Syrian columnists have written that the U.S. and Israel were behind the March 29, 2010 Moscow subway bombings, and that the two countries hoped to reap political gains from them. They denied that Islamic elements were involved in masterminding the attacks.
Following are excerpts from the columns:
"[Washington] Hoped that this Terror Operation Would Pressure the Russian Leadership to Make Many Concessions"
Ibrahim Za'ir, columnist for the Syrian government daily Al-Thawra, stated that the U.S. had carried out the attacks with the aim of forcing Russia into making concessions to help resolve the crisis with Iran, and also to push Russia into signing the arms reduction treaty: "Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov declared that regional and international elements may have been behind the criminal operation that caused... the killing of 40 innocent civilians...
"Like the innocent victims of terror operations in Moscow, Dagestan, and other places in the world, the perpetrators of these operations also did not know the political goals of the operations [that they carried out]. [These perpetrators are] young men or women, in the full flower of their youth, who have been brainwashed with hatred and whose minds have been filled with elements of religious and ideological consciousness removed from the textual context of the books [holy to] the monotheistic religions – particularly [those] of the religion of Islam [i.e. the Koran] that bans the killing of innocents.
"But the planners of the terror operations know full well how to exploit the religion to accomplish their unique goals. It is they who are the most distant from Islam and its commandments... [The fact is that] the leader of the terror operations in the Caucasus, who was killed by Russian intelligence about a month before the recent Moscow operations, was... Sa'id Buryatsky, a Russian whose real name is Alexander Tikhomirov, who was connected to several foreign intelligence networks, particularly the American CIA.
"The U.S.'s condemnation of this does not mislead us. Many terror organizations have weapons and explosives... manufactured by the U.S. and Israel, sent to them via Georgia and other countries close to the U.S.
"Against this backdrop, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's trip to Venezuela to sign 30 agreements with President Hugo Chavez can be understood. Several U.S. and Western newspapers [saw these agreements] as Russia's response to Washington, and as an indirect accusation against it, vis-à-vis the two Moscow subway bombings... [Washington had] hoped that this terror operation would pressure the Russian leadership to make many concessions in all things regarding the signing of the Strategic Missile Arms Limitation Treaty – SALT II [sic][1] with Russia not demanding that the U.S. stop its missile defense project in Eastern Europe and change its position towards Iran, and [forcing] Russia to impose harsh sanctions on Iran [in accordance with Washington's wishes]...
"But Putin's visit to Caracas, the Venezuelan capital, constitutes a clear answer from Russia that it rejects America's dictates; perhaps the signing of the SALT 2 [treaty] will not work out as Washington wishes.
"Perhaps this is the misleading behavior that the U.S. regularly uses when it employs terrorism to obtain political goals... "[2]
"It Is Inconceivable that the Israeli Mossad Does Not Play an Active Part in Events Such as [the Moscow bombings]"
In another Al-Thawra column, Sa'id Muslim wrote that the Mossad had played a part in the Moscow attacks, and that he expected Russia to expose the Israeli connection:
"[Even if] the accusations, suspicions, and evidence point to the involvement of fundamentalist elements with Islamic beliefs and affiliations, it is inconceivable that the Israeli Mossad does not play an active part in events such as [the Moscow bombings].
"The Russian authorities... must expose the ones behind the [terror] perpetrators, and how they are carried out, in order to clarify the Israeli connections and strings. [Such a revelation] will lead to proof of the connection... between the hidden goals [of these operations] and the Israeli agenda.
"I do not believe that the Russian leadership, with its expertise, qualifications, shrewdness, and caution, will fail to draw [conclusions] of this type. It doesn't require extraordinary inventiveness."[3]
