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In this mailing:
* Con Coughlin: Is Trump Being Bamboozled?: Islamic State Terrorists Threaten Comeback Thanks to His Support for Syria's Islamist Leader
* Amir Taheri: National Sovereignty: A Principle Under Attack


** Is Trump Being Bamboozled?: Islamic State Terrorists Threaten Comeback Thanks to His Support for Syria's Islamist Leader ([link removed])
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by Con Coughlin • February 1, 2026 at 5:00 am
* Trump's attempts to improve ties with both Turkey and Saudi Arabia brought about the US lending its endorsement to al-Sharaa's Islamist regime in Damascus. The result is that al-Sharaa has now set about, at the very least, failing to prevent (here, here and here) wholesale attempts, apparently by his own government's security forces, to slaughter Syria's religious and ethnic minorities: Druze, Alawites and Kurds, including America's presumed allies, the Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces Army (SDF), who courageously defeated Syria's Islamic State terrorists.
* Syria's Christians may well be the al-Sharaa government's next target.
* Trump's willingness to give his backing to al-Sharaa is said to be the result of his attempts to deepen ties with Middle East states such as Qatar, Turkey and Saudi Arabia which, for different reasons, appear keen to see an Islamist government in power in Damascus -- as elsewhere. For Qatar and Turkey, supporting al-Sharaa fits in with their long-established policy of backing radical Islamist groups, such as the Muslim Brotherhood, while the Saudis' backing for the new Syrian regime is based on their desire to prevent Iran's ayatollahs from re-establishing a foothold in a country, Syria, that was once Tehran's closest regional ally.
* If the US ever does pull its troops from Syria, the vacuum will most assuredly be filled instantly by Turkey and other Jihadists, as well as by Russia again and possibly China.
* The US president could find himself facing an extremely difficult predicament, especially during midterm elections, if, as a result of his support for Syria's Islamist leader, more Americans and others are killed or suffer serious injury at the hands of al-Sharaa's government, IS terrorists who have escaped from Syrian prisons, as well as al-Sharaa's apparent commitment to ethnically cleanse, then Islamise, Syria.

US President Donald Trump's campaign to prevent Islamic State (IS) terrorists from staging a comeback is in serious danger of being undermined because of his support for Syria's Islamist "interim" president, Ahmed al-Sharaa. Pictured: Trump hosts al-Sharaa at the White House on November 10, 2025. (Image source: Donald Trump/Truth Social/Wikimedia Commons)

US President Donald Trump's campaign to prevent Islamic State (IS) terrorists from staging a comeback is in serious danger of being undermined because of his support for Syria's Islamist "interim" president, Ahmed al-Sharaa.

It was not that long ago that al-Sharaa had a $10 million bounty on his head after Washington designated him a terrorist for his close links to al-Qaeda in both Iraq and Syria.

The bounty was subsequently lifted after al-Sharaa, with significant military backing from Turkey, succeeded in overthrowing the Baathist dictatorship of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in late 2024.

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** National Sovereignty: A Principle Under Attack ([link removed])
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by Amir Taheri • February 1, 2026 at 4:00 am
* What is clearly a political opinion is redefined as a crime, and the French nation, supposedly sovereign and in charge of its own destiny, shouldn't be allowed to decide who to vote for. Worse still, denying [Marine] Le Pen the right to stand for any elected office for five years came into effect upon her March 2025 conviction, even before her appeal has been decided.
* The dictatorship of the judges claimed another victim in 2025, former President Nicolas Sarkozy, who was sent to jail on charges that the court itself admitted it couldn't prove but insisted that the intent to commit them was there.
* In other words, even the mere intention of committing a crime together with others could send you to jail and make you ineligible for office, even before a final appeal is heard.
* The world order shaped after World War II is clearly shaken, both inside many countries and across the globe, with the seemingly endless Ukraine war, a clear case of trying to efface a nation's sovereignty by force.
* Redefining national sovereignty won't be enough. We also need to be clear about the consequences of violating it, either by segments within a society or by outside powers.

What is clearly a political opinion is redefined as a crime, and the French nation, supposedly sovereign and in charge of its own destiny, shouldn't be allowed to decide who to vote for. Worse still, denying Marine Le Pen the right to stand for any elected office for five years came into effect upon her March 2025 conviction, even before her appeal has been decided. Pictured: Le Pen after delivering a speech during a campaign event in Marseille, France on January 16, 2026. (Photo by Miguel Medina/AFP via Getty Images)

National sovereignty is a phrase that, before President Donald Trump brought it into question with headline-grabbing shenanigans on Venezuela, Iran and Greenland, among other places, was seldom heard outside political science classrooms.

Now, however, it is at the center of debates about international law, the future world order, and the need for peace and stability. The concept is under attack not only from Trump but also from elements within many societies, including some Western democracies.

But before we examine those threats, let us remember what sovereignty means. It means a power or an authority that has the final word on all human affairs and, in the case of some religions, the fate of the universe as a whole. In the ancient world, that is to say in the early Mesopotamian civilizations, priest-king figures represented sovereignty.

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