The Syrian Conflict Thread

[LazyLion]

SYRIA DEFECTOR SHOWS WAR 'TORTURE' PHOTOS TO US LAWMAKERS
by Ivan COURONNE

US lawmakers saw graphic images of the brutal conflict in Syria Thursday as an army defector gave an eyewitness account of the horrors he was forced to photograph.

"I am not a politician and I don't like politics... and neither am I a lawyer," said the former Syrian military police photographer who escaped from his homeland last year, bringing with him some 55,000 pictures taken as part of his job to catalogue the dead.

"I had the job of taking pictures of all the deaths ... before and after the revolution," explained the man known only as Caesar, who appeared in heavy disguise before the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

He was required to download the photos and store them on state computers to document the battle against the rebel opposition by the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, now in its fourth year.

"I have seen horrendous pictures of bodies of people who had tremendous amount of torture," Caesar told about 100 people who listened in heavy silence. Around them on easels were six enlarged photos showing naked, skeletal bodies lying on the ground.

Most had been stretched out in meticulous rows, some bearing white labels attached around their wrists, all with their faces blanked out. A few still wore underpants, but most were naked.

Speaking through an interpreter, Caesar told of seeing corpses with "deep wounds and burns and strangulations" -- some of which had had "their eyes carved out" and others that were "emaciated and skinny."

"They were starved to death and their bodies looked like skeletons. These people died of starvation," Caesar said, adding he had never seen anything like it except for images taken during the Nazi regime in World War II.

"Sometimes I would come across pictures of my own neighbors and some of my friends that I recognized," Caesar, donning dark sunglasses, told the hushed room, his profile barely visible under a blue hooded jacket with the drawstring drawn tight.

"Death would have been my fate if the regime had found out I was leaking out secret information."

More than 170,000 people have been killed since the Syrian uprising began in March 2011, and millions have fled -- both within the country or to refugee camps abroad.

"The conflict has created unimaginable human suffering," Committee chairman Ed Royce said.

"One cannot see images like these and not ask, 'What can be done?' Answering that isn't easy," Royce said, adding the briefing was "a vivid and depressing reminder that while action can be costly, so too can inaction."

Caesar said he had sent a letter to US President Barack Obama, urging him to "please don't forget those still in jail, including children. Please make sure they get released and don't get tortured."

He maintained that some 150,000 people were still in Syrian jails, facing the same fate as the lifeless bodies in his photos.

At his side was former special prosecutor David Crane, who tried Liberian president Charles Taylor and is now working on setting up a tribunal to bring those responsible for war crimes in Syria to justice.

"We rarely find smoking gun evidence, but that's what we found," Crane told the lawmakers, adding he and his team were "stunned by the magnitude of this."

The State Department had worked to bring Caesar to the United States "so that US officials analyzing this really gruesome evidence, also some members of Congress, could hear directly from him about the horrific abuses committed by the Assad regime," said deputy spokeswoman Marie Harf.

She confirmed he had met with the Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues Stephen Rapp, but would not be drawn on whether Washington was preparing to bring a war crimes trial against Assad and members of his regime.


Source : Sapa-AFP /mjs
Date : 31 Jul 2014 23:39

 

[Solarion]

6 CHILDREN AMONG 15 DEAD IN ALEPPO BOMBING: SYRIA MONITOR

Six children were among at least 15 civilians killed in overnight bomb attacks by government and rebel forces in the divided city of Aleppo, a monitoring group said Monday.

"At least nine civilians, three of them children, were killed in barrel bombs (dropped by regime aircraft) in Shaar," an eastern district, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Britain-based group, which relies on an extensive network of medical, military and activist sources on the ground, warned the death toll could rise because of the large number of people of seriously wounded.

"Six more civilians, including three children and a woman, were killed in mortar shelling by rebels" of the government-held district of Jabiriyeh, the Observatory said.

The northern metropolis of Aleppo, once Syria's commercial capital, has been divided since 2012 into western sectors held by the government and rebel-held areas.

Hundreds of people have died in near-daily regime air raids, many with the use of crude and inaccurate barrel bombs, despite repeated condemnation by the international community.

The latest bloodshed came at the start of the Eid al-Fitr feast which marks the end of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

In Damascus, President Bashar al-Assad received a warm welcome from the congregation as he joined Eid prayers Monday at a mosque in Muhajarin, although the Observatory said the area was struck in the morning by rebel shellfire.


