New York, NY – In front of 35 members of the United Nations Correspondence Association (UNCA), Ambassador Dr. Bashar Jaafari of the Syrian Mission hosted a report-back, June 18, by five members of the U.S. delegation of election observers who had traveled to Damascus for the June 3 presidential elections. Included among the election observers were Joe Iosbaker of the Anti-War Committee-Chicago; Paul Larudee of the Syrian Solidarity Movement; Jane Stillwater, a freelance journalist; Scott Williams of the International Action Center and Judy Bello of New York’s Upstate Coalition to Ground the Drones and End the Wars. Both Bello and Iosbaker are also members of the administrative committee of the United National Antiwar Coalition.

In addition the statements from the delegation, Ambassador Jaafari also addressed the press. He began by lamenting the terrible relations between the U.S. government and Syria, noting that Washington closed its embassy in Damascus several years earlier. From his office at the UN, he noted, “I’m restricted to travel no further than 25 miles. I don’t know why.”

The American mainstream media, especially Fox News, were openly disrespectful of the ambassador. They questioned him about the humanitarian crisis in his country and the remaining 7% of chemical weapons stockpiles that had still to be destroyed.

In response, Jaafari told a story about Luxembourg and Australia’s ambassadors coming to him recently with an offer to help on the humanitarian issue. He proposed that they assist the relief effort for the U.S./NATO-sponsored war by providing wheelchairs. They said they would test the waters, and never came back to him. He remarked, “Speaking of improving the humanitarian situation in Syria is one thing; doing something about it is different.”

In the hallway after the session, the reporters were badgering the ambassador with questions about aligning Syria with the U.S. to oppose the Al Qaeda type group, ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and Syria), that has been at war with Syria for over a year and has now invaded Iraq. When one reporter returned to the issue again of disposing of the remaining chemical weapons in Syria, he answered, “We’ll destroy the remaining weapons when NATO stops arming the terrorists.”

About ISIS, Jaafari said, “It’s not ‘Who is ISIS?’ The issue is, who is behind ISIS, funding, training, helping them cross the border. The FOX News reporter responded aggressively, “Are you going to tell us?” To which the ambassador responded, “Who is backing ISIS? The backers are Saudi and Qatari, financed by Gulf petrodollars. There was a Youtube video of Sheikh Yusef Qurdawi, broadcast from Saudi Arabia. He says to the ISIS fighters, 'Guys, I won’t be able to sleep tonight unless you kill 300 Christians and 300 Alawites.””

Later that evening, Jaafari addressed a room packed with over 50 Syrian Americans and 25 anti-war activists, organized largely by the Syrian American Forum. In his remarks, he talked about the U.S. use of 'creative chaos.' “The objective is to get the Arab countries to deviate from their attention on the Israelis. This gives them time to kill the objective of the Palestinian state.”

Then he told a story that left jaws dropped throughout the room. Complaining about the degeneration of the UN as a body, he stated that Israel was nominated to be the vice chair of the Fourth Committee, and they won. “What is the Fourth Committee? The body that oversees the status of Palestine and the Golan Heights, among others. Israel will now chairing the UN meetings addressing the status of Palestine.”

Here is a video of the press conference:

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