Inter-Rebel Fighting Enters a New Phase as Salafists Declare Open War on ISIS
by Daniel Abdallah
for Syria Comment, February 14, 2014

Three days ago, the inter-rebel fighting entered a new phase.  For the first time, Salafist factions have openly publicised their attack on the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham and the feircest battles have moved from the Northwest to the East of Syria. Ahrar ash-Sham (AS) and Jabhat an-Nusra (JN) – al-Qaeda’s official branch in Syria – are officially at war with ISIS. The recent fighting spans many governorates, but two – Deir az-Zour and al-Hasakah – have seen the most intense fighting between ISIS and JN/AS. Concurrent attacks on ISIS have taken place in rural Aleppo and Raqqa on a smaller scale, perhaps to take advantage of ISIS’s vulnerability because it was preoccupied in the East.

Although there were previous direct engagements between AS and JN, on the one hand, and ISIS, on the other, they were never at such scale, never so exacerbated, at least, as will be shortly explained, from the AS and JN side. The most well-known precedent took place in the days leading to 12^th January 2014 – the date on which Raqqa fell into the sole control of ISIS. ISIS had been surrounded in the gubernatorial palace by AS from the West and by JN from the East, and the outcome of the battle looked all but certain. Quite unexpectedly, JN fighters were informed on their radios by ISIS to ‘surrender or withdraw because AS have left the battle field and you are on your own’.[1] For ideological reasons, AS fighters had decided not to participate in the fitna (civil discord among Muslims) and to avoid having the blood of their ‘brothers’ on their hands. They, however, were not rewarded for their attempt to remain neutral. They were captured and executed by a different ISIS force outside Raqqa, although ISIS had initially agreed to grant them safe passage.[2]

The infighting under discussion had its origin in a dispute over the control of the Konicko oil field in Khasham, Deir az-Zour. Cottage-industry methods of refining crude oil have become a profitable source of cash for rebels and tribesmen alike in the ‘liberated’ areas of North Eastern Syria.[3] The oil field was originally under the control of tribes who had pledged allegiance to ISIS, but the Common Islamic Court (Hay’a Shari’a) in Deir az-Zour – largely under the influence of JN, as they readily admit – decided to unseat those tribes and put the field under its direct control on 14^th November 2014. ‘It is unacceptable that a small group should be allowed to control the common wealth of the Umma [the wider Islamic society], and in such an unorganised manner that led to electricity being cut off for many days leading to the death of innocent children and the spoilage of food and medical supplies’, it cited as reasons.[4] On 2^nd February 2014 the Bu Jamel and the Bakeer tribes – allied with JN and ISIS respectively – entered into a row that resulted in ISIS retaking control of the field, and a few other facilities.[5] On 7^th February, JN issued a statement intended as a stern warning to ISIS and as comment on what happened.[6] ‘ISIS has shocked us by taking control of some vital facilities in Dair az-Zour, which were under the control of the Hay’a Shari’a […] cutting supply routes to the soldiers of Islam who are standing at the frontlines inside the city and, at the same time, separating them from their strategic depth in the Deir az-Zour governorate’, they claimed. For ‘strategic depth’, read “disturbing cash flow” – the Konicko field, under rebel control, has been reported to generate $330,000 a day.[7] They further say that, once the field was in their hands, they had to give a cut to the local ISIS commander because, he insisted, he had ‘intended to liberate it’ before JN. Although JN admits the guards they had put in charge of Konicko had defected to ISIS, they say this does not give ISIS the right to retake it. JN relate that such actions are to be expected from people like ISIS, their commander had, after all, stolen $5 million from JN. JN, then, find no other way to describe ISIS’ actions than baghi (injustice), which Islamic theology allows retaliation to. ‘Either give back what you have wrongfully taken to those to whom it belongs’ or, stand warned, we have men who are ready to ‘counter your aggression and stop your injustice’.[8]

JN’s threats appeared credible. On the next day (8^th February), they started shelling ISIS positions all over Deir az-Zour, the reports also mentioned that AS and other factions were collaborating with JN in this effort.[9] JN put ISIS’ biggest headquarters in Deir az-Zour – their centre near the salt mines of at-Tibni – under siege.[10] A scholar in JN tweeted that ‘there is only slaughter for those transgressors [ISIS]’.[11] One time JN enemies, the Busaraya local clan from the Masrab village joined the fight on JN’s side.[12] JN, however, said that no men from Masrab were fighting with it.[13] By the end of the day, JN and the Islamic Front (of which AS are members) had overtaken al-Bukamal on the Iraqi border,[14] and could count the ISIS military commander in Deir az-Zour – Abu Dujana the Libyan – among the casualties.[15]

According to Aaron Zelin’s analysis, during the first stage of the infighting ISIS was able to reconquer most of the territory it was almost driven out of and exercise sole control over it by, among other things, securing localised ceasefires and, while exploiting this and the hesitation of Salafist factions to fight them, thereby allocating resources where they were most needed.[16] ISIS may have tried to use the same tactic in this phase but, so far, its efforts appear to have been unsuccessful. They were able to secure a ceasefire with JN in Mouhasen,[17] and there were reports that they had called for reinforcements from Raqqa and Aleppo.[18]

The second day of fighting witnessed considerable escalation, ISIS detonated a car packed with explosives in the oil market in Sabha.[19] The car set off from the Jafra oil field, which ISIS controlled, and was reportedly headed to a JN checkpoint in al-Busaira. However, it was stopped in as-Sabha by one of the market guards. The guard asked the driver to get out of the car but he told him he was a suicide bomber and asked him to let him pass as this was not the area he wanted to blow up. The guard attempted to force him to get out of the car, but the suicide bomber ended up detonating the explosives killing 22 people, six of whom were children.[20]  In a different incident, JN was reported to have executed 20 ISIS members.[21]

The same day (9^th February) ISIS issued a statement about the events in Deir az-Zour.[22] It said JN had wronged ISIS before: by not joining ISIS when it was formed, by collaborating with Sahawat (a pejorative reference to AS) against it in Raqqa and, now, by seeking ‘revenge’ on ISIS whose peaceful efforts to ‘correct the path of Sahawat and counter their aggression’, ‘being careful not to spill any blood’ had caused, so ISIS claimed, many JN fighter to defect and join ISIS.[23] It also explained that JN were now collaborating with “Sahawat” again in this fight, which include: Liwa al-Ahwaz, AS and Liwa Ja’far at-Tayyar (part, with AS, of the Islamic Front), and with the ‘criminals of the Masrab village’. It identified the ISIS positions which had been shelled and fired upon with tanks by JN and its allies as: at-Tibni, Ma’dan, Mintaqat al-Jadeed and al-Jafra – where JN had reportedly executed 20 ISIS members. The statement ended with a threat.

ISIS, the next day (10^th February), withdrew from all their positions in Deir az-Zour,[24] except for their centre at the Tibni salt mines.[25] Casualty reports in the ISIS camp ranged from 20 to 50.[26] The day also witnessed JN blowing up the ISIS communication centre in Deir az-Zour.[27]

While JN, AS et al where enjoying these tactical advances on ISIS in Deir az-Zour; concurrently, it was ISIS who was on the advance, against these very same groups, in al-Hasaka. A local media activists informs me that there had been a tactical alliance between all these factions when they were fighting the YPG in rural Hasaka – the alliance had even been codified into an ‘official’ agreement between ISIS and AS, as will be shortly explained.[28] Once they had been able to drive the YPG out of Tal Barak and Tal Hamees, however, ISIS turned on its allies forcing many, according to the AS narrative, to pledge allegiance to it. By 9^th February, ISIS had emerged as the sole power in Tal Barak, Tal Hamees and al-Hool in rural Hasaka.[29] Both AS and JN released statements about the events in rural al-Hasaka. AS claimed that they have a recording in which ISIS scholars deem AS members infidels (kuffar) because they are ‘in league with other infidels since they refrain from publicly showing any animosity toward them’.[30] This is a reference to the West and to regional powers all of whom ISIS considers infidels. They said they were going to release the recording later. According to the statement, on 6^th February ISIS took a ‘treacherous stab’ at AS – attacking AS centres all over Hasaka, stealing money and weapons, and capturing fighters and forcing them to pledge allegiance to ISIS. All this happened despite an earlier official agreement between the two parties ‘not to fight and to concentrate on fighting the regime and its allies in the area’. The agreement opened with the phrase: ‘we swear to Allah the Great that we shall not raise our arms in the face of our brothers or each other or any factions that fight the regime’. For the above reasons AS considers that agreement null and void and that the ISIS are a ‘treacherous and betraying group’. The JN statement talks of ISIS capturing JN fighters in Shaddadi, al-Hasaka and killing their soldier Abu Ishaak al-Mashhadani, in ‘cold blood’.

During the same period, perhaps to take advantage of ISIS involvement in the East, there were sporadic attacks on it in the Northern West. In Tal Abiadh, Jabhat Tahreer al-Furat al-Islamiya managed to capture 3 ISIS fighters, for example.[31] In ar-Raqqa, there were reports of an AS suicide bomber detonating himself in an ISIS stronghold killing 11 ISIS members, although the report is of questionable accuracy.[32] ISIS was also engaged in al-Ula and Tal Shheer in rural Aleppo[33], and the result was al-Ula slipping out of its hands.[34] A local contact in Jarablus (Northern rural Aleppo) informed me that the ISIS contingent stationed there had partially blown up the bridge, over the Euphrates, connecting Jarablus with ash-Shuyoukh and Ain al-Arab further to the East, to fend off an imminent attack by brigades loyal to Liwa’ al-Tawheed (part of the Islamic Front).[35] He sent this photo in which one can see the damaged Western end of the bridge:

ISIS has now been expelled from one the most economically important regions (because of the oil) for the armed groups, which might impact it in a too insignificant way. Can this stage be read as a prelude to a wider engagement between JN and AS and ISIS? For JN, AS and the Islamic Front in general fighting ISIS in Deir az-Zour has been an epiphenomenon brought about by local conditions, rather than a key concern grounded in a central strategy. Similar conditions exist in Hasaka, but unless these groups are able to mobilise a sufficient force to counter ISIS locally, it is unlikely that they would move contingents from the much more important region of Deir az-Zour. The presence of the YPG might be an important local factor forcing unity, however uneasy, and working to preclude the possibility of wider conflict à la Deir az-Zour. Conditions that could allow for the justification of escalation in Raqqa, on the one hand, and the will to mobilise a force large enough to do so by JN and the IF, on the other, are lacking. The strategy used by ISIS’ ideological siblings (AS and JN) to justify attacks on it has been centred around using local grievances caused by ISIS, that are fresh in memory, and frame their attacks as fights for justice – not, and this is important, as attempts to defeat ISIS or cause it to cease to exist as such. This framework currently remains inapplicable to Raqqa, which is, also, much less economically significant than Deir az-Zour or Hasaka. There is a moderate possibility for further escalation in rural Aleppo, because the region is under a much more heterogeneous form of control and different factions, with different loyalties, co-exist in close proximity to one another.

Could ISIS retaliate and regain its positions in Deir az-Zour? As noted above, in the first stage of the infighting, ISIS was able to make advances by capitalising on local ceasefires to divert resources to the front lines. In this stage, such possibilities seem to have been exhausted. Retaking Deir az-Zour, now, requires ISIS to gather troops from its strongholds such as Raqqa or Eastern rural Aleppo, leaving these areas vulnerable to local take overs. Although this is an embarrassing defeat for ISIS, fighting all other militias combined in Deir az-Zour may turn into a significant threat to its ability to control large territories. They might opt out, instead, for small scale operations, sabotage and suicide bombings to destabilise the area for the other factions, and try to frame this as a tactical victory.

What about Assad? Assad is still capable of marketing himself as a potential partner in fighting ‘terrorism’, for although the rebels are attacking ISIS, something he is not doing, they are in close cooperation with JN – al-Qaeda’s official branch, which the US deems a terrorist organisation.

The overall situation in the inter-rebel war is highly atomised, with a mixture of small scale victories and losses throughout the country. This characterisation is likely to remain true, as not only the infighting between the rebels but the Syrian Civil War in general have proven to be governed by reverse hierarchies of conditions where the local governs the global, rather than the other way around.

Anno Bunnik

Syria, Iraq and Lebanon: the new Af-Pak
By Anno Bunnik
for Syria Comment, Feb 13, 2014

Developments in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon are so deeply intertwined that we might start speaking about these countries in similar terms as we talk about “Af-Pak.”

In less than a decade, pro-Iranian forces have entrenched themselves in Damascus and seized near absolute power in neighbouring Baghdad and Beirut. The structural marginalisation of the Sunnis in Iraq and Lebanon is splitting these communities as evident from the rise of Jihadi groups. This is the context of Syrian conflict.

Three years after the Arab uprising the “Syrian revolution” is dead and to label it the “Syrian conflict” would not entirely be right either. Due to its entanglement with existing political and sectarian divisions in Iraq and Lebanon the war is no longer strictly confined to Syria: the region is witnessing the emergence of a single theatre of war in what we could call the SIL region.

Some would argue this is solely the consequence of a spill-over of the Syrian conflict into neighbouring states but that is too simplistic. After all, the consequences of the war are totally different to its other neighbours Turkey, Jordan and Israel. They too feel the burden (notably Jordan, in terms of refugees) but their fate is far less dependent on developments in Aleppo and Damascus.

The social fabric of society and the political alignments in Iraq and Lebanon, however, follow very similar fault lines as is the case in Syria. The SIL region faces a shared predicament: fragile state institutions, growing Sunni marginalisation and, consequently, the rise of al Qaeda affiliated (or originated) groups that increasingly operate irrespective of national borders. As a result, domestic politics in all three countries is no isolated affair.

The Iranian belt of influence stretches from Afghanistan to the Mediterranean Sea. But this hegemonic position is increasingly under threat by Jihadi groups such as Jabhat al Nusra (JN), Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS), Abdullah Azzam Brigades (AAB) and Jabhat al Nusra in Lebanon (JNL).

The majority of Sunnis still support moderate political parties, such as Saad Hariri’s Future Movement and the Iraqi Islamic Party, which operate within the democratic system but with little success. The longer those parties are shunned from the centres of power the more attractive the Jihadi alternative will become.

The old adage is at play here: if one cannot achieve participation through non-violent means, violence becomes a credible and legitimate alternative to some. It should therefore come as no surprise that the opposition is becoming increasingly militarised.

The violent response to the power grab of pro-Iranian forces over the state apparatus and its security forces is twofold: Shiite neighbourhoods and state institutions have become a legitimate target for the various Jihadi groups. In addition to the surge in anti-Shia terrorism, the region is witnessing an increase in attacks on the Iraqi and Lebanese Armed Forces, which are perceived to be tools of Iran.

In Lebanon, the radicalisation of the Sunni citizenry (over a quarter of the population) can be traced back to Hezbollah’s gradual take-over of the Lebanese state. Through its omnipresent threat of violence and assassination of top Sunni figures, it has manoeuvred itself as the most powerful political party in Lebanese politics

Meanwhile opposition leader and former Prime Minister Saad Hariri has not set foot in Lebanon in two years over fears of facing the same fate as his late father. With Hariri out of touch with his constituency, local hardliners, such as sheikh Assir in Sidon and Sheikh Houssam al-Sabbagh in Tripoli, seized the opportunity to present themselves as alternative resistance figures against Hezbollah.

Hassan Nasrallah has de facto pushed Hariri out of politics and is now finding himself having to deal with al Qaeda instead, as evident from the regular car bomb attacks in the Hezbollah strongholds South Beirut and Hermel. Like their “brothers” in Baghdad, Lebanese Shiites have now become one of the main victims of Jihadi terrorism.

Iraq’s political mess is strikingly similar. Nouri al-Maliki has championed Shia politics within the Iraqi political system and has increasingly marginalised the Sunni population whilst not shying away from sectarianism. Al-Maliki framed the battle with ISIS “a fierce confrontation between the supporters of Hussain and the supporters of Yazid”, a reference to the battle of Karbala in 680 which is a key event in Shia identity and tradition. Meanwhile, numerous pictures emerged on social media of Iraqi soldiers carrying Shia flags and symbols.

Similar to Lebanese Sunni dilemma, Iraqi Sunnis are also forced to choose between mainstream political parties that have little influence and radical groups that offer violent resistance against the Shia-dominated state apparatus. For groups such as ISIS this provides fertile ground for mobilisation of new recruits. Al Maliki’s sectarianism reinforces their message that the Shiites have taken over the country.

2014 was not even a week old and ISIS has already engaged in heavy fighting with rebels in Syria, detonated a deadly car bomb in Beirut and attacked Iraqi-government troops in Ramadi and Falluja. ISIS is more active and controls more land than al Qaeda Central in over two decades. ISIS’ cross-border activities, and the emergence of a Jabhat al Nusra faction in Lebanon, are clear indicators of the rise of Jihadi networks in the SIL region.

The take-over of the Syrian, Iraqi and Lebanese state by pro-Iranian forces paints a complex and dark picture for the future. If the Sunnis continue to be excluded from decision-making, more and more young men will opt for the black flag of al Qaeda instead. This is the shared predicament that Syria, Iraq and Lebanon face.

*Anno Bunnik is a PhD Fellow at the Centre for Applied Research in Security Innovation at Liverpool Hope University. He blogs on www.eurabist.com and can be found on Twitter @Eurabist

Beirut 2012, anti Hezbullah protesters after the assassination of Wissam al Hassan. Photo: Anno Bunnik

Aftermath of car bomb in Hebzollah stronghold, January 2014. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

Almost every day on my Twitter feed, I come across allegations that the jihadis operating in Syria- in particular, the Islamic State of Iraq and ash-Sham (ISIS) or “al-Qa’ida” more generally (by which Jabhat al-Nusra is meant as well)- are somehow in secret collaboration with the Assad regime, if not agents and creations of the regime.