Source : Sapa-AFP /kd
Date : 28 Jul 2014 13:35

Seen the use of these barrel bombs on Liveleak. The aircraft are dropping them right into residential areas, in between the houses while civilians are running for cover trying to figure out where the next one is going to land.

Along with explosives, they fill these barrels with shrapnel, ball bearings and petrol. It's a ****ing nasty weapon and it's being dropped onto women and children.

 

[Jola]

Yep, for Russia and China, killing 170 000 of your own people, is just chump change.

Yes, well, Stalin and Zedong each managed to off at least 30 million of their own people.

 

[MickeyD]

SYRIA TROOPS KILL AT LEAST 50 JIHADISTS NEAR LEBANON: MONITOR

At least 50 jihadists from the Islamic State and Al-Nusra Front were killed overnight by Syrian troops backed by Lebanese Hezbollah fighters near the Lebanese border, a monitor said Saturday.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the jihadists clashed throughout Friday night and into Saturday morning with the regime troops and allied forces in the Qalamun region by the Lebanese border.

Source : Sapa-AFP /dm
Date : 02 Aug 2014 12:44

 

[Grant]

Islamic State imposes media controls in Syrian province

Islamic State, the al Qaeda splinter group which has seized parts of Syria and Iraq, has told activists in Syria's Deir al-Zor province they must swear allegiance to it and submit to censorship, a monitoring group said on Friday.

The militant group imposed the rules after a meeting on Tuesday with activists involved in media work, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

International media organizations have little presence in Syria and rely on activists and other sources to provide information on what is happening in the country.

Islamic State also told the activists they must recognize the caliphate, based on their strict interpretation of Islam, that it has declared in the parts of Iraq and Syria it controls.

It also said they must stop using the term "Daash" to describe the group. "Daash" is the Arabic acronym for the group's previous name, the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), and is mainly used by people who oppose it.

The Observatory, a Britain-based group which reports on Syria using a network of sources on the ground, said Islamic State also banned activists from working with television channels immediately.

They were told that any videos, pictures or written reports needed to be reviewed by the Islamic State's "Information Office," before distribution.

Islamic State, which has been fighting rival rebel groups and government forces in Syria, has its own media operation distributed on social media and militant internet forums.

It used its media arm to effect in June when it announced the creation of the caliphate in statements in a series of languages. It has also produced videos showing the group's leader and celebrating its military advances.

Elsewhere in the country, the group has carried out beheadings and mutilations after finding people guilty of crimes and has set strict limits on women's rights as part of its campaign to forcibly impose its radical brand of Islam.

In the eastern city of Raqqa, the Islamic State's stronghold, the group even executed people who had supported the revolt and carried out other actions which have intimidated activists.

In Iraq, the group has been systematically stamping out any religious or cultural influences they deem non-Islamic since their sweep through the north in June.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/01/us-syria-crisis-media-idUSKBN0G13SV20140801

 

[LazyLion]

WOMEN, CHILDREN HELD HOSTAGE BY SYRIA FIGHTERS FOR YEAR: HRW

Syrian fighters have held 54 women and children hostage for an entire year, a rights group said Wednesday, urging they be freed and warning that holding civilians can amount to a war crime.

New York-based Human Rights Watch said the group was captured in the coastal province of Latakia during an opposition offensive a year ago.

Another group of 40 hostages was released in May as part of a deal that allowed Syrian opposition forces safe passage out of the besieged Old City of Homs.

But the group of 54, which includes 34 children, was still being held, apparently "with the intention of compelling government actions, including exchanging the hostages for detainees in government custody," HRW said.

"For a year families have been waiting to be reunited while rebel groups and the government negotiate over their fate," said HRW's Middle East and North Africa director Sarah Leah Whitson.

"Civilian lives are not pawns for fighters to trade. The hostages should be let go immediately."

It is unclear which groups are holding the 54 captives, with HRW saying at least 20 separate opposition forces took part in the Latakia offensive last August.

HRW said it had identified several individuals, mostly from Gulf countries, who had fundraised for the Latakia operation and warned that citizens or countries that backed groups involved in hostage-taking could be complicit in war crimes.

The group also repeated its call for the situation in Syria to be referred to the International Criminal Court.

"Referring Syria to the ICC would send a clear message to all combatants that they must abide by the laws of war," Whitson said.

"Civilians in Syria on all sides have paid dearly for Russia and China's obstructionism" in the UN Security Council on the issue of referring to the conflict to the court, she added.

More than 170,000 people have been killed in Syrian since the conflict began in March 2011.


