ISIS- SYRIA-THREAD

[Anthea]

CNN

Death toll of U.S.-led airstrikes in Syria tops 900
By Salma Abdelaziz and Mariano Castillo

In the two months since the United States and coalition allies first launched airstrikes against ISIS targets inside of Syria, the missions have killed more than 900 people, nearly all militants, a monitoring group said Saturday.

But 52 civilians, including eight children and five women, are among those who have been killed in the coalition airstrikes inside Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The London-based organization is aligned with the Syrian opposition.

The United States had mostly stayed out of the Syria's civil war, which has been ongoing since March 2011, but as the battlefield fractured with the entry of jihadists like ISIS, the calculus changed.

Of the 910 deaths the observatory has linked to the airstrikes, some 785 were ISIS fighters. That number is likely even higher because of incidents in which the group had difficulty documenting.

Seventy-two of those killed belonged to the al Qaeda affiliate al-Nusra Front, the observatory said, and one was a militant from the Islamic Battalions.

More than 191,000 Syrians have been killed in the civil war, as of August, according to the United Nations.

ISIS threatens government center in Iraq's Anbar province

http://edition.cnn.com/2014/11/22/world ... index.html

[Anthea]

Reuters

Fighters from Syrian al Qaeda wing close in on Shi'ite village

Members of al Qaeda's Nusra Front and other Sunni Islamists seized an area south of a Shi'ite Muslim village in north Syria on Sunday after clashes with pro-government fighters, opposition activists said.

The insurgents advanced overnight on al-Zahra, north of Aleppo city, seizing territory to the south and also trying to take land to the east in an attempt to capture the village, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Al-Zahra and the nearby village of Nubl have been under a long siege by anti-government forces in an isolated Shi'ite area. The United Nations said in March that armed groups surrounding the villages had cut electrical and water lines supplying 45,000 residents. The army has used helicopters to drop supplies to the villagers.

Opposition activists said the fighters also targeted Nubl and were seeking to capture both in the advance on the villages, which are located along a highway that leads to Turkey. Control of the villages could open up a new supply line into Aleppo for the insurgents.

"We targeted the town with dozens of mortar shells and dozens of hell cannon shells and Nusra's forces made progress and control buildings which are in the first line of defense of Nubl," said media activist Ahmed Hamidou who was accompanying battalions involved in the campaign.

The clashes killed at least eight of the fighters advancing on al-Zahra and a number of fighters from the pro-government National Defense Force, the Observatory said.

Villagers from both al-Zahra and Nubl backed up forces trying to stop the Nusra-led offensive, activists said, adding that the Syrian air force had also reacted by bombing several other villages north of Aleppo.

An opposition spokesman said in January that the area had been surrounded because it had been used as a launching pad by the Syrian military to attack Aleppo. The opposition said at the time it could lift the siege if the Syrian military reciprocated elsewhere, but this had not happened.

Aleppo and surrounding areas have been hit by heavy fighting in a conflict which is now in its fourth year and has killed some 200,000 people, according to the United Nations.

The U.N.'s Syria mediator has said that Aleppo would be a good starting point for local ceasefire agreements and has discussed the idea with President Bashar al-Assad.

Further east, Islamic State fighters shot down a Syrian war plane on Sunday close to the eastern city of Deir al-Zor, the Observatory reported, the first time the militant group had taken down an aircraft in that part of the country.

(Reporting by Sylvia Westall; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky and Stephen Powell)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/ ... IO20141123

[Anthea]

Jordan sending refugees back into Syria, Human Rights Watch says
By Nabih Bulos

Jordan has sent Syrian refugees, including wounded civilians and unaccompanied minors, back across the border in violation of international responsibilities, Human Rights Watch said Monday.

The New York-based monitor issued a statement accusing Jordan of ignoring long-accepted principles forbidding governments from returning people back to areas where their lives may be in danger.

There was no immediate response from officials in Jordan, now home to more than 600,000 Syrian refugees.

The report, based on interviews with Syrians and aid workers, marks the latest in a series of allegations that Jordanian officials have sent vulnerable refugees back to Syria or closed the border to those fleeing violence.

"What's new here is the categories of people being deported are even more vulnerable,” Nadim Houry, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Middle East and North Africa division, said in a telephone interview. “In this case, we're talking about wounded and unaccompanied minors.”

The difficulties facing Syrian refugees in Jordan, aid workers say, are part of a larger trend across the Middle East. More than 3 million people have fled Syria since the conflict broke out in 2011, the U.N. says, with the great majority settling in Jordan and other neighboring nations, including Lebanon, Turkey and Iraq.

"We're hitting the point where host countries in the neighborhood are becoming more hostile, with increasing tensions in host countries," Houry said. "The doors are narrowing for Syrians."

Jordan opened up informal humanitarian corridors in 2011 along its more than 200-mile border with Syria, providing safe passage for refugees.

Many Syrian refugees arriving in Jordan are sent to the cramped confines of the Zaatari camp, seven miles from the Syrian border, while others settle in Jordanian towns and cities, often joining relatives.

http://www.latimes.com/world/middleeast ... story.html

[Anthea]

Fox News

Syria's foreign minister meets Putin, says Russia wants to boost relations with Assad
Associated Press

MOSCOW – Syria's foreign minister has met with Vladimir Putin and says the Russian president wants to expand relations with Syria's beleaguered president and improve cooperation between Moscow and Damascus.

