Oh Syria the victory is coming

format_quote Originally Posted by Junon

Salaam

Another update

Idlib Rebel Civil War – 26/2/18

In a sudden and overwhelming push, Harakat Nour al-Din al-Zinki and Free Syrian Army forces captured eight villages south of Afrin, pushing Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham out of the region entirely (except for the heavily-occupied Anadan plain). The captured villages include Atmeh, Qah, Salwa, Deir Simeon, Darat Izza, Kafr Tin, Busratun, and Tuqad. The unexpectedness and sheer size of this advance, along with the sudden capture of the major town Darat Izza, indicates that Turkey was involved, likely by providing military direction and logistical support.

Turkey has good reason to back this move. Because of this latest advance, the Turkish Armed Forces can now lay claim to an extensive base of support inside Syria west of Aleppo. No longer while Turkey be forced to smuggle weapons to rebel groups far away through narrow corridors in order to expand its influence and defeat HTS. From this pocket, Turkey can now coordinate and stage attacks against YPG in Afrin in the rear, while simultaneously clearing HTS from more areas in Aleppo.

https://syrianwardaily.wordpress.com...l-war-26-2-18/

This is nothing more than a wakeup call for HTS their cooperation with the pawns of Turkey like Ahrar and others was a ticking time bomb from the beginning

May Allah (AWJ) unite those who are sincere and righteous

format_quote Originally Posted by Junon

Salaam

Another update

Negotiations continue between rebels and the Syrian Army, but the bombardment of Ghouta won't stop any time soon

Exclusive: Ghouta will fall. That is the message. And when it falls, Idlib must surely be next. And then the Syrians must decide how to break the US-Kurdish hold on Raqqa

Syria continues to mass its armed forces around the east Ghouta enclave of Damascus, including army units commanded by President Bashar al-Assad’s brother Maher and by Colonel Soheil Hassan, the “Tiger” whose military victories across the country have made him legendary among Assad’s supporters.

Instead of moving by night - the traditional tactic adopted by the army in the war - vast quantities of Syrian armour have been humming along the highways to the capital in broad daylight from Aleppo and Homs in the north, from Deraa in the south, and from the countryside of Damascus itself. The Syrian authorities want them to be seen, to show the Islamist rebels of Ghouta know how their battle will end.

Despite Russia’s veto at the UN on Thursday night, however, negotiations have continued between three rebel groups and the Syrian army - under the direct mediation of the Russians - to establish “humanitarian corridors” and “escape routes” for the tens of thousands of civilians trapped inside Ghouta, the vast area of suburban slums and farmland held by Islamist and other rebel groups since 2013. Almost identical talks took place between Islamists and the government over eastern Aleppo before its fall in December 2016. Bloodshed and negotiations have long been a feature of the Syrian war.

But despite all the West’s rhetoric - and the UN’s constant refrain that the civilians of eastern Ghouta are experiencing “hell on earth” - the massive Syrian and Russian bombardment is going to continue. The Islamist Nusrah faction, the “child” of al-Qaeda of 9/11 infamy, appears to be more reluctant to surrender to the Syrians - even if allowed to leave with its light weapons - than Saudi Arabia’s favourite militia, the Jaish al-Islam, or Qatar’s proxy “Rahman Legion”. There are even suggestions that the Saudi and Qatari supported factions are arguing with each other - even now, inside Ghouta - about the Gulf dispute between the Saudis and Qataris.

There appears to be no such disunity among their enemies. The Presidential Guard is on the edge of Ghouta, and the Syrians have brought their 14th Division (Special Forces) to the suburbs. Maher Assad’s 4th Armoured Division, based in Damascus, is positioned on the perimeter, as is the military’s 7th Division, and troops belonging to units commanded by Colonel “Tiger” Soheil Hassan.

Given the multitude of army regiments around Ghouta, Hassan cannot be the overall commander, a post which remains diplomatically undefined. But the convoys of tanks, armoured vehicles, field guns and trucks pouring in daylight towards Damascus – and enthusiastically captured on film by government photographers – is meant to be seen.

Ghouta will fall. That is the message. From within the Syrian military, there are attempts to explain the ruthlessness of the assault. Thousands of soldiers have been killed in the battles around Ghouta since 2013; vast military “resources” – the word the army uses – have been poured into this battle over the years. Most of the car bomb attacks in Damascus and the constant shelling across the centre of the capital for the past four years have come from Islamist forces in Ghouta, especially from the Douma district. Of course, there are the usual explanations from artillery officers: of “surgical” strikes, of rebels hiding in hospitals and using civilians as “human shields”; but these are words the world has heard before – from the Americans about Mosul and Afghanistan, from the Israelis about Gaza, and the Russians about Chechnya.

And pictures, as usual, speak louder than words. While the footage from eastern Ghouta pointedly fails to show the armed Islamists who are fighting in the enclave, there is no reason to doubt the suffering of the civilians. And some of these civilians, it should be remembered, will inevitably be relatives of the very Syrian soldiers who are planning to storm Ghouta; there were many Syrian military personnel who captured eastern Aleppo in 2016 whose own families also lived there.