Source : Sapa-AFP /lk
Date : 06 Aug 2014 09:14

 

[LazyLion]

DAMASCUS SHELLING KILLS 16, WOUNDS DOZENS: NGO

At least 16 people, including two children, were killed when rebels shelled many districts of the Syrian capital overnight, a monitoring group said on Wednesday.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said another 79 people were wounded in the bombardment by an Islamist rebel brigade.

Several of the wounded were in serious condition, and the death toll was expected to rise, the Observatory said.

Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said more than a dozen areas of Damascus had been targeted, including in the upscale western Mazzeh district and central Abu Rummaneh.

Opposition fighters on the outskirts of the city have regularly fired mortar rounds and rockets into Damascus, targeting various neighbourhoods and often causing casualties.

Syrian regime warplanes also regularly launch raids against rebel areas around the city.

On Sunday, regime strikes on Kfar Batna, east of Damascus, and Douma, northeast of the capital, hit marketplaces and killed at least 64 people, among them at least 11 children, the Observatory said.

More than 170,000 people have been killed in Syria's war since peaceful anti-regime protests in March 2011 became an armed conflict after the government put the demonstrations down with force.


Source : Sapa-AFP /lk
Date : 06 Aug 2014 08:55

 

[LazyLion]

DOZENS DIE AS JIHADISTS STORM SYRIA ARMY BASE IN RAQA: MONITOR

Jihadists from the Islamic State group have seized parts of a military base in Syria's Raqa province in fierce fighting that left dozens dead, a monitor said Thursday.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the extremist group was engaged in heavy fighting with troops at Brigade 93 in Raqa, where IS already controls the regional capital and significant amounts of territory.

The monitor said at least 27 regime forces had been killed, along with 11 jihadists, including three who launched the assault by blowing themselves up at the entrance to the base and around it on Wednesday night.

The Observatory said IS fighters "were in control of large parts of the base".

Many regime troops had withdrawn to Brigade 93 last month, after IS seized the Division 17 base in fighting that left at least 85 soldiers dead, according to the Observatory.

That assault left nearly all of Raqa province under IS control, except Brigade 93 and Tabaqa military airport, which were still held by the army.

The two-day assault on Division 17 saw more than 50 troops summarily executed, including some who were beheaded, with jihadists later putting their severed heads on display.

IS, which first emerged in Syria's war in spring 2013, has since imposed near-total control in Raqa province and Deir Ezzor on the Iraq border.

In June, the group proclaimed a "caliphate" straddling Syria and Iraq.

Some Western-backed rebels seeking President Bashar al-Assad's ouster initially welcomed IS as a potential ally.

But the extremist group's abuses and quest for domination has turned the opposition against it.

Syria's war has killed more than 170,000 people since March 2011.


Source : Sapa-AFP /lk
Date : 07 Aug 2014 10:14

 

[LazyLion]

DAMASCUS FACING DAILY REBEL MORTAR AND ROCKET FIRE
by Roueida Mabardi

After a long period of relative calm, Syria's capital is coming under daily mortar and rocket fire from rebels seeking to make the regime ease its attacks on areas they hold near Damascus.

"It is in response to regime air raids on rebel districts around Damascus," said Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Rebel bombardments of the city "have caused a total of 21 deaths in recent days", he said.

Launched from Eastern Ghouta, a woody region east of Damascus where rebels have held off regime efforts to dislodge them, the mortar fire targets several districts, including upmarket Malki where the presidential place is located.

"After a long period of calm, mortar fire began on the Saturday after (the Moslem holiday of) Eid," on August 2, said Abu Hisham, owner of a women's clothes shop in Al-Salhiyeh shopping district in the heart of the city.

"Yesterday and the day before (Tuesday and Wednesday) the noises were new and terrifying. We heard the whistling of the mortar then the explosion."

Rebel chief Abdel Rahman al-Shami said the mortar rounds are in answer to "an escalation of bombardments" by President Bashar al-Assad's forces against opposition strongholds.

"The rebels are trying to aim at military targets in Damascus," said the Jaysh al-Islam leader, speaking to AFP from Douma, a town northeast of the capital held by the rebels and regularly raided by regime warplanes.

Assad's forces have also stepped up bombardments of Kafar, east of Damascus, as well as Mleiha and Douma, he said.

Last Sunday, regime warplanes raided Eastern Ghouta, Kafar Batna and Douma, killing at least 64 people at a market, including 11 children, according to the Britain-based Observatory.

Jaish al-Islam (Army of Islam) and another rebel group, Ajnad al-Sham (Soldiers of Damascus) have been firing 107 mm and 120 mm mortars into Damascus, Shami said.

