This is the first half of a two-part examination by Aymenn al-Tamimi of the activities of and relationships between al-Qa’ida-affiliated fighter groups in Syria.

Where Does Jabhat al-Nusra End, and the Islamic State of Iraq & ash-Sham Begin?

by Aymenn Jawad al-Tamimi for Syria Comment

Since April, the al-Qa’ida-aligned jihadist front in the Syrian civil war has been mired in controversy on account of a naming dispute.

It all began when Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi—the leader of al-Qa’ida in Iraq (AQI) (self-identified as the Islamic State in Iraq, or ISI)—announced that his organization and the Syrian Jabhat al-Nusra (JN), under the leadership of Abu Muhammad al-Jowlani, were one and the same, and were henceforth to merge under the banner of the Islamic State of Iraq and ash-Sham (ISIS).

Though acknowledging the common roots of JN and AQI, Jowlani rejected this apparently-uninvited declaration of a merger that implied a singular structure of authority. Instead, Jowlani asserted autonomy and separateness for JN from AQI, while reassuring those concerned through an affirmation of allegiance to Aymenn al-Zawahiri.

Zawahiri remained silent on the issue until June, when a purported letter from him was revealed by al-Jazeera in which he declared that JN and AQI were to remain separate, while stressing the importance of cooperation between the two entities. Baghdadi rejected this ruling, implying doubts about its authenticity, and insisted on maintaining the ISIS as a real political entity and as the definition of joint jihadi efforts in Iraq and Syria.

So much then for the controversy as it played out at the leadership level. Less explored, however, is the question of how it has worked out on the ground. In this context, Reuters journalist Mariam Karouny has purported to offer some answers. Broadly, she posits a hostile relationship between those identifying with JN and fighters under the banner of ISIS, with foreign fighters representing the latter as opposed to native Syrians for JN.

She has also cited rebel sources suggesting the possibility of a future open conflict between the ISIS and JN, with the latter working with other battalions against ISIS in a similar manner to Iraq’s Awakening Movement (Sahwa) that took on al-Qa’ida from 2007 onwards.

But how accurate is this picture?

To begin with, my own research has certainly found some truth to the idea of foreign fighters operating under the banner of the ISIS. Notably, an overview of the declared ‘martyrs’ for ISIS shows that they are overwhelmingly of foreign origin, with Saudis and Tunisians disproportionately representing their ranks. More recently, the ISIS claimed that a suicide operation in Hama was the work of an Egyptian fighter from its ranks.¹

Furqan media—AQI’s official outlet—also released a video of a French fighter by the name of Abd al-Rahman al-Faransi (“Abd al-Rahman the Frenchman”) who was killed fighting under ISIS’ banner in Syria. To summarize briefly, he recounts that he had converted to Islam three years ago, speaks of the need for jihad in Bilad ash-Sham and restoring the Caliphate, while urging President François Hollande to convert to Islam and stop fighting Muslims. Incidentally, one friend of mine—Arun Kapil—says that the man’s French accent is indicative of his origins in the banlieues populated by immigrants from the Maghreb.

In any case, battalions apparently created specifically for foreign fighters appear now to be mirror fronts of the ISIS. For instance, Abu Omar ash-Shishani—the Chechen fighter who heads Jaysh al-Muhajireen—was appointed commander of northern operations in Syria for the ISIS by Baghdadi.

In this context, it should be noted that Jaysh al-Muhajireen is suspected of being behind the beheadings shown in a video that purported to depict the murder of a Catholic priest, François Murad. The video can be seen here, but caution is highly advised.

Armed rebels, possibly Jaysh al-Muhajireen, behead alleged regime sympathizers or collaborators in Syria

The claimed identification was mistaken. In fact, the beheaded victims had merely been accused of working for the regime, but the rumor that the first victim was a priest quickly spread. Though the first beheaded man was not Father Murad, men in the video refer to him as a Christian (and to the second man as “a Muslim, but a dog”), and it is believed by some that he was a priest of a different identity.

Father François Murad was killed, but in a separate incident. He was reportedly shot inside his church, an event that took place earlier.

Father François Murad

In addition to the battalions of foreign jihadists fighting for the ISIS, it is also true that in certain parts of Syria, there is clear evidence that JN and the ISIS are functioning as two separate entities. In the city of Aleppo, both groups issue separate statements with their own insignia. The ISIS in particular is set apart in Aleppo from JN and other rebel groups that have formed Shari’a committees. In the city of Deir ez-Zor, JN and ISIS are similarly separate; furthermore in Deraa, JN has very much retained its own identity, even forming in May an autonomous military council that issued its own statements while JN’s official channel—al-Manarah al-Bay??—went offline between April and June.

Nonetheless, separateness does not necessarily translate to hostility. At the theoretical level, one can note that ideologues on jihadi forums are encouraging the idea of friendly competition between JN and ISIS in fighting the Assad regime. That is, to not engage in internecine struggle, but to try to outdo each other in the killing of regime and Hezbollah forces.

In any event, it is apparent that in Aleppo ISIS works militarily, not only with JN but also with rebels under the banner of the ‘Free Army’—such as in the battle for Mannagh Airport. In Deir ez-Zor, responsibility for a suicide attack conducted by one Omar al-Tunisi was claimed as a joint operation between JN and ISIS.

Elsewhere in Syria, the question of whether JN and ISIS are separate groups is much more ambiguous. For example, in the rebel-held city of Raqqah and the surrounding area, it seems that the names and banners of JN and ISIS are more or less interchangeable among those ideologically aligned with al-Qa’ida.

This was most apparent during a recent round of rallies and counter-rallies in Raqqah, which were sparked when a demonstration was held featuring slogans denouncing JN for detention of rival rebels, though the location has been identified as the headquarters of ISIS in Raqqah.

In response, demonstrators holding ISIS banners, along with supporters of Ahrar ash-Sham, came out, attacking the news channel al-Arabiya for its coverage of the protests in a supposed attempt to demonize JN. More recently, it would appear that harmony between different groups in Raqqah has been restored, with a rally calling for the fall of the regime (held on the first day of Ramadan) featuring ISIS, Ahrar ash-Sham, Kurdish, and FSA flags.

In eastern towns outside of Deir ez-Zor, the distinction between JN and the ISIS has likewise become blurred.

A good case-in-point is the border town of Abu Kamal, featuring Kata’ib Junud al-Haq that identified as being affiliated with JN. By May, the group issued statements identifying itself as part of the ISIS, but on its Facebook page a photo favorable to JN was posted.

The group has since reverted to calling itself a branch of JN, but that does not translate to hostility to those who gather under the banner of the ISIS. Recently the ISIS also claimed a joint operation with JN in an attack on a regime held checkpoint—ash-Shoula—under the banner of Kata’ib Junud al-Haq.

The same problem of blurring applies at the activist level too: one can frequently find jihadis on Twitter, Facebook and forums praising JN and ISIS as if they were one.

In short, the ISIS-JN relationship as it plays out on the ground is far more complex than the tensions at the highest levels of leadership might suggest. It cannot be reduced to simple dichotomies.

If anything, examining this relationship provides a textbook case of the fragmented nature of rebel groups. This should not translate into the wholesale discounting of the possibility of a wider conflict between the ISIS and JN or other rebel factions (in some places it is already happening, as I will show in a subsequent post), but one needs to be cautious of a narrative of a grand ideological clash reminiscent of the Iraq Awakening (Sahwa). Such a narrative is more a case of a few sources telling Western audiences what they think Westerners want to hear.

Even so, the concept of a ‘Sahwa’ movement in Syria is undoubtedly something jihadis worry about, and one sees in their reports a tendency to characterize any prospect of armed clashes with another battalion as a case of the rival group transforming into a ‘Sahwa’ organization dedicated to fighting al-Qa’ida.

As for future prospects for the ISIS in particular, the group is likely to remain a reality on the ground. The foremost problem for those who would prefer an AQI-JN separation is that Zawahiri did not make clear the abrogation of ISIS by means of a video statement, but instead appears to have relied on a letter meant entirely for internal circulation, leaving significant doubts among those in favor of retaining ISIS as to the authenticity of the Zawahiri statement in June. Unless he reaffirms this position by means of a video, ISIS will continue to expand throughout Syria.

Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi (Twitter: @ajaltamimi) is a student at Brasenose College, Oxford University, and a Shillman-Ginsburg Fellow at the Middle East Forum. He writes a column for Aaron Zelin’s site Jihadology dedicated to tracking the JN-ISIS relationship on the ground: http://jihadology.net/musings-of-an-iraqi-brasenostril-on-jihad/

Note

¹ The primary limitation to my method of analysis of the composition of the ISIS—namely, by looking at claimed ‘martyrs’ for the group—is that the deaths are self-reported, and sources may have reasons to downplay the presence of fighters from certain backgrounds. This is particularly true of Iraqi fighters, as Aaron Zelin has pointed out.

One might get the impression that the ISIS is solely composed of foreign fighters, but two points should be made. First, I would emphasize that the ISIS cannot be regarded as a group that enjoys no support from Syrians on the ground.

Second, as regards fighters, one notable exception has recently emerged. Namely, the assistant to the ISIS’ amir for northern operations is Syrian—one Abu Mu?’ab as-S?r? who even has relatives fighting under the banner of JN. In a recent interview, he made clear that while there is a disagreement at the leadership level over the ISIS/JN affiliation, he does not see a looming conflict between the two groups, and notes that many ‘muhajireen’ also rejected the announcement of the ISIS.

News from Aleppo / Idlib / Homs

Government forces in Syria press on with battle to retake rebel-held areas – WP

Syrian government aircraft scattered leaflets over the northern province of Idlib on Wednesday, calling on rebels to hand themselves over and urging foreign fighters to return to their homelands, as regime troops pressed on with the battle to retake areas they had lost to the opposition. …

President Bashar Assad’s regime has called on opposition fighters in the past to lay down their arms, and it was unlikely Wednesday’s call would be heeded, either by Syrians or foreign fighters battling in the province.

“Abandon your weapons and return to your family,” said one leaflet, aimed at the foreigner fighters. “You have been tricked,” it read, according to a photograph of the leaflet obtained by the Observatory. An Idlib-based activist corroborated the leaflets.

Another leaflet gave instructions to rebels — foreign and local — to approach Syrian government checkpoints slowly and wave the paper in the air in a sign of surrender. …

Children Massacred in a Mosque in Qaterji, Aleppo – Free Halab – Collection of videos related to this incident

Syrian rebels threaten to target Shi’ite villages in Aleppo – Reuters

Syrian rebels in the northern province of Aleppo on Monday threatened to seize two Shi’ite Muslim villages that back President Bashar al-Assad unless they surrendered to the opposition.

Activists say both Nubl and Zahra villages had been reinforced by Assad’s allies in the increasingly sectarian war, among them fighters from Iran and Lebanon’s powerful Shi’ite guerrilla group, Hezbollah.

“We announce our intention to liberate Nubl and Zahra from the regime and its shabbiha (pro-Assad militia), and from the Hezbollah and Iranian elements,” the rebels said in an Internet video. …

Syria’s Rebels in Rift With Aleppo’s Civil Opposition – Al Monitor

The schism between civil activists and armed revolutionaries is at its widest since the Syrian uprising began, and it’s only getting worse. There are a multitude of reasons for this, but the most important one is expectations — what each side hoped the uprising would achieve. For the civil activists, it was the overthrow of tyranny and the establishment of a secular, civil and democratic society. For those who took up arms, it was basically a many pronged power struggle; class, sectarian or opportunistic, depending on which spectrum of the armed groups they belonged to.

The major defining characteristic of civil activists across the country was their insistence on non-sectarianism and an adherence to the higher ideals of justice and freedom. The armed groups morphed like a chameleon changing colors, at the beginning justifying taking up arms to “protect the protesters” from security forces, and later on justifying their violence as a reaction to the regime’s. Any hidden agendas some of those groups may have had initially were carefully kept secret, both from society as a whole as well as media scrutiny — of course some pan-Arab media was actively complicit in this cover up — although there were some troubling tell-tale signs. As the uprising progressed, and some of those groups were armed and trained by regional and foreign powers, they adopted other agendas — usually dictated by whoever was supplying the weapons and the paychecks. They simply no longer cared and transcended the popular uprising and protests that spawned them and gave them their legitimacy, to completely dominate the revolution, and so in essence destroyed it by morphing it into a civil war with visibly sectarian dimensions — as became evident with the deliberate targeting of Shiites and Alawis, regardless of their links to the regime.

We are proud to post the following beautiful reflection by Matthew McNaught. Those who have lived in Damascus (or other Syrian cities) will relate to the pervasive presence of the “service” (serv-EES; plural ser-a-VEES). Personal accounts like this remind us of the Syria we love and miss. Matthew’s thoughtful celebration of the Syrian microbus is touching and helps us realize that even a transportation system can be an unexpected cultural treasure. Matthew maintains a blog called Ibn Sifr.

The End of the Line: A Microbus Map of Damascus

by Matthew McNaught

Here is a Syrian microbus, more commonly known as the servees or micro:

As you can see, it doesn’t look like anything special. A white box on four wheels, about ten seats, a sliding door on the side, a sign on the roof with the route written in large letters. But three years after leaving Damascus, the servees is often on my mind.

I went to Damascus at the start of 2007 with a plan to study Arabic for a year. The city won me over, and I decided to stay on. I worked there as an English teacher until the end of 2009.

