen their hope.

Messing with their trust

The U.S. military has 5,000 troops in Iraq to assist the countrys armed forces fighting Islamic State, or ISIS, with most acting as advisers.

Cesar Gutierrez, a Marine veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, asserted that Trump has disregarded the sacrifices of Iraqi soldiers, interpreters and civilian personnel and the hazards they continue to face working with U.S. troops.

They chose to fight alongside us to defeat the enemy, said Gutierrez, 31, who lives in San Antonio. They were very nervous about patrols not because they werent willing to fight, but because they were alongside Americans. That alone put a price on their heads.

Training Iraqi forces required Americans to confront cultural and language barriers. Discussions with soldiers and local civilian leaders gave Gutierrez an understanding of the country and its people, and he criticized Trumps travel order as rooted in ignorance.

You have to earn their trust and respect. Once you do, theyre with you all the way, he said. But what the ban does is label all Iraqis as the same. Were now messing with their trust with an entire nations trust, a nation that weve fought for for many years and thats going to undo a lot of what weve been trying to accomplish.

A desire to bridge the divide between Americans and Iraqis motivated Ibrahim Eesa, a native of Baghdad, to serve as an interpreter for U.S. troops from 2007 to 2009. He received refugee status a year later and arrived in San Antonio, where he now works as a medical support assistant at the Audie Murphy Veterans Affairs Hospital and belongs to the Texas National Guard.

I wanted to educate Americans about the Iraqi people, and I wanted to explain to Iraqis what the soldiers were doing so they would know what was happening in their neighborhoods, said Eesa, 29, who became a U.S. citizen four years ago. I wanted to be that connection.

Given that he risked his life on behalf of Americans in Iraq, Eesa finds Trumps harsh attitude toward Muslims at once insulting and frustrating.

I feel betrayed. Not by the American people; by the new president, he said. Muslims are tired of being labeled terrorists. We want the same things as everyone else: a safe life, jobs, a good economy.

Makes us go backward

The U.S. military invoked a Vietnam-era mantra of winning hearts and minds in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mike Allen served two tours in Iraq during a 20-year Army career, and he insisted that the perils of the mission remain unchanged under Trump.

Theres no way to make the job any more difficult, said Allen, 44, the coordinator of the Crossroads Area Veterans Center in Victoria. Terrorists are driven by ideology, not some silly policy the U.S. puts in place.

But Eddie Rodriguez, who deployed to Iraq with the Marines in 2007 as part of the troop surge that reversed the gains of insurgent groups, faulted Trump for further endangering American forces in combat zones.

Its easy for politicians to do this kind of thing because theyre not the ones who are shaking hands with the people who live in these countries, said Rodriguez, 30, a social worker and veterans advocate in San Antonio. The troops have to do that. What hes doing is contradicting everything weve been trying to do, and it feeds into the propaganda of radical terrorist groups.

Trumps blunt statements about Islam, as much as his executive order, stoke a perception of Americans as hostile toward Muslims. Navy veteran Jeff Hensley, who deployed to Iraq in 2006 as part of a civil affairs team, predicted the presidents tone will dissuade civilians there from aiding U.S. and Iraqi forces.

The biggest effect may be on the ordinary people who have been watching the war for years, said Hensley, 53, who runs an equine therapy program for veterans in Wylie. They may not become jihadists. But theyre definitely not going to trust us or work with us.

In addition to Iraq, Trumps executive order named Syria, Iran, Libya, Yemen, Somalia and Sudan. U.S. Rep. Will Hurd, R-San Antonio, a former undercover CIA officer assigned to the Middle East and South Asia, pointed out that American forces need the support of local populations to combat radical Islamist groups.

Trumps order makes us go backward, and it erodes trust, said Hurd, a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. And you need trust in your friends and allies, especially against a threat like Islamic terrorism.

Postings on pro-ISIS social media accounts in the wake of Trumps order called it a blessed ban and suggested it would bolster the groups recruiting. Paul Miller, associate director of the Clements Center for National Security at the University of Texas at Austin, noted the fallout could complicate U.S. intelligence gathering in the seven countries.

Virtually anything the U.S. does is twisted for jihadist propaganda, said Miller, a former Army and CIA intelligence analyst. In this case, the Trump administration made the jihadists job a little easier by announcing a poorly written and hastily developed policy with obvious and glaring flaws and rolling it out in an especially hack-handed way.

During his two tours, Almanza recalled, Iraqi troops withstood pressure from insurgent groups to shed their uniforms. He expects the coercion to intensify even if the travel ban remains suspended.

The soldiers we worked with got recruited by terrorist groups, but they did not turn, partly because they trusted us, he said. But now, al-Qaida and ISIS and other groups will come after them harder than ever. And if they go to the other side, then in a sense well have been training ISIS fighters.

mkuz@express-news.net

Twitter: @MartinKuz

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Iraq War veterans see Trump's travel ban as harmful to US, Iraqi troops - mySanAntonio.com