He said Ajnad al-Sham fighters had been targeting the presidential palace in Malki and military positions.

"This will carry on as long as bombardments continue" against rebel areas, Shami said.

A leader of Ajnad al-Sham said on Facebook that the group would attack "the regime's strongholds in the heart of Damascus every time that surrounded civilians are targeted in Eastern Ghouta".

In other comments on all4Syria website, he identified three recent targets: the presidential palace, military and security buildings at Kafar Susah and Al-Mazzeh in the west of the city.

"We said in a statement that civilians should leave," the Ajnad al-Sham official said.

On Tuesday night, at least 16 people including two children, were killed and 79 others wounded in rebel bombardments of several Damascus neighbourhoods, the Observatory said.

A resident of Qabun district, near the Jobar front line, said: "Ajnad al-Sham now has Katyusha rockets."

The man, who asked not to be named, said that on Tuesday he heard a rocket being launched from Jobar and his friend, speaking on the telephone, heard it fall in Malki.

Bombardment of rebel positions around Damascus resumed on Thursday. The rebels replied by firing mortars towards Abbassids Square near Jobar, the rebels and state news agency SANA said.

The Observatory estimates more than 170,000 people have died in the Syrian conflict which broke out in March 2011.


Source : Sapa-AFP /mjs
Date : 08 Aug 2014 04:12

 

[LazyLion]

ISLAMIC STATE MILITANTS TAKE OVER SYRIA ARMY BASE - WATCHDOG GROUP

Islamic State militants have seized a key army base in the north-eastern Syrian province of al-Raqqa, a pro-opposition watchdog group said Friday.

"Islamic State fighters captured the Brigade 93 base in al-Raqqa overnight, and are now preparing to launch an attack on the Tabqa airport, the last regime post in al-Raqqa," said Rami Abel-Rahman, the head of the Syian Observatory for Human Rights.

He said most of the soldiers fled to the Tabqa airport. The militants killed at least 36 soldiers after taking control of the base, according to the Britain-based Observatory.

At least 15 jihadists, mainly foreigners, were killed in fighting in the area.

The Islamic State already controls territory in eastern Syria near the border with Iraq, where the radical Sunni group has made significant territorial gains in recent weeks.

In June, the al-Qaeda splinter group declared the establishment of an Islamist caliphate in the territory under its control in Syria and Iraq.


Source : Sapa-dpa /lk
Date : 08 Aug 2014 10:42

 

[LazyLion]

SYRIA TROOPS RETAKE MOST OF KEY DAMASCUS SUBURB: NGO

Syrian government forces have retaken most of a key Damascus suburb they have been fighting for months to recapture from rebel forces, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Thursday.

Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said the Syrian army had "control over most of Mleiha, though there are still some clashes".

There was no immediate confirmation from Syrian state media or government officials.

But a military source told AFP that the army was "continuing its operations in Mleiha and realising qualitative successes".

He said Syrian troops had "killed a large number of terrorists and are pursuing others in the fields to the north of the area".

Mleiha, which lies southeast of the capital, has been a key flashpoint in the fighting around Damascus.

Government troops, backed at times by fighters from the allied Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah, have been battling there since April.

The area has been under siege for more than a year, and under near-constant bombardment by government forces.

The chief of Syria's air defence forces, General Hussein Isaac, was killed in fighting there in May.

Mleiha is strategic because it lies next to the key rebel bastion of Eastern Ghouta outside the capital, which the regime has also struggled to recapture.

"Taking back Mleiha would allow the regime to protect parts of Damascus from rebel rocket fire on the capital," Abdul Rahman said.

"It is also the gateway to Eastern Ghouta," he added.

While the government retains firm control over Damascus, rebels have several rear bases around the city, from which they regularly launch rockets.


Source : Sapa-AFP /aa
Date : 14 Aug 2014 10:30

 

[LazyLion]

IS STEPS UP ATTACK ON LAST SYRIA ARMY BASTION IN RAQA: NGO

Syrian army forces battled Wednesday to hold onto their last stronghold in the northern province of Raqa, under fierce attack from Islamic State jihadists, a monitoring group said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said IS fighters had been attacking Tabqa military airport for around 10 days, but the fighting overnight from Tuesday was the heaviest yet.

At least five jihadists have been killed in the fighting, which has involved medium and heavy weaponry as well as air raids by regime troops.

Tabqa airport is the last remaining stronghold of Syrian troops in Raqa province, which has been largely overrun by IS fighters.

