This is CBSI on the world.

I'm John Batchel.

Bill Rajo, Foundation for the Defense of Democracy, senior fellow.

My colleague and co-host, and we welcome his colleague, Ahmad Sharawari, writing most recently

for the Long War Journal about the handshake between President Trump and a man who calls himself

the President of Syria, Al-Sharah, standing by smiling is the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia,

Mohammed bin Salman.

We begin with that handshake because there are questions to be answered all around Syria, engaged in civil

war at least since 2010. Assad is in Moscow. He's not dead. He's in Moscow with very powerful

friends who understand what it is to lose a country and take it back. Right now, we're interested

in what's in Syria, the man who presents himself

as president of what? Akhmata, very good evening to you. Thank you. I begin with setting the

landscape, the quick tour around Syria, where millions have fled.

I don't have a final number, but many living in Europe or in Turkey or in camps in Lebanon

and Jordan, very, very deracinated people who have been waiting years to return to their

native land.

But in Syria right now, confirmed the Turkish army to the north,

controlling access to Idlib province. To the west are elements of the Russian forces, either air

or naval, to the south, a very large deployment of Israeli defense forces on the Golan Heights, on Mount

Aramon, and patrolling or dominating deep into Syria, the so-called buffer zone.

To the east elements of the U.S. Army in conjunction with the Kurds, perhaps watching ISIS, perhaps watching Turkey.

That's a beginning of the major forces. So I'll pause there. Have I got all that right?

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