Walid al-Moallem said his Wednesday meeting with Putin in the city of Sochi was productive. He said that during the talks Putin "confirmed the determination of Russia to develop relations with Syrian President Bashar Assad" and "strengthening the strategic partnership between our countries."

Russia's foreign minister Sergey Lavrov said Russia supports the proposal floated by the UN envoy to Syria for local cease-fires, which Assad has said is worth studying. The Islamic State group's onslaught in Syria and Iraq has given greater urgency to international efforts to find a solution for Syria's conflict, which has killed more than 200,000.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/11/26 ... ions-with/

[Anthea]

Here & Now

U.N. Envoy Calls For ‘Firing Freeze’ In Aleppo, Syria

Staffan de Mistura, the United Nations envoy to Syria, says a “firing freeze” in the Syrian city of Aleppo could serve as a model for the rest of the country.

De Mistura told Here & Now’s Lisa Mullins that Aleppo is a symbol — it has worldwide historic and archaeological significance. In addition, it has suffered the most in the country’s civil war. And crucially, none of the rival groups in Syria’s civil war has managed to take it over.

The city is surrounded by government troops, with rebel groups inside and Islamist militant groups like ISIS and Nusra less than 20 miles away. De Mistura is proposing temporary firing freezes to allow for humanitarian aid, and negotiations to work out a joint local governance which might serve as a model for the rest of Syria.

As for ISIS and al Nusra, de Mistura says the U.S. action against the group in Kobane has served as a warning to the group not to make any move on Aleppo.
Interview Highlights: Staffan de Mistura

Why is Aleppo so important?

“It’s the last city which has not fallen, either under the bombing of the government or the attack by ISIS or by anyone else. If it falls under the government, there would be hardly any opposition, moderate opposition being based really inside a city in Syria. If it falls under ISIS, it will be one of the biggest massacres you could dream of and it would be an awful one. If it stays as it is, it won’t survive very long, It is very close to collapse.”

What exactly is a firing freeze?

“We are asking, we are suggesting, as U.N. initiative not a government initiative, not a ceasefire like was done in Homs or another place, it’s a U.N. proposal to have a freeze — stop fighting. Let’s bring humanitarian aid, let’s avoid the city to collapse.”

How is Syria responding to this idea?

“The fact that I was in Damascus three weeks ago and I went to see the President of Syria — and that I explained to him the plan and he was not in favor at the beginning, at least I thought he was not in favor because the local and national media was very much against the idea of a freeze in a place where the government is actually winning.

But I think I used a sufficiently convincing argument to make him reconsider the potential position and to understand it was in the interest of himself, perhaps, but certainly of the Syrians that the city should not continue being bombarded and the war continue there. So he gave a conditional, preliminary ‘OK’ by saying we want to see the details.

And probably believing that the opposition would not accept it, which is in fact one of my concerns. I hope that the opposition will understand that it is in the interest of the Syrian people in the city to freeze this conflict in Aleppo. Aleppo can become a symbol for what can be done elsewhere.

People are asking for de-escalation; they are tired of a war where no one is winning. Everybody’s losing but above all, the people are losing.”

http://hereandnow.wbur.org/2014/11/25/m ... ria-aleppo

[Anthea]

BBC News Middle East

Syria conflict: Raqqa air strikes death toll rises


Activists said a market near Raqqa's museum was among the sites targeted by government warplanes

Almost 100 people are now believed to have died in a series of government air strikes on the Islamic State-held city of Raqqa on Tuesday, activists say.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 52 civilians were killed.

One activist from Raqqa told the BBC the only hospital still functioning in the city was finding it difficult to cope with the dozens of wounded.

Syrian government and US-led coalition aircraft frequently bomb Raqqa, which IS took full control of in January.

The group has since made the city capital of the caliphate it proclaimed in June and governs it according to a strict interpretation of Islamic law.

'Massacre'

Activists said that in Tuesday's air raids, government warplanes targeted at least nine sites, including a popular market near Raqqa's museum.

Most of the casualties were caused by two strikes in quick succession on the industrial area near the train station. The Syrian Observatory said people who rushed to help those wounded by the first were caught up in the second.

The UK-based group said the air strikes had killed at least 95 people, among them three women and four children. It could not confirm whether the 43 dead not listed as civilians were IS militants, but said some of the strikes took place near the jihadist group's positions.

The Local Co-ordination Committees, an opposition activist network, condemned what it called "another massacre by regime forces".

It said it had been able to document 87 deaths, and warned that more might die because of a "severe shortage of drugs, medical equipment and medical staff".

'Angry and afraid'

An activist from Raqqa also told the BBC that Raqqa's hospitals were in a "very bad situation".

"Just one hospital can work as normal but the other hospitals can't. I really don't know how they can deal with this," he said.

"There are a lot of dead bodies and injured. There are just a few doctors and because of that there are a lot of people dying from their wounds.

The activist said people were angry and very afraid.

"All the markets in the city closed after the air strikes. There is nobody walking in the streets - it's just like a zombie [film].

"They are just afraid because they say in the morning there are regime air strikes and in the evening there are [US-led] alliance air strikes and it's very, very hard to live under IS."

The US and its Arab allies have been conducting air strikes on IS positions in Raqqa and elsewhere in Syria since September.