The extremist group controls the provincial capital, which was captured by other rebel groups in March 2013 but later seized by the IS.

In early August, it captured the key Brigade 93 army base in Raqa, not long after taking the military's Division 17, where at least 85 people were killed in fighting or summarily executed.

The latest IS advances in Raqa and Aleppo province, also in northern Syria, have prompted the Syrian government to launch intensive air strikes against IS for the first time,

Rebel groups have often accused the regime of avoiding attacks on IS because the Sunni extremist group has battled more moderate rebel forces.

The IS emerged from the Iraqi affiliate of Al-Qaeda but has since rejected its leadership.

It initially worked alongside other rebel groups in Syria, but they turned against it because of its abuses and its bid to dominate seized territory.

But it continues to draw recruits, and on Twitter its supporters expressed delight about the attack on the Tabqa base.

"The lions of the Islamic State have announced a war without mercy. It is time to cut of the heads of the Nussayris," one supporter tweeted, using a pejorative term for Alawites, an offshoot of Shiite Islam to which President Bashar al-Assad belongs.


Source : Sapa-AFP /kd
Date : 20 Aug 2014 14:59

 

[LazyLion]

UN: DEATH TOLL FROM SYRIAN CIVIL WAR TOPS 191,000
By JOHN HEILPRIN
Associated Press

The death toll from three years of Syria's civil war has risen to more than 191,000 people, the United Nations reported Friday.

The figure, covering the period from March 2011 to April 2014, is the first issued by the U.N.'s human rights office since July 2013, when it documented more than 100,000 killed.

The high death toll is a reflection of the brutality of Syria's conflict, which has transformed into a complex, multi-layered war where various factions fight against each other.

It also reflects the recent surge in deadly attacks by the al-Qaida-breakaway Islamic State group targeting rival militant groups, mainstream Western-backed Syrian rebels and Kurdish militiamen in northern Syria as it seeks to eliminate opponents and consolidate its hold on territory and resources.

Navi Pillay, the U.N.'s top human rights official who oversees the Geneva-based office, said the new figures are so much higher because they include additional killings from earlier periods, as well as deaths since the last report. The exact figure of confirmed deaths is 191,369, Pillay said.

"As the report explains, tragically it is probably an underestimate of the real total number of people killed during the first three years of this murderous conflict," she said.

Men comprised 85 percent of the victims, women more than 9 percent, while the sex was unknown in the remaining cases.

The records show at least 8,800 child victims, although the age of most victims is unknown.

The figures are based on information from the Syrian Center for Statistics and Research, the Syrian Network for Human Rights, the Violations Documentation Center, the Syrian government and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Pillay criticized the world's "paralysis" over the fighting in Syria, which "has dropped off the international radar" in the face of so many other armed conflicts around the world. Her spokesman, Rupert Colville, told reporters she was referring mainly to the standoff on the U.N. Security Council.

Russia has been one of Syrian President Bashar Assad's main allies and has used its veto power four times at the 15-nation Security Council to prevent international sanctions on Syria.

In January, Pillay's office said it had stopped updating the death toll, blaming the organization's lack of access on the ground in Syria and its inability to verify source material. It was unclear why it has released new figures now.

The U.N. also would not endorse anyone else's count, including the widely quoted figures from the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which has closely counted the deaths since Syria's crisis began. On Thursday, that body said the number of deaths has reached 180,000.


Source : Sapa-AP /ar
Date : 22 Aug 2014 11:58

 

[LazyLion]

DOZENS OF JIHADISTS REPORTED KILLED AND WOUNDED IN SYRIA

At least 300 jihadists from the radical Islamic State movement have been killed and wounded in fighting to seize a major military base from Syrian government troops in the north-eastern province of al-Raqqa, a monitoring group said on Saturday.

"These casualties have been sustained by the Islamic State in the past three days as the regime forces have intensified their airstrikes near the military airport in Tabqa, the last remaining base of the Syrian army in al-Raqqa," said Rami Abdel Rahman, the head of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

He told dpa that the government troops had used Scud missiles to repulse three major attacks launched by the Islamic State since Tuesday on the Tabqa base.

"Early Saturday, the Islamic State fighters detonated a car bomb at the gate of the Tabqa base in an attempt to storm the facility. They failed although they had brought new reinforcements from Iraq and the (Syrian eastern province of) Deir al-Zour," the Observatory said in a statement.

Syrian warplanes on Saturday mounted airstrikes against militants' targets in the town of Tabqa, according to the watchdog.

