May all sides go on to complete and total victory.
Washington Examiner (h/t WZ)— Al Qaeda and other extremist groups have increased their presence in Syria in recent months to aid rebels trying to overthrow that country’s government and solidify their standing in the region, senior analysts and U.S. officials said.
The organizations’ ultimate goal is to create an Islamist state once Syrian President Bashar Assad is deposed, said Ed Husain, senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Meanwhile, rebel commanders fighting to oust Assad said Thursday they moved out of the strategic district of Salah al-Din as fighting intensified in the northern city of Aleppo. Syrian military aircraft continued to pound rebel strongholds, though the anti-government forces continue to hold other parts of the city.
Al Qaeda forces are flowing into Syria from Iraq, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and from as far away as England, Husain said. Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri recently called on fighters to join with the Free Syrian Army in its effort to overthrow Assad, potentially raising the stakes for the U.S., which hasn’t done much beyond encouraging the rebels, a U.S. official said on the condition that he not be named. [...]
It doesn’t necessarily mean that Islamists will succeed, but “we’re at risk here of ignoring the rise of a jihadist regime … and, with or without Assad, al Qaeda will play an important role for months to come,” Husein added.
It’s highly doubtful that the guy knew what was going on. One must wonder, however, that if he did know, and then refused to participate what would have become of him. Worse yet, if he had refused by insisting he was a Christian or a Jew. In that case, the video might have become jihadi porn. In any case, he now has a new name – “Mustafa” – which in Arabic means, “useful idiot.”
Times of Israel – The Free Syrian Army is not only in the rebellion business. Some of its members seem to be in the practical joke business, too.
In an apparent prank uploaded to YouTube last week, a band of armed Syrian rebels stand around a man bearing a camera who is identified as a Japanese reporter and convince him to utter the shahada, the Muslim declaration of creed required for conversion.
The Free Syrian Army is not only in the rebellion business. Some of its members seem to be in the practical joke business, too.
In an apparent prank uploaded to YouTube last week, a band of armed Syrian rebels stand around a man bearing a camera who is identified as a Japanese reporter and convince him to utter the shahada, the Muslim declaration of creed required for conversion.
A man off-camera announces that “a Japanese journalist is professing his conversion to the religion of Islam” under the auspices of their rebel brigade, situated on Mount Turkmen, outside Latakia.
The Japanese reporter then repeats the shahada‘s declaration that there is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his messenger. According to Islam, an earnest pronouncement of the shahada is the only requirement to convert to Islam.
Whether or not the “conversion” is in earnest is not immediately obvious, but seems highly unlikely. The camera-bearing, bespectacled young Japanese man gives no sign of knowing what he is saying, and certainly undergoes no evident spiritual experience. Still, he seems fairly cheerful about the whole process, his facial expression switching from initial inscrutability to subsequent mild smiling.
The rebel instructing the reporter seems barely able to restrain his laughter, and several of his companions are beaming from ear to ear.
After a ringing Allahu Akbar, the rebels ask the man his name and he is instructed to reply: “Mustafa.”
Iran claims they are just “pilgrims.” Who in their right mind would make a pilgrimage to a major war zone?
American Thinker – Initially, Iran told the world that the 48 were “religious pilgrims.” But members of the Free Syrian Army who have claimed responsibility for holding them says they’re members of the elite Revolutionary Guards.
“They are Iranian thugs who were in Damascus for a field reconnaissance mission,” said a rebel leader, in a video that the rebels said showed the captives sitting calmly behind armed Syrian fighters. In the video, the rebels flipped through what they said were Iranian identification cards and certificates for carrying weapons, proving, the rebels said, that the hostages were not religious pilgrims.
The identities and motives of the captives could not be independently verified, and some rebel groups have not embraced the kidnapping or the theory laid out by the fighters in the video. Col. Malik al-Kurdi, a deputy commander of the Free Syrian Army – one of several competing umbrella groups involved in the fighting – said the brigade taking responsibility for the kidnapping appeared to have been acting on its own and did not tell the Free Syrian Army about the operation.
Iranian officials said the kidnapped Iranians were pilgrims, denying that any of them were members of the Revolutionary Guards, Iran’s Arabic-language channel Al Alam reported Sunday, quoting an unnamed government spokesman. On Saturday, Iran’s foreign minister, Ali Akbar Salehi, contacted the Syrian and Turkish foreign ministries, asking them to secure the release of the 48 Iranians.
In a statement, the Iranian Embassy in Damascus said that the abducted Iranians had traveled to Syria using a “private” tour company for a pilgrimage to the Shiite shrine of Sayyida Zeinab in the southeastern suburbs of Damascus, which is a mile or two from where fierce fighting has been raging in the neighborhood of Tadamon. While the video clip of the abducted Iranians showed only men, Iranian state news media said that women and children were also among those taken by the Syrian rebels.
So which is it, Rev Guards or pilgrims? It would not be beyond the Iranians to use the cover of a religious pilgrimage to smuggle members of the Quds force into Syria — even using women and children as part of the scheme. And there have been documented instances of Iranian fighters assisting in the crackdown.
But the rebels have been wont to make wild claims, so their credbility is barely better than the Iranian government. If they are members of the Quds force, it shows that Iran is about to take a more active role in the Syrian civil war. This would be in keeping with the Iranian statement that they will not let President Assad fall.