But Ghouta is experiencing a different sort of siege, one that has no precedent in size during this war. “Shock and awe” – or shock and terror – is what Syria’s enemies are supposed to experience. The Russian and Syrian air attacks are proof of that. Even if maps look simple on television screens, wars are infinitely more chaotic. Think of the effect of a brick hitting the windscreen of a car, of the dozens of fractures across the glass; that is what Syrian military maps look like.

It is now being said that if the first Syrian advance into Ghouta moves against areas controlled by al-Nusrah, it means that the al-Qaeda fighters are being more stubborn in the negotiations than the other two major groups. They will suffer first, along with the civilians of course. This is the inevitable lesson of this terrifying war. The Syrians, along with Iraqi militias and Hezbollah, do indeed have plans for the overrunning of rebel-held Ghouta. And after this demonstration of firepower, how could the Syrians and Russians stop now? If they did, who would believe the message of the next siege? In northwestern Idlib, for example. Or in the towns around it.

And so, when Ghouta falls, Idlib must surely be next. And then the Syrians must decide how to break the US-Kurdish hold on Raqqa – perhaps that is one reason why pro-Syrian forces have now gone to the rescue of the Kurds in the northern province of Afrin, to drive a further wedge between the Turks and the Americans, and force Washington to abandon its Kurdish allies on the Euphrates.

It is painful to remember how these huge landscapes of river and desert and mountainside lived in peace for a century – their societies straitjacketed, of course, and without justice – before the bloodbath. Ghouta receives the waters of five rivers, and the 1912 French edition of Baedeker’s travel handbook to “Syria and Palestine” describes how the tributaries flowing into the sands to the east conferred upon Ghouta the name of “Lakes of the Prairies”. But that was the old Syria.

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/...-a8224701.html

What's pathetic is those in the UN like France, Germany, and others they don't care about Ghouta they don't care about the siege in fact they love this and notice how around this same time the situation in Idlib and the operation in Afrin. These are carefully calculated political moves to not only allow Assad to be victorious but to also partition Syria between a Shia South and West run by Hezbollah, Iran, and Alawites to please Russia whilst the North and East are given to the despicable Atheist Communist Kurds to please their backers in Europe.

The goal is remove every faction in the region conflicting with the interests of foreign interventionalists as well as securing precious resources like petroleum and they have succeeded. They know how to play the game they played it well in Syria especially Russia the Mongol horde of today in collaboration with their Safawi puppet and their devil proxies of hellfire like HezbulShaytan. These powers of the modern world know when to play humanitarian and when to play the role liberator.

Where was the "Emergency Appeal" for Mosul and the people of Iraq? Where was the United Nations and their pathetic "Security" council for Iraq? I'll tell you they ordered the destruction of Iraq and they planned step by the step the victory for the Rafidha death squads.

When the situation in Ghouta is "resolved" by the "Peace Makers" Allah warned us of in Surah Al-Baqarah and the groups there surrender like Jaysh al-"Islam" and the criminals in the Nour ad-Din group surrender and Assad seizes more land and the Rafidhas being besieged right now get to live in peace while the Sunnis being besieged just get assigned a different death date don't ask why this happened, because it is simple the deviant Turks lead by Erdogan and his deviant proxies they are nothing but arrogant warlords too blind to care about Islam and its people, if they knew any better they would know Victory is From Allah.

Victory is from Allah in patience and steadfastness not the United Nations of failure.

format_quote Originally Posted by Junon

Salaam

Another debate. Peter Lavelle is a little overenthusiastic in this debate, but worth a listen.

Why are you posting videos from RussiasTrash? Why is it you post so much Safawi/Russian propaganda

Salaam

format_quote Originally Posted by JustTime

Why are you posting videos from RussiasTrash? Why is it you post so much Safawi/Russian propaganda

Brother I appreciate your viewpoint but the world doesn't revolve around our various viewpoints. I'm not naive about RT but we need to get all perspectives.

Another update, I can believe this.

The US is protecting ISIS to weaken rivals, expand US occupation of Syria

The dominant view of the US-led coalition against the Islamic State (ISIS), Operation Inherent Resolve, is that its fundamental goal is the defeat of ISIS. And so, in the wake of the routing of ISIS from Iraq and Syria, the core justification for an ongoing US military presence in Syria is ensuring that no post-mortem ISIS insurgency arises.

That the US is unequivocally opposed to ISIS is simply taken for granted.

Yet a closer look at the history of US involvement shows that counterterrorism has been a lesser concern relative to geopolitical and strategic goals. Whenever the goals of expanding territorial control or weakening rivals conflicts with the goal of opposing ISIS, the entity was either ignored or even empowered in pursuit of these more paramount concerns. In some ways, by providing a pretext for extended military operations on foreign soil, and by helping to diminish the military might of the Syrian regime and its allies, some coalition officials have seen the Islamic State as a potentially beneficial phenomenon to the wider ends of weakening the Syrian state and opposing Iranian influence in the Levant.