Indeed, this theme appears to have been prominent at a Chicago Council event held yesterday. “For the first time in 3 years I hear something that makes sense from experts about Syria. Assad regime is helping al-Qa’ida. We might discover very soon Assad regime coordinating and supporting al-Qa’ida fighters,” tweeted Diana Rudha al-Shammary, covering the event live yesterday.

In a somewhat similar vein, Syria Report tweeted on February 3, commenting on the official al-Qa’ida Central (AQC) statement clarifying that ISIS has no links with AQC: “Their [ISIS’] leaders take orders from Assad’s intelligence.” On January 12,  @TaziMorocco, a person who regularly interacts with me on Twitter, commented: “Assad Air Force Intelligence officers in Damascus decided in 2012 to create and supply ISIS thugs in order to destroy the rebellion.”

Given the widespread nature of these allegations, culminating in the recent opposition-in-exile’s report claiming Assad-ISIS collaboration, I believe it to be worth addressing the claims. I will deal with each of the main lines of argument used to advance the thesis.

Usefulness to Assad’s Narrative

It is appropriate to state the following as a virtual preface. There is no doubt that the jihadi presence in Syria- whether in the form of ISIS, Jabhat al-Nusra, or the multiple muhajireen-led battalions- is useful to the Assad’s narrative on the rebellion as a foreign-backed “takfiri/Wahhabi” conspiracy against Syria.

It is also clear that the regime has tried to exploit this presence to compel the opposition-in-exile at the Geneva talks into accepting that Assad should stay in power, and that the regime and opposition should instead work together to crush ISIS et al.- an opportunity that Assad hopes could quell the entire rebellion and reassert control over the whole country, which has been and remains his goal.

However, it must be noted that it is not only these groups with global jihadi visions that serve his narrative, but also the Islamic Front (IF), which may well be the largest single rebel coalition on the ground, with some blurring between the national/transnational distinction. The IF’s main leaders, backed by Saudi Arabia and Qatar, all engage in virulently sectarian rhetoric, labeling Alawites as “Nusayris” and Shi’a as “Rafidites” (e.g. see these remarks by Jaysh al-Islam leader Zahran Alloush).

The mere existence of such rhetoric and the IF’s prominence- regardless of what happens on the ground- are enough to provide considerable credence to the regime’s characterization of the opposition as sectarian. Further, the sectarian rhetoric of the IF has translated to results on the ground, most recently with reports of a massacre of Alawites in the Hama village of Ma’an after it was taken over by Ahrar ash-Sham in coordination with Jund al-Aqsa- a battalion with an ideology identical to that of ISIS but maintaining better relations overall than ISIS maintains with other rebel groups

Initially, the National Defense Force, which was mainly responsible for defending the village and was largely able to evacuate the village’s residents successfully, released a toll of 20 civilians killed by the rebels, including 11 members of a single family (the Khadur family). The incident has since been corroborated by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, with photos subsequently emerging of the victims.

Figure 1: Ibrahim al-Naser and Fattoum Mayhob, 2 of the victims of the Ma’an massacre (H/T: @TahrirSy, who has provided further corroboration of the massacre).

None of this is to deny sectarianism exists on the regime side, as evinced by sectarian massacres perpetrated by forces fighting for the regime, whether by Alawite irregular militiamen (the Houla massacre) or foreign Shi’a militiamen (the Nabk massacre in rural Damascus province as part of the regime’s offensive to push through Qalamoun; like the Ma’an massacre, numerous members of a single family- the Masto family– were wiped out). The point is that Assad is a beneficiary not only of ISIS’ presence but also of multiple other rebel groups, but it does not follow that these groups must be secretly working with the regime.

Infiltration by the Regime

This section could also be seen as a prefatory note. There is also no doubt that ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra have regime infiltrators. One should note an interview back in the summer with one Abdullah Abu Mus’ab al-Suri, an assistant to ISIS’ northern amir Omar ash-Shishani, in which he affirmed: “Indeed the [Islamic] state has become greatly infiltrated by the Syrian regime; and that has led to harm to the reputation of the state and shaking of its security.”

However, infiltration is hardly a surprise, and does not show a group is a regime agent. Infiltration amongst both the opposition and regime sides is only to be expected in a time of war, as when the predecessor of Jaysh al-Islam- Liwa al-Islam– was able to infiltrate regime ranks and perpetrate the suicide attack in summer 2012 that killed the Defense Minister. On the other side, former regime officers- leaving aside what their real loyalties might be- can be found across the rebel spectrum.

We can now move on to consider more specific data points.

Oil Deals

It has been reported that Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIS in particular have been selling oil and gas in eastern Syria to the regime. The Daily Telegraph’s report, relying on testimony from unnamed Western intelligence sources, should not be taken as anything ground-breaking: it was already reported as far back as May 2013 by The Guardian. Given the inability and reluctance of outsiders generally to get on the ground in Syria, Western intelligence sources do not necessarily have more access to information than social media activists and journalists, but are rather depending on the same sources, whether through open access online or through local contacts via online communication or other means, such as meetings in the Turkish border areas.

In any case, there is no reason to doubt that Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIS have been selling oil and gas to the regime, but the picture is far more complex than just to conclude the two organizations must be regime agents. Broadly, competition for oil and gas resources in the east among rebel groups fall into three families: Jabhat al-Nusra sometimes aligned with IF groups such as Jaysh al-Islam and Ahrar ash-Sham, ISIS, and the YPG.

All of these factions deal with the regime in selling oil and gas, not because they wish to bolster the regime, but rather because such a transaction is the simplest and most logical way to exploit these resources for profit and cement their hold in the eastern areas.

In eastern Syria, the regime’s ground forces presence has largely been reduced to strongholds in parts of the city of Deir az-Zor, parts of the city of al-Hasakah, and parts of the city of Qamishli (where its control was substantially reduced last year in the face of the YPG’s expansion). Though it maintains some air bases like Deir az-Zor military airport, which is currently under rebel siege, the regime lacks manpower to launch any kind of offensive to retake rebel or Kurdish territory. Seeking some kind of intermediaries to strike deals for oil and gas is therefore also a logical step on the part of the regime, which is now largely dependent on Iraqi oil imports via Lebanese and Egyptian third-party intermediaries. Given this dependency, the rebels and YPG have no reason to assume that selling oil and gas to the regime will harm their territorial control.

In any case, there is no evidence that any of the rebel groups have refrained from confronting regime forces in eastern areas: ISIS, Jabhat al-Nusra and IF groups have all participated in fighting against regime forces in the city of Deir az-Zor. The group that comes closest to seeking territorial accommodation with the regime is the YPG, for a nebulous and uneasy co-existence is maintained in Qamishli.

Figure 2:  Documentary evidence of oil dealings between the YPG and the regime.

Figure 3: Illustrating the complexity of intra-rebel relations over control of oil and gas resources: factions including Jaysh al-Islam, Ahrar ash-Sham and Jabhat al-Nusra appealed to the consultation council of ISIS and ISIS’ leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in late November to mediate a dispute over a recently captured oil field.

Figure 4: Rebels do not only deal in oil and gas when it comes to exchanges between regime and rebel areas. In Aleppo, for example, rebel groups (not just ISIS) have been able to regulate what kind of goods can come for residents in regime-controlled areas in return for extorting profits from the regime. In this statement from July 2013, ISIS imposes its own regulations about what cannot be allowed to enter regime-held areas in Aleppo: gasoline, diesel fuel, anything forbidden according to Shari’a (e.g. cigarettes), and food in large quantity.

Along with the oil-deals, this point forms a key part of the argument that jihadis are aligned with or working for the regime. The allegations here are more directed at ISIS than other jihadi groups, since it is undeniable that Jabhat al-Nusra is currently playing a leading role on multiple battlefronts, including the Qalamoun area, where regime advances have largely been halted, East Ghouta (where a number of battalions have recently pledged allegiance to Jabhat al-Nusra) Deraa, and Deir az-Zor.

Figure 5: Katiba Junud al-Rahman, which pledged allegiance to Jabhat al-Nusra in East Ghouta in mid-January.

Figure 6: Katiba Asima al-Ghouta, another battalion in East Ghouta that pledged allegiance to Jabhat al-Nusra in mid-January.

With ISIS, the reasoning goes that the group does not focus on fighting regime forces, such that it even leaves regime areas alone, and in return the regime agrees not to bomb ISIS-held territory.

This line of argument overlooks that ISIS has a record of fighting the regime on multiple fronts, including the Sheikh Said area of Aleppo province, Kwiris military airbase (where an offensive is ongoing under the leadership of muhajireen battalion Suqur al-Izz, in coordination with the Green Battalion, ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra), Nubl and Zahara, Brigade 17 airbase in Raqqa province, Tabqa military airport, Qalamoun, Sayyida Zainab, Sakhna in Homs desert, the Qamishli area, and Latakia province. Besides these locations, one should also remember ISIS’ leading role in the capture of Mannagh airbase.

Figure 7: Operation “And Don’t Separate”: a Nusra-ISIS-Green Battalion-Suqur al-Izz-Jaysh Mohammed-Ansar al-Mahdi joint operation announced this month on Kwiris military airbase.

It is of course true that ISIS is now fighting on fewer fronts against regime forces since the wider infighting with other rebels broke out, but that is only to be expected: remaining too thinly spread out would have cost the group even more territorial losses. Even so, following ISIS’ seizure of Raqqa city, Tel Abyad, Tabqa and Ma’adan, it is not true that ISIS has ignored the regime’s airbases in Raqqa province, engaging in clashes with regime forces around Brigade 17 in mid to late January before being cleared out by the end of month through airstrikes on the surroundings.

As for Tabqa military airport, this area has been subjected to mortar shelling recently by ISIS in collaboration with Liwa Owais al-Qorani, an independent battalion in Tabqa that has not pledged bay’ah (allegiance) to ISIS but rather, as a local anti-ISIS Raqqa contact explained to me, is subordinate to and “takes orders from ISIS.”

Coming to regime airstrikes, it is untrue that the regime has not hit ISIS strongholds, having struck Raqqa city as recently on February 7. The counter-claim is that since ISIS advertises itself on social media so much, why does the regime not strike these positions? However, this argument firstly presumes that the regime’s air force has any kind of precision in launching airstrikes. Second, as the regime’s record elsewhere demonstrates, targeting of civilian areas in rebel-held territory is part of its tactics.

In any event, one must ask what the regime would gain strategically by constantly bombing ISIS strongholds in Raqqa province, or ISIS strongholds elsewhere, for that matter, located far beyond the frontlines. As in the wider east of Syria, the regime lacks ground forces to launch an offensive to retake any territory in Raqqa province, and must depend on airlifts from elsewhere to maintain its remaining airbases. Hence, the regime is focusing its airstrikes where it has some real expectations of advancing: most notably in Aleppo city.

Figure 8: ISIS fires projectiles at Brigade 17 airbase. Image from mid-January.

Figure 9: ISIS engages in fighting around Brigade 17 airbase. Late January. The clearing out of the surroundings of Brigade 17 was reported by pro-regime Raqqa sources, who were also the first to report ISIS’ establishment of a “Khansaa Battalion” of women in Raqqa to enforce the wearing of the niqab, later corroborated by @TahrirSy.

Figure 10: ISIS fighters (in cooperation with Liwa Owais al-Qorani) prepare to shell Tabqa military airport. Photo from February 7.

Figure 11: Liwa Owais al-Qorani issuing a statement on January 10, giving an update on the situation in Tabqa. The spokesman affirms the group’s independence, and its support for implementing Shari’a and overthrowing the “Nusayri” regime, ensuring that the Shahada will be supreme. The spokesman then emphasizes that all Islamic factions are brothers in religion, indicating the group’s unwillingness to fight ISIS and its subsequent subjugation under ISIS’ command.

Given how much ISIS in particular focuses on expanding itself within rebel-held areas and the intense infighting that has spread to a large number of localities, it might seem understandable why other rebels and activists, feeling a sense of ‘betrayal’ seek to explain events in terms of an ISIS-regime conspiracy. After all, there is also the regime’s prior record of facilitating the inflow of jihadis into Iraq to fight coalition forces during the U.S. occupation. That Assad wanted the rebellion to have a jihadi and sectarian face from day one is obvious, and the international community has been right to reject the regime as the solution to the jihadi problem and the corrosive sectarianism in Syria.

However, it must be emphasized that no conclusive evidence exists illustrating an active ISIS-regime collaboration; and for Jabhat al-Nusra, it is even more implausible. Much of the lines of argument applied to ISIS can also be applied to other groups outside the jihadi fold: most notably, the YPG and some of the IF. The YPG is frequently accused by other rebels of being a regime agent, but its agenda is quite clearly separate from that of the regime: namely, it is seeking Kurdish autonomy and is securing a PYD monopoly in Kurdish areas, in line with the PYD’s authoritarianism that is shared by most Kurdish political factions.

On the subject of the historical record, the duration of Assad support for the jihadis is exaggerated. As al-Qa’ida in Iraq vanished through absorption into the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) umbrella in 2006-7, the inflow of muhajireen into Iraq largely ceased as ISI became almost entirely Iraqi, particularly at the leadership level (cf. this article by Aaron Zelin on the sparks of a low-level jihadi campaign against Assad in Syria that was ultimately quashed in the period 2007-2010).

In any case, the regime also provided a safe haven for other Iraqi insurgents outside al-Qa’ida and ISI, and as Sunnis joined the political process in 2008-9, the regime initially hoped for an Ayad Allawi victory in the 2010 elections, reflecting its then growing ties with Turkey and an opposition to the U.S.’s preferred candidate Maliki, who has always loathed Assad. Indeed, Assad’s eventual switch of support to Maliki after intense lobbying was only ever a cosmetic change.

As for ISIS’ behavior, there are much simpler explanations that do not require resort to conspiracy. One need only look at its name to see what its agenda is and the problems therein: Islamic State. ISIS does not merely consider itself a group (jamaat) or faction (faseel). It believes foremost in the setting up of an Islamic state as the basis for a Caliphate that should encompass the entire world.

Not content with being reduced to mere organizational status, it follows that ISIS believes that it alone has the right to rule, and so it is ultimately not amenable to power-sharing or submitting to independent authority, even with other groups who share its ideology of Caliphate and world domination. That ISIS’ top priority is to set up its dream Islamic state in rebel-held areas where it is easiest to establish a presence hardly comes as a surprise. There is no need to explain what it does in terms of being a secret regime agent.

Ultimately, attempting to prove an ISIS-regime conspiracy without any conclusive evidence is unhelpful, because it draws attention away from the real reasons why ISIS grew and gained such prominence: namely, rebel groups tolerated ISIS. Back in the summer of last year, I noted how pace the claims of SMC circles, not all those even by the FSA banner were hostile to ISIS. The most prominent case-in-point is Colonel Oqaidi, who used to head the Aleppo FSA military council. Oqaidi constantly downplayed the idea that ISIS constituted a threat, describing his relations with ISIS as “excellent” in an interview with Orient News and deriding concerns about its conduct as “media intimidation.”

These words were spoken in appreciation of ISIS’ efforts to help capture Mannagh airbase. But the collaboration between ISIS and other groups did not end there. There was also the completely unnecessary fighting in the mid and late summer against the YPG whereby other rebel groups in Hasakah, Raqqa and Aleppo governorates threw in their lot with ISIS after clashes broke out between ISIS aligned with Jabhat al-Nusra and the YPG in Ras al-Ayn, culminating in the expulsion of the former two groups in mid-July.

The other rebel groups that assisted ISIS in the wider conflict here included Liwa al-Tawhid, Ahrar ash-Sham, Suqur ash-Sham, and FSA-banner groups such as Liwa al-Hamza, Ibn Taymiyya (both Tel Abyad area) and Liwa Ahrar al-Jazira al-Thawri (Hasakah province, to be distinguished from the Liwa Ahrar al-Jazira of Shammar tribesmen in Yaroubiya that aided the YPG in expelling ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra). Yet the end result of this fighting has been nothing more than a stalemate with each side consolidating their positions. The sole reason for the other rebels’ participation in the fight against the YPG is the dogmatic belief that the YPG is a regime agent, combined with general hostility to notions of Kurdish autonomy.

Perhaps most important to consider here is the extent to which other rebel groups- particularly those that now constitute the IF- attempted to resolve problems with ISIS via mediation and negotiation, rather than deciding that it constituted a menace and/or regime agent that needed to be uprooted.

Contrary to what ISIS members and supporters claim, there was no pre-planned ‘sahwa’ against ISIS. Till the very end of 2013, IF and its constituent groups tried to resolve problems with ISIS peacefully, with the most notable case being Liwa al-Tawhid’s mediation in Azaz between Northern Storm and ISIS. Despite the agreed ceasefire, ISIS took advantage of it and eventually took over Azaz, with Liwa al-Tawhid and other groups effectively abandoning Azaz to ISIS. Similarly, the ultimate spark of the current infighting was the Ahrar ash-Sham-ISIS dispute over Maskanah that saw Ahrar ash-Sham’s Abu Rayyan tortured to death, even as Ahrar ash-Sham had tried to resolve the dispute over the town peacefully.

Even after the infighting broke out, ISIS has been able to exploit rebel disunity in areas to take advantage. This was notable in Tel Abyad, for example, where some Ahrar ash-Sham affiliates refused to participate in fighting against ISIS on the grounds that the “Nusayri” and “Rafidite” enemy was the bigger priority. Together with Liwa al-Hamza’s tacit collaboration with ISIS, ISIS eventually took over Tel Abyad.