An Iranian entry into the war would be just about as bad as it gets from the standpoint of spreading the conflict to other nations.
Once the rebels take over this will be an everyday occurrence. It wouldn’t be an Islamic revolution otherwise.
Beirut (via Atlas) – Syrian television presenter Mohammed al-Saeed, kidnapped from his Damascus home in mid-July, has been executed, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Saturday.
“The television presenter, a well-known figure on state TV, has been executed, and the Al-Nusra Front has claimed responsibility for the killing,” the Observatory’s Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.
Al-Nusra, a little-known Islamist militant group, claimed the kidnapping and execution of Saeed in a statement on Friday.
“The heroes of western Ghouta [in Damascus province] imprisoned the shabih [pro-regime militia] presenter on July 19,” said Al-Nusra. “He was then killed after he had been interrogated.”
Posted on a forum featuring the al-Qaeda flag, Al-Nusra’s statement showed a photograph of Saeed looking frightened, with his back against a wall in an unknown location.
“May this be a lesson to all those who support the regime,” it said.
Contacted by AFP, state TV director Maan Saleh said: “We have no material proof of this killing.”
Last month, international media rights watchdog Reporters Without Borders issued a statement on Saeed’s kidnapping, and urged his captors to release him.
“News media and journalists – both professional and citizen journalists – should not be targeted by any of the parties in a war or civil war,” it said at the time.
Hijab was only sworn in as prime minister by Assad on 26th June this year.
June swearing in ceremony.
Arutz Sheva – Syrian President Bashar Assad’s prime minister Riyad Hijab fled to Jordan Monday and declared, “As of today, I am a soldier of the Free Syrian Army,” while Syrian President Bashar Assad escalates his onslaught in Aleppo. Three other ministers also fled.
Jordan confirmed Hijab’s asylum, but the Syrian regime immediately announced that he was fired, two months after he was appointed
Hijab’s defection was one of the most high profile desertions from President Bashar al-Assad’s political and military circles, Reuters reported. On Sunday, al Arabiya television reported a senior Syrian intelligence officer had also defected to Jordan.
Hijab may have seen the writing on the wall as Assad survives with the diplomatic if not military support of Russia and China, but it is questionable how much longer they can justify their alliance as Syrian war panes bombed civilians in the capital and in the commercial hub of Aleppo.
In Damascus, thousands cheered in the streets over the news that a bomb exploded on the third floor of the regime’s official radio and television building. However, broadcasting continued.
Rebels in districts of Aleppo visited by Reuters journalists seemed battered, overwhelmed and running low on ammunition after days of intense tank shelling and helicopter gunships strafing their positions with heavy machinegun fire.
Emboldened by an audacious bomb attack in Damascus that killed four of Assad’s top security officials last month, the rebels had tried to overrun the capital and Aleppo, but the lightly armed rebels have been outgunned by the Syrian army’s superior weaponry.
The violence has already shown elements of a proxy war between Sunni and Shi’ite Islam that could spill beyond Syria’s border. The rebels claimed responsibility for capturing 48 Iranians in Syria, forcing Tehran to call on Turkey and Qatar – major supporters of the rebels – to help secure their release. Continue reading →
(AFP) – Members of the rebel Free Syrian Army executed regime loyalists in the embattled northern city of Aleppo on Tuesday, according to amateur video posted on YouTube by activists.
The video showed members of the Al-Berri tribe being led into a square filled with armed men, chanting: “The FSA forever!”
The face of one of the captives was covered in blood, and he had been stripped almost naked, as rebels gathered around him and stood him against a wall.
Other captives were lined up next to him, as rebels chanted: “God is greatest.”
They opened a torrent of fire on their captives, identified as members of a tribe that entered the fighting on Tuesday in Aleppo on the side of the regime.
Al Qaeda in Iraq has long had a strong presence in Syria, with the assistance of the Assad regime. The terror group has used Syria to recruit, train, and arm fighters to wage jihad. Syria also has served as a transit point for foreign jihadists entering Iraq.
The Al Nusrah Front has claimed credit for numerous suicide attacks, roadside bombings, ambushes, and complex assaults against security forces and government installations. Al Nusrah has been very active in Syria and has been linked to al Qaeda.
The Abdullah Azzam Brigades has a presence throughout the Middle East, including Syria, and was formed at the behest of al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al Zarqawi and al Qaeda emir Osama bin Laden. At the end of June, Majid bin Muhammad al Majid, the group’s emir, said that Syrians should support the uprising against the Assad regime, and that further rebellions against Muslim governments would follow.
The Al Baraa Ibn Malik Martyrdom Brigade, which is named after a suicide cell that joined al Qaeda in Iraq in 2005, said it had formed a martyrdom battalion and was prepared to carry out suicide attacks against Syrian forces.
The Liwa al Islam, or Brigade of Islam, took credit for the attack that killed the top two Syrian defense officials and Assad’s national security advisor. The Free Syrian Army also claimed credit for the attack, and both groups said it was carried out by a remotely detonated bomb, but the Syrian government maintained it was a suicide attack.
The Omar al Farouq Brigade includes Turkish “mujahideen” and is named after a prominent al Qaeda leader who was slain in Iraq in 2006. The group has implored Muslims to “fight together to save Syria, Somalia and Afghanistan.”