Some days, I still have pangs of nostalgia for the servees. When I am waiting at the bus stop on a wet Southampton morning, for instance, watching the back of the bus I’ve just missed as it disappears around the corner. When I look at the timetable and see I have thirty minutes till the next one. This is the kind of time when I indulge myself: I imagine for a moment a battered white servees sailing down the street towards me. I see myself flagging it down, pulling open the clunking slide door with a mumbled salaamu ‘alaykum, and riding the micro again.

Riding the micro is one of the most efficient ways I have known of getting around a city. It came regularly, responding to demand at busy times but also running late into the night. You could flag one down wherever you were, and you could get off wherever you wanted. They drove fast, weaving through traffic at bum-clenching speed. They were also absurdly cheap. When I first arrived, you could ride the servees five times for the price of a falafel sandwich. Sometime in 2009, the fare doubled, but it remained so cheap that even regular rides failed to make the slightest dent on my wallet. But it was not just the practical advantages that made me love the servees. It also had less tangible charms.

Riding the servees was not easy for beginners. You first had to be initiated into its mysterious ways. I met the first hurdle when I discovered, to my surprise, that there were no maps of the different routes. There were no timetables, no central ticket offices. There was nothing but the minibuses themselves, snaking and swerving through busy streets, each heading in a winding line towards the final destination painted on the sign on its roof. The routes seemed to have always been there, as if they had emerged organically, like sheep-tracks or the paths of migratory birds. It seemed that every Damascene carried a microbus map in their head, like the knowledge of a London cabbie. But as a foreigner, I had to construct my own map, one line at a time.

In the beginning, my mental map of Damascus was a stubby little thing. It was a Lonely Planet Damascus, a wandering line from the ancient souqs of Old Damascus to the hotels and banks of the modern city centre, punctuated by famous ice-cream parlours, cheap restaurants and historic bathhouses. It was enchanting, but I wanted to see more. When I figured out how to navigate the servees lines, the larger city began to open out in front of me.

My servees apprenticeship began outside Bab Sharqi, the eastern gate of the old city. The first servees I took was the Jobar-Mezze line, which took me through the heart of the modern city to my Arabic classes at Damascus University. I would stand at the edge of the pavement, beneath the ancient stone tower. Nancy Ajram, the botox-enhanced Lebanese pop star, towered over me on a giant billboard across the road, seductively enjoying an ice cold Coca-Cola. The main road roared with several lanes of traffic that skirted around the Old City walls. The bend in the road gave me about 5 seconds to identify the right servees after it came speeding around the corner.

This was, I discovered, an excellent exercise in speed reading. As a beginner, you don’t read Arabic, you decipher it, picking apart each word letter by letter, brain straining and lips moving. But when the word is hurtling towards you on four wheels, you do not have that luxury. You have to be primed, ready for its shape; the swooping arms of the waw, raa and zaa, the dotted cap of the taa marbuta. With time, the names of the various servees routes came to occupy a special place in my brain, their shapes burned into my memory as some of the first Arabic words that I read as a native speaker reads — Ghouta, Qaboun, Midan-Sheikh, Duma, Barzeh, Harasta, Yarmouk, Jobar-Mezze.

For its passengers, the servees was simply a convenient way of getting from A to B. But it was also, inadvertently at least, a kind of meeting place. A place where Syrians of all ages and backgrounds came together for a moment, in an awkward shuffle of elbows and knees, before heading off their separate ways.

For this reason, riding the servees was an education for a foreigner like me. It seemed like all Syria was there. There would be manual workers in dusty work clothes alongside civil servants with shirts and briefcases. Chattering college girls, some in grey overcoats and tight white hijabs, others in jeans with their hair down. Old men in thaubs counting on prayer chains, and large housewives in black abayas with hijabs pinned above the chin; teardrop frames for pale faces.

The seats of the servees would soon fill up, but it seemed that a sacred rule of servees drivers was that there was always room for one more. As passengers, it was up to us to find imaginative ways of tessellating. It was times like this that reminded me that the Turkish name for the servees was ‘dolmu?’, meaning ‘stuffed’. Squatting awkwardly on the slippery hump above the back wheel, tightly pressed between one man’s legs and another man’s bottom, it was hard to dispel the feeling that we were the meaty stuffing in a tightly-packed aubergine.

Service interior – Photo: Matthew Barber/Syria Comment

But on other days, I would be lucky enough to find my favourite spot — the window seat directly behind the driver. Here I could lean my head sleepily against the window and stretch my legs (or at least not have them jammed up against my chin). If I was lucky, I would get to listen to the driver telling some anecdote to the passenger in the front seat. I rarely understood much, but I enjoyed the familiar phrases that would pepper the stories: I swear to God. By the prophet. You’ve gotta be joking. I’m serious, man.

On an English bus, the passenger is a passive creature. The rules are simple: you pay your fare, you sit and you mind your own business. But riding the servees felt like joining a fleeting community.

Despite the chaos and the bustle, the servees was often a place of small kindnesses and civility. Men would give up their seats for women and the elderly. People would help the frailer passengers on and off. And there were rules pertaining to specific places in the servees. The person sitting nearest the door, for instance, would make sure that it was properly shut after every stop. And the one place I learned to avoid was the aisle seat behind the driver.

The first time I sat there, I was shocked to find myself bombarded with coins and notes from other passengers. I felt a rising panic as a woman pressed a 25 lira piece into my hand, saying ‘two fives’. A man then handed me a 50 lira note and a 5 lira piece, muttering ‘three fives and a five’. I realised that the passenger sitting there had the job of receiving fares from passengers, handing them over to the driver and making sure everyone got the right change passed back. I was up for language challenges, but a maths problem and a language problem wrapped up in one was more than my poor brain could take. A kind woman next to me noticed my bewilderment and sorted out the mess, and I made a mental note to never sit in that seat again.

Any visual impairment? Photo: Matthew Barber/Syria Comment

Drivers were remarkably relaxed about when you paid the fare, as long as it reached them before you arrived at your destination. However, when I rode the service with Syrian friends, I soon learned that they would go to great lengths to stop me from paying my own fare. This appeared to be a common Syrian trait; I once saw two elderly ladies on a servees getting into a physical altercation over who paid. I let my friends win this battle a few times, but soon I learned to be as ruthless as them. I would prepare the change for both of us in the palm of my hand before the servees arrived, ready to make a lunge for the driver on the way to our seat.

Learning the language of the servees was also essential. As there were no fixed stops, you had to shout to the driver when you wanted to get off, something that initially made me very anxious. The first time I tried, I half-shouted to the driver from the back seat in a formal phrase straight from my Modern Standard Arabic textbook: ‘uriidu an anzil hunaa!’ When he didn’t respond, I repeated myself, shouting louder each time until he eventually pulled over. For some reason, this display prompted many stifled giggles in my fellow passengers. I only realised the reason for this when a Syrian friend told me that it was roughly comparable to yelling ‘VERILY, I WISH TO ALIGHT!’ on an English bus. After this, I quickly learned how to do it like a Damascene, with the standard phrase: ‘al yamiin!’ meaning ‘on the right!’.

But one day as I was riding the servees, I heard a man say something slightly different to the normal phrase. He was a big man, thick-set and stubbled, and he crouched in the aisle. When we approached his stop, he shouted ‘nezzilni, bullah!‘. It meant, literally, ‘let me off, by God’. There was nothing particularly unusual about the words in themselves, but there was something about the phrase that pleased me in some indefinable way. It might have been his accent, the gruff bark and falling intonation of a Damascene working man. It might have been the assertiveness of it, or its casual grandeur, invoking the name of God in order to get off a minibus. But to me, it said: here’s a man who knows exactly where he’s going, and exactly where he’s getting off.

And so I adopted this phrase. The first few times, it came out in a timid adolescent croak, and attracted some odd looks. But with time and practice, I liked to think, it developed into something approximating that man’s gravel tones.

Once I had overcome these minor obstacles, I couldn’t help feeling a small buzz of mastery from riding the micro. I flagged them down with confidence and climbed on with a spring in my step. I would pity my ex-pat friends who relied on taxis. After a while, I even dared to take the accountant’s seat behind the driver. And when we approached my destination, I would bellow “let me off, by God!” and the driver would pull to the edge of the road without so much as a backwards glance.

I came to enjoy the variety between the micros. Some micros were tatty, all rusted metal and threadbare upholstery. A few were fitted out with plush interiors, multicoloured lights and thumping sound systems. Some had names written on the back window: princess, beautiful, light of my life. On some, we listened to the recitation of the Quran, the sonorous voice drenched in holy reverb. On others, it was rural debke music, with its abrasive pounding beats and the manic electric organ that sounded like an overdriven Casiotone with extra black keys.

With time, my microbus map grew to become a tangle of intersecting lines that joined up different parts of the city that I knew. The Mezze Autostrad line took me to my friend Jawad’s place, where we would sit on the balcony of his high rise flat, drinking tea and eating lentil and rice mujaddara discussing the confounding mysteries of Arabic grammar and the opposite sex. The Yarmouk line took me to the home of my Arabic teacher, Mazin, whose legendary parties would go on into the early hours. The Jeramana line took me to the hole-in-the-wall Iraqi bakery where I got my supplies of the pitta-like samoon and the crispy tanoori flat-bread, and I would ride the Midan line to some of the oldest and best restaurants in Damascus, famous for their grilled meats and fuul beans.

Under the Jesr Ra’is

The Rukneddine line took me to one of my favourite places, where the houses climbed steeply up the rocky slopes of Mount Qassioun. I would ascend the steps past teetering buildings to the path that led to an ancient shrine that looked out over Damascus. Heading up in the early evening, I would watch the sun set as the call to prayer from a hundred mosques hung over the city like a fog.

The micro lines showed me a city of contrast; from wide tree-lined streets to densely built-up working class neighbourhoods. They showed me a city of diversity; from conservative Muslim areas to places rich in minorities; Druze, Ismaelis, Christians and Mandeans from Iraq.

I noticed that you could not get everywhere on the micro; there were blackspots. No servees went to the complex of expensive restaurants off the airport road or the swimming pools and leisure centres on the road to Beirut. They were places for people with cars. And it was unusual to see a servees in the high-class neighbourhoods of Maliki and Abu Roumaneh, with their jewellers, designer shops and luxury apartments with armed guards. Micros skirted around the edges and along the main thoroughfares, but rarely ventured inside.

When friends came to visit, I would insist on getting the servees rather than the taxi. ‘I’ll show them the real Damascus’, I would think to myself, and proudly take them to places outside of the usual tourist trail. It took me almost three years to feel like I really knew Damascus. But in the three years since I left, I have begun to realise how much was missing from my map.

The last servees that I saw was on the news. It was torn open like a tin can. There was a bomb near the President Bridge, one of the main microbus hubs in the centre of town. The servees had been gutted by flames and its seats were wrenched apart by the blast. There were shoes scattered on the concrete outside.

Service destroyed in Damascus car bombing

Early on in the uprising, news of every bombing, massacre and military assault left me with a lingering knot of dread and sadness. But there came a point where the images of destruction began to lose their power. They hit my visual cortex with a numb familiarity, just one more item on the news parade: here is shiny-faced Cameron and his hand gestures. Here is George Clooney on a red carpet. And from Syria: shrouded bodies, weeping mothers, and the ragged skylines of ruined streets. The images were horrific in a distant way, but somehow, the scale of destruction had become too great for me to process. It was as if a parallel Syria had emerged: Syria the news story, the conflict, the humanitarian crisis. Meanwhile, the uneventful, everyday Damascus that I had loved remained intact in my memory, as if I could return to it at any moment.

Burned-out service – Photo: AP/SANA

Service burns behind Syrian security agents carrying a man at site of car bombing near the Baath party headquarters and Russian Embassy in central Damascus, Feb 21, 2013 – Photo: SANA-AP

The image of the servees cut through this. It captured the moment when a familiar and mundane world turned hellish. A normal day: a school run, a commute, an errand. Mumbled greetings. Three warm bodies squeezed into each row of seats. The faint smells of aftershave and sweat, washing powder and cigarette smoke. Coins passed from palm to palm across the rows to the driver. In Syria this normality had seemed as solid as the concrete beneath our feet. The photo showed how fragile it had become.

Service damaged in Barzeh car bombing – Photo AFP/Getty Images

When the uprising first reached the capital in 2011, I noticed something odd as I followed the news. The first areas in Damascus that rose up against the regime sounded strangely familiar, although I had never visited them: Jobar, Douma, Barzeh, Ghouta, Qaboun, Harasta. It took a moment before it hit me. They were the names that I had seen every day on the roofs of passing microbuses. They were the destinations of the routes; places on the outer limits of the city’s sprawling suburbs. Some of them were lines that I had ridden regularly within the city. But I didn’t have any friends or students in these places. There were no famous restaurants or beauty spots there. I’d never had a reason to ride the servees to the end of the line.

When I had taken the coach to other cities in Syria, I had occasionally glimpsed some of these areas out of the window. It had surprised me how far the urban sprawl stretched, a sea of grey in all directions. Some areas, like Douma, were cities in themselves, with their own souqs and parks and upmarket neighbourhoods. But as a general rule, the further we got from the centre of Damascus, the more the buildings became shabby and densely built up; naked concrete and breezeblock, unfinished roofs bristling with metal rods. The municipal services didn’t appear to reach this far; some streets were unpaved and rubbish piled up on corners. Why did the uprising reach the city through these outer suburbs? It might be suggested that the Sunni Muslim areas were the ones that rose up first. There is no denying the ugly sectarianism that has risen to the surface in this conflict. But most neighbourhoods in Damascus are dominated by Sunni Muslims. There must have been more to it than that.