In a separate development on Tuesday, UN humanitarian chief Valerie Amos said 12.2 million Syrians needed assistance because of increasing violence and deteriorating conditions, up from 10.8 million in July.

Baroness Amos told the UN Security Council that cross-border deliveries of aid to rebel-held areas without Syrian government approval had "made a difference" and urged member states to extend the authorisation for them beyond 9 January.

However, she warned that the UN was still failing to get enough aid to the 212,000 people living under siege - 185,000 by government forces and 26,500 by rebels.

The UN says 7.6 million people had been displaced inside Syria and 3.2 million have fled abroad since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began in 2011.



http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-30208687

[Anthea]

Seattle Times

How French truck driver became a target of U.S. air war in Syria

According to European intelligence officials, killing David Drugeon was among the chief goals when the United States unleashed 47 cruise missiles on Syria on Sept. 23, striking at a unit of al-Qaida fighters that U.S. officials call the Khorasan Group.
By Mitchell Prothero & McClatchy Foreign Staff (TNS)

PARIS — To hear French officials tell it, David Drugeon is a 24-year-old former truck driver from the Brittany region of France who occasionally worked out with French soldiers before slipping off to Pakistan to join al-Qaida. He is, at such a tender age, no former French intelligence officer with military training, certainly no “James Bond.”

Then why has he been targeted at least twice in U.S. air raids on Syria at a likely cost in expended weapons of millions of dollars?

“We don’t waste $1.5 million cruise missiles on truck drivers from Brittany,” said a U.S. official asked last month about Drugeon’s background. Like all of the intelligence officials cited in this story, he spoke on condition of anonymity.

According to European intelligence officials, killing Drugeon was among the chief goals when the United States unleashed 47 cruise missiles on Syria early Sept. 23, striking at a unit of al-Qaida fighters that U.S. officials call the Khorasan Group, which the U.S. said had set up shop in Syria to plot attacks on the West.

At least 50 fighters from al-Qaida’s Syrian affiliate, the Nusra Front, with whom the Khorasan fighters were based, died in those raids; Drugeon was not among them. On Nov. 5, the U.S. apparently took another shot at Drugeon, targeting a car he was in as part of an attack that pummeled not just Nusra bases, but also outposts belonging to Ahrar al-Sham, another Syrian rebel group believed to have ties to al-Qaida. Drugeon apparently survived that barrage, too.

According to a witness who claimed to have seen some of those strikes, Drugeon was driving with a companion in the town of Sarmada when U.S. forces targeted an Ahrar al-Sham base at Babsalqa, a town about a mile away.

Seconds after that explosion, Drugeon and his companion “jumped out of the car,” the witness said.

A missile then struck the car, destroying it, the witness said. Drugeon was wounded, though not fatally, and was taken by ambulance to Shifa hospital near the Bab al-Hawa border crossing to Turkey, the witness said.

After 24 hours, Nusra Front fighters removed him to an undisclosed location, according to the witness, who asked that his name and nationality be withheld.

U.S. officials announced the airstrikes, saying they had taken place near Sarmada, but provided no more information.

Drugeon’s current whereabouts are unknown. Little in the official accounts of Drugeon’s background explains how he came to be one of the central figures in a U.S. military effort that appears to be as much manhunt as strategic jockeying for advantage.

French officials downplay his significance, dismissing claims by European intelligence officials that the French had described him as a “big fish” with knowledge of Western intelligence tradecraft in seeking to have him targeted by the U.S. military campaign in Syria.

But the two strikes against Drugeon also suggest he is more than just another European who has joined the jihad against the West.

A monthlong probe — spanning five countries and interviews with more than a dozen intelligence officials — found many who believe the French intelligence service once recruited Drugeon to work as an informant inside al-Qaida, only to see him pursue a life of jihad.

Drugeon first came to the attention of international intelligence services — the French were aware of him sooner — as the rumored mastermind behind a “lone wolf” attack in March 2012, when a Frenchman of Algerian descent, Mohammed Merah, killed three Jewish schoolchildren and four others in a shooting spree across southern France.

It was then, according to three non-French European intelligence officials, that Drugeon’s name began appearing in intelligence reports — provided by the French government — that described him as having an intelligence background and military training before joining al-Qaida in Waziristan, the mountainous region of Pakistan where al-Qaida continues to maintain safe havens and training facilities.

“They put him out as this super-dangerous guy with, and I’m quoting from the report here, ‘familiarity with Western intelligence tradecraft and practices,’ ” said one European intelligence official. “There was no ambiguity to the reports, which also stated that he’d received military and explosives training, and it was stated in a way that led us to believe these skills had come from training with the French government,” the official added. That same description was given to Syrian rebels who said they were asked to monitor Drugeon on behalf of a Western intelligence service that they believed was part of the U.S. government. Interviewed in Turkey in early October, the Syrians said they had been told that the Frenchman was a highly trained former French spy and that they should report on his movements and prepare a kidnapping operation to turn him over to Western authorities.

The Syrian rebels’ account of Drugeon was later confirmed by two European intelligence officials — from different countries — who had direct access to the intelligence provided by France about Drugeon.

The French government now strongly denies that Drugeon was a member of military intelligence or that any member of France’s main foreign intelligence service, the General Directorate of Foreign Security, known by the initials DGSE, had defected to al-Qaida. One French official suggested the description of Drugeon having Western-style intelligence or military training was a misunderstanding by “perhaps an overeager American intelligence analyst.”

