Those of us who concern ourselves with the Syrian revolutionary war will be more than familiar with the old line, almost solely repeated by leftists and self-proclaimed anti-imperialists, that they simply just can’t support the Syrian rebels because they’re ‘supported by imperialism’. In its even more crude and directly antagonistic form, the narrative is that the rebels are ‘proxies of imperialism’ or stooges of forces that are deemed to be in the wrong ‘camp’, such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Qatar. The logic of this is inherently irrational and/or downright perfidious.
Firstly, it’s usually wielded not as any kind of genuinely analytical point, but rather merely as a means to deny support for and even just interest in the Syrian rebels and the revolution in general. It’s a position shaped by counter-revolution, Eurocentrism and isolationism rather than any form of progressivism. In different circumstances, this intercedes with sectarianism, different forms…
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GAB 