(AGI) Rome – The Fides news agency has reported on groups of rebel extremist Islamists “terrorising people in Damascus” especially Chrstians and Iraqi refugees. Fides has also reported the murder of an entire Christian family by militiamen from the “Islam Brigade”, “Liwa al-Islam”, the same group that claimed responsibility for the attack on Bashar al-Assad regime’s hierarchy.
According to the news agency, which is quoting sources in Damascus, these militias stopped the car of a Christian, a civilian state official called Nabil Zoreb, and forced the man, his wife Violet and his two children, George and Jimmy, to get out of the car and then shot them all at point blank range.
In the south-eastern part of Damascus, Islamist fighters from the Jihad al Nosra group, close to the Muslim Brotherhood, attacked the homes of Iraqi refugees, looting and burning down the houses, obliging the residents to flee.
Last Wednesday’s bombing in the heart of Damascus was carried out by local Muslim extremists, who will surely battle for their piece of the pie as Syria fragments, says Mordechai Kedar.
Watch the video to see what Kedar is talking about.
Times of Israel – The bombing last Wednesday in Damascus of President Bashar Assad’s national security headquarters, the most significant blow yet to the Assad regime, was perpetrated by an Islamist group and not the Free Syrian Army, as was initially claimed, according to an Israeli expert on Arab affairs.
This achievement, by a local radical group, will carry significance in the sectarian struggle for power that is sure to come in the wake of Assad’s departure, said Dr. Mordechai Kedar, an expert on Arab affairs at Bar-Ilan University.
The July 18 blast killed Defense Minister Daoud Rajha, the highest ranking Christian in the regime; Assef Shawkat, the president’s brother-in-law and deputy commander of the military; Hassan Turkmani, military adviser to the foreign minister; and Hisham Ikhtiyar, the national security chief. The four were an instrumental part of the regime’s brutal efforts to extinguish the 17-month-old uprising in Syria. The blow, in the heart of Damascus, appears to have hastened the end of Assad’s rule.
If Assad’s Alawite sect, considered infidels by Sunni Muslims, withdraws from Damascus and hunkers down in western Syria where it holds a majority — west of the Orantes River and between Latakia in the north and Tartus in the south — and the non-Arab Kurds break off into their own mini-state, as they have done in Iraq, then the remaining Druze, Christian, Sunni and Salafist sects will battle for what remains, Kedar said. In light of this possibility, the identity of last week’s attackers is highly significant.
“The video of the attack is absolutely replete with Islamist messages,” said Kedar. By contrast, the Free Syrian Army, he noted, has always gone out of its way to avoid any sort of Islamist affiliation, trying to rally all of Syria’s sects and religions against the regime.
Speaking of the icon in the top left-hand corner of the video clip, Kedar noted that it features green flags with white writing, the colors of Islam, and the verses quoted on them are from the Shahada, the Muslim prayer and profession of faith. The writing on the icon in red says “al-Haq,” which means, literally, “the truth” but is one of the 99 descriptive names for Allah, and the entire icon is cradled by a green crescent. The music accompanying the blast, is an Islamic chant, and the sermon, delivered toward the end of the clip, is directed at Satan. In Syria today, Kedar said, that means Assad.
Nor was the footage randomly captured by an Islamist group. Kedar, a former military intelligence officer, said the camera was intentionally positioned one kilometer away from the site of the explosion, in the national security agency building.
Kedar explained that he established the distance based on the three-second gap between the sight of the explosion and the sound of the blast, taking into account that sound travels roughly 300 meters a second, and on the stability of the frame, which does not move. He said that the camera had been perfectly positioned, the focus crisp.
“The people who filmed that footage knew in advance. They set up the camera, arranged the focus,” Kedar said. “They were part of the cell of attackers and not just up on a rooftop by chance.”
Because chemical weapons in the hands of Hezbollah, Iran, Al-Qaida, or Iraqi Shia would be so much more preferable than Assad being able to wrangle an extra month or so of propaganda.
Once that stuff disappears, it would be ten times harder to track. Israel’s best interest and safety is always the least important thing on Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton’s minds.
Israel Hayom – The White House is now holding daily high-level meetings to discuss a broad range of contingency plans — including safeguarding Syria’s vast chemical weapons arsenal and sending explicit warnings to both warring sides to avert mass atrocities, according to the New York Times.
There was heavy fighting in Damascus and the surrounding areas on Sunday morning, with Syrian army helicopter gunships bombing three districts of the capital. Reuters reported that rebel forces had pulled back from the district of Mezze after coming under heavy aerial and ground bombardment by presidential forces. Some 300 people were reportedly killed in Damascus on the weekend, and a total of 400 across Syria.
U.S. administration officials have been in talks with officials in Turkey and Israel over how to manage a Syrian government collapse, according to the Times report, and the issue will be at the top of the agenda for Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta’s visit to Israel this week.
Officials told the New York Times that the administration has had regular talks with the Israelis about how Israel might move to destroy Syrian weapons facilities, though the U.S. does not support such a pre-emptive attack as it would risk giving Assad an opportunity to rally support against Israel.
Israel believes that Syria is currently still in control of its chemical weapons arsenals.