“That’s ridiculous,” said a European intelligence official. “My report came from France and there’s no ambiguity here, they’ve changed the story.”

The official suggested another theory for why the French would have seen Drugeon as a major threat. “What they don’t want to admit is that they clearly put him into play in the hopes he would go to Pakistan and report back to them,” he said. “Well, he went to Pakistan. But when he got there he told everyone he was a defecting French spy and proceeded to become one of al-Qaida’s best operatives.”

http://seattletimes.com/html/nationworl ... cation=rss

[Anthea]

L A Times

Islamic State and rival Al Nusra Front each strengthen grip on Syria
By Raja Abdulrahim

A group with ties to Al Qaeda has gained significant ground across Syria in recent weeks, creating the possibility that the war-ravaged nation will be divided among two opposing militant Islamic groups and the government of President Bashar Assad — with much of the U.S.-backed secular opposition squeezed out.

In late October, Al Nusra Front began attacking towns in northwestern Syria, some of which had been controlled since 2012 by the Free Syrian Army, a group of former civilians and ex-Syrian army soldiers that has in the past been identified as a potential U.S. ally.

Al Nusra Front, which has rejected the more-violent Islamic State group's brutal tactics but shares its goals of imposing strict Islamic laws, holds sway over about 75% of Idlib province, on the Turkish border in the west. Al Nusra members say they have launched a campaign to expand their reach across much of Syria.

"This is how the orders came down; it is better to have an independent area," said Humam Halabi, a member of Al Nusra's media arm. "Not just in Idlib, everywhere."

The new developments mean it will be increasingly difficult for the U.S. to find effective partners in Syria willing to help coordinate with the Western-led air campaign aimed at checking the expansion of militant Islam in Syria and neighboring Iraq.

By driving out fellow antigovernment forces, Al Nusra is following the lead of Islamic State, which now controls much of northeastern Syria and northwestern Iraq. Last year, Islamic State began its aggression against rebel groups it deemed guilty of such crimes as theft and kidnapping. But soon the militant group turned against all other antigovernment forces — from the secular to the Islamist — in areas where they had once shared power.

Syria has become a battleground for supremacy within the global militant Islamist movement since Al Qaeda's central command disowned Islamic State this year. Now, residents of northwestern Syria say Al Nusra Front is working to establish full control — through religious courts and edicts — over territory it once shared with Free Syrian Army and Islamic rebel forces. Many say it has made clear its plans to declare its own independent state ruled by strict Islamic law, or sharia, countering the Islamic State's self-proclaimed caliphate.

Months ago, the group erected a sign in Idlib province reading, "Idlib Emirate welcomes you," but it was taken down when residents questioned it. An emirate is a smaller version of a caliphate, a transnational state.

"Syria is going to be divided between an emirate, a caliphate and the regime, and there will no longer be anybody called revolutionaries," said Alaa Deen Yusuf, an antigovernment activist in Idlib.

This comes as the United States is gearing up to train as many as 15,000 Syrian rebels to fight Islamic State amid concerns that the secular opposition is increasingly splintered and weakened, raising serious questions about the effectiveness of any training program.

The proposed training and arming of rebels come in conjunction with airstrikes in Iraq and Syria by a U.S.-led coalition. The airstrikes have mostly targeted Islamic State but on several occasions have also been aimed at an Al Nusra affiliate, the Khorasan Group.

After more than three years of war, Syria is divided among a wide array of forces — a confused landscape in which enemies in one part of the country might act as allies in another. Al Nusra still fights alongside many rebel groups, most recently in Aleppo, where it coordinated with the Islamic Front — a coalition backed in part by Saudi Arabia — in an offensive against two government-controlled towns with a Shiite Muslim-majority population.

The rebels who formed the original antigovernment opposition still control territory across Syria, including parts of Idlib and neighboring Aleppo provinces, as well as areas in the south, where the uprising first began, and around the capital, Damascus. But with stalled international military support, their ability to hold on to this territory, much less advance, is in question as they come under threat.

The recent gains by Al Nusra have further emboldened the group to begin instituting its more restrictive brand of Islam in areas once governed by secular and more moderate Islamist rebels.

"The situation is getting worse," said Dr. Alaa Wahab, a gynecologist in the town of Salqeen, adding that Al Nusra members have begun implementing strict religious dress for women, sending female students home from school if their clothing is deemed immodest.

Last month, Al Nusra fighters came to Wahab's clinic and told him that the female employees would now be required to wear long black robes, niqabs covering their faces, and gloves. The fighters said the group would provide the required clothing.

Wahab objected, telling them that it would be difficult for women to work in a medical setting while wearing such garb. Many of his employees have said they would quit rather than submit to such rules, Wahab said.

"This is not the time for that," activist Yusuf said. "People don't have anything to eat."

Most of the newly imposed rules have yet to be enforced with physical punishment, "but in the future these things could advance," Al Nusra member Halabi said.

He added that days earlier, two men were summarily executed after being accused of engaging in homosexual acts.

"Nusra Front has become" Islamic State, said a Syrian man who goes by the nickname Abu Adeeb, who moved his family to Turkey but still travels regularly to his home in Idlib province. These trips could become impossible if Al Nusra Front seizes the border post with Turkey, he added. For now the post is controlled by Islamic Front, but many suggest it could eventually become a target of Al Nusra.