Leveraging the Caliphate

In 2015, ISIS executed an unprecedented advance in Syria.

Audio leaks would later surface of then Secretary of State John Kerry explaining that the Obama administration saw this expansion as beneficial to the US position. Seeing that this could be used to pressure Assad, the threat of state-collapse was something to be “watched” and “managed,” rather than deterred. “We were watching,” Kerry said:

“… and we know that this was growing… We saw that Daesh was growing in strength, and we thought Assad was threatened. We thought, however, we could probably manage — that Assad would then negotiate.”

Yet this was not simply a case of exploiting events that were entirely out of control. At this time, Obama’s regional allies had been conducting major influxes of support to jihadist factions among the rebels, including ISIS, for years in their bid to oust Assad. US intelligence oversaw and was well aware of these policies. As Kerry’s observations suggest, the motive was that with “Daesh growing in strength”, the US military would be able to “manage” this development while the expansion of ISIS would mean that “Assad would then negotiate.”

This all changed when Russia, in response to the expanding ISIS movement, intervened. With Russia in the game, regime-change looked like an increasingly dwindling prospect.

Awkwardly, Russia was “carrying out more sorties in a day in Syria than the US-led coalition has done in a month,” while also targeting ISIS oil tankers, something the US-led coalition was reluctant to do — to the point that large convoys of oil trucks carrying ISIS oil were able to operate efficiently and in broad daylight.

The embarrassing contradictions of the “anti-ISIS” campaign were becoming difficult to explain away. Instead of being “degraded” or “destroyed”, ISIS was actually expanding during the bulk of the anti-ISIS campaign.

Durham University’s Dr. Christopher Davidson, one of the world’s leading scholars in Middle East affairs, has explained that:

“… the Islamic State was effectively on the same side as the West, especially in Syria, and in all its other warzones was certainly in the same camp as the West’s regional allies.”

Moreover, “on a strategic level, its big gains had made it by far the best battlefield asset to those who sought the permanent dismemberment of Syria and the removal of [the Iran-leaning] Nouri Maliki in Iraq.”

Therefore, the trick for the West was “trying to find the right balance between being seen to take action but yet still allowing the Islamic State to prosper.” Citing a prophetic 2008 RAND Corporation report, Davidson explains that the “illusory campaign that would eventually need to be waged against the Islamic State” would therefore mainly consist of “the establishment of certain red lines” along a “contain and react approach.” This would “involve deploying perimeters around areas where there are concentrations of transnational jihadists,” while making sure to limit any action to only “periodically launching air/missile strikes against high-value targets.”

In other words, Russia’s intervention essentially called Washington’s bluff. Seeing this, and also seeing Syria increasingly in a position to reclaim those territories that ISIS had been so effective at denying them, it appeared that it was time to start getting serious about putting an end to the Caliphate.

https://medium.com/insurge-intelligence/the-us-is-protecting-isis-to-weaken-rivals-expand-us-occupation-of-syria-f7b3e7d01d0d

format_quote Originally Posted by Junon

Salaam



Brother I appreciate your viewpoint but the world doesn't revolve around our various viewpoints. I'm not naive about RT but we need to get all perspectives.

Another update, I can believe this.

The US is protecting ISIS to weaken rivals, expand US occupation of Syria

The dominant view of the US-led coalition against the Islamic State (ISIS), Operation Inherent Resolve, is that its fundamental goal is the defeat of ISIS. And so, in the wake of the routing of ISIS from Iraq and Syria, the core justification for an ongoing US military presence in Syria is ensuring that no post-mortem ISIS insurgency arises.

That the US is unequivocally opposed to ISIS is simply taken for granted.

Yet a closer look at the history of US involvement shows that counterterrorism has been a lesser concern relative to geopolitical and strategic goals. Whenever the goals of expanding territorial control or weakening rivals conflicts with the goal of opposing ISIS, the entity was either ignored or even empowered in pursuit of these more paramount concerns. In some ways, by providing a pretext for extended military operations on foreign soil, and by helping to diminish the military might of the Syrian regime and its allies, some coalition officials have seen the Islamic State as a potentially beneficial phenomenon to the wider ends of weakening the Syrian state and opposing Iranian influence in the Levant.

Leveraging the Caliphate

In 2015, ISIS executed an unprecedented advance in Syria.

Audio leaks would later surface of then Secretary of State John Kerry explaining that the Obama administration saw this expansion as beneficial to the US position. Seeing that this could be used to pressure Assad, the threat of state-collapse was something to be “watched” and “managed,” rather than deterred. “We were watching,” Kerry said:

“… and we know that this was growing… We saw that Daesh was growing in strength, and we thought Assad was threatened. We thought, however, we could probably manage — that Assad would then negotiate.”