Defense official Amos Gilad told Army Radio on Sunday that while Israel is afraid Syria’s large chemical stocks could be seized by Lebanese terrorists, Al-Qaida-affiliated radicals or other unspecified “irresponsible elements” operating in Syria, “right now, they [the Syrians] are protecting these arsenals as best as they can.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at the top of Sunday’s Cabinet meeting that Israel is closely monitoring the situation in Syria and are ready for any possible scenario.
Defense Minister Ehud Barak reiterated on Sunday morning that Israel is closely watching whether Hezbollah will move advanced weapons system out of Syria and into Lebanon and that “Israel would not tolerate this.” Barak said in television interviews on Friday evening that he has “ordered the Israeli military to prepare for a situation where we would have to weigh the possibility of carrying out an attack” against Syrian weapons arsenals.
Barak also said that he believes the fall of Assad is closer than ever because the attack on the Syrian defense establishment headquarters last week “dealt a massive blow to the Assad family. This blow will accelerate his exit.” On what may replace Assad, Barak said “no one can predict what will happen the day after Assad [goes]. The direction isn’t a positive one. There won’t suddenly rise up a western European democracy.”
Times of Israel – BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian activists say 310 people were killed across the country on Thursday in what was the single deadliest day of fighting since the beginning of the revolt against President Bashar Assad’s regime.
Syria’s civil war escalated dramatically in the past week as rebels closed in on the capital Damascus and launched their most serious blow yet on Assad’s inner circle, killing three top aides in an assassination.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Friday at least 93 of those killed Thursday were government troops.
The Local Coordination Committees, which documents civilian deaths, said 217 civilians were killed Thursday.
Death tolls are difficult to verify in tightly controlled Syria which places severe restrictions on journalists.
Syrian TV said troops recovered control of a rebellious neighborhood in Damascus Friday.
(You have been weighed on the scales and found wanting. – Book of Daniel 5:25-28)
Times of Israel – A massive blast struck the National Security building in Damascus on Wednesday, killing Syrian President Bashar Assad’s most trusted security official, his brother-in-law Assef Shawkat, and his defense minister, Dawoud Rajha.
Several other senior officials were seriously wounded in the bombing, which took place as the regime’s top officials were holding security talks, and marked the most brazen rebel attack to date on the seat of government power.
Reuters said it was unclear whether Assad himself was present at the meeting.
State TV reported that Assad’s brother-in-law, Shawkat, who held the formal title of deputy chief of staff but who headed the president’s military intelligence hierarchy and was leading the fight against opposition forces, died after being hospitalized in critical condition.
Interior Minister Muhammad al-Shaar was seriously wounded but in stable condition. Syrian intelligence chief Hisham Bekhtyar was undergoing surgery after being wounded.
Rebel leader Riad al-Asaad said in a phone interview from his headquarters in Turkey that rebel forces planted a bomb inside a room where senior government officials were meeting.
Reuters reported that the bomber worked as a bodyguard for Assad’s inner circle. Initial reports spoke of a suicide bomber. Later reports, however, suggested that a bomb had been placed in the room where the top officials met, and was detonated either by a timer or by remote control.
Government officials claimed that America and Israel were involved in the attack.
The Syrian army released a statement saying its forces will continue to fight. ”Whoever thinks that by targeting the country’s leaders they will be able to twist Syria’s arm is disillusioned because Syria’s people, army and leadership are now more determined than ever to fight terrorism … and cleanse the nation from the armed gangs.”
According to the BBC, Damascus quickly appointed a new defense minister, Gen. Fahad Jassim Freij, who was previously the military chief of staff.
The capital has seen four straight days of clashes pitting government troops against rebels — an unprecedented challenge to government rule in the tightly controlled capital. (more >>>)
Manaf Tlas was a commander in president’s elite Republican Guard before fleeing to Turkey; his father Mustafa, who was defense minister for 32 years, has ‘slipped away to Paris.’
Bashar Assad, left, and Manaf Tlas seen in an undated picture.
Times of Israel – Manaf Tlas, one of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s closest friends and most trusted military colleagues, who is also the son of the Assad regime’s former long-serving defense minister, has defected from the Assad regime and fled to Turkey, in what one analyst described Thursday as the gravest blow yet to Assad’s regime.
Manaf Tlas and Bashar Assad have been friends since childhood, and the Tlas family, who are Sunni Muslims, have played a critical role in maintaining support for the Alawite Muslim Assads within the Syrian Sunni community. Tlas was a battalion commander in Assad’s elite Republican Guard.
According to Israel’s Channel 2 news, Tlas’s father Mustafa, who was the Syrian army’s chief of staff from 1968-1972, and then served as minister of defense from 1972-2004, has also abandoned Bashar Assad, though more discreetly. “He had slipped quietly away to Paris,” said Channel 2′s Ehud Yaari, a respected Arab affairs analyst.
Many other members of the Tlas family hold senior positions up to and including the rank of general in the Syrian army, Yaari said, and it was hard to imagine that they would long continue in those positions now that Manaf Tlas had defected.
Manaf Tlas held failed talks with Syrian opposition leaders soon after anti-Assad unrest erupted in March of last year, the BBC reported at the time. Tlas was quoted then as saying that while Syria needed reform, Bashar Assad was the reformers’ best hope.