In Tel Hamees and the Qamishli area, Ahrar ash-Sham continued coordinating with ISIS, Liwa Ansar al-Khilafa (only in Qamishli area) and Jabhat al-Nusra as though nothing was happening elsewhere. A renewed offensive was also declared on Ras al-Ayn, but back in the rebel-held areas in the province, ISIS eventually turned on Ahrar ash-Sham and Jabhat al-Nusra, giving ISIS the upper-hand with many from Ahrar ash-Sham forced to pledge bay’ah to ISIS. In Damascus province, no infighting has broken out yet, and ISIS’ training camps have been left alone and the group carries out some operations against regime-held areas.

On a more general level, ISIS was even offered another chance for reconciliation as part of Sheikh Muheisseni’s “Ummah Initiative,” which all major rebel groupings except ISIS accepted. Sheikh Muheisseni’s earlier role was more limited to maintaining relations between ISIS and the other jihadi groups as well as Ahrar ash-Sham, such that he organized joint ISIS-Nusra-Ahrar da’wah events in Aleppo in the fall of last year.

Figure 12: ISIS-Ahrar-Nusra joint da’wah meeting in Aleppo, organized by Sheikh Muheisseni in late October.

On the international level, there is blame to go around. While Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu is free to claim ISIS and the Assad regime are in partnership, he is overlooking Turkey’s own role in facilitating the inflow of foreign fighters into Syria, the majority of whom congregate to ISIS’ banner. In turning a blind eye for so long, there was no doubt hope that the jihadis in general would be useful proxies against the YPG, but Turkey must now face the consequences of rebel infighting.

When faced with these realities regarding prior rebel abetting of ISIS’ growth, it is then claimed that the rebels were ‘forced’ to turn to ISIS. This statement reflects cognitive dissonance, for in claiming they had to seek out ISIS’ help, it must be acknowledged that ISIS fights against regime forces. If they always knew ISIS was conspiring with the regime, why did they not uproot it while the organization was still relatively weak?

Conclusion: Lessons

The growth of ISIS has lessons for the rebels. How long will they tolerate Jabhat al-Nusra? Prior to the announcement of ISIS, the group was subject to far more allegations of collaborating with the regime, even as it maintained generally excellent working relations with other rebel groups, which I predicted would continue to flourish despite the announcement of ISIS and Jowlani’s declaration of an allegiance to AQC. That prediction has been vindicated, but even further, Jabhat al-Nusra’s overall standing has improved. Indeed, besides the leading roles in multiple battle fronts as I stated above, Jabhat al-Nusra is the leading faction in a number of Deir az-Zor localities and the leading authority throughout the province’s Shari’a committees.

Figure 13: Jabhat al-Nusra welcomes you to Abu Kamal. Emphasizing its loyalty to al-Qa’ida: “Tanzim al-Qa’ida wa al-Jihad fi Bilad ash-Sham.” Despite some hopes of Jabhat al-Nusra relenting on its bay’ah to AQC, the trends have gone the opposite way in light of the tensions with ISIS. Shari’a strictures are already being implemented in the area, including principles such as banning alcohol and qisas (retaliation).

Despite the clear AQC connection, many rebels and activists deny that Jabhat al-Nusra has any interest in an agenda that ultimately conflicts with their own, specifically in that the group like ISIS supports the establishment of a Caliphate. Of course that is not to deny the group’s pragmatism or that not all those who pledge allegiance are committed to the leadership’s real ideological agenda, but this agenda cannot be overlooked.

Sometimes, the denial of Jabhat al-Nusra’s agenda takes on bizarre forms. For instance, one Syrian Revolutionaries Front commander I spoke to in Idlib characterized the IF as “extremists” for the dominance of Salafi ideology and taking support from Saudi Arabia and Qatar, such that they would become the “next ISIS,” yet he denied that Jabhat al-Nusra was similarly extremist.

One should also note the opposition-in-exile’s denunciation of the U.S.’s designation of Jabhat al-Nusra as a terrorist organization back at the end of 2012, despite the fact that U.S. intelligence’s analysis of the group as an ISI front in origin turned out to be correct. And what would rebels now say about American allegations that Iran is facilitating inflow of al-Qa’ida militants into Syria for Jabhat al-Nusra? One cannot imagine a positive reception.

The clashes of agendas- in addition to more mundane factors (e.g. control of resources)- are bound to produce tensions in the future, whether or not ISIS is ultimately driven out of Syria. There are many groups beyond ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra that support a Caliphate, such as the muhajireen battalions, many members of IF groups, particularly in Ahrar ash-Sham, where there is clearly an AQC-aligned faction: in fact, one muhajir in Ahrar ash-Sham claimed to me that most members of the group support a Caliphate, but a minority believe in an Islamic Emirate as a prelude to a Caliphate in the far future.

Besides some clear pro-Caliphate trends in IF, there are also many independent groupings supporting this political idea (e.g. Katiba Bayariq al-Sunna and Liwa al-Qadisiya al-Islamiya in Abu Kamal; Saraya ash-Sham in Homs governorate; and Harakat Fajr ash-Sham al-Islamiya in Aleppo province; to name just a few).

This conflicts, for example, with the new Jaysh al-Mujahideen coalition, whose agenda, as one religious sheikh from the organization told me, is within a strict national framework, supporting an “Islamic state: moderate Salafist.” It is also in conflict with the Syrian Revolutionaries Front, whose ideology is generally much more vaguely Islamist.

Who will be to blame when such further infighting breaks out? Useful as Jabhat al-Nusra and the hardline rhetoric of the Islamic Front may have been to Assad’s narrative, it will ultimately be the failure at rebel unity and the turning to more hardline forces in the first place that will be to blame.

Does the Truce Between ISIS and Suqour al-Sham Mean an End to Syria’s Inter-Rebel War?
By Daniel Abdallah – twitter: @Daniel_Abdullah
for Syria Comemnt, February 7, 2014

Has the newly brokered truce between rebel militias in Syria ended the fighting that began in earnest on 3 January 2014? The reasons that Syria’s militias attacked the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria were many. ISIS had arrested members of many militias; it had torture many of those and killed quite a few. The immediate result of the initial onslaught against ISIS was the expulsion of ISIS from most of Idlib province as well as from the city of Aleppo and its rural areas. ISIS positions in ar-Raqqa were also seriously weakened. To the untrained eye, ISIS appeared to be on the verge of total collapse in Syria. Some militias demanded that it leave the country altogether[1].  ISIS promised retaliation.[2]

Although the Islamic Front (IF) – the largest armed rebel coalition in Syria – had numerous grievances with ISIS, the Free Syrian Army (FSA) led the attack on ISIS.  To be more correct, the remnants of the FSA led the attack. The FSA proper had ceased to exist when two of its largest constituents joined the IF in November and its putative leadership, the Supreme Military Command, was driven from Syria only weeks later. Those FSA militias that did not find a new home in the Islamic Front formed the Syrian Revolutionaries Front[3] (SRF) and a few other groups, which spearheaded the attack on ISIS. The fight appears to have been well planned, as both Saudi Arabia and Qatar sent money and weapons ahead of the January 3 conflagration. Some claim it was earmarked for the battle against ISIS. The US limited itself to financial support – amounting to $2 million a month.[4]

The Islamic Front, Jabhat an-Nusra, and ISIS disagree on details about the future state in Syria, but all agree basic principles: that ia theocratic state in should take the place of the Assad regime; and Sharia law should be its guiding if not sole source of legislation. The ideological kinship that binds together the Islamist militias along with their professed horror at fitna, or civil discord among Muslims, caused the Islamic Front to hessitate in its response to the fight against ISIS. A local contact informed me that in Tal Abiadh (a town on the border with Turkey), soldiers of Ahrar ash-Sham, a constituent of the IF, handed their weapons over to Turkish authorities and fled into Turkey rather than fight ISIS. The same was taking place in ar-Raqqa; Ahrar soldiers declared their neutrality refusing to fight ISIS. They professed their desire to leave for the East in what amounted to surrender.  ISIS soldiers initially agreed to give them safe passage, but ended up executing them to the man.[5]

The IF’s reticence and not only ISIS’ military superiority helped ISIS win the struggle in Raqqa.  ISIS was able to reconquer all of Raqqa, Jarablus, al-Bab and Manbij (i.e. most of Eastern rural Aleppo). It also solidified its positions in Deir az-Zour by establishing new alliances with local tribes.[6] Whereas before the ISIS had to share power in all of these locales, it now emerged as sole ‘governor’ ruling by Sharia law and on its own.

Many Jihadi theorists were deeply troubled by this fitna, and they tried their best to bring an end to it. Most famous of such initiatives was one by Saudi theologian, rebel fighter in Syria and Phd Abdullah al-Muhaysini that came to be known as al-Umma Initiative.[7] It called for the cessation of violence and the establishment of a common, neutral Islamic court to arbitrate all disputes according to Sharia law. It was unconditionally embraced by Jabhat an-Nusra, the SRF, the IF, the Mujahideen Army and many Jihadi ideologues.[8] The ISIS, however, predicated its acceptance on two conditions: that all parties involved publicly declare their position regarding democracy and secularism (refused en bloc by the ISIS, the IF and Jabhat an-Nusra) – intended for the SRF and the other remnants of the FSA who accept them half-heartedly – and, second, that all parties clarify their positions regarding current Arab regimes and Turkey – creating a hurdle for factions who are supported by these very countries.[9] The various IF constituents’ position vis-à-vis the ISIS remained a mixture of verbal denouncements and an acceptance of Muhaysini’s initiative, all the while trying to avoid the fight where possible. Hassan Abboud – leader of Ahrar ash-Sham – publicly stated that they were going to ‘avoid any battle [with the ISIS] that can be avoided’.[10] As previously mentioned Suqour ash-Sham’s Abu Issa ash-Shaikh had a much stronger stance against the ISIS – promising to cleanse them from the Levant. A milder version, at least verbally, was put forward by Zahran Alloush – leader of the Islam Army (also an IF constituent and largely based in the South away from the centre of the infighting) – saying the fight with the ISIS was no fitna and that there was no more room for middle-of-the-road positions.[11] Abdul Azeez Salama – head of Liwa at-Tawheed (IF) – reiterated the ‘majority’ position by saying ‘I would be honoured to be judged by Allah’s Sharia’.[12] The nature of the overall conflict in Syria, it is worth mentioning, is resistant to the implementation of centralised strategies. More often, decisions are taken based on local conditions even if they go against orders the particular group had received from its leaders. While the characterisation offered here of the IF publicly distancing itself from the fight with ISIS is perfectly true, it is also true that a number of their sub-factions entered the fray against ISIS with full force.

Until the truce under discussion took place, all calls for arbitration had appeared dead for all intents and purposes. Significantly, ISIS went back on their two conditions when the truce was brokered. No public denunciation of democracy, secularism or regional states by Suqour ash-Sham (or the faction within it that accepted the deal) have taken place so far, while the truce is in full effect. The ISIS, then, have accepted, in principal, the establishment of an Islamic court with 50% of its judges coming from their side and 50% from the side of their opponents. Importantly, the court the ISIS agreed to has no retroactive effect. It only applies to potential disputes that might arise in the future, and SS had no qualms about agreeing to this. The ISIS have also accepted to dealing with a group that was once part of the Western-aligned FSA, not an insignificant step for it. One can read this as the ISIS’ content with the status quo – now that they have become the sole power in a large swathe of territory – and as their readiness to dilute their refusals of arbitration for this purpose, with the not insignificant caveat of nullified retroactivity.

For the IF, the truce can have one of two possible effects. It can either help formalise their so far hesitant approach to the ISIS and offer them a way out of internecine struggle with a face-saving mechanism, such as a Sharia court that may turn out to be largely toothless. Or, less likely, the truce may presage a split within the Islamic Front, a group that never functioned as a single unit, but as an alliance of convenience. If the Islamic Front splits up, Suqour ash-Sham would go its own way. The reason this is unlikely is that larger groups are better channels for funding. Small units cannot survive well on their own or bring in big money and thus will not want to break from the larger coalition for purely ideological reasons. Should leaders of the IF denounce the truce, it could mean that the Front will come apart, but this seems to be a small possibility.

Assad may have had mixed feelings toward the fighting between ISIS and the other rebel militias. Had the enemies of ISIS turned out to be victorious, they would have proven their effectiveness as fighters of “terrorism,” thereby stealing Assad’s fire – or at least the fire he is trying to market to Western powers and the Syrian people. ISIS’ counterattack and success in reconquering Syrian territory is doubtlessly satisfying to Assad for it ensures inter-rebel conflict and chaos in the days to come. It also ensures that western powers will continue to fret about Syria becoming a training ground for future Western Jihadists. Those opposition leaders who claim that mainstream Syrian groups can easily defeat al-Qaida and eject jihadists from Syria once Assad is defeated will have a harder time making this argument. If the ISIS-SS truce becomes a starting point for further deals with other groups in the IF, and so universalizes the uneasy truce begun with the SS, Assad will be reassured. He will claim the rebel groups have re-allied themselves with the ISIS and that it cannot be a regime creation as so many opposition members insist. ‘Assad must be waiting for the call from the CIA’, as one of my friends put it.

Although conspiracy theories claiming to expose ISIS as an Assad back flag operation, designed to mar the purity of the revolution and destroy it from within, are ubiquitous, there is evidence to suggest that Assad looks on ISIS as a strategic ally. The Syrian Army has not bombed their well-known headquarters and has spared their men.

To conclude, it is important to stress that all stated potential ramifications of this truce remain speculative. All the evidence we so far have for analysis is the text of the agreement as released by ISIS-sympathetic sources, the video showing a convoy moving through the desert and Rashed Tuggo (SS’ Head of General Staff) claiming that he was authorised to speak on behalf of SS’ Shura Council. More time and evidence is needed to determine whether the truce will be of any significance to the Syrian Civil War.

[1] http://all4syria.info/Archive/122779

[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwPTVj5lyzQ

[3] http://www.alarabiya.net/ar/arab-and-world/syria/2013/12/10/%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AD%D8%B1-%D9%8A%D8%B4%D9%83%D9%84-%D8%A3%D9%88%D9%84-%D8%AA%D8%AD%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%81-%D8%B9%D8%B3%D9%83%D8%B1%D9%8A-%D8%AA%D8%AD%D8%AA-%D8%A7%D8%B3%D9%85-%D8%AC%D8%A8%D9%87%D8%A9-%D8%AB%D9%88%D8%A7%D8%B1-%D8%B3%D9%88%D8%B1%D9%8A%D8%A7-.html

[4] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/10588308/US-secretly-backs-rebels-to-fight-al-Qaeda-in-Syria.html

[5] https://twitter.com/HassanAbboud_Ah/statuses/422770031412654080

[6] See: http://t.co/6N635C1r6x, for example.

[7] https://twitter.com/mobadratalomah and http://mobadrah.mhesne.com/. For analysis see: http://carnegieendowment.org/syriaincrisis/?fa=54320

[8] https://twitter.com/mobadratalomah

[9] https://twitter.com/Daniel_Abdullah/statuses/427854070842281985

[10] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYa7MnqeqsI&feature=youtu.be. For a summary in English and commentary see http://danielabdullah.wordpress.com/2014/01/28/on-hassan-abbouds-latest-speech/

[11] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Upaj2Krtg6g

[12] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wspbiB8sY50&sns=tw

The ISIS – Suquor al-Sham Truce: Is It Real and Can It Last?
By Daniel Abdallah – twitter: @Daniel_Abdullah
for Syria Comment, Feb 6, 2014

Abu Issa or Ahmed Issa ash-Shaikh, the leader of Suqour ash-Sham (Syrian Falcons) who became the putative leader of the Islamic Front when it was formed in Nov. 2013

Yesterday, a statement was circulated on Twitter and Facebook claiming that a truce had been established between Suqour ash-Sham (SS) and the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS).[1] According to the statement, it appears that the truce had been mediated by Liwa’ Dawoud.[2] Below is my translation of the statement:

In the Name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

Allah the Highest says: ‘The believers are but brothers, so make settlement between your brothers’ [Quran 49:10].

From this divine instruction, and as the beginning of a wider process of reconciliation, we – the Suqour ash-Sham Brigades and its prince Abu Issa ash-Shaikh and the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria and its prince Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi – agree to immediately put an end to the ongoing fighting between ourselves.

Neither party will attack the other in any way. Also, after this agreement, neither party will assist any third party in the Levant – that fight for Allah – in any way.[3]

Should any dispute between the two signatories arise, a Sharia court – established by both parties – shall arbitrate in the matter.

Allah is the determiner of success.

Although the statement was being circulated by accounts sympathetic to ISIS, and indeed some were making claims that SS factions in the Badiya (Homs desert), as a result of the agreement, were leaving their positions there against ISIS, not only did official SS accounts not mention it, they were verbally attacking ISIS. For example, the last three tweets, by then, of Abu Issa ash-Shaikh, SS leader, were describing ISIS as Khawarij and referring to them with their Arabic acronym ???? (Daesh) – which they find offensive.[4] These reasons led to a lively debate on twitter regarding the authenticity, and even the possibility, of the statement.[5]

Later in the day, an official SS spokesperson appeared on Orient TV to clarify the matter.[6] He stated that the situation was ‘nebulous’ – to use his expression – because the SS leadership was still unable to contact its local commanders who had supposedly signed the agreement. With that in mind, according to him, the truce was not approved by the SS top brass. Asked by the presenter what their official position regarding ISIS was, he said it was ‘no secret’, and that such a deal cannot take place ‘under any circumstances’. ISIS had gone too far, they had killed one of SS’ top military commanders.[7]

Although the SS spokesperson’s story is plausible, it does not explain how ISIS and Liwa’ Dawoud were able to contact their local commanders to obtain a copy of the statement and release it. Presumably, all factions are using the same infrastructure for their communication needs. SS was also once part of the Free Syrian Army which received communication equipment and other forms of non-lethal aid from the West.

A few hours after the interview was broadcasted, a video was released depicting an armed convoy moving through a desert road. It was claimed it represented SS’ retreat from its positions against ISIS in the Homs desert (the Badiya).[8] The video also showed an anti-aircraft gun firing at what was said to be a regime plane, which does not appear in the video.

