Luca Steinmann Talks about the Reasons Behind Silence of the Western World about Syria

Presenter: Western world has been mostly indifferent towards the situation in Syria. What do you think is the reason for that?

Luca Steinmann: Well, Western world is directly engaged in what happened in Syria. First of all, from the very beginning, Syria was seeing the influence of some Western powers coming inside this country and trying to influence what was happening. I am thinking of the role that France played and I am thinking of the role that the US played in trying to support those rebels that then were identified, in a second phase as terrorists. So this is not something new that I am saying, it is something that has been confirmed by the words of Donald Trump last week when he ordered to stop the training of the rebels inside Syria. But another reason for this silence of the West is that there were some actors, some foreign actors that played an important role in the Syrian conflict which are strongly linked to the Western main countries. For instance I was interviewing some people from the opposition in Syria that took part to the first manifestation, to the first demonstration that happened against the government, against the Syrian government in 2011. And if in a first moment, those demonstrations were really coming from the people that were asking for a change, then step by step after the very first days some external influence started to be part of them. And so people started to listen to slogans against Shia people, against Iran, against Hezbollah which were at that time not present on the Syrian ground. And so from the very beginning it was evident that there were external actors trying to use the rivalry, the conflictuality happening between the Shia world and the Sunni world in order to make this situation develop into a not a Syrian conflict, not a civil conflict but an international conflict which it is today.