Syrian state media reported that at least 150 Islamic State militants had been killed in Tabqa since Tuesday.

The al-Qaeda splinter group, which is also active in neighbouring Iraq, has made considerable territorial gains in eastern and northern Syria in recent months.

In late June, Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared himself the ruler of an Islamist caliphate in the territory under his group's control in Syria and Iraq.


Source : Sapa-dpa /nsm
Date : 23 Aug 2014 11:37

 

[LazyLion]

SYRIA WAR PLANES HIT JIHADIST SITES IN DEIR EZZOR

Syrian war planes carried out a series of air raids Tuesday on positions held by the Islamic State jihadist group in eastern Deir Ezzor province, an NGO and state media said.

"Syrian army forces targeted headquarters and warehouses storing weapons and ammunition belonging to the terrorist group known as the Islamic State... destroying them completely," Syria's state news agency SANA reported.

The agency added that the army had also targeted groups of IS members, "killing large numbers of them."

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitoring group, said the Syrian army had carried out at least 12 strikes across the oil-rich province.

"It's the first time since the Islamic State took control of most of Deir Ezzor that warplanes have carried out such intensive and pinpoint raids against Islamic State positions in the region," Observatory director Rami Abdul Rahman said.

At least seven civilians were killed in the raids, along with an unspecified number of jihadists, the monitoring group added.

Among the targets of the raids was a training camp in the west of the province, Abdul Rahman added.

The raids come a day after Syria said it was willing to cooperate with the international community to counter the threat posed by IS, which declared a "caliphate" in territory it holds in Syria and Iraq.

The jihadist group has raised international concern after lightning advances in Iraq and a slew of abuses including the murder of US journalist James Foley, who was kidnapped in Syria.

The United States is already carrying out air strikes against the group in Iraq and US officials have said they are ready to send spy planes into Syria to track IS jihadists.

Elsewhere in Syria, the Observatory said at least 33 people died in fighting between the army and Al-Nusra Front -- Al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate -- in Zabadani northeast of the capital Damascus.

Al-Nusra has seized five army checkpoints in the region during three days of clashes that left 20 soldiers dead, along with 13 Nusra fighters, the Observatory said.

Zabadani is considered strategic because of its proximity to the Lebanese border and the mountainous border region where many rebels sought refuge after being routed from the Qalamun area earlier this year.


Source : Sapa-AFP /lk
Date : 26 Aug 2014 16:04

 

[LazyLion]

SYRIAN MILITARY LAUNCHES COUNTER-ATTACK ON JIHADISTS IN QUNEITRA

The Syrian military launched a counter-attack Friday against the militants controlling some posts on the Syrian side of the Golan Heights near the border with Israel, state media and a monitoring group said.

Syrian forces heavily shelled areas on the outskirts of Quneitra, killing at least 16 fighters from the rebel Islamic Brigades and the al-Qaeda-linked al-Nusra Front, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

State TV said government troops had killed an unspecified number of rebels on the edges of Quneitra and destroyed their weapons.

The fighting has raged since Wednesday. Al-Nusra continues to hold 45 Fijan UN peacekeepers.

In the eastern province of Deir al-Zour, 18 Islamic State militants were killed in overnight government airstrikes, the Observatory said.

The Islamic State, which is also active in neighbouring Iraq, has in recent months seized considerable chunks of territory in northern and eastern Syria.

Meanwhile, the United States on Thursday expressed concerns that the al-Qaeda splinter group could get access to chemical weapons that Syria may have not declared to an international watchdog tasked with dismantling the war-torn country's chemical arsenal.

"Certainly if there are chemical weapons left in Syria, there will be a risk that those weapons fall into ISIL's (Islamic State) hands," the US ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, said.

"And we can only imagine what a group like that would do if in possession of such a weapon."

Power was speaking after the UN Security Council received a briefing from Sigrid Kaag, who heads a joint mission of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and the UN on dismantling Syria's chemical arsenal.

Kaag said the mission was still working with President Bashar al-Assad's government to resolve discrepancies in its disclosure about the country's chemical weapons.

Under a UN resolution adopted in September with the backing of Russia and the US, Syria agreed to hand over its stockpile of chemical weapons for destruction by mid-2014.

The plan was a rare diplomatic success in years of failed international efforts to end Syria's civil war.