Manaf’s brother, Firas, is a billionaire businessman and part of the Sunni merchant class who have hitherto widely supported the Assad regime, Yaari noted. Now based in Dubai, Firas has lately been in contact with the Syrian opposition, Yaari said.
Yaari said Syrian state media briefly reported online on Manaf’s defection earlier Thursday, calling him a traitor, but then removed the item and had since issued no official comment.
Obama and Hillary Clinton want these people to be running the ‘new’ Syria. In the Arab world, there is no such thing as ‘a good guy.’ It is always a choice between two or more evils.
A video posted on YouTube to the LiveLeaks website appears to show Islamists throwing a man to his death after forcing him from a third-floor window in Syria.
According to the site, the cameraman says, “This is what happens to all traitors who support the police or Shabbiha [Syrian government militia.]” The man, identified as Abu Wael Rashid, screams, “In God’s name, don’t!” as he is forced out of the window.
The video was shot last week at a block of flats in Nabk, 80 kilimetres north of Damascus. Both sides in the Syrian conflict have been condemned by human rights organizations for abuses, including torture
Meanwhile…
Assad loyalists shown with mustaches half-shaven off in humiliating video
Youtube clip features pro-regime men forced to sing praises of Free Syrian Army.
Times of Israel – A video uploaded to YouTube this week purports to show captured members of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s shabiha militia, with their mustaches half-shaven off, chanting “Allah bless the Free [Syrian] Army.”
The enforced shaving of the ostensible Assad loyalists, a mark of disgrace and humiliation in Arab culture, presumably took place after they were captured by Free Syrian Army forces.
It was not clear under what circumstances the pro-regime men were captured, nor could the authenticity of the video’s contents be confirmed.
The incident would hardly be the first case of retaliatory humiliation by either side in the Syrian conflict. Numerous videos uploaded to YouTube over the 16-month uprising against Assad have purported to show one side or the other mutilating or defiling the bodies of their opponents.
According to Al Jazeera some 140,000 Syrian refugees have fled to Jordan.
Jul 4, 2012 by AlJazeeraEnglish – Some 140,000 Syrian refugees have fled to Jordan, escaping the Shabbiha — gunmen loyal to President Assad. They are currently housed in two compounds in a border town, and the Jordanian government is considering opening more holding centres. There are now so many refugees that they’re overwhelming the border towns. But the government is reluctant to build proper camps. Politicians here are worried that the Syrian government would consider that a hostile act.
Assad has moved some 170 tanks northwest of Aleppo after Turkey sent anti-aircraft guns, rocket launchers and other fortifications to its border. If war breaks out, may they both win.
Times of Israel – The Assad regime has massed approximately 170 tanks near the Turkish border, according to an unconfirmed report on Friday by a general in the Free Syrian Army.
General Mustafa al-Sheikh told Reuters that the tanks are now located 30 kilometers (19 miles) from the border, northeast of Aleppo.
“They either want to move toward the border to confront Turkish troops stationed there, or they are planning to attack rebels in towns near the border,” al-Sheikh said.
The move comes after Turkey on Thursday sent anti-aircraft guns, rocket launchers and other fortifications to the border, marking an escalation in hostilities between the two countries.
Last week, Assad’s forces shot down a Turkish F-4 jet which they claimed had made an illegal foray into Syrian airspace. The Syrian government later claimed that the plane may have been shot down because it was suspected that it belonged to Israel.
Crazy Muslims versus crazy Muslims. May they both win.
Times of Israel – The Turkish military mobilized large numbers of reinforcements from its eastern provinces to the Syrian border on Tuesday, amid rising tension with Damascus, after the downing by Syria of a Turkish Air Force jet on Friday, Turkish media reported.
Large numbers of Turkish troops — including at least 15 long-range artillery pieces and tanks – moved to the Syrian frontier from the eastern city of Diyarbakir. A video published by the Turkish Cihan News Agency showed Turkish tanks being transported by carrier trucks toward the frontier.
The mobilization followed statements by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan that the Turkish military will respond to any future violation of its border by Syrian military elements.
“As awe-inspiring as Turkey’s friendship is, Turkey’s wrath is equally awe-inspiring,” Erdogan told the Turkish parliament on Tuesday.
“The rules of engagement of the Turkish Armed Forces have changed,” Erdogan said. “Any military element that approaches the Turkish border from Syria posing a security risk and danger will be regarded as a threat and treated as a military target.”
Erdogan closed his remarks with an especially harsh condemnation of Syrian President Bashar Assad: “Turkey and the Turkish people will continue to provide all support until the people of Syria have been saved from this tyrannical, murderous, bloody dictator and his gang.”
Opposition sources in Syria reported at least 86 civilians were killed by Assad troops on Tuesday.
The father of one of the two missing pilots who were shot down in Friday’s incident told Turkish newspaper Hürriyet Daily News that he opposed Turkey going to war over his son.
“It is not appropriate for a country to go to war over a pilot, an airplane or 50 airplanes,” Ali Erton said. He said he was aware of the risks his son took as a military pilot, but added “what matters is that my son serves his country.”
Arutz Sheva – Dozens of Syrian Army officers have defected to the opposition forces and taken their weapons with them. A First-Lieutenant and 39 other military officers switched sides during fierce fighting at Deir al-Zor airport over the weekend, according to one of the defectors.