"Everyone is waiting for his turn," Abu Adeeb said. "Everyone is getting ready to flee to Turkey."

These developments have made the Al Nusra-Islamic State relationship less clear. The two sides have been at times hostile toward each other but at other times have struck conciliatory tones.

Al Nusra member Somsam Islam said reports that the two sides had struck an agreement were false, but there remained open communication between the groups. Pointing to occasional examples of unity between Muslims and Christians, Islam said that "unity between the Nusra and the State is possible."

There are some indications in Idlib that this accord has already begun.

When Al Nusra fighters stormed through the towns of Jabal al Zawiya, a mountainous region in Idlib, some of them scrawled on walls "the State is staying." The phrase has become an anthem of sorts for Islamic State members and supporters in response to international efforts to destroy the group.

Meanwhile, residents are stuck in the middle as their homes and neighborhoods once again become battlegrounds.

"The people are very scared," said Yusuf, the activist. "The first fear is that Nusra will turn into ISIS [an acronym for Islamic State], and second is that they are afraid of the coalition airstrikes. And lastly they are worried that the regime is going to take advantage of this and advance."

http://www.latimes.com/world/middleeast ... tml#page=1

Anthea: Am I the only person who thinks that things are becoming even worse in Syria - instead of getting better - I see NO IMPROVEMENT at all - and am very much aware that the situation in Aleppo is becoming much worse with the ever increasing numbers of young jihadists from all sides moving into the area

[Anthea]

Kobani has almost vanished from the news

Where are all those thousands of people from across the world - who a few weeks ago came out on to the streets to protest and show their support for the people of Kobani

The fighting goes on - people are still killing and being killed - occasionally we hear news of yet another bombing raid

What we do not hear is anything of the people in Kobani - who is still there - how are the people managing to survive - how are supplies getting to the people from both sides?

What is life really like in Kobani?

Why did nobody prevent the attack on Kobani?

We all saw the Islamic Front heading in that direction as it took over all the small towns in it's path - yet little or no effort was made to prevent the advance from reaching Kobani WHY ?

[Anthea]

Reuters

Islamic State sets off suicide bombs on Turkey border: monitoring group

Islamic State fighters set off two suicide bombs on the Turkish border with the Syrian Kurdish town of Kobani on Saturday amid clashes that have killed at least 30 fighters, a monitoring group said.

Kurdish militia have been holding off Islamic State fighters for more than two months in the battle for the town, known as Ayn al-Arab in Arabic, but neither side has been able to gain a decisive advantage.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Islamic State fighters detonated a suicide car bomb at the border crossing at dawn on Saturday and that clashes broke out after.

A second suicide bomber with an explosive vest later blew himself up in the same area, the Observatory said.

Clashes also broke out throughout the town itself, and another car bomb was detonated to the south, the Observatory said.

At least 30 fighters from the two sides have been confirmed as killed so far, said Rami Abdulrahman, the Observatory's director. Twenty-one of those were Islamic State fighters, including four suicide bombers. The remaining nine were from the Kurdish forces.

(Reporting by Alexander Dziadosz; Editing by Hugh Lawson)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/ ... 6R20141129

[Anthea]

Denver Post

Inside Kobani, Syria: Devastation, but also optimism
By The Associated Press

KOBANI, Syria — Blocks of low-rise buildings with hollow facades, shattered concrete, streets strewn with rubble, overturned and crumpled remains of cars and trucks. Such is the landscape in Kobani, where the sounds of rifle and mortar fire resonate all day long in fighting between Islamic State aggressors and the Syrian town's Kurdish defenders.

Kurdish fighters peek through sand-bagged positions, firing at suspected militant positions. Female fighters in trenches move behind sheets strung up to block the view of snipers. Foreign jets circle overhead.

An exclusive report shot inside Kobani offered a rare, in-depth glimpse of the horrendous destruction that more than two months of fighting has inflicted on the Kurdish town in northern Syria by the Turkish border.

There, Kurdish fighters backed by small numbers of Iraqi peshmerga forces and Syrian rebels, are locked in what they see as an existential battle against the militants, who swept into their town in mid-September as part of a summer blitz after the Islamic State group overran large parts of Syria and neighboring Iraq.

Helped by more than 270 airstrikes from a U.S.-led coalition and an American airdrop of weapons, the Kurds have halted the militants' advance and now think that a corner has been turned.

Several fighters with the YPG, the main Kurdish fighting force, spoke confidently of a coming victory. Jamil Marzuka, a senior commander, said the fighting has "entered a new phase" in the past week.

"We can tell everyone, not just those on the front lines, that we are drawing up the necessary tactics and plans to liberate the city," he said.

A YPG fighter, who identified himself only by his first name, Pozul, said small pockets of militants remain. Still, he said he and other fighters must remain wary as they move around because Islamic State snipers lurk amid the ruins and the militants have booby-trapped buildings they left behind.

"They are scattered so as to give us the impression that there are a lot of them, but there are not," he said.

On Friday, activists said Islamic State militants withdrew from large parts of the so-called Kurdish security quarter, an eastern district where Kurdish militiamen maintain security buildings and offices. Militants had seized the area last month.

