The world focuses on Gaza as bloodshed continues in Syria, Libya and Iraq

Arabic News Digest on the ongoing crises in Libya, Syria and Iraq from Ali Ibrahim (Asharq Al Awsat), Abdullah Jumaa Al Hajj (Al Ittihad) and Jasser Al Jasser (Al Hayat).

The mosque of the prophet Jirjis in central Mosul, Iraq, was destroyed on Sunday by Islamic State militants. Photo: AP

While the focus of the international community has shifted from other conflicts in the Arab world to the ongoing war in Gaza, Libya and Iraq are facing their own crises while the Syrian people live in the same state of uncertainty, with conflicts persisting in the country.

“After a period of absence, Gaza has resurfaced [in the news], as efforts persist to find a solution that will lead to a ceasefire agreement”, wrote Ali Ibrahim in the pan-Arab daily Asharq Al Awsat.

“In Libya, a new crisis has been building for a while and reached a peak so dangerous that countries have evacuated their diplomats and nationals. It could be described as the crumbling of a state where militias now have the upper hand, fiercely fighting in Tripoli as Libyans pay the price.

“Mosul and the province of Anbar are yet another model that reflects the fragmentation of a state which did not exercise sovereignty over a part of its territory.

“Syria is out of the spotlight, despite continuous fighting and bloodshed, with signs of fragmentation of the state with the loss of sovereignty over a big part of the remaining land.

“It is still one of the most dangerous crises in the region, with its impact on regional security. This is a climate conducive to the thriving of organisations such as the Islamic State, which do not have slogans of freedom and justice on their agenda. Those same slogans were present at the start of the Syrian revolution before it turned into an armed conflict,” he concluded.

Abdullah Jumaa Al Hajj wrote in the Abu Dhabi-based Al Ittihad, The National’s Arabic-language sister newspaper: “Amid this chaos, it seems as though the Syrian crisis will leave the country permanently and completely dismantled, similar to what is currently taking place in Iraq.

“Looking at Syria’s current social map, one can anticipate what will become the borders of future mini-states that will emerge from the heart of the current events,” he remarked.

The north east is home to the Kurdish minority. The land that extends from Damascus to the west and north is home to the Alawite minority that will always be close to Iran and Hizbollah for security and religious reasons, with the regime recently securing the area around Damascus by expelling Sunni rebels, to ensure its own mini-state, Al Hajj noted.

Other pieces of the puzzle seem to be forming, including villages inhabited by Sunnis. Some have a secular perception of Islam and others have a more radical view that they wish to see come true within the Islamic State, he explained.

This multiplicity of perspectives has led to clashes between Sunni moderates and extremists, while foreign fighters keep fuelling existing religious conflicts.

“No power can bring Syria back to the state that it was before the crisis,” he added.

“Similarly, the international community will not be able to succeed in its fight against terrorism or in dealing with the ambitions of expansionist states in the region.”

In the pan-Arab daily Al Hayat, Jasser Al Jasser notes that “over 12,000 children have died at the hands of the Syrian regime since March 2011.

They died of hypothermia, bombs and from poisonous gas and chemical weapons.

“The media did not count those children. There were no protests in the name of those children, crying over their innocence or denouncing the ugliness of the crimes they fell victims to,” he stressed.

“If this goes on, the Arab world will stand without children, even if more are born into this world, because barrels of explosives, mines, and tombs hunger for them.

“If children die, then what meaning will the future have?” he concluded.

Translated by Carla Mirza.