When I mentioned this to Rami, a Syrian-Palestinian friend who now lives in the UK, he said that this was no coincidence. ‘This is not a war of politics, or religion, or sectarianism,’ he said. ‘It’s a war of poverty.’

In the years I lived in Damascus, nothing much seemed to change. I had noticed the doubling of the servees fare along with an increase in the price of mazout heating oil. The price of bread also went up, and I was vaguely aware of a drought in the countryside from occasional news headlines. But none of this had impacted my Damascus. Looking back, the 5 lira increase in fare had reached me like a small tremor from a distant earthquake.

It wasn’t until I left Damascus that I realised the scale of the drought. Between 2007 and 2009, it had displaced 1.5 million people. Countless internal migrants had come to Damascus, and most lived in the outer suburbs of the city, where the housing was cheapest, and where they remained invisible to most people in the centre. These neighbourhoods were home to those who felt most keenly the grotesque imbalance of power and wealth in the country. They were the people who protested first, and who first faced the brutal reaction of the regime.

I was not blind to the poverty in Syria. I saw the contrast between rich and poor, but it was on the periphery of my vision. I didn’t see how far it stretched beyond the horizon. My Damascus felt normal but it was an anomaly. It was an island of relative plenty in a ocean of poverty.

A boy sleeps on the street in a southern, poorer area of Damascus’ Old City. Photo: Matthew Barber/Syria Comment, 2010 – (As I passed the boy in the early morning, two nearby boys were pointing and laughing. “What’s so funny?” I asked. One replied chuckling: “He doesn’t have a house!”)

The poor neighbourhoods were not the only places missing from my Damascus map. There were dark places in the city. Since speaking to Syrian friends now living in the safety of the UK, I have realised how their cities were haunted by places whose very names were a gut-punch of dread. Certain neighbourhoods such as Kafer Souseh, Adawi, Mezze and Barzeh were infamous for the security centres they housed; the prisons and interrogation rooms of the labyrinthine branches of the mukhabarat. These places meant torture, indefinite detention without trial, humiliation and helplessness. When I lived in Damascus, I passed heavily guarded military buildings most days. I may have looked at their armed guards and wondered vaguely for a moment about what was inside, but the wondering didn’t last long. These places didn’t occupy my city the way they did for Syrians.

The conflict in Syria cannot be oversimplified; it has become a sectarian civil war and an international proxy war as well as a local struggle against tyranny. But at its heart, it seems that the Syrian regime was a dictatorship that relied on old methods to deal with a new reality. Dictatorship depends on a precarious balancing act; finding the right combination of bread and terror to keep a people pacified. If the population are scared enough, a certain amount of hunger and hardship can be tolerated. But if the hunger becomes unbearable, then an escalation in terror is not enough to keep people silent. The balance is lost, and there is no turning back.

I never foresaw the intensity of the popular uprising in Syria, or the brutality of the government response. But the conflict could only be understood in light of those places that were absent from my map; those dark spots of brutality and the invisible band of poverty that encircled the city. With these blindspots, the unrest and violence seemed alien and surreal. Perhaps it is not surprising how many Damascenes swallow the regime propaganda that blames all unrest on foreign mercenaries and terrorists.

I went for a drink with Kareem, a musician friend from Damascus who now lives in the UK. I told him that I had been writing about the Damascus map I had drawn from my rides on the servees. We reminisced about the points where our maps converged. His fifth floor flat in Rukneddine where I had lived with him for a month. The bar in the Jewish quarter of the Old City where he played jazz piano every Tuesday, while I drank Lebanese beer and made a meal of the complimentary peanuts and carrot sticks.

Kareem told me that I was not the only one with a limited map. He had lived in Damascus his whole life, he said, but had grown up ignorant of much of the country outside his neighbourhood. It was only when the uprising started that he gave much thought to the people of Idlib, Der’aa or Deir Azzour. For all the destruction and death of the last few years, he said, peoples’ eyes have at least been opened to a wider reality, a Syria beyond their own.

It is not much of a silver lining: A move from the learned helplessness of a life under dictatorship to the anarchy and terror of civil war, with a brighter future still a long way off. Our conversation tapered off with a familiar refrain: allah kareem, God is generous. It is an endlessly useful phrase in Syria, employed to resolve conversations about sad and terrible things on a note of hopefulness. But over the second pint of bitter in a sports bar in Reading, it rang somewhat hollow.

On the train home, I mulled over what Kareem had said. In a dictatorship, I thought, it takes a certain amount of guts, even recklessness, to be curious about the city beyond your own map. Selective vision can be a survival strategy. But I realized that, living in the UK, it takes a lot less than a police state to instill the same kind of incuriosity.

These days I watch Damascus through the news and the scrolling updates of Facebook friends. I watch as the BBC and CNN teach us its geography one massacre at a time; scattered flashpoints of destruction on an otherwise empty map. The slaughter in the suburbs has escalated from bullets to mortars to Mig strikes. Meanwhile, we learn the names of new neighbourhoods as the violence moves towards the centre: Kafer Souseh, Mazraa, Bab Touma, Saba’a Bahraat.

Residents of Damascus are learning to live with a map that is constantly shifting. My friend from Yarmouk tells me how, in the southern suburbs, the battle-lines creep backwards and forwards from day to day, from Tadamon to Hajr al Aswad to Yarmouk. A mental map is no longer enough; on Facebook, maps are circulated that help people navigate an increasingly dangerous city. In late 2012, a a friend shared a map that showed sniper locations in Yarmouk, red spots with an arc indicating the sniper’s field of vision. There are maps that show the location of the hundreds of checkpoints in Damascus. Some maps mark areas controlled by the Free Army and the regime, while other maps talk about the Syrian army and terrorists. As the sectarian divide deepens, the safe places on people’s maps are increasingly determined by the name and birthplace on their ID cards. Whatever the future holds for Damascus, the city is dramatically and irreversibly changing.

Kareem’s family live in a middle-class neighbourhood close to the centre. For now, it is a relatively safe neighbourhood. He told me how children were being taken out of private schools on the outskirts of the city and put in the local government schools, to avoid travelling in areas vulnerable to kidnapping. Some of the same servees routes are running, but lines are interrupted by checkpoints, and are stopped for days at a time when military operations are launched against restive suburbs. Those who oppose the regime but happen to live in these regime-controlled areas live in a state of painful ambivalence. True, it is not as painful as being crushed by mortars and SCUD missiles, but it is painful enough. When you live in an embattled enclave of a power that you oppose, surrounded by destruction and anarchy, what is it that you hope and pray for?

I liked to ride the servees because it felt like a microcosm of life in Syria. It was a glimpse of a social fabric, held together with courtesies and customs and unspoken agreements. But seeing Syria unravel, I realize how much a calm surface can obscure.

Back in the UK, the stability we enjoy here feels less immutable. The UK is not Syria, but history gives us too many cautionary tales. Where there is growing inequality, where there is a rising tide of hunger and poverty, there is eventually a tipping point. Meanwhile, holes are cut in the social safety net with every new budget announcement. Waves of austerity measures concentrate power in fewer hands.

These days, I take the bus every morning. I hang on to the handrail with the other commuters and try to avoid eye contact. At some point in the journey, my gaze wanders over to the route map above the window. It occurs to me, at times, how small my city is. My Southampton map delineates my own little kingdom: where I shop, where I work, where I drink coffee, the houses of friends. If anything, here I am even more blind to the city beyond my own. I lack the foreigner’s curiosity that drove me to discover Damascus. Some mornings, for a moment, this bothers me. I have lived here for years, but I have never taken the bus to the end of the line.
 

END

Someone’s parody of obituary announcements commonly posted in Syrian neighborhoods when someone dies: this one announces the passing of the “Syrian Pound”

Economics are often neglected in coverage of the Syrian conflict. In this post we offer a helpful article provided to us by Andrew Cunningham, followed by a brief response from our resident financial expert Ehsani, followed by a new article from the Atlantic Council.

Deconstructing the Syrian Banking System

by Andrew Cunningham with Darien Middle East

Amid the daily turmoil in Syria, it comes as something of a surprise to see the financial statements of 12 of the country’s banks posted, quarter by quarter, on the website of the Damascus Securities Exchange (DSE).

By the end of May, all 12 had published audited financial statements for 2012, complete with detailed accounting notes.

But despite the apparent normality projected by the DSE’s website (daily changes in stock prices stream across the home page; weekly trading reports are easily available and up to date), echoes of the civil war can be detected.

In recent weeks, three banks have had trading in their shares suspended because they did not provide the Exchange with reports on their Annual General Assembly meetings –it is hardly surprising that convening an annual meeting, to be attended by numerous prominent directors and shareholders, is difficult to arrange when large gatherings present easy targets for bombs.

On 17 January Bank Bemo Saudi Fransi informed the Exchange that it had transferred all funds in its Deir al-Zour branch to its head office in Damascus. (A few days later, rebel forces captured strategic positions around the city.) On 5 March the bank informed the Exchange that a convoy taking money to the Central Bank had been attacked by an armed gang, resulting in lost funds of S£25mn.

Amid the acres of news that have been published about the conflict in Syria, little has been written about how the conflict has affected the financial system. Economic reporting tends to focus on the exchange rate (which has depreciated by more than 100% since the start of the conflict) and the level of the Central Bank’s foreign exchange reserves (now probably around $2bn-3bn).

Banking Activity Has Declined Dramatically

Cash, of course, is playing a much greater role in the economy than before. Banking activity is at a minimum as banks run down existing credit facilities while continuing to fund basic imports such as food and medicine. Banks say that they are able to get dollars as well as local currency to stock their ATMs (in areas under government control), although money exchangers are playing an increasingly important role in the distribution of cash.

Banks’ financial statements should give a reasonable impression of the broad trends in a country’s financial system. Those published in Syria – one of the least developed banking systems in the Middle East, even before the civil war – need to be treated with considerable care, although the figures published by subsidiaries of overseas banks are likely to be more reliable since overseas head offices are subject to supervision and auditing standards that are more robust than those applied in Syria.

With that caveat in mind, the financial statements of the 12 banks that report to the DSE show an aggregate 28% decline in loans extended in the two years to the end of 2012 and a 29% decline in customers’ deposits. In both cases the figures under-state the effective shrinkage in the banking system. Syrian banks report their financial results in Syrian pounds but have, at least in the past, extended some loans and taken some deposits in foreign currency. A 50% devaluation in the Syrian pound will increase the reported value of a foreign currency loan by 50% on a bank’s local currency-denominated balance sheet. Without that effect, the banks’ loan portfolios would have shown a much greater decline.

As the crisis has deepened, banks have been converting foreign currency loans into local currency loans in the hope of improving their borrowers’ ability to repay. Again, the accounting treatment around such transactions has a big effect on the banks’ balance sheets, inflating the apparent size of a their loan portfolios.

Well-placed observers comment that the assets and liabilities of the banking system have fallen dramatically since the end of 2012.

Syrian Banks listed on Damascus stock exchange: Summary of Financial Position (click image to view full resolution)

Syrian Banks’ Exposure to Banks in Major Economies is Now Minimal

The decline of international lending and borrowing by Syrian banks can be seen in figures published by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), an institution that tracks overseas exposures of banks in the major world economies. According to the BIS, banks in major economies had placed $264mn with banks in Syria (including the Central Bank) at the end of 2009. This figure halved by the end of 2010 and at the end of 2012 was down to $42mn. Placements by Syrian banks (including the Central Bank) with banks in the major economies stood at $16,310mn at the end of 2009, remained steady through 2010 before falling to $2,328mn at the end of 2012. The fall in placements by Syrian banks reflects both the repatriation and spending of much-needed foreign currency, as well as the redeployment of funds out of the major international banking systems and into others where the reach of international sanctions is less keenly felt.

The Syrian banking system was one of the smallest in the Middle East even before the civil war. Assets of $47.7bn at the end of 2010 represented 2.1% of the assets of commercial banks in the Arab Middle East. Private sector deposits of $23.5bn represented about 2.2%. This was a little more than Oman and Tunisia. Private sector credit was equivalent to 23% of Gross Domestic Product – a very low figure in a region where banks dominate financial intermediation.

Non-Performing Loans Double or Treble

Income and net profit figures of the 12 listed banks have been fluctuating wildly as a result of revaluations of assets and as a result of loan loss provisioning. All 12 of the listed banks reported a doubling of non-performing loans (NPLs) in 2012 and in some cases a trebling or even quadrupling. Eight banks showed NPLs as more than 20% of their total loan portfolio.

Three of the 12 listed banks declared net losses for 2012 but income statements carry little meaning in the current Syrian environment. Quite apart from the exchange rate, which can turn revenue streams into losses, or vice versa, from one reporting period to another, the physical destruction of a client’s businesses can render loans which were performing yesterday uncollectable today.

(Although the exchange rate has depreciated considerably during the last two years, it is interesting to note that the unofficial rate shows big fluctuations and at times can show significant appreciation as well as depreciation. The collapse of a country’s exchange rate during a time of civil war cannot be assumed. For example, the Lebanese pound remained around $1=LL3 for the first seven years of the Lebanese civil war and only started to slide after the Israeli invasion of 1982, with the really big devaluations happening in the late 1980s and early 1990s. As any seasoned Lebanese banker will tell you, militias expect to be paid in cash, and usually in dollars, so civil wars bring a lot of foreign currency into a country, regardless of whether the official sector is running low on its own foreign reserves.)

The State-Owned Banks Dominate the Banking System

The 12 listed banks account for about a quarter of banking assets and liabilities in Syria. The state-owned banks dominate the system but their financial statements for recent years are not available.

