The west and its allies cynically bleed Syria to weaken Iran

"That has coincided with talk of creating an Israeli buffer zone inside Syria,"
that's about as much into the fantastic as Seumas Milne goes this time, though everything he says is questionable in objectivity. The crux of his argument, they are all as bad as each other, is a lie. This was a peaceful revolution, which became an armed rebellion when the government starting shooting demonstrators a lot, and while Assad receives tonnes of Russian weaponry each week, the rebels get a little from the Gulf and nothing from the US. It is only the combination of naked brutality and the staying power of an inherently sectarian state that has got Assad this far, some rebalancing of the military struggle in favour of the Syrian people is the way to end the conflict.
"The consequences for Syria have been multiple massacres, ethnic cleansing, torture, a humanitarian crisis and the risk of the country's breakup. The longer the war, the greater the danger of a Yugoslavian-style fragmentation into sectarian and ethnic enclaves. The Assad regime bears responsibility for that, of course. But so do those who have funded and fuelled the war, bleeding Syria and weakening the Arab world in the process."