Yet this was not simply a case of exploiting events that were entirely out of control. At this time, Obama’s regional allies had been conducting major influxes of support to jihadist factions among the rebels, including ISIS, for years in their bid to oust Assad. US intelligence oversaw and was well aware of these policies. As Kerry’s observations suggest, the motive was that with “Daesh growing in strength”, the US military would be able to “manage” this development while the expansion of ISIS would mean that “Assad would then negotiate.”

This all changed when Russia, in response to the expanding ISIS movement, intervened. With Russia in the game, regime-change looked like an increasingly dwindling prospect.

Awkwardly, Russia was “carrying out more sorties in a day in Syria than the US-led coalition has done in a month,” while also targeting ISIS oil tankers, something the US-led coalition was reluctant to do — to the point that large convoys of oil trucks carrying ISIS oil were able to operate efficiently and in broad daylight.

The embarrassing contradictions of the “anti-ISIS” campaign were becoming difficult to explain away. Instead of being “degraded” or “destroyed”, ISIS was actually expanding during the bulk of the anti-ISIS campaign.

Durham University’s Dr. Christopher Davidson, one of the world’s leading scholars in Middle East affairs, has explained that:

“… the Islamic State was effectively on the same side as the West, especially in Syria, and in all its other warzones was certainly in the same camp as the West’s regional allies.”

Moreover, “on a strategic level, its big gains had made it by far the best battlefield asset to those who sought the permanent dismemberment of Syria and the removal of [the Iran-leaning] Nouri Maliki in Iraq.”

Therefore, the trick for the West was “trying to find the right balance between being seen to take action but yet still allowing the Islamic State to prosper.” Citing a prophetic 2008 RAND Corporation report, Davidson explains that the “illusory campaign that would eventually need to be waged against the Islamic State” would therefore mainly consist of “the establishment of certain red lines” along a “contain and react approach.” This would “involve deploying perimeters around areas where there are concentrations of transnational jihadists,” while making sure to limit any action to only “periodically launching air/missile strikes against high-value targets.”

In other words, Russia’s intervention essentially called Washington’s bluff. Seeing this, and also seeing Syria increasingly in a position to reclaim those territories that ISIS had been so effective at denying them, it appeared that it was time to start getting serious about putting an end to the Caliphate.

https://medium.com/insurge-intellige...a-f7b3e7d01d0d

"Other Perspectives" are all fine except when they actually are other perspectives and not reiterations of the same propaganda just with different logos.

Salaam

Another update, Views on rebel infighting.

Salaam

Another update

Syria: US-backed Kurds brace for dramatic escalation of Turkish invasion that could be bloodier than Aleppo, Raqqa or Eastern Ghouta

The wars in Syria: Kurdish fighters are streaming in their thousands from the front line with Isis to stand up to Erdogan's forces. But given their six years' battle experience against a fanatical enemy, Turkey is unlikely to beat the YPG on the ground

In a field beside an abandoned railway station close to the Turkish border in northern Syria, Kurdish fighters are retraining to withstand Turkish air strikes. “We acted like a regular army when we were fighting Daesh [Isis] with US air support,” says Rojvan, a veteran Kurdish commander of the People’s Protection Units (YPG). “But now it is us who may be under Turkish air attack and we will have to behave more like guerrillas.”

Rojvan and his brigade have just returned from 45 days fighting Isis in Deir Ezzor province in eastern Syria and are waiting orders which may redeploy them to face the Turkish army that invaded the Kurdish enclave of Afrin on 20 January. Rojvan says that “we are mainly armed with light weapons like the Kalashnikov, RPG [rocket propelled grenade launcher] and light machine guns, but we will be resisting tanks and aircraft”. He makes clear that, whatever happened, they would fight to the end.

Kurdish and allied Arab units are streaming north from the front to the east of the Euphrates, where Isis is beginning to counter-attack, in order to stop the Turkish advance. Some 1,700 Arab militia left the area for Afrin on Tuesday and Turkey is demanding that the US stop them. The invasion is now in its seventh week and Rojvan and his fighters take some comfort in the fact that it is moving so slowly. But the Turkish strategy has been to take rural areas before mowing methodically to surround and besiege Afrin City and residential areas.

The big battles in Afrin are still to come and are likely to be as destructive and bloody as anything seen in Eastern Ghouta, Raqqa or East Aleppo. YPG fighters have battle experience stretching back to at least 2012, much of its gained against fanatical opponents like Isis. The likelihood is that, as in Ghouta, the Turkish generals will seek to avoid the heavy losses inevitable in street fighting and pound Afrin into ruins with air strikes and artillery fire. Civilian casualties are bound to be horrendous.

The Syrian Kurds believe they are facing an existential threat. They believe Turkey wants to eliminate not just the enclave of Afrin, but the 25 per cent of Syria that the Kurds have taken with US backing since 2015. Some think that defeat will mean the ethnic cleansing of Kurds from Afrin, which has traditionally been one of their core majority areas. They cite a speech by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made the day after the start of the invasion started, claiming that “55 per cent of Afrin is Arab, 35 per cent are the Kurds ... and about 7 per cent are Turkmen. [We aim] to give Afrin back to its rightful owners.” There is a suspicion among Kurdish leaders that Erdogan plans to create a Sunni bloc of territory north and west of Aleppo which will be under direct or indirect Turkish control.