The Central Bank of Syria’s public disclosure of aggregate banking statistics peters out in early 2011. Statistics for year-end 2010 show aggregated assets for the 20 banks at $47.7bn (converting the Central Bank’s Syrian pound figures into dollars at a rate of $1=S£45.79). State banks account for 71% of this. Note that not all private sector banks are listed on the DSE – Cham Bank and al-Baraka Syria are not.

Overview of Syrian Commercial Banks (click image to view full-resolution)

Physical Safety and Hard Cash Are Crucial for Banking Activity to Continue

Looking ahead, the most obvious threats to the continuation of banking services in Syria are physical – the destruction of bank branches or security threats that prevent banks restocking their ATMs or prevent their staff from going to work. (In mid-June, the website of Arab Bank Syria announced that banking services had been discontinued at eight of its branches (out of 19), most of them in the south western corner of Syria, near the Lebanese border.)

The availability of physical cash in government-controlled areas will be another challenge for the banks. Much will depend on the willingness of the regime’s foreign backers to facilitate the printing of local-currency bank notes and the provision of foreign currency notes. (It is assumed that rebel-held areas will continue to receive cash dollars from their foreign benefactors).

The state-owned banks will continue to support local industries, providing loans and not calling-in bad debts. They will be able to do this because the Central Bank of Syria will not enforce its own regulations. And because state-owned banks account for such a large part of the banking system, a significant part of the economy will be able to continue to operate as if all is well and everyone is paying everyone else on time. Again, it is when banking gets “physical” – for example, when wages have to be paid in cash, or foreigners paid in Dollars or Euros – that problems arise. If confidence in the regime declines, then, in regime-controlled areas, cash will become even more important than it is now.

When the Fighting is Over

What will the Syrian banking system look like when the fighting stops? The obvious answer is that it will depend on how long the fighting continues and who emerges as the victor.

And to some extent, that obvious answer is the correct one.

If the rebels overthrow the Asad regime, fighting their way to Damascus, the destruction to the country’s infrastructure will be huge. Regime figures who have been managing the financial system in recent years will either flee or be removed, and physical assets will be looted, either by the departing regime or by uncontrolled elements of the victorious forces.

In the final days of Saddam Husain’s rule in Iraq, the Central Bank of Iraq was emptied of millions of dollars by regime figures preparing for a last stand or a future fight back.

If the Asad government prevails and regains control of its territory, then destruction in the regions outside Damascus will be considerable, but the Damascene key infrastructure, both physical and professional, will probably be in reasonable shape.

Yet whoever controls Damascus in the years ahead will inherit a banking system dominated by decrepit state-owned institutions that have been managed by public servants with little appreciation of modern banking.

Any country’s banking system reflects the broader economy in which it operates, and there has been little real change in the structure of the Syrian economy and the relationships within it for decades. (The rise of private sector businessmen and industries is a chimera – their success has been reliant on regime patronage.)

The so-called “reform” of Syrian banking in recent years has combined the granting of new banking licenses to private sector interests and foreign banks with the acquisition of shares in many of those banks by cronies of the regime. The process has brought new skills and technology into the system.

Six of Syria’s 20 banks now have Lebanese banks among their major shareholders. Jordanian banks are the largest shareholders in another three, and Qatari investors in another two.

Lebanese banks in particular stand to gain once the fighting stops and business resumes (and assuming sanctions are lifted). With their strong personal connections to the Syrian business community, geographical proximity, and entrepreneurial acumen, they were already building strong franchises when the Syria civil war began in 2011.

But the experience of Iraq since the overthrow of Saddam provides a cautionary tale to any who think that a change of regime will lead to quick and dramatic change in an antiquated banking system.

In Iraq, state owned banks continue to dominate the banking scene, with Rafidain and Rashid accounting for about 90% of banking assets. Reform programmes implemented by foreign advisors backed by millions of dollars achieved little over many years. The Central Bank of Iraq, focussed on upgrading its own operations and on winning the political knife fights that threatened its independence, was unable to force the two big banks to make meaningful changes to the way they conducted business.

Iraqi bankers with long experience in developed markets were discouraged from returning to Baghdad by the appalling security risks and by their inability to navigate the lethal sectarian environment that continues to pervade all areas of Iraqi life.

So what are the realistic priorities for the reconstruction and development of the Syrian banking system once the conflict ends?

Assuming that head offices and branch buildings are physically in tact, the first task will be to restore the provision of reliable electrical power and internet connections through bank networks. Without these, the process of reconciling branch accounts into a consolidated ledger – and managing the bank’s liquidity position — is delayed and dependent on couriers.

Then the focus should move to the Central Bank. An authoritative and competent Central Bank is the key to upgrading a banking system because only the Central Bank can force commercial banks to take the difficult decisions that are needed to modernise their operations.

Thirdly, the loan portfolios of state-owned banks will have to be realistically re-valued and restructured, and then the banks re-capitalised.

Alongside these moves, a modern electronic payments system needs to be introduced.

But most important of all, and most difficult, will be the need to bring competent and motivated senior staff into the state-owned banks, and to modernise and enforce the laws and regulations that underpin financial activity. The timetable for doing that kind of change is more likely to be measured in decades than in years.

The Lebanese Example

Lebanon provides a case study of a banking system which was able to quickly regain its footing and then move forward after a devastating civil war. In Lebanon’s case, the war lasted fifteen years, entailed considerable physical destruction (though not on the scale being seen in Syria) and saw large-scale displacement of population.

Yet when rating Lebanese banks for Moody’s just a few years after the war had ended and stable government established, I saw institutions that were well managed, entrepreneurial, profitable and solvent.

Before the war, Lebanese banks had been privately owned and they were managed by businessmen and financiers determined to make money. True, regulation was light, scandals occurred, and corruption widespread in the economy, but it was a dynamic environment always with an eye on the future.

Bank shareholders worked hard to protect their banks during the war, and when peace returned, the system benefitted from the return of thousands of young Lebanese who had spent the war years in London, Paris or the U.S. earning university degrees and developing a taste for high standards and good living.

Then there is the Central Bank. Supposedly the only institution not to be targeted during 15 years of war, but certainly one that retained its reputation and integrity, Lebanon’s Central Bank has taken a lead in setting high standards and requiring compliance with international regulations.

Andrew Cunningham has spent over 25 years writing, training and consulting on banking and finance, both in the Middle East and in Europe and the U.S. He can be contacted at: www.darienmiddleeast.com

A response from Syria Comment’s Ehsani to Mr. Cunningham’s article:

Mr. Cunningham does an excellent job of deconstructing the Syrian Banking system. As his article states: “The physical destruction of a client’s businesses can render loans which were performing yesterday uncollectable today.”

It is indeed the case that most banks appear to be severely under provisioned. Before banks write off a loan, they tend take provision charges. Such provisions are done with consent of the clients (borrowers). Some have claimed that the provisions are understated by a factor of at least 1 to 4. Without adequate and accurate provisioning, recorded interest income is overstated.

It would not be a stretch to argue that the Syrian Banking system is perhaps technically insolvent. Once the provisions are raised by four times and interest income takes a significant hit, the current capital of the banks may fall short of the total hit emanating from the credit losses.

A new article from Mohsin Khan and Faysal Itani available at the Atlantic Council explores the economic impact of the crisis:

The Economic Collapse of Syria

The violent civil war in Syria that began with the uprising in March 2011 has already imposed tremendous costs on the Syrian population. More than 100,000 people have died and millions have become refugees in Jordan, Turkey, and Lebanon, in addition to the internally displaced in Syria itself.  Naturally, the focus of the international community has been on the human suffering and costs that the war has caused. What has taken a back seat is the cost of the fighting on the economy. This may not be of immediate concern to outsiders, but it is something members of the international community, both those that favor the present regime of President Bashar al-Assad and those that do not, should keep in the back of their minds. The Syrian economy is in total disarray and will eventually have to be resurrected when the fighting is over. The Syrian government is in a state of denial and Prime Minister Wael al-Halqi is reported to have said that the economy is “strong and balanced,” a view that is at total variance with the facts.

While very little is known about precisely what shape the Syrian economy is in, available indicators point to a virtually complete collapse of output, trade, and finance. Once the war ends the international community will have to deal with the consequences of the fighting that has destroyed a large portion of the country’s capital stock and productive capacity. Aside from the need to stabilize the economy, reconstruction will require substantial external financing as the costs of rebuilding the Syrian economy will be huge.

Economic developments prior to the uprising

Syria’s macroeconomic indicators in the decade before the uprising were relatively sound. During 2000-2010, the country’s growth rate averaged 4.3 percent per year, about a percentage point below the average growth experienced by the MENA region. Inflation was kept in check at less than 5 percent and only once during those years did it hit double-digits. In 2008, the sharp rise in commodity and oil prices led to a spike in the inflation rate to 15.2 percent, but the following year the government had brought the rate down to 2.8 percent. Overall, inflation in Syria was considerably below the rates witnessed in the MENA countries group. To a large extent this good inflation performance was the outcome of a sensible fiscal policy that maintained a relatively low fiscal deficit of under 3 percent of GDP until 2009. While the fiscal deficit jumped to nearly 5 percent of GDP in 2010, over the entire period the Syrian fiscal deficit was about one half of the average fiscal deficits of MENA oil-importing countries.

On the external front too, Syria’s performance, though not stellar, was nonetheless positive. The current account deficit, which averaged about $400 million a year (1.6 percent of GDP) during 2000-2007, started to rise steadily thereafter to reach $1.7 billion (2.9 percent of GDP) by 2010. However, capital inflows comprising mainly foreign direct investment (FDI) from other Arab countries and Europe, led to overall balance of payment surpluses and increases in the international reserves holdings of the Central Bank of Syria (CBS) that reached $18.2 billion at the end of 2010. The largely positive external picture was reflected in the relative stability of the exchange rate. The Syrian Pound (SYP) appreciated steadily against the US dollar at an average rate of 2 percent per year and at the end of 2010 reached SYP 47 to the US dollar.

While the overall macroeconomic picture was generally positive, in the years leading up to 2010 real household expenditures steadily declined, unemployment and poverty rates rose, income inequalities increased, and regional disparities in development grew larger. The economic seeds for the uprising were clearly evident in Syria, and were essentially the same as those seen in other Arab transition countries.

Furthermore, prior to the start of the civil war, Syria was undertaking a number of structural reforms to liberalize the economy to make it more market-oriented. These reforms included unifying multiple exchange rates, allowing the opening of private banks and the Damascus Stock Exchange, eliminating controls on interest rates, and raising prices of some subsidized items. Nevertheless, in 2010 the economy was still tightly regulated both internally and externally and the process of reform was designed to be very gradual.

Economic developments since the uprising

Following the uprising the economy started to deteriorate significantly, slowly in 2011 and much more rapidly in 2012. In 2011, official estimates show a decline of real GDP by 2.3 percent, although some observers question this number, arguing that the decline in the growth rate was much larger. The inflation rate stayed at about 5 percent for the year, although this was achieved by tightening price controls on basic food items and increasing subsidies to placate the population. The increase in military spending and subsidies, coupled with a decline in tax revenues, caused the fiscal deficit to nearly double to 9 percent of GDP.

However, the external balances of the country worsened quite dramatically. The current account deficit shot up to nearly $8 billion (from $1.7 billion in the previous year) and was financed largely by running down international reserves, which fell to $14 billion by the end of 2011. Undoubtedly, the decline in international reserves would have been far larger had the CBS not imposed limits on the amount of foreign currency that could be bought to $1,300 per month. Syria also received financial assistance from Iran during the year. Through a mix of selling foreign currency in the market and controls on purchases by the public, the CBS was able to maintain the exchange rate at SYP 47, or close to what it was in December 2010. This was obviously an unsustainable policy as events in 2012 and early 2013 proved.

The full damage to the economy became evident in 2012. While there are only a few reliable economic indicators on recent developments in the Syrian economy, those that are available show an economy in a high state of distress. Inflation in 2012 jumped ten-fold to over 50 percent and international reserves fell to $2 billion at the end of 2012. The current account deficit did decline to $6 billion, but that was because of the dramatic drop in foreign trade. Exports fell by 60 percent to under $5 billion and imports to $10 billion from $18 billion in the previous year.

Clearly the economy in 2012 was in freefall. As direct estimates of real GDP are unavailable, other indicators are needed to proxy the growth rate during 2012. These estimates indicate that real GDP fell by between 50-80 percent, depending on whether the fall in trade or the fall in the broad money supply are used as the indicator. By any token, this was a massive decline in the country’s output. While more than a halving of real GDP in one year is highly unusual, it is not unknown in wartime situations. For example, non-oil real GDP of Libya fell by 52 percent in 2011 when it was engaged in its civil war. As a matter of fact, Libyan total real GDP, that is including the oil sector, fell by 62 percent in that year.

The unholy combination of spiraling inflation and a rapidly shrinking economy showed up in the behavior of the exchange rate during 2012 and into the first half of 2013. In December 2012, the currency fell to SYP 60 to the US dollar, a decline in value of some 50 percent from the previous year.  In early 2013, however, it fell off the cliff. At the beginning of June 2013 the currency had fallen to SYP 170 to the US dollar, and when the United States announced that it was going to supply arms to the rebels, it really tanked. On June 17, the currency reached a low of SYP 220 to the US dollar as Syrians tried desperately to get out of the Syrian Pound and into foreign currencies. It had now become a full-fledged run on the currency and the government did not have the foreign exchange reserves to counter it.