Source : Sapa-dpa /gf
Date : 05 Sep 2014 12:13

 

[LazyLion]

SYRIA TROOPS PUSH BACK REBELS THREATENING AIR BASE

Syrian troops have regained control of villages near a military air base in the central province of Hama, pushing back rebel fighters in the area, a monitoring group said Tuesday.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said regime troops and pro-regime militiamen had made the advances in the past few days after months of fighting with rebel groups in the area.

Regime forces pushed back rebels "who were threatening the strategic Hama military airport, from which the regime launches air raids on several areas," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said.

The advances came after the launch of an operation reportedly led by Suhail al-Hassan, the Syrian officer notorious for a brutal campaign of barrel bombing in Aleppo as well as operations in the northern province that have seen regime forces regain large stretches of territory.

Abdel Rahman said government troops were expected to continue their advance in the western part of Hama province by moving towards Halfaya, a stronghold of the Syrian Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front.

The regime has already begun bombing raids on the area, including dropping two explosive-packed barrel bombs on Tuesday, the Observatory said.

In southern Quneitra province, meanwhile, where rebel forces seized the Syrian side of a crossing with Israeli-occupied territory last week, fighting continued between rebels and regime forces.

The Observatory said rebels had seized territory between Quneitra and Daraa province, and that the fighting in the area had prompted residents of surrounding villages to flee.

Around the capital Damascus, meanwhile, state news agency SANA reported at least five people killed Tuesday in mortar fire on the suburbs of Jaramana and neighbouring Kashkul.

The agency blamed "terrorists" for the fire, the term used by the government for all those seeking to oust President Bashar al-Assad.

Regime forces were also continuing operations in the areas of Dakhaniyeh, on the highway leading south from Damascus to Daraa, a security source said.

"The area has been surrounded and a number of armed men present have been eliminated in the course of the operation," the source said.

Operations were also ongoing in the eastern Damascus district of Jobar, which the regime is trying to wrest from rebel control.

Regime planes have carried out a fierce aerial campaign on the area, which they consider a key gateway to the neighbouring opposition stronghold of Eastern Ghouta.

"The decision has been taken to continue operations until the return of security and stability to Jobar," the security source said.

"This is a step towards cleaning up in Eastern Ghouta."


Source : Sapa-AFP /nsm
Date : 09 Sep 2014 16:22

 

[LazyLion]

REGIME AIR RAIDS KILL 42 NEAR SYRIA CAPITAL: NEW TOLL

Syrian government air raids on a rebel-held area near Damascus killed 42 people, including seven children, a monitoring group said Friday, giving an updated toll.

Thursday's air strikes were carried out in Douma, a satellite suburb northeast of the capital that has been under siege for more than a year

"The toll from regime air raids on Douma has risen to 42 dead, including seven children and two women," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which on Thursday had given a death toll of 17.

Among those killed were an unspecified number of rebels who have been fighting to oust the regime of President Bashar al-Assad for more than three years, said the Britain-based group.

Activists posted videos on YouTube showing the destruction caused by the raids in Douma, a frequent target of deadly strikes.

People could be seen carrying the charred remains of victims amid scenes of panic as firefighters battled to put out blazes in several buildings.

The Observatory says more than 180,000 people have been killed in the Syrian conflict since it erupted in March 2011, while the United Nations puts the figure at 191,000.

Opponents of Assad took up arms in response to a bloody crackdown on peaceful pro-democracy protests inspired by the Arab Spring uprisings.


Source : Sapa-AFP /avb
Date : 12 Sep 2014 09:52

 

[LazyLion]

BATTERED BUT HARDENED, SYRIA ARMY ADAPTS TO GUERRILLA WAR

by Mohamad Ali Harissi

The army has shrunk by nearly half since Syria's conflict erupted in 2011 but experts say the remaining military force is now both more flexible and capable.

It has transformed itself from a traditional military built on the former Soviet model into an effective counterinsurgency force.

And with sustained military support from Russia and Iran, and the guerrilla warfare expertise of its ally, Lebanon's Hezbollah group, it has gradually regained ground.

Aram Nerguizian, a military affairs expert from the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, said Syria's standing army has lost around half of its manpower.

"Defections, desertions and attrition after three years of civil war saw Syria's total manpower decline from a high of 325,000 in 2011 to 295,000 in 2012 to an estimated 178,000 in 2013 and 2014," he told AFP.

But the remaining "100,000 to 150,000 loyal troops tested in battle over more than two years of fighting are arguably more lethal than a 300,000-strong Syrian military in 2010, complacent after some 30 years of sitting idle."

Syria's armed forces were hurled into an unprecedented conflict after the government moved to quell an uprising that began in March 2011.