The Kurdish leaders are convinced that Erdogan is determined to destroy their de facto state in the long run, but differ about the timing and objectives of the present attack. Elham Ahmad, the co-president of the Syrian Democratic Council that helps administer the Kurdish-held area, believes that the Turkish assault on Afrin, if successful, will set “a precedent for a further Turkish military advance”.

Ahmad had just returned from Afrin where she was born and where her family still lives. “Our convoy of 150 civilian cars was hit by a Turkish air strike,” she said. “We ran away from the cars, but 30 of them were destroyed and one person killed.” She is angry that the outside world is exclusively preoccupied with the bombardment of Eastern Ghouta by President Bashar al-Assad’s forces, but ignores similar bombing and shelling in Afrin where, she says, 204 civilians had been killed, including 61 children, as of last weekend.

She expects that the next Turkish target, if its so-called Operation Olive Branch succeeds in Afrin, will be the Arab city of Manbij that was taken by the YPG in 2016. Strategically placed on the main road from Aleppo to the Kurdish heartlands, with a diversion where part of the highway is held by Turkish forces, it is a prosperous looking place full of shops crammed with goods and produce. Local rumour has it that one small shop recently changed hands for $1m (£720,000). It is the main supply line to the Kurdish zone, the highway crowded with oil tankers bringing crude oil from Kurdish-held oilfields far to the east to the Syrian government refinery at Homs.

If local people are nervous about the prospect of being submerged by the impending battle for northern Syria, they are not showing it. After being occupied by Isis and besieged by the YPG, they have strong nerves. They may also reflect that, if war is coming to their city and its 300,000 people, there is not a lot they can do to avert it. The main reason they might feel secure is a US pledge to defend their city against a Turkish attack, a promise backed up by regular and highly visible patrols of five or six US armoured vehicles carrying large Stars and Stripes. But the US willingness to confront its Nato partner Turkey is nuanced, particularly since Isis was defeated last year, though the movement is not entirely dead.

There is a sense of phoney war on the front line between the forces of the Manbij Military Council and the Turkish army and its allied anti-Assad militias, who are dug in three or four miles north of the city. Most of the front lines in the Syrian civil war are a depressing scene of abandoned and half-wrecked buildings, even when there is no fighting going on. The Manbij front is idyllic by comparison, though just how long it will stay that way is another question.

This is a fertile heavily populated country with a Mediterranean feel to it, its hills and small fields full of olive trees, pines, poplars and almond trees which are covered in little white flowers. There are tractors on the roads and, just behind the front, we drove through the Arab village of Dadat, whose streets full of cheerful-looking children excited by the sight of military vehicles.

A trench and rampart gauged out the hillside by bulldozers zigzags upwards through a green field to a fortified position on a hilltop. Peering through gun slits in a sandbagged post on top of an earth bank, one could see Turkish positions not far away on the far side of the Sajur river. “They have tanks and artillery on every hilltop and they fire randomly with heavy machine guns every night,” says Farhat Kobani, a local commander whose orders come from the Manbij Military Council. The Turkish army is backed up by Ahrar al-Sham, a militant Islamist movement long allied to Turkey, whose men act as auxiliaries.

These exchanges of fire do not seem very serious because everybody, at least in day time, is standing upright in easy range of the other side and Farhat says his men have not suffered any dead or wounded. Phoney war is often derided, but there is a lot to be said for it when compared to the real thing – and, unfortunately, that may not be too far away.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/syria-latest-news-turkish-invasion-escalation-us-allied-forces-bloodier-eastern-ghouta-aleppo-raqqa-a8243981.html

format_quote Originally Posted by Yahya.

Violence is not the solution when it comes to suppressing wrong ideas among Muslims. Even when the leaders of such groups you have described have unislamic ideas, their basic soldiers; those who will die in such a conflict, are Muslims, even if not appropriately educated. And to my view posts like this lead to an insular polarization between factions. In my opinion we should just leave it to the scholars on ground to discuss and speak about such critical matters. Allah knows best.

There needs to be polarization, I agree many are sincere and that's why I said pray for them but those who aren't and continue fighting out of zeal for corrupt ideals need to be removed. This is no different than the wars of Ridda many left Islam and fought for separate ideals some even continued calling themselves Muslim others made new Prophets like Musaylimah who taught a religion similar to Islam and even revered the Prophet (SAAWS) yet they were fought.

Likewise in Syria there are groups with leaders who intend on doing very evil things and if not stopped early it could become dangerous.

Salaam

Update situation in Ghouta.

format_quote Originally Posted by Junon

Salaam

Another update

Did UAE and Saudi Play Role in Assassination of Syrian Opposition Leaders?