Some foreign exchange was provided to the market by the CBS utilizing a $1 billion credit line with Iran, but this effort only slowed down the run and did not reverse it. Even Governor Adib Mayaleh of the CBS recognized that the “normal” rate for the currency was now around SYP 170 to the US dollar and that “speculation” had pushed the rate way beyond that level. The central bank would intervene to achieve the normal rate using the financing that had been provided by Iran. However, having lost $15 billion in reserves in trying to defend the rate, it is difficult to see anything but a temporary pause in the drop of the Syrian Pound by activating the Iran credit line. Furthermore, absent sustained support from Iran, a highly unlikely prospect given Iran’s own financial constraints, it is completely rational for Syrians to move out of the local currency as fast as they can.

Syria now has all the characteristics of collapsed economy with falling economic activity and trade, inflation that is likely to move into hyper-inflation as the government finances its spending through printing money, and a currency that is depreciating at a breakneck pace.

What happens next?

While the timing and outcome of the civil war in Syria is for politicians, diplomats, and political scientists to predict, there is the big question of what will need to be done to salvage the economy when it is all over. At this stage, virtually no one can say with any degree of certainty as to when and how the conflict will ultimately end. Irrespective of who emerges victorious—the rebel Syrian forces, Bashar al-Assad, or some type of national unity government—they will face the monumental task of fixing the broken economy. So what will they need to do?

In the short run, the government will have to stabilize the economy and reverse the direction in which it is currently headed. This means bringing inflation down, arresting the continuing falling output, improving the external balances, and managing the exchange rate. This is not by any means going to be an easy task, but it will need to be done. Fortunately, the recipe to stabilize an economy is well known—appropriate monetary, fiscal, and exchange rate policies have brought many countries back from the brink. External financing will, of course, be needed but, if the government is willing, approaching the IMF for a program is the typical choice for many countries emerging from conflict. In the Middle East, Iraq is one example of a post-conflict country going into an IMF program in 2004 to stabilize the economy.

Over the longer term, there will need to be a major emphasis on reconstruction. This is more difficult than stabilizing the economy because it will require large-scale financing to undertake the rebuilding of the capital stock and infrastructure destroyed in the war. Cost estimates of reconstruction are obviously uncertain as the war continues. However, the UN has estimated that were to be peace today, the country would need at least $80 billion to put the economy back to what it was prior to the uprising. The examples of Iraq and Libya would argue for a much higher level, possibly running into hundreds of billions of US dollars.

Unfortunately, Syria is in a worse situation than Iraq and Libya because these two countries could count on future oil revenues to support reconstruction. Syria, on the other hand, will be almost entirely dependent on the international community to assist in what will be a massive reconstruction effort involving roads, telecommunications, electricity, factories, etc. Will the international community be ready to provide such financing? Unfortunately, there is probably little or no chance it will, and particularly if Bashar al-Assad prevails and remains in Syria. There is a degree of hope if the rebel Syrian forces prevail or a national unity solution emerges. In that event, it is possible that the wealthy Gulf countries—notably Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates—could provide a large share of the needed financing.

At present, naturally the focus of the world is on the fighting and the humanitarian catastrophe in Syria. Eventually, however, the international community will have to face up to the question of how to deal with Syria on the economic front. There should be some type of contingency plan to assist Syria irrespective of who wins in the end. An economically failed state would struggle to secure it own territory and population, deepen the suffering of the Syrian population, and pose a geopolitical threat to its immediate neighbors and beyond.

Mohsin Khan is a senior fellow in the Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East focusing on the economic dimensions of transition in the Middle East and North Africa.

Faysal Itani is a fellow with the Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East whose focus is political economy and transition in the Arab world, with an emphasis on the Levant.

US Policy and Weapons for Rebels

In Turnabout, Syria Rebels Get Libyan Weapons – NYT

Tyler Hicks/The New York Times

During his more than four decades in power, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya was North Africa’s outrageously self-styled arms benefactor, a donor of weapons to guerrillas and terrorists around the world fighting governments he did not like.

Even after his death, the colonel’s gunrunning vision lives on, although in ways he probably would have loathed.

… Evidence gathered in Syria, along with flight-control data and interviews with militia members, smugglers, rebels, analysts and officials in several countries, offers a profile of a complex and active multinational effort, financed largely by Qatar, to transport arms from Libya to Syria’s opposition fighters. Libya’s own former fighters, who sympathize with Syria’s rebels, have been eager collaborators.

… As the United States and its Western allies move toward providing lethal aid to Syrian rebels, these secretive transfers give insight into an unregistered arms pipeline that is difficult to monitor or control. And while the system appears to succeed in moving arms across multiple borders and to select rebel groups, once inside Syria the flow branches out. Extremist fighters, some of them aligned with Al Qaeda, have the money to buy the newly arrived stock, and many rebels are willing to sell.

For Russia — which has steadfastly supplied weapons and diplomatic cover to President Bashar al-Assad of Syria — this black-market flow is a case of bitter blowback. Many of the weapons Moscow proudly sold to Libya beginning in the Soviet era are now being shipped into the hands of rebels seeking to unseat another Kremlin ally.

Those weapons, which slipped from state custody as Colonel Qaddafi’s people rose against him in 2011, are sent on ships or Qatar Emiri Air Force flights to a network of intelligence agencies and Syrian opposition leaders in Turkey. From there, Syrians distribute the arms according to their own formulas and preferences to particular fighting groups, which in turn issue them to their fighters on the ground, rebels and activists said.

Qatari C-17 cargo aircraft have made at least three stops in Libya this year — including flights from Mitiga airport in Tripoli on Jan. 15 and Feb. 1, and another that departed Benghazi on April 16, according to flight data provided by an aviation official in the region. The planes returned to Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar. The cargo was then flown to Ankara, Turkey, along with other weapons and equipment that the Qataris had been gathering for the rebels, officials and rebels said.

… The movements from Libya complement the airlift that has variously used Saudi, Jordanian and Qatari military cargo planes to funnel military equipment and weapons, including from Croatia, to the outgunned rebels. On Friday, Syrian opposition officials said the rebels had received a new shipment of anti-tank weapons and other arms, although they give varying accounts of the sources of the recently received arms. The Central Intelligence Agency has already played at least a supporting role, the officials say.

The Libyan shipments principally appear to be the work of armed groups there, and not of the weak central state, officials said.

Mr. Bukatef, the Libyan diplomat, said Libyan militias had been shipping weapons to Syrian rebels for more than a year.

“They collect the weapons, and when they have enough they send it,” he said. “The Libyan government is not involved, but it does not really matter.”

One former senior Obama administration familiar with the transfers said the Qatari government built relationships with Libyan militias in 2011, when, according to the report of a United Nations Panel of Experts, it shipped in weapons to rebel forces there in violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973.

As a result, the Qataris can draw on their influence with Libya’s militias to support their current beneficiaries in Syria. “It’s not that complicated,” the former official said. “We’re watching it. The Libyans have an amazing amount of stuff.”

U.S. training Syrian rebels; White House ‘stepped up assistance’ – LA Times

White House officials refused to comment Friday on a Los Angeles Times report that CIA operatives and U.S. special operations troops have been secretly training Syrian rebels with anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons since late last year, saying only that the U.S. had increased its assistance to the rebellion.

The covert U.S. training at bases in Jordan and Turkey began months before President Obama approved plans to begin directly arming the opposition to Syrian President Bashar Assad, according to U.S. officials and rebel commanders.

“We have stepped up our assistance, but I cannot inventory for you all the elements of that assistance,” White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said. “We have provided and will continue to provide substantial assistance to the Syrian opposition, as well as the Supreme Military Council.” …

Who is Ben Rhodes? – Posted by Daniel McAdams on June 17, 2013

Everyone is wondering (at least I am) who is Ben Rhodes, a 30-something who ascended from literally nowhere to be what seems a main driving force behind Obama’s foreign policy. He is credited with convincing the president to embrace the Arab Spring, convincing the president to bomb Libya, and, now, convincing the president to start yet another war, this time against Syria.

Who is he? How did a 24-year old aspiring fiction-writer in 2002 suddenly become one of the drafters of not only the 9/11 Commission report but also the Iraq Study Group Report? Then move on to Obama’s presidential campaign as a speechwriter and then to Deputy National Security Advisor, from which he announced the beginning of a US war on Syria while the president met with supporters in the East Room of the White House? Those familiar with Washington know that such miraculous ascents rarely happen on their own and are equally rarely the result of pure, raw talent.

There might be some clues to his brother David’s also improbable rise — from a lowly production assistant at Fox News at the end of the 1990s to covering presidential elections for Fox News (including the one where his brother was writing Obama’s speeches) to the lofty position of president of CBS news by 2011!

The excellent Russ Baker was wondering about all this way back in March, when he noticed a typical New York Times gloss-over article on Rhodes.

Aside from his quite unbelievable rise, we do know that he was catastrophically wrong on Libya, where a Time Magazine article pointed out at the time that he was the strong counter-weight to those who argued for more caution on the use of force.

Here is how Time put it back in 2011, when the interventionists were on the verge of their triumph:

Obama and his aides know they are taking a big risk. “It’s a huge gamble,” says the senior administration official. The administration knows, for example, that al Qaeda, which has active cells in Libya, will try to exploit the power vacuum that will come with a weak or ousted Gaddafi. They also know that the U.S. will have to rely on other countries for the crucial task of rebuilding Libya and that the region may in fact be further destabilized by intervention. Outweighing that, the National Security Council’s Ben Rhodes says, are the long-term benefits of saving lives, protecting the possibility of democratic change elsewhere in the region and—tellingly—ensuring “the ability of collective action to be a tool in circumstances like this.”

Rhodes carried the day on Libya and he was completely incorrect in his assessment, his analysis, his prediction, and his prescription. Anyone who bothers to look at Libya today, which is run by gangs of roving extremist death squads would see what a fool Ben Rhodes is for his promise of “democratic change” in Libya — and how much more foolish is the president for following the advice of such a person.

Rhodes is named as the source of the White House-altered CIA talking points on Benghazi, where references to the Islamist extremist role in the attack on US Ambassador Chris Stevens were erased. It is understandable why the fiction writer Rhodes would want to toss that reference in the circular file: that particular sub-plot did not fit in with the main theme he had already painstakingly written, namely that the US attack on Libya would end the killing, stabilize the country, and bring about a democratic revolution that would continue to spread through the region. Fiction writers understand that a sub-plot could take your readers too far off the main narrative of the story and cause serious structural problems. That is why there are so many rounds of re-writes. The killing of Stevens and the rise of murderous — and racist — extremists did not fit the plot, so it had to be deleted.

Being wrong on war when you are on the sending end of death and destruction is less obvious to your countrymen than when you are on the receiving end. But anyone living in Libya after Rhodes’ “life-saving” mission knows full well the kind of liberation that comes at the tip of a US missile. And neighboring countries know as well what happens when a nation armed to the teeth with weapons, including chemical weapons, completely implodes after its infrastructure is destroyed by foreign attack.

In Washington, though, being catastrophically wrong on Libya eminently qualifies Ben Rhodes to take the lead on US Syria policy.

Why the Current Syria Policy Doesn’t Make Sense – Atlantic – Obama’s move to arm the rebels is angering both sides of the intervention debate.

President Obama’s decision to arm Syrian rebels — after resisting such a course for nearly two years — has come under some withering criticism. Marc Lynch, who has long opposed military intervention in Syria, calls it “probably his worst foreign policy decision since taking office,” while Daniel Larison casts it as “certainly one of the two or three worst [decisions].” Despite being on the opposite side of the debate — I began writing in favor of military intervention nearly a year and a half ago — it is hard to disagree with their assessment that providing “small arms” to the rebels is unlikely to make much difference.

What makes Obama’s decision so unsatisfying — and even infuriating — to both sides is that even he seems to acknowledge this. As the New York Times reports, “Mr. Obama expressed no confidence it would change the outcome, but privately expressed hope it might buy time to bring about a negotiated settlement.”

Syria rebels say they have ‘game-changing’ new arms – AFP

“We’ve received quantities of new types of weapons, including some that we asked for and that we believe will change the course of the battle on the ground,” Free Syrian Army spokesman Louay Muqdad said.

… Muqdad declined to specify what weapons had been received or when they had arrived, but added that a new shipment was expected in the coming days.

So You Want to Intervene in Syria Without Breaking the Law? Good luck with that. – FP

So let’s say you’re the president of the United States and you want to use military force to intervene in Syria. I’m not saying you do (it sorta looks like you don’t), and I’m not even saying you should (you’re not wrong to worry that military intervention might not end well).

But let’s say you become convinced that military intervention is the only way to protect Syrian civilians from being slaughtered by government forces, or that it’s the only way to prevent Iran and Hezbollah from becoming dangerously emboldened, or the only way to prevent factions with links to al Qaeda from gaining the upper hand within the Syrian rebel movement, or the only way to prevent the conflict from spilling over into neighboring countries, or the only way to do all those things. And let’s say that Russia continues to block every U.N. Security Council resolution that might pave the way for a civilian-protection intervention á laLibya.

You’re a president who respects international law — or, at any rate, you’re not inclined to thumb your nose openly at international law. You’re not Dick Cheney, and you don’t like being compared to Dick Cheney. That means that if you decide America should intervene militarily in Syria, you want to be able to tell the world, with a straight face, that the intervention is legal. At a bare minimum, you want to at least feel confident that what you’re doing isn’t blatantly, manifestly, obnoxiously illegal, in a “F*** the U.N. Security Council and the horse it rode in on” kind of way.

Can you do it? Would it be lawful, as an international law matter, for the United States to use military force in Syria without a Security Council resolution authorizing the intervention?