As if to make matters worse for the SS spokesperson’s story, the head of the general staff of the SS Brigades released a statement confirming the reconciliation.[9] Below is my transcription of his statement followed by an English translation:

??? ???? ?????? ??????

??? ?????? ??????: “????? ???????? ???? ??????? ??? ??????”

??? ????? ??????: ???? ????? ???? ???? ???? ????? ????? ????? ????? ???? ?????. ??? ?????? ?? ??? ???? ???? ????? ???? ????? ???????? ?? ??? ????? ??? ????? ???? ????? ??????? ????????? ?? ?????? ??????. ?????? ??? ????? ???? ?? ??? ??? ?????? ?????? ???? ?? ??? ????? ????? ???? ?????? ???? ???????? ????? ???? ??????? ?? ?????? ????????? ?? ?????? ??????.

??? ?? ???????? ??? ??? ???????? ?? ???? ????? ?????. ???? ?????? ?? ???? ????? ?????? ????????? ?? ?????? ?????? ????????? ???? ???? ?? ??? ???? ?? ???? ?????? ?????? ????? ??? ?????? ???? ?? ?????? ????????? ???? ?? ????? ???? ?????. ?????? ??? ??????? ?? ?????? ????????? ?? ?????? ?????? ?? ??????? ????? ???? ??????? ???? ?????? ????. ????? ??? ???????.

6 ???? ??????

In the Name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

Allah, May He Be Glorified and Exalted, says: ‘The believers are but brothers, so make settlement between your brothers’ [Quran 49:10].

I am the humble servant to Allah, Rashed Tuggo, commander of the Suyouf al-Haqq Brigade, and head of the General Staff of the Suqour ash-Sham Brigades [SS]. I was commissioned by the Shura Council of the SS to negotiate a reconciliation between the SS and the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria [ISIS]. Thanks be to Allah. The Almighty and Exalted has allowed us success and we have been able to reach a comprehensive agreement that is valid all over Syria to stop the spilling of blood and end the fighting between us and our brothers in the ISIS.

The agreement stated the cessation of fighting [between SS and the ISIS] all over Syria; providing no assistance to any faction that fights the ISIS; and, in case of a future dispute, setting up an Islamic court that rules by Allah’s Sharia with a judge from the ISIS and a judge from SS to resolve the case. We would like to stress that our brothers in the ISIS have abided by all the clauses of the agreement we have jointly reached.

Allah is the determiner of success.

6^th Rabi’ ath-Thani [Lunar Islamic Calindar. Corresponds to 6^th February].

This statement represents not only the view of Tuggo, but also of the majority – we may assume – of SS’ Shura Council. SS’ spokesperson’s contention that no SS officials had spoken on the matter has, then, become invalid. Those views are at odds with those of SS’ leader – Abu Issa ash-Shaik, who has been quite public about his animosity to the ISIS. In one of his tweets, for example, he says: ‘I will cleanse the Levant from you – you sons of Saba’’.[10] It would, perhaps, be premature to say there is dissent in the ranks of the SS Brigades, but the last word on this matter has not been said.

Images of people who allegedly starved to death in the Yarmouk neighborhood of Damascus

by Matthew Barber

A fabulous documentary about the situation of children in Syria is being shown on Canadian and British television. The documentary, “Children on the Frontline,”  will be available for viewing for a limited time online, but unfortunately only for viewers in Canada or the UK. The documentary contains enlightening footage of life inside war-torn neighborhoods of Aleppo, and interviews with a number of children who talk about their experiences living on the frontline of the Syrian war. One little girl talks about how she searches for salvageable scrap metal that she brings home to her father who makes bombs. She describes, as though it is perfectly ordinary, seeing the head of a man split open when a bomb in their workshop was accidentally detonated. Another girl, about 5 years old, relays a dream of being surrounded by a circle of snipers who begin opening fire on her. “They hit me here, here, here,” she says, touching her body in the places where she dreamed the bullets hit. The scene that brought tears to my eyes was seeing several sisters searching through abandoned homes, looking for weapons. The harsh juxtaposition of the world of children and the world of war is depicted so clearly: One of the girls is carrying a gun and they are discussing finding weapons, when suddenly they become distracted by a stash of little toys and stuffed animals they discover. The gun is laid aside as colorful little bears and plastic balls are examined. Their older sister then won’t allow them to remove the items from the house, because “it would be stealing” from the people who own the house. The mother of the girls explains on camera that she won’t allow her children to loot anything from any home, whether it had belonged to regime-aligned people or not.

A well-known activist named Aboude is also profiled, who lives in Aleppo and is 13 years old. He began taking the courageous stance to criticize the government openly, at school, two years ago when he was only 11. No one put him up to this; his parents were against his involvement in activism, but he has been leading protests ever since. The documentary also examines the plight of the area that is now threatened by al-Qaida-linked Islamists who punish even the most stalwart revolutionaries for “un-Islamic” behaviors. The area in which the documentary was filmed is an FSA stronghold at the edge of rebel territory, directly adjacent to regime positions. Though sniper fire is a serious threat, one of the fighters explains that “being close to your enemy is the safest place to be,” because aerial bombardment is unlikely on the frontline where rebel positions are so close to regime forces. In addition to daily confrontations with regime forces, the people of the area now have to contend with the threat of kidnappings by al-Qaida rebels who target even the most committed activists who pioneered dissent in the early days of the uprising. Those who follow events in the country have known for a while that this has been a growing problem, but there are still plenty of FSA-controlled areas that are feeling increasingly hampered by the oppressive involvement of ISIS members who are more interested in imposing their own religious norms than in uniting with rebel forces to provide defense. (A significant example of this occurred this week when Raed Fares, the man behind the famous protest artwork that comes out of Kafranbel, was shot—likely by ISIS—but survived the assassination attempt.)

[Update: the video was made available for now on Youtube: http://youtu.be/rYWiOsvBRTk ]

Something evident in the area depicted in the documentary, still controlled by FSA forces, is that food is available. Other areas of resistance that become surrounded or captured by the regime do not remain so fortunate.

Over the past month or more, a high number of photos and narrated accounts have emerged that present evidence of horrific levels of suffering, due to starvation.

Starvation is a weapon of torture employed against the regime’s opponents; it is less about any military strategy but more about collectively punishing political enemies and breaking the will of those who defy the state. Starvation in Syria has been taking place in two contexts: 1) opposition areas that fall under regime control and are subsequently blockaded, food supplies being prevented from entering these districts, and 2) prisoners in custody who are not fed by their captors.

Over the course of the Geneva peace talks, the regime’s narrative was unsurprising. It highlighted instances of terrorism committed by jihadists and then portrayed itself as trying to combat the terror problem. Even as we near the beginning of the 4th year of the conflict, regime figures at the talks would not acknowledge that their opponents were Syrian or that a great portion of the Syrian population does not recognize Assad as president. They portrayed their own narrative as “the Syrian side” or “the Syrian story” implying that contrary views were not Syrian. For regime proponents and members of the Ba’athist cult of unreality, a Syrian is not someone originating within the geographical bounds of the historical place called Syria; to be a Syrian, one must embrace and endorse the rule of the current state, as defined by the rulers.

The Guardian reports that during the Geneva talks this past week, nearly 1,900 people have been killed in Syria. Allegations of blockades that result in starvation continue, reportedly occurring in multiple locations within the country. In addition to the accounts of starvation, Human Rights Watch yesterday released a detailed report on the Syrian regime’s systematic use of punitive housing demolition—the destruction of entire neighborhoods—over the last two years. The report can be accessed here: “Razed to the Ground.”

After hearing the tired yet predictably deceitful language propagated by regime figures at the Geneva talks, it is important to remember that yes, terrorism has been rampant among many Syrian rebel factions—typical in asymmetrical warfare, and in this conflict often directed at sectarian targets—but nevertheless, no single player in the conflict has utilized terrorism as widely as the Syrian regime.

The places currently under siege in Syria that we could identify (that may experience the risk of a lack of food or from where reports of the absence of food have been received) are: Babila, Beit Sahem, Duma, Harasta, Zamalaka, Deir al-Asafir, Mukhayam Yarmook, Yelda, al-Mo’adamia, Daraya, Qabuun, Jobar, Berzeh, Homs, Homs al-Qadima, al-Qasour, al-Qarabiss, Jorat al-Shayah, al-Waer, Rastan, Telbissa, Hola, al-Dar al-Kabira, Qal’at al-Hosn, Zara.

The following are a few of the examples of starvation that have been circulating recently.

An old man from Rif Dimashq (Damascus countryside or suburbs) cries while talking about the imposed blockade and the inability to find food.

Starvation in the Yarmouk Palestinian neighborhood of Damascus, showing recently deceased emaciated body and an emaciated man still alive:

Emaciated infant dead from starvation in Jisreen:

An article in Arabic describes how a family in Yarmouk was poisoned after eating cat meat

‘Eating grass to survive’ in besieged Homs – BBC

“We are now eating anything that comes out of the ground, plants, even grass. We pick it, then cook it with some water using wood because we have no gas…

“These shrubs and grass that we’re eating causes illnesses, such as indigestion and fever. A few days ago an elderly man died within six hours from eating the grass and shrubs.”

An Amnesty International article discusses, in addition to the absence of food, the danger of being shot by snipers while trying to bring leaves/grass for family members to eat:

… “Every day, we receive around four people – probably half of them women – who were shot at by snipers as they were picking plants and shrubs in the fields. The women say they prefer to risk their own lives to spare their children. On one occasion, we received a teenager, probably aged 16 or 17, who was shot dead. His father started talking to him, saying: ‘You died for the sake of bringing hibiscus leaves for your siblings.’ It was heartbreaking,” he said. …

BBC article from today describes some aid reaching Yarmouk:

… In a separate development, the UN relief agency UNRWA said it had delivered 720 food parcels to a besieged Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus on Thursday.

Yarmouk camp, which is held by the rebels, is suffering severe shortages of food and medical supplies, with activists reporting dozens of deaths there from starvation.

UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness described “chaotic scenes” as 700 of the total 900 food parcels brought into the camp were distributed to residents.

He said it was the first aid to reach the remaining 18,000 residents since 21 January, when UNRWA distributed 138 food parcels. …

More images are here: 1, 2

In addition to the issue of blockades that will not allow food to those inside, evidence emerged recently confirming widespread starvation within Syrian prisons. On Jan. 20, the Guardian published a report it had received from an independent commission on the issue. The report, available here, consisted of an analysis given by several individuals who examined photographic evidence of torture and starvation. The photographs had been smuggled out of Syria by a regime defector who worked inside the prisons. The evidence consisted of 55,000 photographs of around 11,000 bodies. A large percentage of the photographed corpses showed signs of emaciation. I won’t relay the story of the defector or details of the investigation. The report is worth reading. Aspects of the report’s methodology were criticized, as were the political motivations behind the timing of its release just prior to the Geneva talks, in addition to scrutiny on those who funded the report. This notwithstanding, the findings of the report deserve attention.

One article to discuss the report was published on Mail Online: Starved, tortured then throttled: The true horror of how Assad’s soldiers execute rebel prisoners is revealed in new images

The article contains a number of the leaked photos of tortured and starved bodies, a few of which I will post. On the one hand I feel apologetic for posting these, but on the other I believe its important to consider the extent of suffering experienced by prisoners in Syria. This is a reality we must not ignore, and it should disturb us.

Commentary on the report appeared here and in the following article: Syrian regime document trove shows evidence of ‘industrial scale’ killing of detainees

Senior war crimes prosecutors say photographs and documents provide ‘clear evidence’ of systematic killing of 11,000 detainees

Syrian government officials could face war crimes charges in the light of a huge cache of evidence smuggled out of the country showing the “systematic killing” of about 11,000 detainees, according to three eminent international lawyers.

The three, former prosecutors at the criminal tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Sierra Leone, examined thousands of Syrian government photographs and files recording deaths in the custody of regime security forces from March 2011 to last August.

Most of the victims were young men and many corpses were emaciated, bloodstained and bore signs of torture. Some had no eyes; others showed signs of strangulation or electrocution.

The UN and independent human rights groups have documented abuses by both Bashar al-Assad’s government and rebels, but experts say this evidence is more detailed and on a far larger scale than anything else that has yet emerged from the 34-month crisis.

… The authors are Sir Desmond de Silva QC, former chief prosecutor of the special court for Sierra Leone, Sir Geoffrey Nice QC, the former lead prosecutor of former Yugoslavian president Slobodan Milosevic, and Professor David Crane, who indicted President Charles Taylor of Liberia at the Sierra Leone court. …

“This is amazing. This is the type of evidence a prosecutor looks for and hopes for.  We have pictures, with numbers that marry up with papers with identical numbers – official governmentdocuments. We have the person who took those pictures. That’s beyond-reasonable-doubt-type evidence.” …

“These photos – if authentic – suggest that we may have only scratched the surface of the horrific extent of torture in Syria’s notorious dungeons. There is only one way to get to the bottom of this and that is for the negotiating parties at Geneva II to grant unhindered access to Syria’s detention facilities to independent monitors.”

ISIS has also starved their prisoners. The narrator in this video says that after being imprisoned by ISIS and not being given food or water, prisoners had to eat rats. The video shows the mutilated body of a man who was in prison with him. He says there were 325 prisoners. ISIS guards came and led out a group of them, including some militia commanders, after which they heard gunshots. The guards came back and took out another group, including a 14 and a 15 year old. More gunshots were heard. When they asked the guards where they were taking these people, they were told that they were letting them go home, but then one of the prisoners who was arrested for a trivial reason and tortured at the hands of a British interrogator was shot and killed in front of them for not being able to move after being tortured. That’s when they realized that they were all being executed in turns. One of the prisoners was arrested for simply walking past an ISIS headquarters building and looking at them. Another was a 73 year-old diabetic man with very swollen fingers and feet. The arrested children were more resistant to the hunger and thirst than were the adults. As the cameraman moves the camera around, people standing near the narrator cover their faces out of fear of being seen by ISIS.

Starvation of pro-regime civilians by blockade is also used as a weapon on the part of rebel forces: The politics of starvation: Syria’s civilians go hungry after months of sieges – Patrick Cockburn

… Unnoticed by the outside world, the largest single community currently besieged and on the edge of starvation in Syria lives in two Shia towns west if Aleppo, Zahraa and Nobl, with a combined population 45,000. In this case the besiegers are Sunni rebels who accuse the Shia townspeople of supporting the government of President Bashar al-Assad and are seeking to starve them into submission. …

Zahraa and Nubl form an isolated Shia pocket in an area where most of the people are Sunni supporting the rebels. The towns have received no supplies from the outside apart from an occasional delivery by a government helicopter. …

The politics of starvation are complex in Syria and open to manipulation for propaganda purposes. The problem stems primarily from the government forces’ strategy of sealing off areas that have been captured by the armed opposition and not letting people or goods in or out. …

Round-Up

Landis and Tabler discuss why nothing got done at Geneva and who is to blame on PBS Newshour

For those interested in more translations of the @wikibaghdady leaks, the folks over at reddit continued them. See here

The Other Syrian Peace Process – Aron Lund

… On January 23, Moheisini launched a peace plan called the Umma Initiative…

…The plan is as follows: after an immediate ceasefire between the ISIL and other rebels, the factions will elect a joint arbitration court from a list of ten independent religious scholars. …

… Just as this post went online, the ISIL announced that it is rejecting the Umma Initiative. The group demands that all signatories must first cut their ties to states like Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and of course the West, and to non-Islamist groups like the SMC and other foreign-funded entities. Until this happens, it will continue to fight its enemies. While this is a clever way of trying to play the ball back to the signatories of the Umma Initiative, the end results seems to be that the ISIL has opted for increasing isolation instead of reconciliation. It will attempt a military solution to the conflict, in the hope that the anti-ISIL ranks will splinter with time.

Assad’s hopes thwarted at Syria talks – Liz Sly

… That hesi­ta­tion is evidence that the regime is rattled by the way the talks have gone, a senior U.S. official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

“I find Minister Moualem’s reluctance to make a commitment telling, and it probably is an indication of their understanding that they have a very hard case to defend,” the official said, referring to Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem, the head of the Syrian delegation. …

Fascinating article: At Neutral Site, Syrians Feel Free to Confront the Other Side – Anne Barnard & Hwaida Saad

For Syrian officials, a lakeside idyll here, far from their country’s war, has been marred by what plainly feels to them like an endless stream of impertinent questions.

They have been asked why their government is bombing its citizens, when their president is leaving office, what happened to a British doctor who died suspiciously in a Syrian government prison. They have even been offered the coordinates of jihadist fighters — and asked if they will drop bombs on them instead of on civilians.

The questions that gall them the most, judging by their reactions, are not from the foreigners whose queries they are accustomed to viewing as part of a “media war.” The ones that really nettle them come from Syrians.

… It is an encounter that neither side has experienced before, and in some ways it is the most significant thing taking place at a peace conference that has been more about optics than results. Here in neutral and secure Switzerland, Syrian government delegates used to meeting journalists only inside a government-controlled bubble are finding that almost anyone can come up to them anytime, anywhere, and ask anything.

It is a surreal experience, too, for Syrian activists like Adnan Hadad of Aleppo, who sees it this way: “If we tried this in Syria, they would torture us to death.” …

Yet the government bubble is far older than the war. An Arab journalist who worked in Syria for years said government delegates probably had “never seen, let alone spoken to, anyone in the opposition.”

So for them to sit across from Haitham al-Maleh, an opposition delegate in his 80s who is a former political prisoner, is “historic,” the journalist said, “as if people from the Stalinist system suddenly sat down with Solzhenitsyn or Sakharov.”