Zardasht Kobani, 26, a YPG unit commander, has been fighting day and night for weeks. Often he and his fellow fighters were short on ammunition and sleep, he said. Now he feels an important victory is at hand. He said the militants have failed in Kobani and are looking for a way out.

"But IS knows that escaping from Kobani will spell their downfall," he said.

Link to Article & Video:

http://www.denverpost.com/nationworld/c ... source=rss

[Anthea]

BBC News Middle East

Islamic State: Syria says air strikes not hurting group

Anthea: The small recently formed Islamic State are holding their own against the might of the American Airforce - within the Middle Eastern and indeed the entire Sunni Islamic community - the kudos this affords them is far greater than any harm the bombs inflict - indeed within Sunni communities it is the Islamic State who are winning the propaganda war

Two months of US-led air strikes have failed to weaken Islamic State (IS) militants, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem has said.

A US-led coalition has carried out nearly 300 air strikes in Syria since September.

Mr Moualem told Lebanese TV the only way to tackle IS was to force Turkey to tighten border controls to stop foreign fighters crossing into Syria.

IS controls large swathes of both Syria and neighbouring Iraq.

The BBC's Jim Muir says the air strikes have been widely credited with helping to halt the advance of IS fighters on the border town of Kobane in northern Syria.
Losing ground

"All the indications say that [IS] today, after two months of coalition air strikes, is not weaker," Mr Moulame told al-Mayadeen TV on Friday.

"If the [UN] Security Council and Washington do not force Turkey to control its borders then all of this action will not eliminate IS," he added.

Mr Moualem also said Turkey's plan for a no-fly zone over northern Syria would mean the de facto partition of Syria.

Turkey has a 900km (560-mile) border with Syria.

Ankara has repeatedly denied backing militant Islamist groups - inadvertently or otherwise - to help Syrian rebels oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Meanwhile, the Syrian government has been escalating its own use of air power.

It has carried out more than 2,000 air strikes in less than six weeks in many parts of the country against rebels, including IS.

Many of the attacks have been directed at Raqqa, the city in north-east Syria that has become the militant group's headquarters.

A Syrian monitoring group says that more than 500 people have been killed in the raids, many of them civilians.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-30257783

[Anthea]

The Washington Times

Islamic State group attacks Kobani, Syria, from Turkey, Kurds say
By Bassem Mroue - Associated Press - Saturday, November 29, 2014



The Islamic State group launched an attack Saturday on the Syrian border town of Kobani from Turkey, a Kurdish official and activists said, although Turkey denied that the fighters had used its territory for the raid.

The assault began when a suicide bomber driving an armored vehicle detonated his explosives on the border crossing between Kobani and Turkey, said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and Nawaf Khalil, a spokesman for Syria’s powerful Kurdish Democratic Union Party.

The Islamic State group “used to attack the town from three sides,” Khalil said. “Today, they are attacking from four sides.”

Turkey, while previously backing the Syrian rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Assad in that country’s civil war, has been hesitant to aid them in Kobani because it fears that could stoke Kurdish ambitions for an independent state.

A Turkish government statement on Saturday confirmed that one of the suicide attacks involved a bomb-loaded vehicle that detonated on the Syrian side of the border. But it denied that the vehicle had crossed into Kobani through Turkey, which would be a first for the extremist fighters.

“Claims that the vehicle reached the border gate by crossing through Turkish soil are a lie,” read the statement released from the government press office at the border town of Suruc. “Contrary to certain claims, no Turkish official has made any statement claiming that the bomb-loaded vehicle had crossed in from Turkey.”

“The security forces who are on alert in the border region have … taken all necessary measures,” the statement continued.

Associated Press journalists saw thick black smoke rise over Kobani during the attack. The sound of heavy gunfire echoed through the surrounding hills as armored vehicles took up positions on the border. The Observatory said heavy fighting also took place southwest of the town where the Islamic State group brought in tanks to reinforce their fighters.

Mustafa Bali, a Kobani-based activist, said by telephone that Islamic State group fighters have taken positions in the grain silos on the Turkish side of the border and from there are launching attacks toward the border crossing point. He added that the U.S.-led coalition launched an airstrike Saturday morning on the eastern side of the town.

“It is now clear that Turkey is openly cooperating with Daesh,” Bali said, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State.

The Islamic State group began its Kobani offensive in mid-September, capturing parts of the town as well as dozens of nearby villages. The town later became the focus of airstrikes by the U.S.-led coalition against the militants.

Kurdish fighters slowly have been advancing in Kobani since late October, when dozens of well-armed Iraqi peshmerga fighters joined fellow Syrian Kurds in the battles. The fighting has killed hundreds of fighters on both sides over the past two months.

The Observatory said Saturday the latest fighting killed at least eight Kurdish fighters and 17 jihadis.

The Islamic State group has declared a self-styled Islamic caliphate in areas under its control in Iraq and Syria, governing it according to its violent interpretation of Shariah law. The group has carried out mass killings targeting government security forces, ethnic minorities and others against it.

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[Anthea]

Irish Times

Islamic State converts: Torment of a jihadi’s mother
By Lara Marlowe

She believes there is no force on Earth more powerful than a mother’s love. If she could, she would pull him back through sheer force of will. Since her 22-year-old son Timothée travelled to Syria in September to join Islamic State, Marie (53) has lived on a precipice. She sends emails “into the void” every week. And she fears the irreparable; that Timothée could veer into barbarism, like the two Frenchmen his age who were shown participating in a mass beheading of Syrian pilots on an IS video. And that Timothée could die.