According to information divulged by Abu Ali, who served in the Islamic Front for two years between 2014- 2016, the UAE played a role in the assassinations of Syrian opposition leaders, According to Yeni Safak Turkish Newspaper.

The UAE is said to be behind a wave of assassinations that targeted the most prominent anti-U.S. Syrian opposition leaders between 2014- 2015, which paved the way for Daesh and Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) terrorists to advance in opposition-held territories.

After obtaining information about the whereabouts of the opposition leaders via its intelligence services, the UAE then passed on these tips to the Assad regime which carried out attacks that killed Jaysh al-Islam commander Zahran Alloush, Ahrar Al-Sham leader Hassan Abboud and 45 high-ranking group members, according to Abu Ali, a member of the opposition group.

An attack that killed all leaders of Ahrar Al-Sham

Zahran Alloush, who was the leader of one of the biggest opposition groups in Syria, Jaysh al-Islam, was martyred on Dec. 25, 2015, following an airstrike on Eastern Ghouta.

Ahrar al-Sham leader Hasan Abboud was martyred along with 45 high-ranking members of the prominent opposition groups following a chemical attack that targeted a meeting in their Idlib headquarters on Sept. 9, 2014.

According to information divulged by Abu Ali, who served in the Islamic Front for two years between 2014- 2016, the UAE played a role in these assassinations, betraying Syria’s opposition with help from Saudi intelligence.

Saudi role

Abu Ali stressed that Saudi Arabia initially played a crucial role in supporting the opposition against the Assad regime through a Saudi intelligence colonel named Abul Kassim who assumed an influential position during that stage.

“Commander Alloush’s only communication device was a satellite phone that was given to him by the Saudis, who used it to track his movements before the attack that killed him was carried out,” said Abu Ali.

“Following investigations carried out after the attack, it was revealed that UAE first pinpointed his position and then UAE Foreign Minister Abdullah Zayed tipped Bashar Assad’s brother Maher Al-Assad about his whereabouts,” he continued.

“We also know that Muhammed Bin Zayed and his brother Abdullah played a role in the 2014 massacre of the Ahrar Al-Sham Emir Hassan Abboud and 45 of his friends,” concluded Abu Ali.

Israel knew of the attack

“Since 2015, we began to understand more clearly that some groups that were our allies during the war had a different goal.

“After 2015, we also saw that some of the information we shared with some of our allies had reached Israel. We learned that information shared with us about the location of Alloush, among other confidential topics, had also reached Israel.

“After the assassination, the cooperation between Israel, UAE, Russia and the Assad regime in the killing of Alloush became clear,” pointed out Abu Ali.

https://www.middleeastobserver.org/2...ition-leaders/

Salaam

Related

Anti-HTS offensive in northern Syria

Jabhat al-Nusra was part of the loose alliance of armed factions that took over Idlib city and the province in the spring of 2015. Its influence over the province steadily grew at the expense of other factions and despite frequent civilian protests against their oppressive presence and human rights violations.

In July 2016, Jabhat al-Nusra announced its split from al-Qaeda in Syria and changed its name to Fateh al-Sham. The move came three years after a large number of its fighters broke off from its ranks to join what came to be known as ISIL, which also rejected al-Qaeda's authority.

"That [move] back then was dismissed as a publicity stunt. If you look at the details, you realise that this was more than just a PR move," said Heiko Wimmen, a project director at the Brussels-based research organisation International Crisis Group. According to him, since the summer of 2016, the armed group has sought to reinvent itself as a nationalist armed group movement, giving less priority to international movement.

"This doesn't mean that they have become nicer people. It means [different] tactics, ideology and leadership," said Wimmen.

In mid-January 2017, what was still called Jabhat Fateh al-Sham attacked positions of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) and a number of other smaller armed groups in Idlib province, entering a standoff with Ahrar al-Sham, one of the largest Islamist factions in the region, which was also included on Moscow's "moderate opposition" list.

As a result of the tensions, smaller factions sought protection from Ahrar al-Sham, while others joined Fatah al-Sham, which changed its name to Hay'et Tahrir al-Sham. In July 2017, tensions between the two large armed groups escalated again, and HTS attacked Ahrar al-Sham and its allies, which withdrew after week-long clashes allowing their adversary to dominate Idlib province.

In November 2017, the HTS formed the Syrian Salvation Government, which in December issued an ultimatum to the Syrian Interim Government of the Turkey-based Syrian opposition to cease all operations in the province. In early January, Syrian regime forces with the help of Iran-backed militias and Russian air support, launched an offensive in southern Idlib province, causing tens of thousands of civilians to flee.

In response, FSA-affiliated groups and Ahrar al-Sham, Nour al-Din al-Zinki (previously associated with the HTS) and others created two separate operation rooms to counter the regime advances.

In mid-January, Abu Mohammed al-Joulani, the leader of the HTS, called for unity among armed factions in Idlib, but instead of heeding his call, other armed groups accused the HTS of withdrawing from areas in southern Idlib province to the benefit of the regime.