“‘Darkness at Noon,’ you have to think in these terms,” the journalist added, referring to the book about Soviet repression and speaking anonymously to freely express his personal views. …

An example of the kinds of encounters that Anne was describing above can be seen in this video of Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi running from a reporter who keeps asking “Why won’t the regime bomb ISIS targets?” (It was recently reported that an ISIS defector claimed he and his comrades always slept soundly in their bases, knowing that the regime wouldn’t be bombing them.)

Even if the Syrian regime doesn’t attack ISIS bases, the Turkish military attacked an ISIS convoy on Wednesday. Turkey’s longstanding policy of leaving the border open to jihadists was certain to return to haunt them at some point. ISIS and others seeking to create what they term an “Islamic state” will recognize the legitimacy of Turkish borders as much as they do Syrian borders. The irony is that after tacitly (and actively) supporting the jihadists, Turkey may at some point begin fighting them. The attack was in retaliation for cross-border fire. al-Arabiya – Turkish army strikes ISIS convoy in Syria

The Turkish armed forces opened fire on the convoy of an al-Qaeda-linked jihadist group’s vehicles in Syria in retaliation for cross-border fire on Tuesday, destroying three vehicles, Turkish media said on Wednesday.

“A pick-up, a truck and a bus in an ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) convoy were destroyed,” Agence France-Presse quoted published by Turkish media. There were no casualties on the Turkish side.

The army said the attack, carried out Tuesday, came after two Turkish military vehicles had been fired upon at the Cobanbey border post in the south of the country.
The Turkish military targeted ISIS positions in northern Syria after a mortar shell fired from Syria landed in Turkish territory during clashes between ISIS and the rebel Free Syrian Army, Reuters reported broadcaster NTV as saying.
The incident is considered to be the first pitting Turkey against ISIS which has been fighting forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad as well as fellow rebel groups in the north of the country since January.

Al-Qaeda in Turkey?

The Turkish military action also comes after Israel’s military intelligence chief said some of the al-Qaeda militants fighting in Syria have set up bases in Turkey, where they can also easily access Europe.

Al-Qaeda fighters from around the world enter Syria weekly, but they “do not stay there,” Major-General Aviv Kochavi told a security conference, while presenting a map of the Middle East marking areas with an al-Qaeda presence. According to the map, there are three al-Qaeda bases in Turkey. …

If you missed it before, make sure to view a documentary released at the beginning of this month, on the struggle of the Kurds in northeastern Syria. The Kurdish fighters in the video point out that Turkey keeps its border with Arab areas of Syria open, allowing fighters and journalists in and out. However, they keep the portion of the Turkish border adjacent to the Kurdish area of Syria tightly sealed. The Kurds believe that Turkey is worried about the success of the Kurds, and is happy to allow ISIS fighters through to fight them. That those ISIS fighters may eventually pose a terror threat inside Turkey, or become a force that Turkey itself will have to fight, highlights the irony. Another significant moment in this film is a scene in which a Kurdish fighter displays a knife he retrieved from a fallen ISIS fighter. He says the knife was bloody when he got it and had been used to cut someone’s throat. Printed on the side of the knife was “Made in USA” and the words “9/11 – We Will Never Forget.” The implication was that US military equipment, complete with pro-US nationalist (and ultimately anti-jihadist) slogans, destined as aid for FSA rebels, wound up in the hands of ISIS jihadis who were using that very equipment in their executions. Layers of irony.

While Turkey worries about its border, Israel is worrying about its border as well, going so far as to take an active role in supporting rebels. Israel’s Growing Role in Southern Syria Arabic version here: ??? ??????? ???????? ?? ???? ?????

Concerned about the possible drift of al-Qaeda affiliates to areas adjacent to the Golan Heights border, Israel finds itself obliged to increase its assistance to local rebel militias in southern Syria.

As the fighting in Syria rages, Israel has been moving cautiously and often reluctantly toward assuming a modest role in the civil war, restricted to areas along the Golan Heights frontier line. What began as a purely humanitarian step — extending emergency medical aid to injured and sick Syrians from neighboring villages — has by now reportedly expanded into a well-developed mechanism for providing a whole range of items, from medications to food, fuel, clothes, heaters, and more. …

Intra-jihadist ideological conflicts: The Islamic State of Disunity: Jihadism Divided – Cole Bunzel

More on the nature of ISIS: The Dawn of the Islamic State of Iraq and ash-Sham – Aymenn al-Tamimi

Analysis: Why Syria’s Assad heads to Geneva from a position of strength
By Joshua Landis
for Aljazeera America, Edited by Tony Karon
January 22, 2014

His army is stronger, his allies are more committed and regime’s capacity for brutality has kept it in charge.

As representatives of Syria’s Assad regime and some of its opponents sit down Wednesday for their first direct negotiations since the rebellion began three years ago, the grim reality facing the Syrian opposition is this: President Bashar al-Assad comes to the negotiating table in Switzerland apparently stronger today than at any time in the last two years. Thus his cavalier tone ahead of the talks, dismissing opposition representatives as a “joke” and brushing off Secretary of State John Kerry’s and the opposition’s demand that he relinquish power and accept a “transitional governing body.” Instead, Assad maintains, Syria will hold elections this year, and “I see no reason why I shouldn’t stand.”

Understanding why Assad’s regime survives more than two years after then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called it a “dead man walking” is critical for gauging the outcome of the Geneva II talks.

The regime’s resilience is based, first and foremost, on the Syrian Army. Without its loyalty, Assad would likely have fallen as quickly as did Tunisia’s President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak in 2011. But while many soldiers and officers did join the rebellion, most did so as individuals; few entire units defected and no entire divisions did. Structurally, the military held together, and it was able to replenish its ranks through intensive recruitment among the Alawite minority, where many are loyal to the regime and still more live in mortal fear of sectarian retribution at the hands of the Sunni-led armed rebellion. The same factors allowed the military to expand its capabilities through the paramilitary Popular Committees, often called shabiha. And it has also been able to enlist the support in critical battles of units of the Shia Hezbollah militia from neighboring Lebanon, whose leaders recognize that their own military fortunes depend on maintaining the re-supply lines that the Assad regime has long provided.

Just as important as the military’s loyalty to the regime has been its superior armaments. Even if rebel fighters, who number well in excess of 100,000 by most estimates, outnumber the Syrian Arab Army, in any battle for territory they are often little match for the Syrian Army’s dramatic technological and organizational advantage. Rebel militias have no answer for the artillery, armor and air power of the Syrian military. Perhaps even more importantly, the rebels have no central command. And it is difficult to imagine, today, how the rebels could plausibly overcome these disadvantages.

The fragmentation and radicalization of rebel fighting forces, over whom there is no clear political command, has been the opposition’s greatest weakness. Had a unified political-military command emerged among Syria’s rebels in the first year of the uprising, at the height of optimism over the Arab Spring, the United States and Europeans might well have been persuaded to give direct military backing to the uprising. Today, such hopes have been dashed.

Infighting among rival militias battling for control over rebel-held areas has, in recent weeks, cost over 1,000 lives. The prospect of militia chaos combined with widespread human rights abuses, the radicalization of the militias, and an estimated 10,000 foreigners fighting on the rebel side have spooked Western leaders, even amid the anguish caused by images depicting gruesome torture and murder in the dungeons of the regime.

Few policy-makers talk about “good guys” in Syria anymore; some — most notably former CIA Director Gen. Michael Hayden last December — even argue that a rebel victory would be worse than an Assad win. Not even the recent emergence of a larger militia coalition, the Islamic Front, to organize rebel fighting and challenge forces aligned with Al-Qaeda has been able to end rebel chaos.

Foreign involvement in the Syrian civil war has also worked strongly to the advantage of the regime. Iran and Russia have proven to be far more reliable as allies to Assad than the U.S. and Gulf Arab states have been to the rebels. From day one of the revolt, Assad’s top concern has been that the U.S. would invade. He and his generals were convinced that they could survive so long as F-16s did not appear over the Damascus horizon. So far, their assumption has proven to be correct.

Rhetoric and action gap

Rarely has the gap between U.S. rhetoric and action been wider than it has been on Syria: President Barack Obama proclaimed during the first months of the uprising that “Assad must step aside,” which was read as a statement of intent by the rebels but which has produced negligible concrete action. Even when Washington proclaimed that Assad had crossed Obama’s “red line” by using chemical weapons, no retribution rained down. The U.S. electorate has no appetite for further wars in the Middle East. So, while Obama was able to strike a deal ridding Syria of all WMD, to the opposition that success was a damp squib. They had expected Washington to deal Assad a crippling blow, turning the fight in their favor. Instead, Washington struck a chemical-weapons dealthat saw Assad dispense with a category of weapons that had played very little role in the civil war, while effectively strengthening his and his allies’ diplomatic position.

Obama made clear in his pivot on launching a punitive strike on Syria that he believes the U.S. has practically no interest in the country’s civil war. Syrian opposition figures look at the fact that the U.S. has spent less than $2 billion on Syria, the equivalent of three days’ spending at the height of the Iraq war, and see little reason to expect much from Washington. Even those opposition groups who’ve agreed to go to Geneva II are not convinced by Secretary of State John Kerry’s insistence that Assad will have to agree at the talks to form a sovereign “transitional government.” Kerry took charge of the State Department last year declaring his intention to change Assad’s “calculation” about his ability to hold on to power, but instead it is Washington’s calculations, rather than Assad’s, that have changed.  How he will be made to step aside on the basis of the current balance of forces remains a mystery.

Assad has been extraordinarily ruthless in pursuing his survival, and such ruthlessness can have a decisive effect in determining the course of a war. The most recent U.N. report about “industrial scale killing of detainees” made for blood-chilling reading, chronicling the regime’s brutality and willingness to destroy whole neighborhoods in order to kill rebel fighters sheltering within them. The carnage wrought by Assad’s forces has been breathtaking — one in three Syrians today has been displaced from their homes by the war.

Assad’s game plan was to confront unarmed civil disobedience with gunfire, betting that turning the uprising into an armed rebellion would push extremist forces to the fore, which would alienate key Syrian and foreign stakeholders. He prioritized geography, withdrawing from the regions that hold less strategic value or are ungovernable by his regime in order to consolidate his hold on core geographic assets, such as Damascus, Homs, Hama and the highways linking them to the Alawite population centers on the coast. Although he ceded control of the poorest and most heavily Sunni provinces of northern and eastern Syria, his army has been able to retain bases in every major northern city. Government artillery and aircraft continue to bombard rebel-held areas at will, creating chaos and sowing dissention.

So, although Assad’s representatives have gone to the negotiating table in Switzerland, it is not clear they are there to seek compromise. But others might.

While Assad insists that his army is “making progress,” it is not at all clear that he can retake Syria or that Syria’s allies will continue to bankroll his attempt to do so. Iran and Russia may well be content to have the Assad regime survive in only half of Syria if Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the West agree to the other half for the rebels. Even then, a deal remains a distant prospect. Most Syrians today reject the notion of partition or even autonomous regions, but the military stalemate has endured for almost two years. On the eve of the Geneva talks, Syria’s Kurds declared unilateral autonomy in the far northeast, where they hold military power and comprise the majority of the population. Syria is effectively divided, and none of the military forces in the field appear capable of reuniting it under their control. Negotiated settlements to end wars tend to reflect the balance of forces in play; the idea of Assad stepping aside for a consensus-based national unity government is quite at odds with the current balance of geopolitical and military forces. For that reason, it is unlikely to be achieved at Geneva II.

Aboud Dandachi in Istanbul, where he recently acquired his residency card.

Observations of a Homsi living in Tartous
by Aboud Dandachi
Written for Syria Comment, January 20, 2014

*Aboud Dandachi is a Syrian activist from Homs, currently living in Istanbul. He is the author of the blog “From Homs to Istanbul” at www.adandachi.com/istanbul (The Dandashi family is a well known Sunni family.)

Over the course of the Syrian conflict, the port city of Tartous has been regarded as a bastion of loyalist support, a regime stronghold, and a city whose populace are loyal to Bashar Assad.

In fact, only two of the above statements are true.

I moved to Tartous in late March 2012, after being displaced first from my home in Homs, and then from my village of Telkelakh. Like all displaced persons since the beginning of time, I thought my troubles would be a temporary and I’d be able to return home once the situation improved. I hoped.

But as it turned out, I spent eighteen months in Tartous, living my life in an area no bigger than ten square kilometers. During those months, Tartous was like a small passenger boat; crowded, but offering safety from the storm raging in the middle of an infinite sea of tidal waves of anxiety and war.

The situation was surreal. By March 2013, the anniversary of my move to Tartous, half the populace consisted of displaced people who had relatives actively at war with relatives of the other half. I myself came from a village well known for its opposition to the regime; three cousins of mine and numerous distant relatives had taken up arms against the state, whose own rank and file consisted of the relatives of the taxi drivers, shop keepers, hotel staff and restaurant workers of the city I looked to for refuge. It was absurd.

And yet, in eighteen months in Tartous, I never once heard a single word of abuse or experienced any act of aggression. Tartus before the war was equal parts Christian, Alawite, and Sunni. My being a Sunni from Homs was never held against me.

On the contrary, anytime the topic of Homs came up with a native of Tartous, the conversation would invariably lead to reminiscing about Homs’ previous status as “Um el fakir”, as Homs was called, the Mother of the Poor; memories of shopping for Eid cloth in a city where Eid shopping was much cheaper than the coast or Damascus; where one could get one’s car fixed for half the price a workshop would charge in Tartous; a city where rents and the very cost of houses were ridiculously cheap by the standards of any major cities. To a native of Tartous, pre-conflict Homs used to offer a cheap alternative to the much higher cost of living of the coastal areas.

And almost every such conversation would end in someone voicing eternal damnation on the souls of the Saudis, Turks, Chechens, Pakistanis, Libyans, Jordanians etc etc who had supposedly infiltrated Homsi society and turned it into a “well of terrorism”, and a place where the most barbaric acts of inhumanity were regularly practiced on those who had not sold their souls to Zionism-Wahabism-CIAism and were still loyal to…well, what a good Syrian should be loyal to exactly depended on the person you were speaking with.

It’s inevitable that when a people’s lives have been disrupted and affected by events, people will spend a great deal of time discussing and debating those events. In Tartous, the most honest opinions could always be gleaned from discussions that took place late at night; in the hotel lobbies when only the staff and a few night owls were left awake; at the restaurants or sidewalk cafes closing up for the night and the only ones left were the staff drinking one last cup of coffee before heading home, or in the Internet cafes, sparsely filled with customers taking advantage of the ultra cheap midnight rates to Skype with relatives in Europe or Canada.

The president. The regime. The state. To a Homsi whose city had suffered the worst of the conflict up to that point, all three were one and the same, inseparable. The revolution was about getting rid of the president, to cause the downfall of the regime, and create a new state. What the nature of the new state would be was something the myriad groups that made up the opposition never did get around to agreeing on.

The president, the regime and the state. To a Tartousian, these were three very distinct and separate entities, a fact that took me a very long time to understand. Being a “loyalist” meant different things to different people. In eighteen months, very few people had a kind word to say about the president Bashar Assad. Explicit criticism of his person was never voiced openly, of course, but there were plenty of criticisms of the “strategy” of the war, of its “handling”, and many wistful nostalgic yearnings for the “wisdom and experience” of Hafiz Assad. I lost count of the number of times I heard it said that Hafiz would never have allowed things to reach the point they did. One didn’t have to scratch much beneath the surface to detect a distinct lack of enthusiasm for the younger Assad’s abilities as a war leader.

Which was not to say that having no faith in Bashar’s abilities to handle the conflict, meant that a person was part of the opposition. Among the people of Tartous, there was a clear and very well defined distinction between the president, the regime and the state. I met no one who expressed much love for the president. The vast majority however, felt that the regime was a necessity, and would have gladly been happy to see the current regime headed by a new president.

And every person in Tartous felt that they were part of a struggle to preserve the very state and its institutions. Tartousians did not want to live in a failed state, and if the state collapsed, the average person in Tartous felt like they had nowhere else to run to. While I myself never experienced any discrimination or hostility as a displaced person from Homs, I heard nothing but scorn and contempt whenever the topic of the hundreds of thousands of Syrians who had fled to Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt or (especially) Turkey came up. In Tartous, a person who seemingly abandoned the country to live in a refugee camp was regarded as being beneath contempt.

In a way, it wasn’t hard to understand why this should be so. The people of Tartous had their backs to the sea, in almost a literal sense. If the war reached the city, there would be no place for them to flee to. Many Sunnis from other parts of Syria had fled to the Gulf and other countries. Alawites, Christians and those Sunnis who had remained loyal to the regime could count on no such welcome. For the most part Tartousians didn’t have the luxury of contemplating a life as refugees in other countries, it was a convenience that would not be afforded to them.

Well, displaced people who found themselves in Tartous did infact contemplate very much life as refugees in other countries. By the summer of 2013, the number of Sunni and Christian refugees in Tartous overwhelmingly outnumbered the local Alawites in the city. Every Christian displaced family I knew was biding time until relatives abroad could arrange for them to get visas. Canada and Sweden were particularly favored as destinations. One Christian female doctor from Aleppo had made no less than eleven visa requests to the USA, Canada and European countries.

Evert day saw a massive crush of applicants at the Immigration and Passports department, which is a small three story building, designed to handle many fewer applicants then the hordes now trying to leave the country. At the beginning of the uprising and as late as March 2012, a person could walk into the Tartous passport department in the morning, and leave in the afternoon with new passports for himself and his family of six kids, a widowed sister, and her six kids.

When I went to renew my passport,the place was a hell hole. My name was put on a waiting list and I was given an appointment five weeks away. On the appointed day, if your name wasn’t on the appointment list, there was no way you were stepping inside the building, no matter how desperate your sob story, who you had tried to bribe, or how urgently you needed to leave the country. It was the only way to bring order to an insanity created by the fear that at any day, the state’s institutions might collapse, and those without passports would become refugees without travel documents for the rest of their lives. Even after submitting all the required paperwork, it would take another month for a new passport booklet to be issued, such was the shortage in new passports.