Marie is one of thousands of mothers confronted by the same nightmare. She asked that the family’s surname be withheld, because IS militants watch the internet closely and have reportedly punished volunteers whose families talked about them. And she is afraid of losing her job if her employers learn her son is a jihadi.

French authorities say 1,132 French men and women, some younger than 18, are involved in the Syrian jihad; one third are currently in the combat zone. Si Rien n’est Fait Agissons (“If nothing is done, let’s take action”), a support group founded by a woman who lost two sons in Syria, claims their real number is closer to 5,000, because many parents do not report their children’s disappearance. The group believes some 20,000 “internationals” have joined IS.

Youth exodus

“It’s a haemorrhage, an epidemic,” says Marie. “Something that surpasses our understanding.” Had France taken a stronger stand against the Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, she believes, the exodus of French youths, at least 23 per cent of whom are converts to Islam, might not have happened.

A recent IS video showing young Frenchmen burning their passports “was their way of saying the West is useless”, Marie says. “They’re saying, ‘You didn’t want to help us ([/fight Assad)/], so we’re doing it without you. And we’re stealing your children, draining your life force.’”

Marie and her husband, Francis (55), taught their two sons to be tolerant, open and humane. Timothée was baptised a Catholic. He read books on religion and philosophy. “He was looking for something,” Marie says. Two years ago, he chose Islam.

“He got down on his knees in front of us and said, ‘Papa and Mama, I have to tell you something’,” Marie recalls. “I wept. Not because it was Islam, but because I felt excluded. He did it on his own, in his little corner. That really hurt. When I started crying, Timothée cried too. He put his arms around us and he said, ‘Mama, it doesn’t matter. I’m still the same. It doesn’t change anything.’”

Marie sells advertising for a lifestyle magazine. Francis owns a small cosmetics company. Timothée was a happy, outgoing boy who loved sports, music and dancing. “But he couldn’t bear injustice, inequality and corruption,” Marie says. “He was disgusted by society. After he converted, he was more calm, meditative.”

Timothée’s girlfriend, Alison, hoped they could continue their relationship. “But when you’re in love with someone – and they were in love – after a while if you can’t touch the person or kiss them, it’s difficult,” Marie says.

Timothée dropped out of university, ate halal food, prayed five times a day and increasingly wore khamis, a long, Gulf Arab-style shirt. He refused to dine with the family if there was wine on the table. He did odd jobs, including selling khamis in an open-air market. He bought a suit and worked as a driver.

Marie shows me a photograph of Timothée in his driver’s suit. He is pale, with brown hair, green-brown eyes and a radiant smile. “That beard drove him crazy, because it wouldn’t grow longer,” she laughs. “They wear beards to show they are pious, and to resemble the Prophet. A long beard means you’re wise.”

In September, Timothée told his family he was travelling to Frankfurt to purchase a car for a client. There were several days of text messages before “the knife to the heart”. It said: “The network isn’t good here. I’m sorry to tell you this way, but I’d mentioned I was going to learn Arabic. I’ll be in a touch in a month.”

On October 20th, Timothée left a voice message with a Syrian dialling code, telling his parents not to worry. There was another month of silence, during which Islamic State released the decapitation video. “It was horrible, horrible,” Marie says. “They all resemble each other and you say to yourself, ‘That could be him.’”

On November 20th, Marie was on an RER commuter train when an email from Timothée appeared on her iPhone. She called her husband and Timothée’s older brother, Thomas, who immediately went on the internet for a “chat” – the family’s first direct contact with Timothée in two months.

Over three days, the family conversed with their prodigal son for several hours. “It’s almost as if he were on a school trip with friends,” Marie says. “They’re moved around in buses, except the buses get ambushed and bombed.”

‘Same flag’

Marie reads excerpts from Timothée’s emails aloud: “I am with converts from the entire world. There is no nationalism, no racism. We are all equal: whites, blacks, rich and poor, united under the same flag. We are all servants of Allah.

“I miss you but there is no place for me in a country that fights Islam. I left to be able to live my religion. It is difficult to understand, but I wasn’t happy in France. The only thing that kept me there was you. I assure you I am happy. It is hard, but I am at peace.”

On November 22nd, Timothée telephoned Marie. “He told me he’s doing humanitarian work. I am convinced that he’s distributing food and clothing,” she insists. “The people who are beheaded are people who are fighting against us,” he told her. “It’s war. I know that in France they say we are terrorists, but I promise you that what I see and hear, the civilians, the bombardments – it is we who are the victims.”

French police have repeatedly questioned Timothée’s family. “They searched our computers. For them, our home is a crime scene and we are accessories to the crime,” Marie says. “They snoop into your friendships, your work.”

France recently passed a law punishing returning jihadis with prison. Right-wing parliamentarians propose stripping them of their citizenship, and establishing a Guantánamo-style prison on Devil’s Island in French Guiana.

Marie criticises the absence of psychological support for families, and the state’s failure to shut down extremist websites or repatriate the bodies of at least 49 French citizens who have died in Syria.

Most of all, Marie faults the treatment of returnees. “I can’t come back. It would mean prison if I did,” Timothée told her.