The short answer: Probably not.  …

Al Qaeda affiliate in Syria now best-equipped of the group – CNN – Barbara Starr

Al Qaeda’s affiliate inside Syria is now the best-equipped arm of the terror group in existence today, according to informal assessments by U.S. and Middle East intelligence agencies, a private sector analyst directly familiar with the information told CNN.

Concern about the Syrian al Qaeda-affiliated group Jabhat al-Nusra, also known as the al-Nusra Front, is at an all-time high, according to the analyst, with as many as 10,000 fighters and supporters inside Syria. The United States has designated al-Nusra Front as a terrorist group with links to al Qaeda in Iraq.

That assessment is shared by some Middle Eastern intelligence agencies that have long believed the United States is underestimating the Sunni-backed al Qaeda movement in the country, according to a Middle East source. It is also believed that Iran is running training camps inside Syria for Hezbollah and that other Iranian militia fighters are coming into the country to fight for the regime.

The analyst has been part of recent discussions with the U.S. intelligence community, which is urgently working to understand what is going on inside the war-ravaged country and is consulting outside experts. The analyst, who declined to be named because of the sensitive nature of the information, stressed that all assessments about Syria are approximate at best because of the lack of U.S. personnel on the ground.

With the growing strength and support for al-Nusra, U.S. concerns are growing about its influence to further destabilize Syria and potentially pose a greater regional threat, administration officials have told CNN.

“They are making desperate attempts to get chemical weapons,” the analyst told CNN, noting that in the past few weeks, security services in Iraq and Turkey arrested operatives who were “trying to get their hands on sarin.”

A senior U.S. intelligence official told CNN recently that gathering intelligence on Syria, including its potential future use of chemical weapons, is now one of the top priorities of the U.S. intelligence community.

The Obama administration announced last week that it will start arming rebels because Syria crossed a “red line” by using chemical weapons – including sarin gas – against the opposition.

Amazing Stories from the Conflict

Reuters visits abandoned Alawite village: Deepening ethnic rifts reshape Syria’s towns

The villages that dot the valleys and terraced hills of Syria’s northwest used to epitomize the country’s diversity. Each one was dominated by a different religion or sect. The settlements coexisted – sometimes peacefully, sometimes less so – for centuries, a patchwork of distinct but interwoven communities that, for many Syrians, was central to the nation’s identity.

Over the past two years, that order has fallen apart.

In Zambaki, a concrete-block village in a valley near the border with Turkey, Sunni families have moved into homes abandoned by Alawite owners; Sunni instructors teach in the Alawite elementary school; and Sunni religious slogans in black paint mark the walls.

Mohamed Skafe, a 40-year-old Sunni maths instructor remembers how the Alawites began to flee nearly a year ago. As government troops withdrew and rebels took over, he phoned a friend in the village and pleaded with him to stay.

“He told me, ‘Can you protect me?'” Skafe recalled, holding his hands out, palms upward. “I said, ‘I have no guarantee.'”

As the revolt against Bashar al-Assad that began as a mostly secular call for democratic reform descended into civil war, communities have split along religious and ethnic lines. Majority Sunnis have come to dominate the opposition, while Shi’ites and Alawites, the offshoot sect of Shi’ite Islam that Assad belongs to, have largely sided with the government. Other minorities, such as the Christians, Druze and Kurds, have split or tried to stay neutral.

Across the country, violence and fear have emptied entire villages, forced millions of people to flee their homes, and transformed the social landscape.

The involvement of Shi’ite power Iran on one side and the ascendancy of hardline Islamists, including groups linked to al Qaeda, on the other has accelerated the process. For some fighters, the war has taken on an apocalyptic overtone. For others, enmity is rooted in old resentments and suspicions.

During a 10-day journey through rebel-held territory, Reuters saw first-hand how the sectarian divisions are transforming the country. Those splits, and the risk of large-scale communal retribution, are one reason Western powers have hesitated to intervene.

Now, as the United States prepares to arm the rebels, it risks getting entangled in an intricate conflict that often pits neighbor against neighbor. As in Yugoslavia or in neighboring Iraq, where conflicts were marked by sectarianism and ethnic cleansing, Syria is unlikely to go back to the way it was. Even when the war ends, the reordering of villages and towns will leave behind a very different country, a change which could reverberate through the region.

In Zambaki, in a house once owned by Alawites, a Sunni family of 10 has moved in after fleeing their own homes outside Hama, in central Syria. “The whole village was completely empty. We were in a Turkish camp, but it was so crowded. We decided to come back,” one man in the family said, asking not to be named.

“The regime is playing a big game, a very big game. We had Alawite neighbors and I swear we were living like brothers. But the regime played with their minds, and frightened them. We were neighbors.” …

My Harrowing Escape from Qusayr, Part II – Syria Deeply – Recommended

As part of our effort to highlight civilian stories, below is a conversation between Syria Deeply and Rifaie Tammas, a 24-year-old from Qusayr. The Lebanese militia Hezbollah, working with Syrian government troops, overran the key smuggling route between Lebanon and Homs province last week. Tammas describes the final anxious hours in his city, his chaotic evacuation and a tearful reunion with his mother after losing three close family members.

The most dangerous place we had to cross on our journey was the Homs-Damascus highway. The areas around it to the west were under shelling and sniper fire, because the regime and Hezbollah knew that the civilians and rebels would flee there. But it was either we wait until the next morning for them to come and kill us, or we move fast and cross. We made the choice that we had to cross, not knowing our fate.

In order to reach a safe place, we had to cross a 50 meter-wide stretch of the highway. But even before we reached this spot, we had to cross over about 1.5 or 2 km of lands that were open to shelling. We started calling it the “death opening.”

When we saw there was no guide, people were confused. It was terrible. The way leading up to the highway was very hilly and tough. There were some houses and tress, but it was mostly open fields. We do not know this area at all and we felt that we could be shot at any minute. And I had my wounded brother Rami with me the whole time.

Rami was completely exhausted after crossing 20 m on crutches. He told me he can’t move another meter and he wants to die right there. He is 22 years old and a defected officer. I put him on my back. He is 85 kg. I moved him for 50 m and I couldn’t move anymore. Even though his leg was broken, sometimes we had to walk or duck and lie flat when there was shelling and shooting.

At one point we saw two lights ahead and we knew that these were checkpoints. We thought the dark area in between might be safe, so we headed in that direction. Then all hell broke loose.

We came under intense shelling, and some people decided to turn back and continue on a safer route, but we decided to keep moving through. On our way I saw many wounded people lying on the ground with no one to help them. Some people had run for their lives during the heavy shelling, and so many others had been left behind.

We were halfway to the highway when we saw a big house where about 50 people had stopped, most of them wounded. Suddenly, a huge tank shell hit the house when we were 20 m away. Fragments flew above our heads and we ducked for cover. We were okay because the house absorbed the whole shock.

When we started to make our way over, we heard so many sounds. Many people were crying for dear life. You could smell flesh burning. We couldn’t do anything. We were exhausted with no water or food. We had been surviving on tree leaves and some fruit.

I saw these people and I can still remember them begging for help. But I couldn’t. I had to choose my brother. I was also carrying my brother’s rifle because he was a defected soldier. He was trained to not leave his weapon. He had learned to kill them or kill himself, not be captured as a prisoner. I took it just in case we were ambushed.

About 20 m away from the house another shell hit a group in front of us. They were civilians with wounded people and they had been targeted. Imagine. I felt that’s the end, I’m going to die. I kept on saying shahada with my brother. Even if I made it there is no safety at the end. After all this we might end up near the checkpoint. All we could do was continue under the sniper fire and shelling. Sometimes we would duck. I knew it was useless, but we did it anyway.

My brother kept falling to the ground, and I had to help him stand up or sometimes carry him. I had to lie to him and keep telling him we were almost there because he wanted to give up. We had just lost our brother Hadi, so it was not just physically but also mentally terrifying. But we kept thinking about our mother and sisters.

When we finally crossed the highway, there were people on the other side who congratulated us. But we still had to walk for about another hour before we reached a relatively safer place. We waited in a small village, and then we continued our journey on foot for an hour before we got to another village called Deeba. We arrived there at about 6 a.m. on Friday, and then we stayed there until 10 p.m. Then we could take cars to the Damascus suburbs, where I am staying right now.

An Ill-Planned Evacuation

One of the things that I really hated – that really frustrated me and changed the way I look at things – was not the fall of Qusayr, or that it fell in the hands of Hezbollah. That was sad, absolutely horrible, but the dreadful thing was the way we evacuated. It was the lack of cooperation among Free Syrian Army [FSA] members and civilians. There wasn’t a very good plan, and the regime knew about this. They knew we were panicking and they took advantage of that. They knew about almost every move we made.

There were guides along the way giving directions to people and telling people, go this way, or shut off your mobile phones, or don’t shout. Some of the guides were excellent and would tell you where to go every step of the way. But the problem is they weren’t spread all across the way.

We were lost many times and got very close to regime checkpoints because of this. Some of the guides were confused. They kept having us go back and forth, and we were carrying wounded people the whole time. There were not enough stretchers, so we were moving them on blankets, pieces of wood or whatever we could find. Sometimes we put them on our backs and took turns. And when we reached the most dangerous spot by the highway, we had no one to guide our group. Some people didn’t do their job well, and this is what caused chaos and many people to be killed.

I would not put all the blame on the regime or Hezbollah, but I also blame the FSA leaders who didn’t know how to do things effectively during this evacuation. We were thousands, and this was a very hard test, and they didn’t pass it very well. They had to know that the regime would take advantage of their lack of cooperation.

On the other hand, the FSA didn’t know how to manage this crisis because they’ve never experienced it. The FSA leaders were very keen on the safety of the wounded, and they tried not to leave anybody behind. Most people acknowledge what the FSA has done for us, but they are so angry with the way the evacuation happened.

Where Are They Now?

The people of Qusayr have spread out to many different cities around Syria. Some made it to Lebanon, but the majority are staying in towns like Nabak, Yabroud and other cities. The rebels are scattered as well and trying to reorganize themselves into a more coherent unit. There is a lot of debate about assigning new leaders and making huge changes after what happened.

Most people are determined to go back and fight. Some have given up and decided to stick with their families, but I think that even they will go back to fight after they rest a bit and think about the whole thing. Being forced to live outside their hometown will make a lot of people go back and fight.

These were the craziest two weeks of my life. I don’t think I could suffer more than this. Ten days before the fall of Qusayr I lost my uncle – he was killed while trying to evacuate the wounded. Days later, I lost my father – a shell killed him when he was going outside to bring us some food. Next, my younger brother’s leg was wounded. And after a week I was forced to leave my house and hometown, and a day later I lost my youngest brother.

Now it feels weird to be away from home, to feel homeless and live in other people’s houses. Luckily, I have some friends who came here before me, and they welcomed me to stay until I sort things out. However, I will have to leave once their mother and sisters come back from a trip to a nearby city.

The only good thing about getting out of Qusayr was reuniting with my mother and little sister. The moment we saw each other, we burst into tears although I was trying to sound strong so that she wouldn’t break down, but I simply could not. Seeing her reminded me of losing my father and youngest brother. Hadi was the hero in our family. He was very loved by his friends and everyone who knew him. He was in the FSA and responsible for firing 14.5 medium machine guns, which is considered a big thing since you have to be very strong to do it. Before all this he was majoring in history.

I still don’t know how I am coping and how I am still thinking. I am crying a lot, especially when I pray. We as Muslims believe that our martyrs are in heaven, so my condolence is that my father and brother are in a happy place now.

Losing them all makes me even more determined to continue what I started. I am going to expose the crimes of Hezbollah and the regime to the whole wide world – that is, if the world cares. They are going to pay for what they have done to us. Sooner or later, they will be brought to justice.

The Price of Loyalty in Syria – NYT – Robert F Worth – Recommended

Ibtisam Ali Aboud (with her son Jafar) says that her husband, a Syrian Alawite, was killed by his Sunni friend. – Jehad Nga for The New York Times

The Damascus neighborhood known as Mezze 86 is a dense, dilapidated warren of narrow hillside streets adorned with posters bearing the face of Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad. The presidential palace is nearby, and the area is crawling with well-armed guards and soldiers. It is next to impossible to enter unless you are accompanied by government officials or well-known locals, almost all of them members of Assad’s Alawite sect. I drove there on a quiet Friday morning in May, and we were stopped several times at checkpoints by young soldiers who examined our documents carefully before waving us on. When we arrived at our destination, in a small parking lot hemmed in by cinder-block towers, I emerged from the car to the suspicious glares of several middle-aged men in fatigues. “They are not expecting foreigners here,” one of the men who accompanied me said. “The rebels are trying constantly to hit this place, because they know who lives here.” He pointed to a damaged roof not far away. “A mortar struck very close the other day. A lady was killed just above us, and another just below.”

To many Syrians, Mezze 86 is a terrifying place, a stronghold for regime officers and the ruthless paramilitary gunmen known as shabiha, or “ghosts.” These are the men accused of carrying out much of the torture and killing that has left more than 90,000 people dead since the Syrian uprising began two years ago. Some of the older men living in the neighborhood are veterans of the notorious defense brigades, which helped carry out the 1982 massacre of Hama, where between 10,000 and 30,000 people were killed in less than a month. Yet Mezze 86 now emanates a sense of aggrieved martyrdom. The streets are lined with colorful portraits of dead soldiers; every household proclaims the fallen and the wounded and the vanished.

