Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad’s trip to Syria is more than a regular protocol visit.

This trip comes at a time when Syria is the target of propaganda attacks of the United States and other Western countries, while some regional Arab countries are trying to weaken Syria instead of supporting the strategic country.

The approval of UN resolutions 1559 and 1636, the accusation of Syrian involvement in the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri, and the exaggeration of the significance of former Syrian vice president Abdel Halim Khaddam’s defection to Paris are only part of the West’s attack on the country.

These provocations are meant to weaken Syria and force it to abandon its principled positions on the Palestinian issue and the Middle East in general and to facilitate efforts to make Israel the gendarme of the region.

Syria attained its rightful place in the region and joined the frontline of the resistance against the influence of Zionism after the late Hafiz Assad came to power in 1970.

The 1973 Middle East war, in which the myth of the invincibility of the Israeli army was shattered, broke out because Hafiz Assad decided to restore the lost dignity of the Arabs.

In the war, the Syrian army won some victories in the Golan Heights which Western analysts later called the miracle of the Arab world.

This humiliated the Israeli army, which had been regarded as invincible since the Six-Day War of 1967, and proved that if regional Arab states maintained unity, they could easily control Israel.

After this humiliating setback, Israel tried to establish a foothold in the region by igniting a civil war in Lebanon in 1975 through the machinations of Zionist agents.

In response and at the request of the leaders of the national parties of Lebanon, Hafiz Assad, who was aware of the conspiracies of the Zionist regime, dispatched troops to Lebanon to promote security.

During the nearly three decades of the Syrian military presence in Lebanon, the Syrian government did its best to restore tranquility to the Mediterranean country and as a result experienced many political problems.

When former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein launched a war against Iran in 1980, Hafiz Assad, who knew Saddam’s true nature, stood by Iran’s side.

He always called Iran the strategic extension of the Arab world and defended Iran’s regional and international stances in all Arab fora.

However, Syria’s support for Iran became intolerable for some Arab countries. Damascus was severely pressured to alter its pro-Iranian stance, but Hafiz Assad never agreed to abandon his principled positions in exchange for the financial incentives offered by regional Arab states.

Now that Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government is being attacked from all sides by the West, the Islamic Republic of Iran is standing by Syria, within the framework of its strategic relations with the country, and will not abandon its longtime ally.

Tehran, Damascus, and Beirut, as the invincible triangle of the region, will maintain their warm ties, and in light of the Israeli threats to the security of the Middle East, will not allow the Zionist regime, the U.S., and other Western countries to break one side of the triangle because the collapse of solidarity between Iran, Syria, and Lebanon would pave the way for Israel to become the sole power in the region.