In August 2013, a new fast track system was implemented. Pay 16,000 liras, and you could get your passport two days later. People cynically referred to it as Assad’s idea of a “reform”.

For Tartousians, the preservation of the state and its institutions were essential to their own survival; the preservation of the president, not so much. Indeed, spend enough time in Tartous, and one would get the unmistakable impression that the president himself was increasingly seen more as a liability; what the people of Tartous wanted was a more capable leader to lead the same regime and ensure the preservation of the same state.

As the number of displaced people fleeing to the city increased, the cost of living screamed up, leaving most with no way of coping. Apartments whose rent had been 5,000 liras a month were going for five times that, putting them out of reach of the ordinary Tartousian. Daily, the city experienced traffic jams that rivaled those of the major metropolises. In the eighteen months I was in Tartous, the price of food, taxi fares and cloth more than tripled.

You could also see the demographics of the city change before your very eyes. It would be no exaggeration to say that females outnumbered males to a ratio as high as twenty to one. At any time, one’s favorite shawerma vendor, shopkeeper, vegetable seller or barber might suddenly close shop, having been called up to “perform his national duty”, and serve in the reserves for an undefined period of time. “Talbeno”, they requested him, was a phrase that was dreaded in Homs. It meant the security forces were after a specific person. The same phrase in Tartous meant that a person was being called up into the reserves, to be sent to God knows what front line.

And yet throughout all this, there was never a backlash against the newly arrived displaced persons. A woman could walk in the streets in a niqab without a second thought, in contrast to the stories that were coming out of some of the areas of Syria that hardline Islamist groups had taken over.

Within the ten square kilometer “bubble” that made up the safe areas, life went on as normal. The regime’s security forces didn’t have a single checkpoint set up within the city itself. The only time weapons were fired inside the city was during military funerals, or right after one of Assad’s (mercifully infrequent) speeches or interviews. And the day that the Egyptian army deposed Mohamed Morsi. That party lasted well into the night.

Which is not to say that security in Tartous was lax. Some days, the queue of cars waiting to pass through the checkpoints on the city’s outskirts would stretch for miles. If you were on the run from the regime, Tartous was not the place to hide in. Twice I heard of individuals from my home village being arrested in Tartous (they were later released when it turned out they shared similar names with individuals on the regime’s shit list). My favorite mobile phone shop owner was hauled in by the State Security branch to explain where he got the money for his opulent lifestyle (amazingly, there was never any shortage of the latest iPads and smartphones in Tartous).

I myself was interviewed three times by mukhabarat from the State Security branch during my stay in Tartous. It was standard practice, even before the conflict, for checks to be made on anyone staying long term at hotels. The interviews were conducted in the lobby of whichever hotel I’d happen to be staying at, and were friendly and polite. I was asked a bunch of questions about my family relations, the answers to which I had no doubt whatsoever the agents already knew.

Indeed, during the first interview, the person interviewing me seemed more concerned that I was running away from some vendetta in Homs. “Did someone threaten you back in Homs? Are you running away from some gang?”

No, I was running away from a military occupation. My home neighborhood of Inshaat was being choked by frequent raids and random arrests being conducted every few weeks. In Homs, if I wasn’t  home by 4 pm, my relatives would start collecting ransom money in the expectation that I’d been kidnapped by the shabihas. In Tartous, I’d hear the same shabihas complain at night over coffee about late salaries, long assignments with little leave, and a desire to see the regime “get serious about finishing off the terrorists”.

The shabihas got their wish on August 21^st 2013. I woke up to frantic Whatsapp messages from relatives in the Gulf with news of the Ghouta chemical weapons attack.

In a moment, the very atmosphere in Tartous changed. There had always been an undercurrent of tension in the city, as if people somehow knew in their bones that the calm they were enjoying couldn’t possibly last indefinitely. Overnight, Tartous had turned from a safe haven, to ground zero in any NATO attack on the country. I started seeing in my fellow Tartous residents, the same sickening fear and sense of impending doom I’d feel back in Homs, whenever I heard rumors of military buildups.

That Saturday, the 25^th of August, was the most nerve racking day I’d experienced since coming to Tartous. People in Tartous were convinced that a NATO attack was all but inevitable, and that a long overdue reckoning was at hand. The chemical weapon attack on Ghouta was just the excuse the “conspiracy” needed to finally finish off what had been started by the “armed groups”. That night, the lobby of the hotel I was staying at turned into something resembling a refugee camp, with families vacating their rooms on the upper floors and instead choosing to spend the night downstairs.

The next day, more than half the hotel staff didn’t show up for work, and the normally bustling commercial street in which the hotel was located was eerily quiet. Most of the hotel’s occupants were Christian families from Aleppo, who had been biding their time until relatives in Europe and North America could arrange visas for them. A lot of these same families decided, screw it, it would be much safer to wait in Beirut.

On August 29^th, I was sitting in the lobby when I heard gunfire out on the cornice, with exuberant chants of “We are shabihas, we are shabihas!” OK, a demonstration to demonstrate the city’s defiance and “steadfastness”, I thought to myself.

Actually, it turned out to be a celebration. The British parliament had just voted to reject any involvement in any military action in Syria. Just as suddenly as the atmosphere in Tartous had changed to a city on the edge of a catastrophe on August 21^st, the emotional pendulum swung the other way round; the long feared specter of foreign military intervention, the consequences of which Tartous would have borne the brunt of, in one night had had a stake driven through its heart, and buried in a six foot grave.

Tartousians were euphoric, as only someone who has survived a close brush with death can be. The regime had spat in the eyes of the “NATO dogs”, and gotten away with defying the “great powers”.

As the following days and week saw Barack Obama desperately try to squirm his way out of his “red line” commitments to make Assad pay for any chemical attack, many an unflattering remarks were heard in the hotel lobby and cafeterias regarding Obama’s manhood, or lack thereof. The man who was once feared as the embodiment of everything tormenting Syria, in the space of one week become an object of derision and scorn; a bumbling clown who was flailing at the deep end of a swimming pool.

For me, it was a clear indication living in Syria had become untenable. Anyone who remained in Syria could only look forward to increased brutality by a regime that had discovered it had absolutely no consequences to fear. There was now nothing to stop Assad from butchering the population wholesale, and the countries neighboring Syria were not going to keep their borders open indefinitely. In early September, I left Tartous and crossed into Lebanon.

I left behind a city that had sheltered me during eighteen months when the rest of the country was experiencing hell, a city whose populace realized that they were stuck between Assad’s extremists and Al-Qaeda’s, with no way to save the country. A city whose populace did not want to live under the Islamists who have come to dominate the opposition, but who were desperate to preserve the state as it was, lest they become, like so many Palestinians and Iraqis in the region, themselves stateless.

by Matthew Barber

A new Twitter account that appeared last month is making waves within the jihadi community and rebel groups of Syria. It has not yet been noticed by the international media, but if the author’s claims are legitimate, it may significantly help to shape our understanding of ISIS.

The author of the @wikibaghdady Twitter account claims to be leaking inside information about the background and activities of ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham, the most powerful al-Qaida force fighting in Syria). He started posting on December 10, and continues up to today. He presents a cursory sketch of the history of the Islamic State in Iraq (al-Qaida in Iraq), Jabhat al-Nusra, and the background leading up to ISI’s attempt to subsume Nusra within a larger, unified jihadi command, the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS).

The first question that emerges is whether this posted material is authentic or cleverly-composed fiction. If it is the latter, it is very clever indeed. The author doesn’t give information that would identify himself. Did he belong to ISIS/Al-Qaida in Iraq and defect? One thing that seems possible is that the account may take a position sympathetic to Jabhat al-Nusra. The author is ready enough to reveal all information about ISIS, but he never frames Nusra in a negative light. In responses to angry accusations by ISIS members on Twitter that the leaks are spurious, some connected observers have asserted that the author’s knowledge is real and all the material is true. It waits to be seen whether the account represents internal dissatisfaction with ISIS or part of the recently-deepening rift between ISIS and Nusra.

Though not highly detailed, the leaks do present us with some interesting insights into the structure of al-Qaida in Iraq, including protective strategies used to insulate key leadership figures, as well as al-Qaida’s readiness to embrace thievery and extortion to fund their own operations. What is also interesting is the claim that Nusra was created by al-Qaida in Iraq, not because they were serious about fighting the Syrian front, but merely as a measure to preserve their own powerbase in Iraq, which they feared might erode if too many became enthusiastic about participation with the jihad in Syria. Nusra’s fame would then grow to overshadow ISI’s, and the U.S. adding Nusra to the terror list further bolstered their prestige, fueling an eventual competitive clash between the two factions. The author of the leaks also claims that ISI ordered Nusra to attack FSA commanders.

One of the most significant insights that the leaks can provide is the alleged role of a previously-unknown figure, Hajji Bakr, who ostensibly acted as al-Baghdadi’s right-hand, but who in reality seems to have been the real power and mastermind of the group. (For background on al-Baghdadi and al-Julani, the leaders of ISI and Nusra, respectively, see these posts by Pieter van Ostaeyen: 1, 2) Unconfirmed reports have recently claimed that Hajji Bakr has been killed in Tel Raf’at, in Aleppo province, in clashes with other rebels. It’s all a bit odd; no one had ever heard of this person before this twitter account went live, and soon after he is reported dead. His death was reported by some Islamic Front rebels. There is still a question about the existence of this individual and we need more information that can confirm these claims. Following reports of Hajji Bakr’s death, a video parody participating in the online “Hitler meme” appeared online; all the names used in this parody rely heavily on the @wikibaghdady tweets.

We can’t establish the authenticity of the leaks, but as they do appear reasonably credible and likely true, we are posting selected translations of the leaks, below. (While we were preparing this post, al-Akhbar released an article reporting on these leaks.)

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The author began his twitter feed (December 10) with a series of prefacing questions that he planned to answer:

The first account to expose the secrets of the Dawlat al-Iraq wa al-Sham organization [ISIS] and who runs it… Who is al-Baghdadi? Have you seen his picture? The names of his council? What are his plans? Wait for us soon…

He tweeted that message several times, tagging well-known anti-ISIS/pro-jihadi figures on twitter, then asked more rhetorical questions:

Why did al-Baghdadi come to Syria?! And when?! Who was the first to welcome him?! Who are the sharia’a legislators who gave fatwas saying bayaa should be given him?! Who is the Iraqi officer that accompanies him?! Soon, here…

Who are the closest people to al-Baghdadi? What are their names?! Who are they who support him from outside, especially from Saudi Arabia?! Who manages the anonymous twitter handlers that support him?! Soon, here…

Where does al-Baghdadi get his money from?! Is [his organization] infiltrated?! And How?! Who gives him the fatwas for killing?! Soon, here…

Who supports al-Baghdadi in Saudi Arabia: who is the former Saudi officer Bandar al-Shaalan?! What is his role in moving and supporting the Daesh movement in Saudi Arabia?! Soon, here…

On December 14 he began to provide answers to the questions he laid out:

We will now start tweeting with Allah’s permission.

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is a real person but who uses a fake name and title, and everyone around him does the same thing. There’s no member of al-Baghdadi’s council [his inner circle] who uses his family name or real title.

Everyone of al-Baghdadi’s council are 100%  Iraqi; no other nationality is accepted because he doesn’t trust anyone.

The size of al-Baghdadi’s military council increases and decreases between 8 and 13 people.

al-Baghdadi’s military council is led by 3 people from the former Saddam army who belong to the Ba’ath party.

Those three are led by [the chief of the 3 is] Staff Brigadier General Hajji Bakr who was a former officer in the Saddam Baathist army.

Who is Hajji Bakr?! And what is his relationship to al-Baghdadi and when did it start?! That’s what we’ll talk about an hour from now with Allah’s permission.

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[Briefly in the meantime,] Who writes under fake, Daesh names?

Here he gives a list of those twitter accounts supposedly corresponding to members of ISIS:

Who is Abu Doujana @almohajer9225

Who is AlHezbr @Alhezbr_

Who is Haqiqat Al Sororia @hnt1433

Who is Qorin Kalash @K_L7

Who is Gharib @kmkmmmsmsm

Who is Salafi from Iraq @abdalrahmaniraq

Who is Al Sarouria Tabor Khames @bmr8000

And the list goes on. We’ll reveal 5 names to you every so often.

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1) As we said, al-Baghdadi’s military council is led by 3 [individuals] and those 3 are headed by a former officer in the Baath party named Staff Colonel Hajji Bakr.

2) Colonel Hajji Bakr joined the Islamic State in Iraq when the state was led by Abu Omar al-Baghdadi. [former ISI leader]

3) Hajji was a military member who offered his military service along with his experience in the Ba’ath army to al-Baghdadi’s organization.

4) Staff Colonel Hajji demonstrated his commitment and his repentance from the Ba’ath party and he is considered the most important military commander close to Abu Omar al-Baghdadi.

5) There was no previous acquaintance between the two; he was recommended to Abu Omar al-Baghdadi and Abu Hafs al-Muhajir by middlemen and he was accepted under the condition that he connect them with leadership [commanders] and useful information in the army.

6) The Staff Colonel was brought close to the leaders of the Islamic State in Iraq as a military advisor for Abu Omar al-Baghdadi and Abu Hafs al-Muhajer.

7) The Colonel Hajji Bakr provided the leadership with military information and plans and connected them with former military commanders from the remnants of the Ba’ath party.

8) Within a few weeks, Colonel Hajji Bakr became closer and closer to the leadership of Dawlat al-Iraq because he was a military treasure and an important commander.

9) The strange thing about Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of Da’esh today, is that he wasn’t present in the command council of the previous leader Abu Omar al-Baghdadi [he didn’t join the council] until [around the time of] the death of the latter.

10) Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi was a member in the organization of Islamic state of Iraq outside of the organization’s command. He resided in western Iraq, specifically in Al-Anbar Province, specifically in Falujah.

11) He had been in the command as an adviser for al-Baghdadi and Al-Muhajer for nearly 50 days when the catastrophe hit the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Baghdadi and Abu Hafs were targeted with a shell and they all died.

12) Colonel Hajji Bakr was not harmed but the top commanders of the Islamic State were all killed at the same time and all the command was vacant [????? ??? ????? ?????? – ?]

13) There is another Colonel who is a friend of Hajji Bakr named Mazen Nahir and he often visits Hajji Bakr. He went with him to Abu Omar Al-Baghdadi one time as a collaborator with the organization and an unofficial member.

14) This other colonel Mazen Nahir is regarded by Hajji Baker as a trustworthy agent who [can be used] to inflitrate the regime; [therefore] he doesn’t like to appear in the organization’s leadership or its councils.

15) After the assassination of the leaders, colonel Hajji Bakr told people close to him and from the leadership that he gave bayaa to a new emir to lead the Islamic state of Iraq and that being Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

16) The news was a surprise to everyone! In another meeting soon we’ll talk about the Islamic state of Iraq under the leadership of the new emir Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and his constant companion Colonel Hajji.

Addendum: Abu Hamza al-Muhajir, the companion of Abu Omar al-Baghdadi is Egyptian and his name is Abd Al-Moneem Izz Al-Din Badawi. He had two other nicknames before he joined al-Baghdadi: 1. Abu Ayub 2. Abu Hafs

The next meeting with deal with the new commander of the Iraq State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and the real engine behind his state: Colonel Hajji Bakr

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December 15

The new era of Dawlat al-Iraq under the command of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and Staff Colonel Hajji Bakr – Part 1

1) When Colonel Hajji Bakr suggested the emirship to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in a private meeting in the first hours after the death of the leader al-Baghdadi (the first) and al-Muhajir, Abu Bakr expressed concerns.

2) Colonel Hajji Bakr gave assurances and said that he would provide support and assistance from the background; this is what al-Baghdadi has confided to those close to him since the begining of his leadership.

3) A new era began for the Islamic State in Iraq with two leaders, the leader in the front, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and the leader in the shadow, Staff Colonel Hajji Bakr.

4) ISI began to work amid concerns about the presence of an emergent figure, Haji Bakr, who is very close to and the right-hand man of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

5) The image of the clean-shaven Colonel next to the leader disturbed the members of the State and both leaders, al-Baghdadi and the Colonel, noticed it.

6) The Colonel started growing his beard and changing his appearance and the way that he talked in the first weeks, and no member was allowed to question anything about the leadership,

7) because questions plant doubts and planting doubts is breaking the ranks which might permit blood and assassination in one way or another.

8) Nobody in the Dawlah organisation knew the Colonel 2 months prior to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi taking the leadership.

9) Colonel Hajji Bakr started meeting privately with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi to restructure the new State and the first agreement was to give attention to two apparatuses:

10) An apparatus that could protect the cohesion of the State and protect it from the inside through security units that eliminate any threat to the entity and another apparatus that guarantees financial resources.

11) First, the security apparatus: the first secuirty steps were taken by the Staff Colonel Hajji Bakr to protect the leader in the front, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, by keeping him from meeting the leadership of the subdivisions,

12) so as not to affect him with influence or guidance [so that other commanders wouldn’t influence al-Baghdadi]. And the emir’s orders came through the leaders of the Shura Council, which was formed by the Colonel later.

13) Colonel Hajji Bakr became a permanant fixture next to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and doesn’t leave his side anywhere, like a personal minister, but in reality he is the leader in the shadow.

14) The second step in creating the security apparatus was to set up security detachments that carry out eliminations and secret assassinations. It was created by the Colonel with 20 people in the beginning.

15) It then reached 100 people; these detachments take their orders directly from the leadership and do not follow any regional emir.

16) These people were selected by the Colonel. Most of them come from his former occupation within the desolved Iraqi Baathist regime and are highly trustworthy.