A month later, an alliance of Ahrar al-Sham, Nour al-Din al-Zinki and Soqour al-Sham attacked HTS. The factions managed to take over large areas in southern Idlib province, northern Hama province and western Aleppo province.

Earlier this week, Syrian opposition media reported that HTS sent reinforcements to Idlib city, its main stronghold, and Bab al-Hawa crossing on the border with Turkey.

HTS fighters managed to repel an attack on the crossing and counter-attack at other locations in Idlib. Bab al-Hawa serves as a major source of income for the armed group, which imposes a levy on goods that pass through it.

According to Wimmen, the attack on HTS was expected.

"The way [the HTS] basked in their victory, they were getting a lot of people ready to line up against them once the [time] was right, with the external threat removed," he said.

The deployment of Turkish troops in Idlib province stopped the regime offensive and gave a chance to HTS' adversaries to attack it, he added.

"[The operation] has been quite successful. After it, you can no longer say that Idlib is under exclusive HTS control," Wimmen said.

Before the attack, HTS had already been weakened by internal clashes, defections and killings. In late 2017, more than 35 high-profile foreign members of the HTS were assassinated, some of them al-Qaeda loyalists who were displeased with the formal split of the group.

According to Wimmen, some of the internal instability within HTS was the result of Turkish involvement.

"Turkey has tried to drive wedges into HTS because they see it as very problematic, and in particular the foreign element in it," said Wimmen. "They are hoping to split it and hoping to arrive at a point where the real hardliners, who are mostly foreigners, and who you cannot make any deals with, form only a small faction that you can destroy without too much damage and cost."

According to him, Turkey is likely to retain influence over Idlib and is, therefore, seeking to steer hardline armed groups into local governance. The Turkish presence in Syria's north is also likely to stave off future plans by the Syrian regime to recapture the area, Wimmen said.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/...152110387.html

That story about the UAE at the top is utter garbage and about killing commanders and stuff you should be ashamed for spreading lies

The 7-year old war in Syria, with intervention of big powers, has almost destroyed the once beautiful and prosperous land of one of the most civilized peoples of the world. Even the recent Ghouta massacre of over 600 innocent women and children has failed to stir the conscience of the world leaders. No serious efforts are being made to extinguish the fire of unending war and blatant human rights violations in Syria.

Syria has been turned into a battlefield of big powers that are testing their fresh developed weapons of mass destruction on the hapless population of the country. The dictatorial regime of Bashar al- Assad is hand in gloves with the Russian government. America is supplying dangerous weapons to this party or that party alternately and improving the fortunes of the bloodsucking barons of arms manufacturing industry.

Syria would not have been destroyed in this way if the Muslim countries would have been united and powerful. Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) is virtually powerless in the hands of Muslim rulers who are mere puppets in the hands of their western masters. General masses of these foreign controlled countries are just like dumb driven animals, whose voices have been stifled, hands tied and minds captured. Had there been democracy, freedom of expression, free press and freedom of conscience in these countries, such massive destruction of Syria would not have taken place.

The world wants to know where Islam is and where its teachings of liberty, equality, fraternity and human dignity are. The teachings of Islam have been confined to the four walls of mosques or interned in the religious books. And now, in the turn of new events, even the teachings of Islam also are not allowed to be referred to in some of the Arab countries. They have lost not only Islam and its golden teachings but even the basic human values.
If we have decided to destroy ourselves, no outside power can save us. Yet the question remains if the United Nations’ responsibility is limited only to passing pious resolutions. The reality is that the big brothers, merchants of death, capitalists and conspirators of the world have entered into an unholy pact to dispose of the Arab and Muslim countries, one by one. Israel is openly behind all these conspiracies. Either we have to unite and fight for peace and justice or be ready to face slow and steady decimation. Verily Allah does not change the condition of a people unless they change themselves.

http://radianceweekly.in/portal/issu...tion-of-syria/

InshaAllah,By Allah's Will.

Salaam

format_quote Originally Posted by JustTime

That story about the UAE at the top is utter garbage and about killing commanders and stuff you should be ashamed for spreading lies

First chill bro.

The article asks the question, it didn't state it as incontrovertible fact.

What do you think this conflict is, goodies vs baddies? I'm sure you've realised the the conflict in Syria is more complex than it seems, its turned into a proxy war between regional powers and the great powers, a shadow war, that is dimly understood.

If you dont think UAE and Sauds (among many others) are capable of this behaviour then you are very naive.

format_quote Originally Posted by Junon

Salaam



First chill bro.

The article asks the question, it didn't state it as incontrovertible fact.

What do you think this conflict is, goodies vs baddies? I'm sure you've realised the the conflict in Syria is more complex than it seems, its turned into a proxy war between regional powers and the great powers, a shadow war, that is dimly understood.

If you dont think UAE and Sauds (among many others) are capable of this behaviour then you are very naive.