On Sunday, government forces shelled the area for a second day. At least 20 people had died by midday, according to activists who reported to human rights organizations.
A commander in the Free Syrian Army (FSA) confirmed to a journalist with the Egyptian Al Ahram newspaper that the defecting officer said the numbers of government troops who fled are expected to double.
Both France and the United States had high praise late last week for a Syrian Air Force colonel who also defected, having flown his Mig fighter jet to a military base in Jordan, calling him “extremely courageous.”
The pilot, Col. Hassan Hammadeh, had been based in southern Syria. He landed at the King Hussein Air Base in Mafraq, 45 miles (70 kilometers) north of Amman.
On Sunday, a Jordanian newspaper reported meanwhile that three more Syrian pilots also defected to Jordan, hours after Hammadeh had made his move. However, the three pilots were without their aircraft.
“The three pilots entered Jordan after crossing the border illegally, and they were housed in one of the provinces of the kingdom after the authorities provided security,” according to the report in the Jordanian Al-Arab Al-Yaum.
Jun 22, 2012 by AlJazeeraEnglish The Syrian military says it has shot down a Turkish fighter jet “over its territorial waters”, risking a new crisis between Middle Eastern neighbours already at bitter odds over a 16-month-old revolt against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
“Our air defences confronted a target that penetrated our air space over our territorial waters pre-afternoon on Friday and shot it down. It turned out to be a Turkish military plane,” a statement by the military circulated on state media said.
Free Beacon – U.S. intelligence agencies are closely watching Israel’s military for signs it will conduct strikes on Syria’s stockpiles of chemical weapons, amid concerns the deadly nerve agents could fall under the control of Hezbollah or al Qaeda terrorists, U.S. officials said.
Syria’s arsenal remains vulnerable as the result of the internal conflict currently underway in Syria between government forces and opposition rebels, one official said.
“Everyone suspects Syria maintains an active chemical weapons program; and it would be dangerous not to plan accordingly,” the official said.
As for concerns the weapons will be captured or transferred, the official said: “Most countries that have CW stocks view it as a strategic, not tactical, tool—and strategic tools are usually pretty well protected and aren’t given away lightly.”
However, other U.S. officials said special operations forces are prepared to take action inside Syria in the event the regime falls and the country spirals further into chaos. The teams would seek to secure or destroy stockpiles of chemical arms to keep them from being taken over by terrorists. Hezbollah has been very active in Syria, and there are reports that al Qaeda terrorists have moved into Syria during the current crisis.
The exact size of the Syrian chemical arsenal is not known. The Center for Strategic and International Studies reported several years ago that Syria has stockpiled 500 to 1,000 metric tons of chemical agents. The weapons are said to include long-lasting VX nerve agent and less-persistent Sarin nerve agent, as well as mustard blister agents.
Most but not all of the weapons stockpiles are known to U.S. intelligence agencies.
The New York Timesreported Thursday that CIA operatives are working in southern Turkey to coordinate foreign assistance to Syrian rebel forces.
Recent statements by senior Israeli military officials prompted U.S. concerns over an Israeli strike on Syria.
Senior officials in Israel told the newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth that if Syria’s army gave chemical weapons to Hezbollah or other terrorists an Israeli attack would be needed.
The newspaper reported May 31 that Israel failed to prevent Syria’s transfer of M-600 rockets to Hezbollah and the weapons can now threaten central Israel. One military source was quoted as saying that mistake would not be repeated.
Israeli Maj. Gen. Yair Golan, commander of forces deployed on the Syrian and Lebanese front, was quoted in press reports expressing concerns about Syria being used as “a warehouse for war materiel that feeds terrorist elements in the region.” (more >>>)
Voice of Israel cites Russian reports that say Russian commandos may sail to Syria to escort Assad to safety.
Assad and Pelosi
Arutz Sheva – Ships carrying Russian commandos may soon sail to Syria to escort strongman Bashar Assad to safety from the country where a rebellion against him is growing fiercer.
Reports to this effect were cited by Voice of Israel radio’s veteran “listener” Miki Gurdus, who specializes in listening to radio broadcasts on various frequencies worldwide.
The Interfax news agency said Monday that two Russian navy ships are to sail to Syria to protect Russian citizens and its naval base there. This would be the first time since the current rebellion in Syria began that Russia is sending extra troops to its base in Syria.
Cited by the Associated Press, Interfax quoted an unidentified Russian navy official as saying that the Nikolai Filchenkov and Caesar Kunikov amphibious assault vessels will be heading to the Syrian port of Tartus. The ships appear not to have left their home port in Sevastopol on the Black Sea yet.
The Russian official mentioned nothing about evacuating Assad, but said the ships will carry an unspecified number of marines to protect Russians in Syria and evacuate materials from Tartus if necessary.
Russia has shielded Damascus from international sanctions over its bloody crackdown on the rebellion against the minority Alawite regime. Russia also continued to provide the regime with arms.
The UN, don’t forget, elected Syria to UNESCO’s human rights committee
UN Watch – When Syria and its allies Russia, China and Cuba told lies to the recent UN Human Rights Council session on the Al-Houleh massacre, UN Watch brought 20-year-old torture victim Hadeel Kouki to tell the truth. The delegates—several of whom privately thanked UN Watch for contributing dramatic first-person testimony to the debate—in the end voted for a firm condemnation of the Assad regime.