17) Their mission is to secretly eliminate anybody showing signs of dissent or disobedience: whether members of ISI or even field commanders or sharia legislators.

18 ) So that assassination orders don’t go through the chain of command of the men of ISI and then become leaked, the Colonel appointed these detatchements to an officer and a former colleague of his named Abu Safwan Rifai.

19) Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi started to feel very safe and was grateful to Colonel Hajji Bakr and he started seeing him an as indispensable man,

20) to the point that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi felt that he couldn’t remain in control without Colonel Hajji Bakr because, with his military background, he plays the role of both the defense and intelligence ministries.

21) Second, the financial resources: the State of Iraq with the leadership of the former commander Abu Omar al-Baghdadi made great strides in bringing in high financial resources based on the following:

22) First: Confiscating the money of all Shi’a, Christian, and Druze minorities, and all regime agents, even if they were Sunnis.

23) Second: The takeover of oil resources and generation, power and oil stations, government factories, and any governmental financial resources because [they consider] its money as owned by Dawlat al-Iraq.

24) Third: Any companies that have contracts with the al-Maliki regime are agents [of the regime], whether a maintenance or cleaning company, or fuel stations, or telecommunications companies.

25) And if something can’t be seized completely, the owner receives a death threat or a threat to blow up the company or the store, if monthly taxes are not paid and the money gets paid in fear for his [the owner’s] property.

26) Fourth: Placing checkpoints on long roads to take money from commerical trucks, as high as $200 in some cases

27) Under the leadership of Abu Bakr and the Colonel, Dawlat al-Iraq came to possess very large and very alluring amounts of money that increased salaries and rewards and military operations.

28) With the increase in financial stature and a large income, the love of joining al-Dawla grew and the Iraqis were the most loyal.

29) A financial command was put in place for Dawlat al-Iraq and oddly, this command was handled by Colonel Hajji Bakr himself along with his military command, and he positioned 5 other managers with him.

30) During this period, the colonel put together advisers and called them the Shura council of Dawlat al-Iraq. They were between 7 to 13 [members] with no non-Iraqi among them, out of fear of a breach.

31) I will leave Dawlat al-Iraq for now and move to:

32) What is the origin of the idea for Dawlat al-Iraq wa al-Sham; who made the suggestion; al-Baghdadi’s entry to Syria 3 weeks before its announcement; and where did he live

33) Why was the announcement rushed? [This is in reference to the public declaration of an Islamic state in April of last year that involved Ayman al-Zawahiri and which Nusra felt was premature, earlier post here] And why did he chose to live by the Turkish borders before the announcement?! And why did he choose to live in a portable room made of steel not too far from refugees?!

34) And what is the threat that he sent to Abu Mohammed al-Joulani [leader of Jabhat al-Nusra] before the al-Dawla announcement? What did he ask of al-Joulani to do, either nullify Jabhat al-Nusra or dissolve it?!

35) There’s a picture of al-Baghdadi with his advisers taken at the Turkish borders a week before the announcement of Dawlat al-Iraq wa al-Sham and the dissolution of Jabhat al-Nusra that we will publish later if it helps you.

We’ll answer all these questions in a coming meeting….

http://www.twitlonger.com/show/n1sefj [the author compiled his own tweets here]

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December 17

1) The Syria revolution started and the attention of the members of Dawlat al-Iraq turned to Syria, especially among the non-Iraqis and the Syrians.

2) Colonel Hajji Bakr feared losing members of Dawlat al-Iraq [to Syria] which would cause a weakening and fracturing in the State and an excuse

3) for some members and commanders within Dawlat al-Iraq, who were looking to defect, to use Syria as their escape door from al-Dawlat.

4) Colonel Hajji Bakr advised Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi to instruct all the commanders not to think about going to Syria and that anybody that went would be considered a defector and an outsider.

5) Indeed, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi did deliver that instruction, loaded with the threat, the apparent reason [stated in his instructions] being that the situation is not clear and that they should hold off on Syria.

6) There was a boiling excitement within Dawlat al-Iraq which pointed toward possibilites of defections and leaks and flight, especially among non-Iraqis, to Syria, out of control.

7) Colonel Hajji Bakr suggested the formation of a group of non-Iraqis that would go to Syria under the command of a Syrian, in order to block any Iraqi commander in al-Dawla from going.

8) He saw that this would protect Dawlat al-Iraq from defections and the new command in Sham would bring in non-Iraqis and attract new members from outside.

9) Jabhat al-Nusra was established and started to grow under the leadership of Abu Mohammed al-Joulani until its name grew and swelled and the name of Abu Mohammed al-Joulani rose up internationally.

10) Many mujahidin from the Gulf, Tunisia, Libya, Morocco, Algeria, Europe, and Yemen started flocking to Jabhat al-Nusra in great and frightening numbers.

11) This surge in numbers became alarming to the Colonel and al-Baghdadi because there was no loyalty to Dawla al-Iraq or to al-Baghdadi within the ranks of Jabhat al-Nusra.

12) Colonel Hajji Bakr was afraid of the growth of Jabhat al-Nusra and al-Joulani which might threaten Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and Dawlat al-Iraq [due to their own] absence from the field.

13) Hajji Bakr compelled al-Baghdadi to order al-Joulani to annouce with an audio clip that Jabhat al-Nusra officially belongs to Dawlat al-Iraq under the command of al-Baghdadi.

14) al-Joulani promised to think and ponder the issue. He took days without releasing anything. al-Baghdadi sent him a rebuke and censure and he [al-Joulani] promised to think and consult those who are around him from mujahidin and scholars.

15) al-Joulani sent a letter to al-Baghdadi that said that the annoucement would not be in the interest of the revolution, in the opinion of everyone in his Shura council.

16) The Colonel was outraged and al-Baghdadi was angry and they sent spies in the disguise of mujahidin and Shura from al-Baghdadi’s branch, to be close to al-Joulani and monitor his movements.

17) Out of fear of any [unwanted] orders or [an order to] merge with another group, al-Joulani was very worried and started limiting his movement and actions, and would praise Dawlat al-Iraq and al-Baghdadi to those that sit with him.

18) [He made a pretense of complimenting al-Baghdadi as a practice of] taqiya, fearing that mistrust in him would grow and that he would get assassinated. His worries grew and his fear for his safety grew very strong.

19) America started droning on about adding Jabhat al-Nusra to the terrorist list and al-Joulani to the top wanted list.

20) It was an opportunity for al-Joulani to hide from the people sent by al-Baghdadi to monitor him and to isolate himself in a closed command circle of people of his choosing.

21) America adding Jabhal al-Nusra to the terror list and al-Joulani to the most wanted list in Syria increased the fears and worries of Colonel Hajji Bakr and al-Baghdadi about Nusra competing with al-Dawla.

22) Abu Mohammed al-Joulani was a rational politician trying to walk a middle ground to reassure al-Baghdadi.

23) But the fears of the Colonel and al-Baghdadi outweighed al-Joulani’s assurances, which made the Colonel consider advanced steps to merge Jabhat al-Nusra with Dawlat al-Iraq.

24) Colonel Hajji Bakr advised al-Baghadi to direct al-Joulani to carry out a military operation against the commanders of the Free Army during any meeting in Turkey that would contain any possible targets from among commanders of the Free Army [in other words, to hit any FSA commander they could reach]

25) And al-Baghdadi did indeed send an urgent letter to al-Joulani ordering him to carry out two bombings, one in Turkey and one in Syria, the two of which would target gatherings of Free Army commanders.

26) And this was justified as the targeting of future Sahwat, agents of America, and eliminating them before they built themselves up in al-Sham and their popularity became strong.

27) Commanders of the Free Army were specified for assassination by name (we withhold the names) [author’s words, not SC] and the orders were received by the command of Jabhat al-Nusra like a lightning strike [i.e., the order was too much to handle].

28) A meeting of the Jabhat al-Nusra Shura was convened and the order was rejected in the meeting. A detailed reply was sent to al-Baghdadi that Nusra with its Shura had rejected it.

29) It justified the rejection on the basis that they’re Muslin and because Turkey cannot be targeted because it is a very sensitive country and a big supporter of the revolution and it would disrupt the march of Jihad,

30) and that the Jabhat with its councils sees the reality up close. The anger of the Colonel Haji Bakr and al-Baghdadi grew and they saw in this an explicit rejection of obedience (??????).

31) The Colonel and al-Baghadi sent a strongly-worded letter and gave al-Joulani two choices: either execute the orders or Jabhat al-Nusra will be dissolved and replaced with the creation of a new entity.

32) al-Joulani stopped replying and the Colonel and al-Baghdadi waited for a reply and the wait was long. al-Joulani appeared reasonable in ignoring them because the sweetest of the two choices was sour.

33) al-Baghdadi sent a messenger to meet with al-Joulani and hear from him and al-Joulani tried to apologize for not meeting because of his situation and the messenger waited for a long time and went back.

34) al-Baghdadi felt the real danger, that Jabhat al-Nusra saw itself as a bigger entity than him and outside of his control, so the Colonel suggested to al-Baghdadi what follows:

35) To send Iraqi subdivision commanders  to meet the subdivisions of Jabhat al-Nusra and test their pulse and suggest the dissolving of Jabhat al-Nusra and see how receptive they are to al-Baghadi and how popular he is.

36) And indeed that happened; the Colonel and al Baghdadi sent tens of Iraqis to Jabhat al-Nusra and they entered the ranks of the mujahidin for 2 weeks.

37) And they met with the mujahidin and a few influentional people in Jabhat al-Nusra and especially the khalijis [Gulfers] and particularly the Saudis. The feedback was mixed between support and rejection.

38) There was a large group that supported the ambition and general Islamic dream of a state that stretched from Iraq to Sham under one leadership.

39) And the most supportive group were the new members in the Jabhat and those who had a history of conflict with the command of the Jabhat, in cases where the Jabhat would prevent the declaration of takfeer [applying the theological category of “infidel” to enemies] and would punish for doing so.

40) There were those who felt supressed by Jabhat al-Nusra for expressing inflamatory and takfiri feelings or who were punished for doing so by the Jabhat and who would love any entity that would give them more freedom.

41) Nusra imprisoned, punished, and confiscated the weapons of its memembers who propagated takfeer.

42) Of those imprisoned by Nusra were Abu Ritaj al-Sussi and Abo Omar al-Abadi (Tunisians), Abu DamDam al-Husni and Abu al-Hajaj al-Nuri (Moroccans), and Abu Bakr Omar al-Qahtani (Saudi).

43) The Saudi Omar al-Qahtani was punished by Jabhat al-Nusra who took away his weapons and imprisoned him 3 times on account of spreading a takfiri and inflammatory ideology against those who opposed Jabhat al-Nusra.

44) This group that was punished by Jabhat al-Nusra and people like them were the core of support for al-Baghdadi’s inclinations, which found an echo inside Nusra.

45) This last Saudi became a general Sharia councilor in Dawlat al-Baghdadi later on and was the first to defect when al-Baghdadi annouced the dissolving of Jabhat al-Nusra.

46) Two weeks later, the 10 spies of al-Baghdadi returned to Iraq with a foggy image about the acceptance of members of Jabhat al-Nusra were it to be dissolved [and folded into] a one-state entity.

47) Colonel Hajji Bakr suggested to al-Baghdadi not to make any decision to dissolve Jabhat al-Nusra and that the Colonel and al-Baghdadi himself travel and see the reality on the ground,

48) because the announcement of Dawlat al-Iraq wa al-Sham with Baghdadi not in Syria wouldn’t give it flare and [attract] many followers, since the people would wish to see al-Baghdadi and that his presence is effective.

49) al-Baghdadi accepted the Colonel’s idea and sent those who would arrange a place of residence and prepare a secure and secret place. He was called and a safe place near the Turkish border was selected.

50) The departure of al-Baghdadi from Iraqi was arranged by his personal bodyguard and Colonel Rokn Hajji Bakr and only three others.

51) What did al-Baghdadi do after entering Turkey, what location did he live in exactly, and how many days did he stay before announcing the dissolvement of Jabhat al Nusra?!

52) What did he do before the announcement?! Did Julani known about the arrival of Baghdadi or not?! And who did al-Baghdadi meet before the announcement?!

When did Baghdadi enter Syria? Where did he live? Who did he meet? And how was the annoucement of the dissolving of Jabhat al-Nusra made? And what role did Saudi officer Bandar Shaalan play in creating Baghdadi’s new state?

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December 18

1) Baghdadi and Hajji Baker and their company entered Syria 3 weeks before the dissolving of Jabhat al-Nusra. They headed directly to the residence quarter at the Turkish border.

2) The preparations were as follows: Portable metal rooms were reserved in a place not too far from a Syrian refugee camp that was more secure for him and away from prying eyes.

3) Baghdadi and his company lived in these rooms on the basis that Baghdadi would meet Jabhat al-Nusra’s subdivisions’ commanders and make them feel like they’re dependents of his.

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The account continues at great length and translating it is time consuming. We’ll stop translating for now, but we may provide more translation later, depending on how useful readers find it to be.

The Battle between ISIS and Syria’s Rebel Militias
by Joshua Landis (with invaluable help from A.J.N.)
For Syria Comment, January 4, 2014

A major confrontation has broken out between the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and Syria’s other rebel militias. It is being led by two newly organized coalitions, called Jaysh al Mujahidiin and the Front of Syrian Revolutionaries. But many other militias have also declared war on ISIS, insisting that it must abandon its attempt to establish a state and that its fighters must either integrate into Syria’s other militias or quit the country altogether. Fighting between Free Syria Army militias and ISIS has been widespread in the countryside of Aleppo and Idlib.

Clashes & protests that have taken place against ISIS by January 3, 2014

The reasons given for the current war on ISIS are numerous as are the reactions of different segments of Syrian society.

The Syrian opposition Coalition claims that ISIS is a regime inspired organization, designed to undermine the principles of the revolution and pervert the meaning of Islam. Chants of “Assad and D`ASH are one” have been repeated at many recent demonstrations against ISIS. (DA`ASH is the acronym in Arabic for ISIS or Dawla al-Islamiyya fi-l `Iraq wa Sham). The Coalition told AP that:

The Syrian National Coalition believes that ISIS is closely linked to the terrorist regime and serves the interests of the clique of President Bashar Al-Assad…. The murder of Syrians by this group leaves no doubt about the intentions behind their creation, their objectives, and the agendas they service, which is confirmed by the nature of their terrorist actions that are hostile to the Syrian revolution.

Hassan Aboud

Hassan Aboud of the Islamic Front and head of its political bureau blamed ISIS for bringing this war on itself. Hassan Aboud explained in an interview with aljazerra:

All this fighting [between rebel forces] will only weaken the revolution and help the regime. We, in the Islamic Front,  did not take the decision to fight ISIS, but whoever did it had his reasons because of the way ISIS treats other groups. ISIS denies reality, refusing to recognize that it is simply  another group. It refuses to go to independent courts; it attacked many other groups, stole their weapons, occupied their headquarters, and arbitrarily apprehended numerous activists, journalists and rebels. It has been torturing its prisoners. These transgressions accumulated, and people got fed up with ISIS. Some of those people have attacked ISIS’s positions, but ISIS was first to attack in other places, bringing this on itself.

Regime soldier telephones for assistance.
He then replies to interlocutor: “No, not ammo, send metteh and sunflower seeds. We are watching the Free Syrian Army and Da`ash.”

A long series of ISIS attacks on competing rebel militias, preceded this war, but for the Islamic Front and Hassan Aboud in particular, the spark was the kidnapping and killing of Dr. Hussein al-Suleiman, a physician who was also a commander in the Ahrar al-Sham militia. Dr. Hussein was put in charge of the Bab al-Hawa border-crossing after Ahrar al-Sham troops, fighting under the name of the Islamic Front, took control of it in December 2013. Photos of his mutilated body, showing that an ear had been cut off, teeth knocked out, along with the top of his head shot off, went viral on twitter, provoking widespread horror and outrage.

ISIS had been trying to take control of the supply lines from Turkey to the rebel groups in Aleppo and the surrounding towns by capturing the towns between the Bab al-Hawa crossing and Aleppo. This effort came to a crescendo with the ISIS raid on the Supreme Millitary Command’s Head Quarters in Bab al-Hawa earlier this month, when Chief of Staff Suleiman Idriss was expelled from Syria. Islamic Front militias swept to the rescue, when they were called by Idriss to help. According to Free Syria Army officers who were at the headquarters, Ahrar al-Sham soldiers took the SMC HQ at Bab al-Hawa by force in the name of saving it from ISIS, plundering FSA weapons, cloths and personal belonging. The showdown at Bab al-Hawa, the strategic boarder-town with Turkey, set all parties on a collision course that exploded in the last couple of days, following the ISIS killing of I.F.’s Dr Hussein and Bab al-Hawa commander.

Hassan Aboud has been trying to moderate and limit the confrontation between rebel groups. During his al-Jazeera interview, he added

We tell our brothers on the inside that this is not a fight against Islamists because Islamisms are on both sides. We ask that our muhajiriin brothers be treated well and not harmed. We tell our brethren the muhajiriin and ISIS to fear God when dealing with the people you came to liberate. Aren’t they the ones that liberated Maskana and Atarib and the western countryside of Aleppo? Don’t live in the illusion that all people against you are sahwa (reference to the Iraqi “Awakening” movement that was armed by the US government. Sunni tribes that defeated al-Qaida in Iraq.)