I went there to meet a woman named Ibtisam Ali Aboud, who had fled her home after her husband — a retired Alawite officer named Muhsin — was killed in February by rebels. Ibtisam is a woman of 50, but she looked 20 years older, her face a pale canvas of anxious lines over her long, black mourning cloak. Her son was with her, a timid-looking 17-year-old named Jafar. We spoke in a dingy, sparsely furnished room, with a picture of a bearded Alawite saint on the wall. “We never used to feel any distinction between people of different sects,” Ibtisam told me. “Now they are ready to slaughter us.” Her husband’s killer was a car mechanic named Ayham, she said, who had eaten at their table and casually borrowed money from her husband only 10 days earlier, promising to pay it back soon. Someone had been slipping notes under their door — “Die, Alawite scum,” “Get out, regime thugs” — and sectarian killings and kidnappings were growing more common; even Muhsin had narrowly escaped being taken captive by armed men. But he refused to listen to his wife’s warnings when she told him that Ayham was working with Sunni rebel gunmen. “Ayham is my friend,” he had told her. “This is Syria, not Iraq.” One night he went out to run an errand and never came home. They found his body in the family car the next day, a bullet hole in his head. The family’s small auto-repair shop was burned to the ground days later. Jafar said that he was on his way home from there when five men surrounded him. “We will cut you all to pieces if you don’t get out,” the men said. “You will follow your father to the grave.”

The family fled their home on the capital’s outskirts to Mezze 86, where they would be surrounded by other Alawites. “We are the ones who are being targeted,” Ibtisam told me. “My husband did nothing. He was a retired officer volunteering at a hospital.” Now, she said, she could barely afford to rent two cramped rooms with her four children. A dull artillery boom shook the coffee cups on the table where we sat. The men who took me to her, also Alawite, began to reel off their own stories of murdered friends and relatives, and of neighbors abducted by rebels. “You will find stories like this in every house, people killed, people kidnapped, and all because of their sect,” one of them said. “They think all Alawites are rich, because we are the same sect as Bashar al-Assad. They think we can talk to the president whenever we like. But look how we are living!”

No one in the room would say it, but there was an unspoken sense that they, too, were victims of the regime. After two years of bloody insurrection, Syria’s small Alawite community remains the war’s opaque protagonist, a core of loyalists whose fate is now irrevocably tied to Assad’s. Alawite officers commanded the regime’s shock troops when the first protests broke out in March 2011 — jailing, torturing and killing demonstrators and setting Syria on a different path from all the other Arab uprisings. Assad’s intelligence apparatus did everything it could to stoke sectarian fears and blunt the protesters’ message of peaceful change.

Yet the past two years have made clear that those fears were not completely unfounded, and it did not take much to provoke them. Syria’s Sunnis and Alawites were at odds for hundreds of years, and the current war has revived the worst of that history. Radical jihadis among the rebels now openly call for the extermination or exile of Syria’s religious minorities. Most outsiders agree that Assad cynically manipulated the fears of his kinsmen for political survival, but few have asked — or had the opportunity to ask — how the Alawites themselves feel about Assad, and what kind of future they imagine now that the Sunni Arab world has effectively declared war on them.

“What is horrible is that everyone is now protecting his existence,” Sayyid Abdullah Nizam, a prominent cleric in Damascus, told me. “For all of the minorities, it is as if we have entered a long corridor with no light.”

… Latakia, the capital city of Syria’s Alawite region, is a sleepy seaside town with a tattered charm. The hills around it have long provided refuge for Syria’s minorities, and once briefly formed part of an Alawite state under French protection, just after the First World War. This gives its people a different view of the country and its history, one that Western journalists have not often been permitted to see. It was in Latakia that I met a devoted regime supporter named Aliaa Ali, the 27-year-old daughter of a retired Alawite military officer and a French teacher. Aliaa has a broad, pretty face and knitted brows that convey a mix of petulance and determination. She is intelligent and fully aware, thanks in part to a year spent studying in England, of how the West views the conflict. Unlike many loyalists, she was willing to acknowledge the brutalities of her own side, and at times seemed embarrassed by the Syrian police state. “I was pro-revolution at first,” she said. “There is a lot that needs to change here, I know that. But the fact is that it turned sectarian and violent much sooner than people think.”

Soon after the first protests broke out, Aliaa told Noura about some of the sectarian protest chants she had heard. Noura refused to believe it. The next month, when the army cracked down in Jableh, Noura was desperate, saying innocent protesters had been killed. Aliaa told Noura it was “not logical” for a government to kill its own people. Noura backed down. “Maybe we just heard different stories,” she said. As she and her family moved deeper into the opposition camp, however, the friendship began to fray. Once, after they had gone for a drive along the seafront, Noura suddenly said: “If Sunnis ever attacked you, I’d protect you. And vice versa.” Both of them laughed. “At the time, it seemed like a joke,” Aliaa told me. “We couldn’t really imagine that happening.” Aliaa traveled to England at the end of the summer, and shortly after, when Noura’s mother was arrested, the two friends stopped speaking. In October, Aliaa told me, she was half-asleep one night when she heard a buzzing on her laptop: Noura was calling to video chat. It was 4 a.m., but they spent an hour talking and laughing as if nothing had changed. “When we hung up, I burst into tears,” Aliaa told me. “I felt so happy that we were still friends, that none of the differences mattered.”

Soon afterward, Noura and her family fled to Turkey. In December, Noura unfriended Aliaa on Facebook, but Aliaa continued to check Noura’s Facebook page every day. The postings were passionately anti-Assad, and included sectarian slurs against Alawites. Noura married a Sunni man from Jableh, whose Facebook photo showed the black banner used by Al Qaeda. In mid-May, Noura posted a long passage praising Saddam Hussein, followed by this sentence: “How many ‘likes’ for the conqueror of the Shia and other heathens?” Aliaa showed me the Facebook page of Noura’s teenage brother Kamal, with an image of him clutching a Kalashnikov. “I used to carry him on my shoulders and feed him crackers,” she said.

Noura now lives in Turkey. I reached her by phone at the Syrian school that her aunt runs near the border. She acknowledged her friendship with Aliaa, but her religious zeal soon became apparent. She said her husband did not permit her to talk by phone to foreign journalists. I then spoke to her aunt Maha, the director of the school, who confirmed the outlines of Aliaa’s account of the friendship and the uprising in Jableh. Her voice rose almost to a shout as she told me only the regime was sectarian. “Before the uprising, we lived together with no problems,” she said. “They felt reassured about us, because ever since the events of Hama, they felt we would not rise up against them. But as soon as we chose the path of revolution, they felt it was directed against them, not against Assad. We told them: We only want freedom. But they shut the door in our faces; they would not talk to us.” Maha struck me as a reasonable woman who regretted the rupture, much as Aliaa did.

But when I asked her about the Alawite religion, I was startled by her response. “Aliaa is a nice girl,” she said. “But the Alawites don’t have a religion. They are a traitor sect. They collaborated with the crusaders; during the French occupation they sided with the French.”

For the Alawites, these familiar accusations have the sting of a racist epithet. The Alawite faith, developed a millennium ago, is a strange, mystic blend of Neoplatonism, Christianity, Islam and Zoroastrianism. It included a belief in reincarnation and a deification of Ali, the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad. These unorthodox tenets may have led the crusaders and other outsiders to favor them, seeing them as potential allies against Muslims. The theologian Ibn Taymiyya — the ancestor of today’s hard-line Islamists — proclaimed in the early 1300s that the Alawites were “more infidel than Jews and Christians, even more infidel than many polytheists,” and urged good Muslims to slaughter and rob them. The Alawites sought shelter in the mountains, and rarely dared to come even to Latakia. Many of them were slaughtered by Ottoman armies, and parts of the community stood close to extinction at some points in their history. According to the historian Joshua Landis, as late as the 1870s, supposed Alawite bandits were impaled on spikes and left on crossroads as a warning. They lived in desperate poverty on the margins of Syria’s feudal economy, often sending their daughters into indentured servitude as maids to wealthy Sunni families.

In 1936, when the French were poised to merge the newly formed Alawite coastal state into a larger Syrian republic, six Alawite notables sent a petition begging them to reconsider. “The spirit of hatred and fanaticism embedded in the hearts of the Arab Muslims against everything that is non-Muslim has been perpetually nurtured by the Islamic religion,” they wrote. “There is no hope that the situation will ever change. Therefore, the abolition of the mandate will expose the minorities in Syria to the dangers of death and annihilation, irrespective of the fact that such abolition will annihilate the freedom of thought and belief.” One of the petition’s signers was Sulayman al-Assad, the grandfather of Syria’s current president. Later, after the French abandoned them, the Alawites rushed to embrace the cause of Syrian nationalism, and went to great lengths to make the rest of the country forget their separatist ambitions.

I thought of that petition when I entered Aliaa’s family home in Jableh, where a black-and-white portrait of her grandfather in a stiff collar and tie hangs on the living-room wall. “He studied in France in the 1930s,” Aliaa said brightly. Then she quickly added, “And later he took part in the struggle for independence — I think.”

I asked Aliaa what she thought of Alawites who joined the opposition, like the novelist Samar Yazbek, who is also from Jableh. She grew wary at the mention of Yazbek’s name. “I met her once,” Aliaa said. “She told me I had a bright future in front of me. But I don’t want a future like hers. I think Alawites who join the opposition don’t realize that they are being used as tools. Or they think they can turn this jihadi war into a democratic revolution. But they will never succeed.”

Yazbek was also in Syria during the early months of the revolution. In her diaries of the revolt’s first four months — later published in English under the title “A Woman in the Crossfire” — she describes the furious campaign conducted against her after she publicly backed the insurrection. Her family was forced to disavow her, and leaflets were passed out in Jableh denouncing her. At one point, she describes a terrifying encounter with the regime apparatus. After being driven from her house in Damascus to an interrogation center, she finds herself with a scowling officer who knocks her to the floor, spits on her and threatens to kill her. Guards then lead her blindfolded downstairs to one of the regime’s basement torture rooms, where she is forced to look at bloodied, half-dead protesters hanging from the ceiling. The officer tells her at one point that she is being duped by “Salafi Islamists” and that she must come back to the fold or die. “We’re honorable people,” he tells her. “We don’t harm our own blood. We’re not like you, traitors. You’re a black mark upon all Alawites.”

When I spoke to Yazbek, who is now living in Paris, she told me she believed that the Alawite community had been the Assad clan’s first victim, that they had been used as “human shields” to keep the regime in power. “They believe the regime’s rhetoric, that they would be massacred if Assad falls,” she said. “But this is not true. They are very afraid, and very confused.” Some Alawites inside Syria quietly make the same point, though it is far more dangerous for them to do so. But the ones I spoke to also argued that it does not matter whether the Alawites were duped or not, because their sectarian fears have been realized. In Latakia, I met an Alawite cartoonist named Issam Hassan, who told me that many Alawites who sympathized with the opposition have shifted to the other side. “The government knew it couldn’t fight peaceful protesters, so it pushed them to violence,” he said. “But now, the violence we have seen on the rebel side has frightened everyone. And look at the media: Al Jazeera and Syrian state television take different sides, but both are pushing toward the same end. They are promoting hatred.”

… When I asked her about the opposition, she said: “I am ashamed to say it, but the opposition has lost its meaning. Now it is only killing, nothing but killing. The jihadis are speaking of a caliphate, and the Christians are really frightened.” There was a pause, filled by the churn of Arab pop music. “I waited all my life for this revolution,” Rita said. “But now I think maybe it shouldn’t have happened. At least not this way.”

If the opposition has lost its meaning, so has the regime. The Assad clan has always defined its Syria as the “beating heart of Arabism,” the bulwark of the Palestinian cause. The Baath Party was meant to embody this spirit, and Syria’s minorities were eager to prove their loyalty as Arabs in a Muslim-majority society. This was the glue that would hold together the country’s fractious communities. But now Syria has been formally excommunicated by the Arab League, the reigning pan-Arab institution, and the old unifying ideologies — paid lip service until the crisis began — are openly mocked.

… In April, I met Manaf Tlass, one of Bashar’s oldest friends, and asked him to narrate the conflict from Bashar’s perspective. Tlass, whose father served as Syria’s defense minister for three decades, was a general in Syria’s Republican Guard until he defected last July. He knew Bashar in childhood and was a member of his inner circle for years. We met at a cafe in Paris on a warm afternoon, and Tlass, who is sometimes mocked as a dandy, wore a blue silk shirt, unbuttoned to the middle of his chest, and aviator sunglasses.

On the day the crisis broke out, Tlass said, “Bashar called me and said, ‘What would you do?’ ” It was mid-March 2011, and the southern city of Dara’a was in uproar after the local security director — a cousin of Assad’s — ordered the imprisonment and torture of a group of boys who had scrawled antiregime graffiti on a wall. Tlass told me he urged Assad to visit Dara’a himself, and to order the arrest of the local security director. Others, including the leaders of Turkey and Qatar, have said they gave him similar advice.

Tlass said he continued to urge Assad to manage the crisis through negotiation rather than force, and with Assad’s permission, he began meeting with civic groups in towns where unrest had broken out, sometimes with as many as 300 people. He would hear their grievances and write down lists of possible fixes to local police corruption, lack of water or electricity and other problems. He would identify local leaders who could be trusted, then forward the list of issues and names to Bashar’s people. Each time, the leaders were promptly arrested.

Finally, Tlass told me, he confronted members of the Makhlouf family, Assad’s first cousins, who are now said to be his closest advisers. “There was a big disagreement,” Tlass said. “They wanted to handle the problem with security, the old way.” He decided to speak to Assad directly, but his old friend put him off for two weeks. When they finally met, Assad made clear that he was no longer interested in Tlass’s advice. “Bashar knew from the start that this was a big crisis,” Tlass said. “He decided to play on the instincts of the people.”