My name is Hadil Kouki, and I am a 20-year-old exile from Hasake, Syria.
On March 10, 2011, I was arrested by the regime for distributing pro-democracy leaflets at my university in Aleppo. I was thrown in jail for forty days.
In August, and again in October, I was arrested for bringing medical supplies. I was thrown back in prison for another forty days. I was tortured, and abused.
The massacre in El-Houleh was clearly an act of the Assad regime. The village where some 130 people were brutally murdered has been known from the beginning of the revolution as one of the most vibrant centers in the struggle for a free and democratic Syria.
I personally knew some of the people who were murdered. Fatima, only 25 years old, was my friend at Aleppo university, where she was studying history. She and her two infant daughters were found decapitated in their house in El-Houleh. Her son’s body was found with his arms and legs cut off.
Fatima’s husband Mohamed was killed by Assad’s forces two months earlier, when he tried to shield peaceful demonstrators from deadly bullets. This is further proof that the people of El-Houleh were massacred for their opposition to the Assad regime.
Madam President, I ask:
Can the people behind such atrocities really be trusted to carry out the Annan Plan to end violence?
Second: How is it that at least three of the governments which shield Assad, and aid his mass murder, are allowed to sit here on this council of human rights?
Third: Why did the United Nations recently elected Syria to UNESCO’s human rights committee? What kind of signal does this send? When will this council demand that Assad be removed?
Madam President, I wish to thank those friendly governments that have provided vital aid to me and many other victims. But as we speak, my people are being killed. The time to act is now.
“These officers sell to us not because they love the revolution but because they love money,” Al Sheikh said of his chain of suppliers. “Their loyalty is to their pockets only, not the regime.”
JABAL AL-ZAWIYA, Syria — At the Free Syrian Army base here, a group of men led a nervous prisoner from his cell to a car waiting outside. A few hours later, the rebels returned alone, with a trunkload of weapons.
As they loaded the store room with new bullets and rocket-propelled grenades, Hamza Fatahallah, an army defector who joined the Free Syrian Army nine months ago, described the transaction that had taken place.
“We have caught many army prisoners,” he said. “We send them back home for a small amount of money on the condition they do not return to the regime. We use the money to buy weapons.”
For the release of this prisoner, Ahmed Haseeba, the group received $500. With this money, Fatahallah said they were able to buy ammunition from their main supplier: Syria’s national army, also known as the enemy.
This strange cycle of exchanging prisoners for weapons has been playing out between rebel forces and President Bashar al-Assad’s army since the beginning of the revolution.
Fatahallah estimated that his village purchased 40 percent of their weapons from the regime. Prisoner exchanges have so far contributed almost $80,000 toward weapons purchases, he said. And they obtain an additional 50 percent of their weapons during battle. The remaining 10 percent are donated and smuggled from outside the country, or are purchased from private merchants, mostly from Iraq.
Occasionally, prisoners are also exchanged directly for weapons, Fatahallah said. They have received up to two Kalashnikov rifles in exchange for a prisoner in the past.
For the regime, or at least the duplicitous members of it, supplying the enemy is a big business. Government officers also sell Kalashnikov bullets, which typically sold for less than 40 cents before the uprising, for about $4 each, according to Ahmed Al Sheikh, the leader of the armed opposition in Jabal al-Zawiya. He leads about 6,000 men from eight battalions that are collectively known as the Sham Falcons.
Kalashnikovs are bought for about $1,000, he said. Rocket-propelled grenade launchers, complete with a set of four rockets, cost up to $4,000, as does a BKT machine gun.
“These officers sell to us not because they love the revolution but because they love money,” Al Sheikh said of his chain of suppliers. “Their loyalty is to their pockets only, not the regime.”
Hmm. Who knows? Who cares? There are no ‘good guys’. We ought to stay out of that crap hole. Let them kill one another. It’s what they want to do. What they live to do. They hate our guts anyway.
NRO (h/t Weasel Zippers) – It was, in the words of U.N. special envoy Kofi Annan, the “tipping point” in the Syria conflict: a savage massacre of over 90 people, predominantly women and children, for which the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad was immediately blamed by virtually the entirety of the Western media. Within days of the first reports of the Houla massacre, the U.S., France, Great Britain, Germany, and several other Western countries announced that they were expelling Syria’s ambassadors in protest.
But according to a new report in Germany’s leading daily, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ), the Houla massacre was in fact committed by anti-Assad Sunni militants, and the bulk of the victims were member of the Alawi and Shia minorities, which have been largely supportive of Assad. For its account of the massacre, the report cites opponents of Assad, who, however, declined to have their names appear in print out of fear of reprisals from armed opposition groups.
According to the article’s sources, the massacre occurred after rebel forces attacked three army-controlled roadblocks outside of Houla. The roadblocks had been set up to protect nearby Alawi majority villages from attacks by Sunni militias. The rebel attacks provoked a call for reinforcements by the besieged army units. Syrian army and rebel forces are reported to have engaged in battle for some 90 minutes, during which time “dozens of soldiers and rebels” were killed.
