Photo: Aleppo — 6 June 2013 (AP From Aleppo Media Centre)

I spoke this morning with Monocle 24’s The Globalist on a wide range of Syrian issues, beginning with the unsupported “news” — spread by outlets from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights to the regime’s Al-Watan newspaper — of Syrian forces and Hezbollah gathering for an assault on insurgents in Aleppo.

Listen to discussion from 8:39 on The Globalist homepage or in a pop-out window

Knocking back that story led to analysis of the Assad regime’s political and military objectives in its propaganda, of a possible increase in foreign arms supplies for insurgents, and of the current thoughts within the Obama Administration.