They have battled rebel groups ranging from the moderate Free Syrian Army to Al-Qaeda's Syria affiliate Al-Nusra Front and the jihadist Islamic State (IS) group.

Nearly 190,000 people have been killed in the conflict so far, including some 40,000 soldiers and 27,000 pro-regime forces, as well as 55,000 rebel fighters, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The real toll among the military may be even higher, according to the Britain-based monitoring group.

Despite its losses, the army has avoided recruitment campaigns and relied on compulsory military service to replenish its ranks.

Men of between 18 and 50 have to serve for at least 18 months, and the term can be extended on orders from the military leadership.

Last week, the Central Committee for Popular Reconciliation, a government body, issued an unusual public call in newspapers for Syrians to sign up.

It vowed to try to "resolve the situation" of those who had deserted or failed to report for military service and "to secure their wages".

An official source in the army, meanwhile, played down the need for reinforcements, insisting losses in personnel and materiel were being quickly replaced.

"The power of the army has increased qualitatively and quantitatively," he said.

The army lost control of large parts of Syria in the early days of the conflict, but it has recaptured signficant territory in the past year, with a focus on protecting the capital Damascus.

Its successes have been partly the result of a shift to the close-quarters guerrilla warfare in which Hezbollah specialises.

The "insurgency in Syria forced Syrian ground forces, and manpower in general, to either adapt or die," said Neguizian.

"Large units were divided up into smaller nimbler units, ineffective and ageing leadership was sidelined, and new or emerging junior officers began to take on greater operational responsibility," he said.

Among those officers is Colonel Suhail al-Hassan, nicknamed "The Tiger" and described on pro-regime social media accounts as Assad's "favourite soldier".

Despised by the opposition, he is credited by supporters with the regime's advances around the second city of Aleppo in the north, in particular the opening of the road to the city a year ago.

But despite the shifts in its capabilities, experts see little chance that the army will be able to restore all the territory it has lost.

Opposition forces control most rural areas in northwest Syria's Idlib, large parts of Aleppo city and the surrounding province, and parts of the countryside in Damascus, Hassakeh and Daraa provinces.

The IS, meanwhile, controls all of northern Raqa province and much of the oil-rich eastern province of Deir Ezzor.

"For the near to mid-term future, Assad is very unlikely to be able to destroy the insurgency and retake all the areas now controlled by rebels," according to Stephen Biddle, a defence policy expert at the US Council on Foreign Relations.

"Wars of this kind typically last seven to 10 years, and some last a generation or more."


Source : Sapa-AFP /mjs
Date : 21 Oct 2014 11:34

 

[MickeyD]

US ARMS AIRDROP FALLS INTO JIHADIST HANDS IN SYRIA: MONITOR

A US military airdrop of weapons meant for Kurdish fighters fell into the hands of their jihadist foes near the Syrian battleground town of Kobane, a monitor said Tuesday.

The American military could not confirm the account but said it was examining a video posted online that shows a masked gunman with what appears to be crates attached to a parachute.

US aircraft parachuted crates of weapons, ammunition and medical supplies on Sunday night to resupply Kurds defending the Syrian town of Kobane from the Islamic State group (IS) jihadists.

"One load was taken by IS and there are contradictory reports about a second" which was also reported to have gone astray, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Some sources said two consignments had landed in the hands of IS, but others said that warplanes from a US-led coalition destroyed one of them once the error was detected.

US Central Command, which oversees American forces in the Middle East, said Monday that only one of 27 bundles had gone astray and that American warplanes bombed it to prevent the supplies being snatched by IS.

In a video posted on the Internet, titled "Arms and ammunition dropped by US planes in an IS-held area of Kobane", a masked gunman shows off what appears to be one such bundle attached to a parachute.

"This is the American aid thrown to the infidels," he says, opening wooden boxes filled with rockets and grenades, as aircraft could be heard circling overhead.

"Praise be to God, this is booty for the mujahedeen (Islamic warriors)."

In Washington, Rear Admiral John Kirby could not confirm whether more than one bundle had drifted off course or if the bundle purportedly shown in the video was later bombed by American warplanes.

But he said analysts at Central Command and at the Pentagon were studying the video.

"We're still taking a look at it and assessing the validity of it," he told reporters.

"I do want to add, though, that we are very confident that the vast majority of the bundles did end up in the right hands."

The US military was highly skilled at conducting air drops and the method was an effective way to ferry supplies to forces on the ground, he added.

Source : Sapa-AFP /mm
Date : 21 Oct 2014 23:36