In Denmark, the government has set up special centres to rehabilitate returnees. “In France, they’re thrown in prison with ordinary criminals. If they’re locked up with criminals, they’ll become criminals. . . Stop seeing them as criminals,” Marie pleads.

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[Anthea]

The Washington Post

Syria’s Assad regime cuts subsidies, focuses ailing economy on war effort
By Hugh Naylor - Sam Alrefaie contributed to this report.

Syria’s economy is in a tailspin, and the regime of President Bashar al-Assad is increasingly struggling to find resources to quash the four-year-old rebellion, analysts say.

The government has had to scale back subsidies for citizens for goods ranging from water to heating oil over the last six months. That has angered Syrians, who already face crippling inflation, 50-percent unemployment and wide-scale damage to industry caused by the civil war. In addition, power outages have worsened recently and food shortages loom.

With the opposition weakened, the Syrian military should be able to deal knockout blows to the rebels. But Assad’s forces are too short on funds, analysts say.

“You’re seeing the continued splintering with these opposition groups, their weakness and ­vulnerability, but the regime is failing to capitalize on the shortcomings of its adversaries,” said Riad Kahwaji, an analyst and chief executive of the Dubai-based Institute for Near East and Gulf ­Military Analysis.

Other economic problems like falling tax revenues, a collapse in the currency and rising bills for imports have also pushed the regime deeper into “survival mode,” he added. Although the government’s budget figures are not made public, analysts say Damascus has had to shift priorities in order to pay for the war effort.

It has slashed spending on social welfare, including cutting subsidies for water and electricity over the summer.

Last month, the government did the same with diesel and heating oil. That cutback was partly a reaction to airstrikes by the U.S.-led coalition that damaged oil installations in eastern Syria that had fallen under the control of Islamic State.

Although they are enemies, the Islamic State gave the regime an unlikely boost, selling its own oil back to the government at cheap rates, according to analysts and U.N. officials. But the coalition airstrikes that began targeting the militant group in September have slowed those transactions, they say.

The cumulative effect has been not only a strain on the government but more hardship for many Syrians like Abdul Aziz, a 29-year-old graphic designer who lives with his parents and two siblings. Like scores of his neighbors, he and his family were forced six months ago to start taking international food handouts distributed by local charities.

“People can hardly afford to live anymore,” Abdul Aziz said via Skype from his home in central Damascus, which is controlled by the government. Fearing retribution, he asked that his full name not be published.

Last month’s subsidy cuts reportedly sent the price of heating oil from 73 to 85 cents a liter — the equivalent of going from $2.76 to $3.22 a gallon — while diesel went up by 12 cents a liter, to 48 cents, or about $1.82 a gallon. This has caused prices of a wide variety of goods to jump. Even clothes are becoming unaffordable for many Syrians, with residents in the capital saying blue jeans are sold for as much as eight times their pre-war price.

“Instead of eating meat or chicken every day like we used to, we eat it once or twice a week,” said Amjad, 24, a software engineer who lives with his sister in Damascus. He also asked that his full name not be published, citing safety concerns.

Syrians have been so angered by the rising fuel costs that there have been protests in regime-held areas, a rare event. That has added to the pressure on the government, which already is facing discontent over the huge war casualties suffered by Alawites, the minority religious group that dominates the regime’s military forces.

Some 200,000 people have been killed since the start of the uprising.
‘Army is overextended’

A year ago, the regime appeared to be turning the tide of the war, inflicting setbacks on rebels in strategic locations like the Qalamoun area near the border with Lebanon.

But Assad’s forces now appear bogged down on a number of fronts. Rebels still cling to parts of Aleppo and the capital, while in the south, the armed opposition is making advances.

“The Syrian army is overextended,” said Fawaz A. Gerges, a professor of international relations at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Many of the government’s revenue sources have vanished. Opposition groups control nearly half of the country and most of its oil installations, and industries such as tourism have been decimated.

Jihad Yazigi, editor-in-chief of the Syria Report, an economic news Web site, said Syrian gross domestic product has fallen to half of its pre-war level of roughly $60 billion.

With local industry battered by the fighting, the Syrian government must rely more on imports of items like oil and wheat. But the Syrian pound has lost three-quarters of its value in the past four years, making those goods increasingly expensive to bring in.

Once the imports arrive, it can be difficult to get them to market. Rebels regularly ambush supply routes, contributing to periodic shortages of flour for bread and natural gas for electricity. In both rebel- and regime-held areas, power outages now last as long as 23 hours a day.

The difficulties have forced the two sides to work together. Rebels control the main water supply for Damascus, but the government secures its flow into the capital with concessions on such issues as prisoner releases.

The Assad government is also being squeezed by Western economic sanctions. It has relied increasingly on Russia and Iran for help. Since the rebellion started, Iranian aid to Damascus may total as much as $10 billion, said Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran expert and senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

“Assad would not be financially solvent today without Iranian aid,” he said.

But the capture of parts of Iraq by the Islamic State over the summer severed important supply lines that had been used by Iran, a close ally of the Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad.

“The Baghdad road was critical for Assad. It brought in not just goods and services from Iran, but also oil, cash and arms,” said Gerges.

Back in Damascus, residents suspect the influx of international food aid has freed up resources for the regime to put toward the war. Nonetheless, the food donations are vital, they say.

“People wouldn’t receive the necessary nutrition without this aid, and things would be far worse,” Abdul Aziz said.

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