….The infighting serves no one; oppressing fellow rebels serves no one save the regime, thus we call on the groups on the ground to keep their unity and not to get bogged down in internal infighting especially before Geneva II. Because we see that the Syrian situation is being portrayed as a civil war that has no solution but a political one. This is a portrayal that serves the regime and takes us back to the situation that existed before the Syrian revolution broke out, but with a destroyed infrastructure and a population made homeless……

You are fighting the regime. So is ISIS. How will in-fighting effect the future of groups fighting the regime? We would like these [ISIS] brothers to join their brethren in the Syrian revolution. We see them as nothing but another group. They see themselves as a State. They need to drop this illusion that they have come to believe as an established fact. It causes them to treat allies as opponents. Nusra doesn’t differ in ideology and authority from ISIS, but they have been able to work hand in glove with the other militias because they have followed the rule that no objective has a higher priority then pushing back the enemy. So we call on ISIS to follow Nusra’s lead. In this way, we will save the blood of our fighters and bullets of our guns for the front lines.

Aboud makes clear that he views ISIS as a potential partner. He is careful to pave the way for its return to the fold. He explains that ISIS’s goal of an Islamic state is not substantially different than that of the Islamic Front or the many other militias fighting in Syria. Where it does differ is that it sees itself as the unique heir to the state and has begun setting up mini-states wherever it rules, pushing aside fellow militias and refusing to submit to the common Sharia court system that the Islamic Front militias and Nusra have constructed and administer together. He points out how Nusra has agreed to cooperate and defer questions of permanent state-building and ultimate governance until after Assad is defeated. This is a way of putting aside what may be fairly substantial ideological differences between militias despite their common goal of an Islamic state and perhaps more importantly, it defers any contest over ultimate executive power. The Emir of ISIS, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, hopes to assert himself as the Caliph and force the others to give him bay`a or allegiance.  He has also imposed rather draconian sharia punishments and forbidden smoking, music, and other simple pleasures that many find intolerable.  This underlines the great problems that remain for the militias in determining what form and style an eventual Islamic state will take, not to mention who among the militia leaders will ultimately rule.

Islamic Front leaders have been very skilful about finessing questions on governance. The standard answer they give to those who ask what kind of government they intend is that they will call on an assembly of Ulema to decide on the correct form of Islamic government when the time comes.

Maps

Map of ISIS controlled towns before January 3, 2014

Map of ISIS controlled versus FSA controlled towns in Northern Syria following January 3, 2014

 

Timeline of the events of the month.

• December 7, ISIS tries to attack the SMC HQ at Bab al Hawa, the SMC calls on the Islamic Front to help defend the HQ, after which Ahrar al Sham raided the SMC HQ itself and took control of it.
• December 15, ISIS kidnaps Brigadier General Ahmad Birri, head of Hama military council in Saraqib, Idlib
• December 9, ISIS storms and captures the liberated village of Haram in Idlib countryside, promising to punish criminals
• December 10, ISIS raids and captures Maskana after a dispute with Ahrar al Sham, killing and arresting a number of Ahrar commanders including Bab al Hawa crossing supervisor Dr. Husayn al Sulayman, Abu Rayan.
• December 15, After failed negotiations, it was made public that the ISIS kidnapped the leader of the Hanano brigade Mohamad Istanboli on his way back from the Homs frontline. Istanboli was on his way to his hometown of Salqin, Idlib
• December 15, ISIS kidnaps Brigadier General Ahmad Birri, head of Hama military council in Saraqib, Idlib
• December 18, Kidnapping of two Atareb FSA commanders
• December 25, ISIS attacks Shada offices in Al Bustan neighborhood in Aleppo after Adnan Al Arour accused them of treason
• December 27, ISIS emir in Bab al Hawa reaches deal with Islamic Front and SMS to leave the area
• December 28, ISIS stormed Kafranbel and raided the local council, the local media office and the offices of local radio station, Radio Fresh. ISIS accuses the activists of Kafranbel of being agents of the west. Radio fresh had  interviewed US ambassador Robert Ford on November 28.
• December 29, ISIS storms Sarmada and raises their flag declaring control of the village from the Islamic front and arresting its members. The Islamic front increases its checkpoint on the Sarmada-Bab al Hawa crossing to keep the ISIS from reaching it. ISIS also raided SMC headquarters near the town and confiscated US aid including helmets and Froot Loops
• December 31, ISIS hands over the body of Ahrar commander Abu Rayan and the body shows marks of brutal torture and one of the ear was cut off. ISIS also stormed an Islamic Front checkpoint 4 KM away from Bab al Hawa crossing, arrested the IF fighters(Ahrar and Suqor) and start massing a big force at the checkpoint. The situation was resolved and ISIS withdrew from the checkpoint after an agreement betweem the two groups. The agreement was the result of negotiations lead by Saudi jihadi preacher Abdallah Al Muhysini, who has very close ties to Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, runs the organisation Preachers of Jihad andhas a verified account on Twitter with 250,000 followers. ISIS also released the head of Hama military council, Brigadier general Ahmad Birri
• January 2nd, Atareb FSA fight Ali Obeid found dead after he was kidnapped the previous day

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Most interesting videos

• ISIS gunfire in an attempt to break a protest in Kafrtakheym,
• The local Emir of ISIS arrested  The camerman calls their captive “Emir of the Kafara or unbelievers. The Emir’s name is Abu Saber the Tunisian

Article in al-Mudun,

“Syria: 2014 revolution against Daesh and Assad,” by Fady al Dahook, gives an overview of the situation in Idlib. He provides detail and a timeline for yesterday’s events making it worth translating at some length.

Kafranbel aliens

The people of Kafranbel did not hide their faces when they protested and drew posters against the Syrian president Bashar al Assad. But the weird irony is that today they raise their banners and posters against “Daesh”, the new tyranny that raided them few days ago, while covering their faces.

The Kafranbel paintings in the Friday of “Marty Abo Rayan, victim of treachery” was the most daring of all, when they named one of their posters after the sc-fi horror movie series “Aliens” and drew the monster with “Da`ash” as a caption to underline that they considered ISIS to be alien invaders.

Kafranbel story with the organisation of “al Dawla al Islamiya in al-Iraq w al-Sham” raised voices against the latter. So did the murder incident of doctor Hussain al Sulayman, who died in the prisons of the organisation, under torture. All of this provoked the activists to retaliate by giving the Friday protest an anti “al Dawla” name, which they succeeded in doing, by naming the Friday after Dr. Hussain al Sulayman. a.k.a. Abu Rayan…

Battles with “Daash” are on-going. The result of these clashes so far is that Free Army units in Hazano, a town in the Aleppo countryside, have killed ten ISIS members. 114 ISIS members have been seized following clashes with “Jaysh al Mujahedin” in al Atareb, Qubtan al-Jabal, Aljina, Ibin, Kafr Nuran – all towns of the Aleppo countryside. The ISIS Emir was arrested in al-Atareb. The Free army was also able to capture the villages of Hayan and Bayanun in the Aleppo countryside. The Islamic Front arrested 30 ISIS members in Aleppo’s northern countryside, the majority of whom are Chechen, Caucasian, Tunisian, Libyan and Iraqi. The IF has also besieged the city of al-Dana in the countryside of Idlib.

The battles in Aleppo started in al Atareb, when “Daesh” tried to storm the village after executing the leader of the “Shouhada al Atareb” brigade on Thursday, and it spread in the early hours of Friday after clashes between “al Dawla” and “Jaysh al Mojahidin” who declared its formation 24 hours prior in Aleppo, and its includes “Tajamu Fustaqm Kul Umrat, the 19th Division, Kataib Nour al-Din al-Zinki, Harakat al-Nour al-Islamiya
and other groups”

The battle front then expanded to include all the areas under opposition control in Aleppo and reached Idlib.

In the midst of these battles, “Daesh” didn’t stand cross handed, it arrested 20 Liwaa al Tawhid members at one of its checkpoint. According to “Orient TV”, members of the organization raided field hospitals and arrested a number of wounded in the city of Saraqeb in Idlib countryside, while protests spread across the areas of Idlib and Aleppo, chanting the slogan “Free Army forever stomping Daesh and Assad”

The general coordinator of the “Shuhadaa Badr” brigade, which is part of the Aleppo military council, Mohamad Rafei al Raya, said in an interview with “al Mudun” and he’s close to the battlefront with “Daash” in Aleppo, that the Free army was able to arrest 15 members of “al Dawla” in al Atareb and 7 in the village of Hayaa in Idlib countryside. He explained the reasons behidn grudge against “al Dawla”, saying that a cold war has been ongoing for the last 6 months between the Free Syrian Army groups in Aleppo and the organisation, but it wasn’t big enough to open a battle front with them, and he adds that they are currently fighting with the ISIS in the Castelo area after ISIS tried to break a protest that came out against them.

He adds “I swear by allah, Even if you were in Germany and I told you what they’ve been doing, you would have came here to fight them, they’re assaulting christians and Ismailis, they went to Latakia countryside and killed the people and kidnapped women and children….I carried arms and i rose up to fight the armed man that wants to kill me and my family, i did not rise up to kill children and innocent people and its like they’re scaring the world about this revolution so that the world forsakes it and sees it as a sectarian struggle.”

He continues “We’ve been under siege for two and a half months in the youth dormitories and Ashrafieh. They stole the flour. Any backup that is sent to us will be blocked from entering. Assad is in front of us and ISIS behind us.

In Idlib, explained Abu Iyad, a commander of one of the Kataib, in an interview with “al Mudun”, the situation is under the control of the Free army. And he adds “Daash headquarters in Jabal al Zawia are under control completely, and now the Kateb are preparing to seize the rest of the headquarters belonging to them(ISIS). Abu Iyad explains this step in Idlib as a precautionary measure to protect the Aleppo front and eliminate the possibility of any escalation from the organisation side in Idlib.

And in talking about extremist, we have to pass by Jabhat al Nusra, the arm of Al Qaeda in Syria. The general coordinator of the “Shohadaa Badr” brigade, which is part of the Aleppo military council says: “I speak the truth and I don’t cover up for anyone, we haven’t seen anything bad from the front, contrary to “Daash”, they’re facing the regime in front of everyone, but even with that, we still fear them because of their mystery and our ignorance of their goals”

And he swears, “I swear by Allah that I will kill anyone who comes close to tries to harm this revolution even if he be my father… I have six brothers who are all injured and haven’t left the battlefront for a single day, Daash didn’t do anything for us. It was working with the regime and against the revolution. Anyone that does what they have done will meet the same fate.

Statement of Front of Syrian Revolutionaries (Jamaal Maarouf)

In following the commands of God Almighty and our responsibilities toward the revolutionary jihadi work to overthrow the oppressive regime, we, the Front of Syrian Revolutionaries, care for the blood of the martyrs and rebel accomplishments. The leadership of the Syrian Revolutionary Front has convened its various militia groups in an effort to unite the revolutionary forces and face the criminal regime that strives to kill our people and families across this land. We will hasten the fall of the criminal regime and lift the oppression off of our people.

The organization known as al Dawlat al-Islamiya fi-l-Iraq w-al-Sham hasn’t stopped distracting the rebel mujahidin in side battles and clashes, the purpose of which is to drain our powers and to target the icons of the revolution and the activists and the officers, in a direct service to the regime.
And from their bad deeds against the revolution:
1- Raiding the rebels operation room in the vicinity of Brigade 93 in Ain Issa a short time before the storming of the brigade. And arresting the leaders of the operation and stealing the weapons and ammunition and 2 tanks that belonged to us.
2- Raiding headquarters that belonged to our front in the Haram area and imprisoning 30 mujahedin and stealing their weapons
3- Raiding the headquarters of division 13 in Kafr Nabl and stealing their weapons and ammunition
4- Raiding the media office in Kafranbel and arrested the journalists.
5- Attacking the rebels in Maskana city and stealing their weapons and ammunition and killing a number of them.
6- Arresting the middle man, the mujahid Dr. Abu Rayan and torturing him to death and handing his deformed body to his family.
7- Arresting the officers, brigadier general head of military council in Hama Ahmad Birri, and officer Ahmad Saoud leader of the 13th Division.
8- Raiding the headquarter of the Haya al Sharia and the revolutionary police station in Sarmada and arrested a number of members
9- Setting up checkpoints along the road leading to the Turkish border in the liberated areas, that attack the rebels and civilians and confiscated their weapons and cars
10- Refusing to use Allah Sharia to decide in conflicts with the other factions
11- And last, the seige of a number of villages in Aleppo western countryside and the liberated 46th Regiment which includes the 9th division and Liwaa Saq Qureish both of which belong to our front, in an attempt to raid it. These are only a few of the many violations that ISIS has committed against the revolution and the rebels.
We in the Syrian Revolutionary Front consider these acts to be an attack against us and the aims of the Syrian revolution. Thus we:
1- Ask the Syrian members of Daash to hand over their weapons to the nearest Syria Rebel Front headquarter and to declare themselves innocent of Daash.
2- We ask our Muhajirin brothers who are being fooled to join the Syria Rebel Front or any other group belonging to the Free Syrian Army. They should bring their weapons or hand them over to us and leave the country within 24 hours.

We in the Syrian Revolutionary Front stand firm and will strike with a hand of steal anybody that blocks the movement of the Syrian Revolution. (victories with Allah’s help)

——
The Syrian Revolutionary Front says it will turn their backs on Geneva II unless Bashar al-Asad leaves and Geneva I is applied.

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The Jaysh al-Mujahidiin statement, translated by Dabbour on the syria civil war subreddit

(Jaysh al Mujahidiin is a coalition of 7 Islamist factions that announced its formation on January 2, 2014. It claims to be the biggest coalition in Aleppo. It includes: Kata’ib Nour el-Din al- Zinki al-Islamiya, Liwaa al Ansar, Tajamu Fastakim kama amrt, Liwaa al-Huriya al-Islami (idlib), Liwaa Amjad al-Islam. Liwaa Ansar al-Khilafa, Harakat al-Nour al-Islamiya, Liwaa Jund al-Haramin

As the honest Mujaheddin are fighting on the fronts of Syria against the Nusayri (Alawite) army which is supported by the militias of Iran and Hizbollah, ISIS is busy sewing corruption in the land and spreading fitna (civil strife). It threatens the security and stability of the freed areas and wastes the blood of the mujaheddin and pronounces them “infidels.” It kicks them and their families out of the areas that they paid dearly to free; it strips the factories of their contents, stops them from working, and expels families from their homes into the cold, cruel outdoors. They steal civilian cars and their property with dumb excuses and they abduct military and media leaders, kill them and torture them in their prisons. They refuse to abide by God’s law and the ways of his Prophet. They sought to break into the city of Alanareb with canon and tanks.

Abiding by God’s word in his verse: “Permission [to fight] has been given to those who are being fought, because they were wronged. And indeed, Allah is competent to give them victory.” (http://quran.com/22/39)

We, the army of Mujaheddin announce that in defense of ourselves, our honor, our money and our land, we declare war on ISIS so long as it refuses to obey God’s law until which time it dissolves and its members join other military groups or they leave their weapons and quite Syria.

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These militias that belong to Jaysh al-Mujahidin also signed Statement #1 of the Islamic Bloc back in September along with other groups of the Islamic Front and Nusra

Kataeb Nour el Din Al Zinki al Islamiya
Liwaa al Ansar
Tajamo Fastakim kama amrt
Harakat Al Nour al Islamiya
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The Islamic Front Statement, translated by Refikoglu on the Syria civil war

While the regime is continually attacking South and East of Aleppo and killing its inhabitants, ISIS came to fight some groups in the West of Aleppo in Brigade 46 area. And we direct this statement to ISIS to stop the fighting immediately and withdraw from that area and return all items taken wrongfully and to submit to the Law of Allah by allowing the Shariah Court to settle this conflict and we would like to remind them(ISIS) that they are fighting the people who liberated Atareb and Aleppo countryside. And we would like to remind our brothers who are at the front not to be distracted for whatever reason, because that will be the situation that the Regime wants.

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See Juan Cole’s “Iraq’s Sunni Civil War,” for excellent analysis of what is happening with ISIS in Anbar Provence

The attempt launched earlier this week by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS or ISIL) to take and hold city quarters in Falluja, Ramadi and Khalidiya in al-Anbar province has provoked an enormous political crisis in Iraq….

NYT: Qaeda-Linked Insurgents Clash With Other Rebels in Syria, as Schism Grows

The backlash in Syria against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria came as the group’s fighters in neighboring Iraq were battling an alliance of Iraqi security forces and local tribal leaders in Anbar Province, which borders Syria and has been an incubator of Sunni extremism in both countries….

I think harakat al nour al islamia was part Ahrar al sham and if i recall correctly, the ahrar guy that was mistakenly beheaded by ISIS was wearing a harakat al nour shirt. And Liwaa Ansar al Khilafa later denied being part of this new coalition.

Photos and Tweets:

• ISIS attacked an army checkpoint in Hamah and slaughtered everyone in it, very graphic images
• https://twitter.com/nael_mosran/status/419177671671947264
• https://twitter.com/abo__7afs/status/419189908264071168
• ISIS created this hashtag: killing_the_muhajirin_a_scandal_to_people_of_levant  ISIS attacks Syrians, not just specific groups but all Syrians, for what is happening. It contains lots of pictures of ISIS dead.
• Abu Wahib breaking into a goverment office: This is somewhere near Falouja. I believe the Iraqi army announced that it has killed him several days ago. This was perhaps the 7th time it has claimed to have killed him. Abu Wahib is the ISIS officer who executed the Alawite truck drivers several months ago for not knowing how to pray properly.
• Al-Jabha al-Souria declares war on ISIS
• Friday January 3, 2014 was given the name “Martyr Abu Rayan” after the Dr. who was tortured and killed by ISIS. Over 40% of voters on the Syria Revolution Facebook page chose the name.
• This tweet was written by a popular Nusra commander. It says: “ISIS finally got what it wanted and is now fighting the Muwahidin belonging to the sons of the al-Qaida organization, based on lame excuses”. This was retweeted by Abdallah al Hamawi, an Ahrar al-Sham commander
• Syrian Revolutionary Front front attacked and took control of ISIS positions east of Maarat al Numan