“According to eyewitness accounts,” the FAZ report continues,
the massacre occurred during this time. Those killed were almost exclusively from families belonging to Houla’s Alawi and Shia minorities. Over 90% of Houla’s population are Sunnis. Several dozen members of a family were slaughtered, which had converted from Sunni to Shia Islam. Members of the Shomaliya, an Alawi family, were also killed, as was the family of a Sunni member of the Syrian parliament who is regarded as a collaborator. Immediately following the massacre, the perpetrators are supposed to have filmed their victims and then presented them as Sunni victims in videos posted on the internet.
The FAZ report echoes eyewitness accounts collected from refugees from the Houla region by members of the Monastery of St. James in Qara, Syria. According to monastery sources cited by the Dutch Middle East expert Martin Janssen, armed rebels murdered “entire Alawi families” in the village of Taldo in the Houla region.
Already at the beginning of April, Mother Agnès-Mariam de la Croix of the St. James Monastery warned of rebel atrocities’ being repackaged in both Arab and Western media accounts as regime atrocities. She cited the case of a massacre in the Khalidiya neighborhood in Homs. According to an account published in French on the monastery’s website, rebels gathered Christian and Alawi hostages in a building in Khalidiya and blew up the building with dynamite. They then attributed the crime to the regular Syrian army. “Even though this act has been attributed to regular army forces . . . , the evidence and testimony are irrefutable: It was an operation undertaken by armed groups affiliated with the opposition,” Mother Agnès-Mariam wrote.
There are no ‘good guys’ in this battle. None, anyway, that would ever have a snowball’s chance in hell of succeeding. Such is the Arab world.
Vatican Insider (h/t Weasel Zippers) — An exodus of Christians is taking place in Western Syria: the Christian population has fled the city of Qusayr, near Homs, following an ultimatum issued by the military chief of the armed opposition, Abdel Salam Harba.
This is what local sources told Vatican news agency Fides, pointing out that since the conflict broke out, only a thousand of the city’s ten thousand faithful, were left and they are now being forced to flee immediately. Some of the city’s mosques have issued the message again, announcing from the minarets: “Christians must leave Qusayr within six days, ending Friday.” The ultimatum therefore expired on 8 June and spread fear among the Christian population which had started to regain hope as a result of the presence of the Jesuit Fr. Paolo Dall’Oglio, who stopped off in Qusayr for a week to “pray and fast in the name of peace, right in the midst of conflict.”
The reasons for this ultimatum remain a mystery. Some say it is necessary in order to protect faithful from further suffering; other sources reveal “a continuity in discrimination and selective repression.” Others still claim that Christians have openly expressed their loyalty to the state and this is why the opposition army is chasing them away.
Now Christian families in Qusayr have begun their exodus as displaced persons, towards the surrounding valleys and rural areas. Some have taken refuge in parents’ and friends’ homes in Damascus. Very few families have courageously decided to stay behind in their birth city but who knows what fate will meet. Fides sources have reiterated that groups of Salafi Islamic extremists within the armed opposition consider Christians as “infidels”; they confiscate their belongings, carry out mass executions and are ready to declare a “denominational war”.
What is going on in Syria is the result of decades of Western facilitation, pandering, and cowardice. Never forget that Nancy Pelosi led a Democrat delegation in 2007 to Syria over Bush White House objections, naively believing that Assad was a man who could be reasoned with. Never forget that Hillary Clinton called Bashir Assad a “reformer.”
“The world needs to see this concentrated axis of evil,” Netanyahu said at the weekly Cabinet meeting on Sunday. “The face of this axis has been revealed in all its ugliness and everyone should see the sort of environment we live in.”
Times of Israel – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the current situation in Syria as “a massacre of civilians, including of children and the elderly, being carried out by the Syrian government with the backing of Iran and Hezbollah.”
“The world needs to see this concentrated axis of evil,” Netanyahu said at the weekly Cabinet meeting on Sunday. “The face of this axis has been revealed in all its ugliness and everyone should see the sort of environment we live in.”
Netanyahu’s statements were the latest in a series of quotes by senior government officials reacting to the ongoing violence in Syria.
Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said that Israel stands ready to offer humanitarian aid to the suffering people of Syria by sending food and medicine and treating the wounded who escape Syria to Jordan, or other countries where Israelis can enter and operate.
While Israel is not in direct negotiations with the Syrian opposition, Ayalon said, that there is communication with the International Red Cross and other aid organizations.
Vice Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz accused the Syrian regime of genocide and has called for international military intervention to stop the bloodshed. Mofaz slammed the weak Western response to the Syrian crisis, especially by Russia, who he says condemns the violence perpetrated by Bashar Assad’s government while providing Syria with arms.
On the eve of his departure to Washington, President Shimon Peres said the world is not doing enough to stop the bloodshed in Syria and expressed admiration for the protesters who continue to go out every day and demonstrate against the Assad regime.
On Saturday deputy minister of regional affairs Ayoub Kara accused the Assad regime of using chemical weapons against Syrian civilians.
Kara said that photos he’s seen left no doubt that the forces of President Bashar Assad have used chemical weapons against Syrian men, women and children.
Kara also told Israel Radio that Israeli doctors are currently on the border between Syria and Turkey treating people injured in the violent clashes between Assad’s troops and opposition forces.
“They either want to move toward the border to confront Turkish troops stationed there, or they are planning to attack rebels in towns near the border,” al-Sheikh said.