I do not doubt the evils of the UAE and Saudis but you are spreading rumors and lying. You are reiterating Pro-Turkish propaganda that posted a story about what an EX commander of the "Islamic" Front has to say regarding their enemies. You should know that the dogs in these Hizbiya factions like The "Islamic" Front are dogs and prostitutes for Turkey and others and will say anything to look good and please foreign doners and sway public opinion.

Are you not aware of the hostilities between the UAE and Turkey since the diplomatic crisis with Qatar? The lies you are spreading are no different than when the regime says that their opponents are Israeli agents you should fear Allah in the rumors you spread.

All you post is made up conspiracy theories from Kuffar like "Brother" Nathaniel or the toxic propaganda of Russia today.

Salaam

Another update

“A man of prayer, Quran, and charity” – This was my husband, Dr Abbas Khan



Hanaa Yehia, the widow of British surgeon Dr Abbas Khan, who died in a Syrian government prison in December 2013, describes the characteristics of her husband which a recent BBC Radio 4 programme failed to shed light on.

This is Abbas.

The call to help those in need was a persistent one in Abbas’ heart. He never held back any goodness or kindness he could offer anyone.

Listening to the BBC Radio 4 drama ‘My Son the Doctor’, it saddened me that, as usual, Abbas was like an extra on the show, with no mention whatsoever to who he really was and what he held dearest to him; his deen – Islam.

I understand that this was a dramatised representation of Abbas and what he went through…but still…his legacy is one that we cannot simply reduce in this way. I want you to know those parts of him that were not simply about the man who was martyred, but how his character led him to that moment.

So far, no news article or an interview or any sort of media coverage actually reflected who Abbas really was.

Abbas was always, from a young age, religiously committed. Islam was the moving force behind his words and actions.

Opposite to what was made to seem true, Abbas never regretted going to Syria to help mend broken limbs and souls. Yes he hated the trouble he thought he landed everyone into, but he was never regretful, thus he never said “I should’ve never come here”. As claimed to have been the case on that drama programme.

Had he returned, I have no doubt he would not have been able to suppress the urge inside him to go back and help again and again.

This is Abbas! He always went out of his way to help others, always.

We were once driving from Carlisle to London around 3am it was extremely cold, we saw a car with hazard lights on – Abbas used to always check when he sees a car in that state if he could help at all. This time it was an English gentleman whose name was David. His car broke down and he was freezing, his phone was dead. Abbas offered to take him wherever he needed to go and David named a nearby Cumbrian village. He was able to call his mother and assure her he was safe.

At the entrance of the village, David told Abbas to drop him there and he would walk, but Abbas insisted he takes him to the door as the snow was a few inches high.

We dropped David to his friends and on our way out of the village we got stuck in the snow and the car wouldn’t move. Eventually, a kind farmer towed our car out with his tractor.

This is Abbas. In his heart and mind it didn’t matter what difficulties he would face as long as he answer the very unstoppable call in his heart to help, help always, and with no limits.

As much as he tried to be nameless, Allah willed his name to be known on earth and hopefully – by Allah’s generosity – in Paradise.

Abbas’ life, his dedication to his deen and enormous amount of sincerity he carried in his heart. The way he departed and the honour Allah willed to attach to his name for eternity was a reflection of Allah’s mercy on him and – I believe – an honourable reward for his humility.

Even when he was at a time of dire need, Abbas wrote requesting no money to be given to prison guards or officials and asked for it to be all given instead to widows and orphans. This is Abbas.

Abbas had the gentlest heart. Before heading to Aleppo, one of his colleagues, an orthopaedic surgeon, had an expensive bird, caged. When this colleague was out, Abbas opened the cage door and let the bird free, and later told his colleague he was happy to pay for the bird’s freedom. This is Abbas.

Abbas was a practising Muslim; was a man of prayer and supplication, a man of Qur’an, a man of charity, a man of morals.

How many mosques will bear witness for Abbas’ love! It never ceased to amaze me how he would always be blessed with catching salaah from the beginning! Every time! Even when we would drive around looking for a masjid, he would always catch the first rakaah. It’s amazing. I believe it’s Allah’s reward for his sincerity.

The Friday congregational prayer was extremely important to Abbas, to the extent that before considering whether to accept a job he would check if he can take the time for Jummah off.

If we were driving on the motorway, he would stop, no matter what, to pray. He would take the first possible exit to pray, even though he is travelling and he knows he can combine his salaah later.

He was over joyous to tell me he had completed the memorisation of Surah Al-kahf, a goal he worked towards for a long time and was blessed with completing just days before he was killed…whilst in prison. These verses were – interpretation of the meaning:

“However, [for the hospitality of] those who believed and did righteous deeds, there will be gardens of Paradise( 107) wherein they will abide for ever and they will never desire to go anywhere out of them (108).”

May these last verses he memorised be a reflection of his destination, insha’Allah.

https://5pillarsuk.com/2018/03/31/a-man-of-prayer-quran-and-charity-this-was-my-husband-dr-abbas-khan/