Last Friday a massacre was committed against Syrian civilians in the village of Houla in the governance of Homs. More than a hundred were killed including 49 children and 39 women.

UN Security Council meeting.

It was an awful, heinous crime against the Syrian people, and exactly the kind of event this newspaper has been warning would happen as a result of the continued militarization of the Syrian conflict from outside forces pushed by the West and its allies in the region. 

No one has yet been able to determine with concrete, credible evidence exactly who committed these  reprehensible acts, as detailed in the article on pages four and five. 

Despite that, western countries led by the U.S. were quick to place the blame directly on the Syrian government even before an investigation had been initiated by UN observers stationed in Syria to monitor and implement Kofi Annan’s peace plan. 

Almost simultaneously and in the same country, 11 Lebanese pilgrims who were returning to Lebanon from Iran were kidnapped right after their bus crossed the Turkish borders entering Syria. The kidnappers are from the Syrian opposition, which means they are financed and armed by the West, Turkey and their Arab allies. Turkish officials have been on and off negotiating with the kidnappers for the release of the hostages. So far, they are still being held and their fate is unknown. However, no one in the West or their Arab cronies or even the Syrian opposition leaders has condemned this brazen international act of piracy and lawlessness by the rebels. Not even a party has been accused of the crime. To the contrary, some have even attempted to justify the kidnapping citing the religious affiliation of the pilgrims who happen to be Shi’a Muslims, accusing them of belonging to Hizbullah on the basis of guilt by association. 

This among other factors proves that the western outcry over the Houla Massacre is not genuine but is instead used to enforce a long-running agenda by pressuring the Syrian government and destabilizing the country to achieve objectives of control and domination over the region while spreading chaos, fear and sectarian conflicts among its inhabitants.

The leaders in the West may fool most of their people with the false pretense that they care about human lives over money, power and control, especially when it comes to Arabs. 

But to most Arabs and others around the world who have been following the atrocities that have been committed by their client state Israel and Arab puppets in the last six decades against the people in the region, this western frenzy of meaningless condemnations is nothing but a tired old charade; a facade that hides a dirty, vicious political agenda. 

The U.S.’ continuous silence and even justifications of the long list of massacres committed by Israel are too many to recount. 

From Deir Yassin in Palestine to Sabra and Shatila and the twin Qana massacres in Lebanon, to the horrors of  white phosphorus bombs unleashed on civilians Gaza and cluster bombs that carpeted south Lebanon, to the shooting gallery disguised as a “war” in Operation Cast Lead, also in Gaza as detailed by the U.S.-rejected Goldstone Report, the opportunities to condemn similarly bad or worse massacres have been roundly passed up for political reasons despite international outrage in each case. 

Similar crimes have been repeatedly documented but the world has yet to hear a single condemnation or even criticism from the same leaders who are shedding crocodile tears over the heinous killings in Syria last week. 

That’s not to say a massacre like this should not be condemned in the strongest terms. But men, women and children were killed at point blank by the Israelis in Operation Cast Lead, as verified by the independent, internationally-respected judge Richard Goldstone, and U.S. leaders looked the other way.

In another cruel, hypocritical twist, the West continues to bribe Palestinian authorities to return to the negotiating table with the Israelis (who have repeatedly shown they’re not interested in peace by stealing more and more of what’s left of Palestine’s land) while also funding the Syrian opposition to reject negotiations in their country and to instead incite what will be a disastrous civil war to wrest control of their country from President Bashar al-Assad. 

Finally, to the Arabs who are financing and arming the Syrian opposition and cheering their brethren on toward killing each other while sowing deep seeds of hatred and division among all people in the region, the time will come, and it may be sooner than expected, when their country becomes the killing field and their people’s blood will be shed.

After all, the West has shown time and time again that all Arab citizens, and their leaders, are equally expendable to them.