One morning in early May, I drove with Aliaa Ali and her brother to their ancestral town, Duraykish, in the Alawite mountain hinterland. The road climbs up from the coast along hairpin turns into a magnificent landscape of lush, terraced hills and orchards. We stopped briefly to look at a new monument to the town’s war dead, an imposing 25-foot marble plaque engraved with hundreds of names. We parked the car at the bottom of a narrow hillside street named for Aliaa’s grandfather and walked up to the family house, a 100-year-old stone building with ceramic tiles that had begun to wear away. Aliaa’s uncle, Amer Ali, stood waiting for us, a sturdy-looking man of about 50 with closely cropped, graying hair. He led us upstairs to a large, high-ceilinged room where sunlight splashed in through two open walls. Dozens of people waited inside.

Amer Ali had gathered them to tell their stories of relatives or spouses lost to the war. I listened to them, one by one. They were working-class people: soldiers, construction workers, police officers. All were Alawites, as far as I could tell. Some were probably shabiha, though none of them would have used that word. One of them, a middle-aged construction worker named Adib Sulayman, pulled out his cellphone and showed me the message he received after his son Yamin was kidnapped by rebels: “We have executed God’s will and killed your son. If you are still fighting with Bashar, we will come to your houses and cut you into pieces. Never fight against us.”

A 20-year-old man who had been shot twice in the head and had lost some of his memory and half his hearing told me he would go back to the front as soon as his wounds healed. His father stared at me and said: “I would be proud to have my son become a martyr. I am in my 50s, but I am ready to sacrifice my life, too. They thought we would be weak in this crisis, but we are strong.”

After lunch, Aliaa’s uncle showed me around the house. On the wall was a Sword of Ali, an important symbol for Alawites, with verses engraved on the blade. There were old farming tools, a stick for catching snakes, hunting knives and a century-old carbine — a kind of visual history of the Alawite people. There were ancient Phoenician amphorae and a framed photograph of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah.

Later, Amer Ali led me to the roof, where we gazed out at the town where his family has lived for hundreds of years. The hills were lovely in the golden afternoon sunlight. You could see an ancient spring with a stone arch over it, and a mosque that was built by one of his ancestors 240 years ago. Aliaa stood next to me on the terrace, looking out at the town with an expression of rapturous pride. I asked her how it made her feel to know that Western human rights groups had documented repeated atrocities by the Syrian regime — some, perhaps, by people like the ones we had just talked to. Aliaa glanced downward. “Yes, there have been atrocities,” she said. “You can never deny that there have been atrocities. But you have to ask yourself: What will happen if Bashar falls? That’s why I believe victory is the only option. If Bashar falls, Syria falls. And then we, here, will all be in the niqab” — the full veil worn in conservative Muslim societies — “or we will be dead.”

Before we climbed back down, Aliaa’s uncle showed me a rusted white tripod, set in the center of the roof, under a gazebo. “It is for telescopes, for looking at the stars,” he said. He looked up at the cloudless evening sky, then down the mountain toward where the hills give way to the vast Syrian plain. “But we can use it to set up a sniper rifle and defend ourselves here.”

The Lebanese Conflict

Lebanese Army deploys after one killed in Sidon clashes – Daily Star

Lebanese kids evacuated from school (The Daily Star/Mohammed Zaatari)

The Lebanese Army deployed Tuesday in the suburb of Abra, south Lebanon, after clashes between supporters of Sheikh Ahmad Assir and the Resistance Brigades, a pro-Hezbollah group, claimed the life of one resident, security sources told The Daily Star.

Backed by 20 armored personnel carriers, some 400 soldiers made their way into Abra, an eastern suburb of the southern coastal city of the Sidon, the sources said.

Sidon residents brace for further violence – NOW – Locals tell NOW they expect worse to come, though analysts downplay talk of a “new Tripoli”

Rina Hassan has only just returned to her apartment in Sidon’s Abra neighborhood, four days after fleeing heavy gun battles that raged on her street between partisans of Salafist cleric Sheikh Ahmad al-Assir and those of the Hezbollah-affiliated Resistance Brigades, leaving one dead.

“When it started, [Assir’s] fighters were under my house. They blocked the street with burning oil so no cars could get in or out, and then began firing RPGs and machine guns non-stop. For two hours, I sat in the corner of my bedroom because it was the only room with no windows.”

Terrified and alone in the house, Hassan then received a call from her son imploring her to come to the comparative safety of his restaurant nearby, which has an underground kitchen.

“He came to my front door and said, ‘Close your eyes, don’t look around, it will just take two minutes.’ Getting there was a real risk. We stayed for two more hours in that kitchen with two fighters outside firing M16s at any car that approached.”

When negotiations between Assir and the city’s Mufti, Sheikh Salim Sousan, brought the fighting to a close, Hassan decided to leave Sidon for her native southern village.

“I called a friend who had a friend involved with Assir’s movement, and he told us of a safe exit route. We had to tell them exactly what cars we would be in so they would know it was us. Many people in Abra were doing the same thing.”

“Today, I returned to Sidon, because I heard that Assir had agreed to postpone any military action for now. But I’ve prepared a bag in the house. The moment I feel tensions are rising again, I’ll get out of here.”

Hassan’s attitude is a widespread one in the city today, which residents fear could become the site of increasingly frequent and bloody clashes in future. Sheikh Maher Hammoud, a pro-Hezbollah cleric who survived an alleged assassination attempt in Sidon earlier this month, accused Assir on Thursday of wanting to turn Sidon into a “new Tripoli,” referring to the northern city that for years has witnessed repeated bouts of deadly sectarian violence.

Certainly, Abra locals NOW spoke to on Friday felt worse was yet to come. “There will be clashes again, of course,” said a roast chicken vendor directly across the street from Assir’s Bilal bin Rabah mosque. “Sheikh Assir agreed to postpone them until after school examinations [concluding on 6 July]. Next time, the fighting will be more intense, yes.”

Assir himself also appears to be taking precautions. The side-street leading up to his mosque now sports a new metal barrier, flanked by heavy concrete blocks and sandbags. A friendly young man, possibly in his teens, raises the barrier to allow a car to enter the complex. Like the two men standing on the corner behind him, he carries an AK-47, evidently undeterred by the heavy deployment of Lebanese Army troops on the adjacent street below. No, he says, we can’t take photos of him. But if we like, we can snap the large new holes on the building’s exterior – the results, he claims, of RPGs fired by the Resistance Brigades from Haaret Saida, the predominantly Shiite quarter two kilometers to the southwest.

In Haaret Saida, where Hezbollah and Amal flags line the streets, another restaurateur initially shrugs off the prospect of further clashes before launching an animated speech about how dangerous they could become.

“The problem of sectarian hatred here is huge. In Sidon, we have every sect: Sunnis, Shiites, Druze, Christians, Palestinians. These Islamists are playing with fire. Since when did they care about school exams? Are children’s exams more important than children dying?”

NOW also spoke to the mayor of Haaret Saida, Samih al-Zein, who was the target of a public death threat from the celebrity Assir partisan, former pop singer Fadel Shaker.

“I made a formal complaint to the judiciary,” he said with regards to the threat. “The attorney general and the security apparatus will deal with this. We don’t have a personal reaction – we won’t sink to that level.”

Al-Zein played down the possibility of further clashes, implying that Hezbollah and Amal would seek to avoid confronting Assir.

Syria war prompts move for Lebanon’s Baalbek festival – AFP

Lebanon’s renowned Baalbek International Festival, normally held in the town’s spectacular Roman ruins, is to move to an alternative venue in the face of a spillover of violence from neighbouring Syria, organisers said on Friday.

Miscellaneous

Jordan jails jihadists trying to join Syria rebels – Ahram

A Jordanian military tribunal jailed on Tuesday three men convicted of trying to join Syria’s jihadist Al-Nusra Front and fight President Bashar al-Assad’s regime.

“The state security court today initially sentenced the three to five years in jail each, but immediately halved the prison terms,” a court official told AFP.

“They attempted in January to interfiltrate Syria and join Al-Nusra Front.”

The official said the men were charged with “carrying out acts that the government does not approve and that would expose Jordan to the risk of aggression, as well as possession of unlicensed firearms.”

Al-Nusra, which seeks to establish an Islamic state in Syria, is among the most prominent groups involved in Syria’s 26-month conflict, which has killed more than 94,000, according to monitors.

The ruling comes a day after the same court jailed two Jordanians for five years for going to Syria last summer for jihad, a judicial official said.

The two were arrested after they returned to Jordan in August, “pretending that they were Syrian refugees.”

In May, the military court handed down similar jail sentences for nine Muslim extremists who wanted to go to Syria.

Jordan, which says it is hosting more than 500,000 refugees from Syria’s civil war, has arrested dozens of jihadists as they tried to cross into the war-torn country.

Jordanian Salafists have said there were more than 500 jihadists from the country in Syria.

Amman denies accusations from the Syrian regime that the kingdom has opened up its borders to jihadist fighters.

Jordan generally does not tolerate Salafist groups that espouse an austere form of Sunni Islam.

But slain Al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, hailed from the impoverished northern city of Zarqa, considered a stronghold of Muslim extremists.

The Wannabe – Daily News Egypt – Mahmoud Salem

One of the few remaining benefits of living in Egypt these days is the ridiculous amount of entertainment that our Islamist rulers provide.  In a scene that’s beyond parody, a number of Islamists held a massive conference to support Syria, which in their world means “Let’s kill those Shi’a Infidels”. In the first ever display of state-sponsored-Jihad-promotion in Egypt’s modern history, a number of Islamists, alongside our great ruler Mohamed Ibn Morsi the first, called upon the Nation’s Muslims to support Syria and, if possible, go fight Jihad there, because, after two years of inaction, they suddenly realised that there was a conflict there and on one side there was some non-Sunni Muslims fighting some Sunni Muslims. Gasp and horror.

In case you didn’t know, that’s completely unacceptable of course. Non-Sunni Muslims have no business being alive to begin with, or at least that’s what the speeches of the day implied. Sectarian rhetoric got spewed for two hours on live television, proving that Morsi doesn’t only have a “Christian problem”, but a “down with anything other than Sunni Muslims” problem, which should console our Christian brothers in so far that it’s not only them he dislikes. Today’s article should then bemoan the first Egyptian democratically elected openly sectarian president. If only it was that simple…

… Oh, how I wish that what took place in that conference was simply Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood showcasing their true sectarian selves, because the alternative is so utterly pathetic: That the MB is so desperate to hold on to power in the face of sweeping national anger, that they had to pander to Jihadist elements in such a disgusting way. The Jihadist elements naturally returned the pandering in kind, with Sheikh Mohamed Abdel Maksoud openly stating that 30 June will be a great day for Islam to stand against the “infidels” behind the “Rebellion” movement. Meanhwile, Sheikh Mohamed Hassan informed the average-electricity-and-fuel- deprived Egyptian citizens about the great benefits of Jihad in Syria: 1) There are the brownie points you get with God for killing other people, 2) There are the spoils of Jihad for the taking in the bountiful lands of Syria, like looting, pillaging and hot Syrian women, and 3) If you die, you get to die fighting in a Jihad for Islam, which immediately puts you on Heaven’s VIP list. Dear Sunni Muslim Egyptian citizens, what more could you possibly ask for? It’s a win-win situation.

… Had Morsi truly wanted to help Syrians, he would have issued some initiatives that would help the estimated one million Syrian refugees in Egypt so as not to suffer daily humiliation. He could have issued a directive that equalised the degrees of educated Syrian with that of Egypt’s to allow Syrian doctors and engineers a chance to work in their vocations. He could have given them all work permits, thus giving the Syrian refugees a method to exist, work and survive in Egypt legally. He could have banned the practice of selling Syrian women as wives to Egyptian males that happens in Salafi mosques. Instead, in a grandiose move, he shut down their embassy, which is the only place that provided Syrian refugees access to crucial consular services, and helped them get to their next destination if they wanted out of Egypt. Dear Syrian refugees, you can start thanking us any minute now.

I am willing to wager that when historians document this phase in Egyptian history, they will call it “the LSD period”, because we are watching the hallucinations of the Islamists and their leaders being broadcasted on our national televisions, creating a binary primordial world where Islam is threatened, all of their enemies are infidels bent on destroying the religion and where they are the faith’s sole defenders and champions. It’s beyond sad. Had a US channel created a TV show depicting Islamist rule and simply copied and pasted the actions and speeches of the Morsi government, its writers and producers would’ve been called Islamophobic and out of touch with reality. Unfortunately this is reality, and it must change. 30 June cannot come fast enough.

Confusion arises among Syrians after accelerating drop in Syrian pound’s value – Xinhua

In all the hubbub over the dramatic devaluation of the Syrian pound that has declined by roughly 40 pounds against the U.S. dollar in a single day in the black market, top Syrian officials are still determined that the economy is stable and capable of facing all challenges.

Following the steep depreciation of the pound over the past 24 hours — the dollar soared from 170 pounds to around 210 pounds — many Syrians rushed to markets to buy basic food stuff and commodities out of fears that their prices would rise soon.

Media reports said that there is currently a meeting combining top Syrian officials and economists, including the governor of the Central Bank of Syria and exchange dealers, to discuss the issue of the striking rise in the exchange rate of the dollar against the pound, and to find an appropriate way of intervening to rein in the upward climb of the dollar price.

The Syrian Prime Minister Wael al-Halqi said Monday during the meeting of the economic commission entrusted with following up the pound exchange rate that the government has large reserves of foreign exchange to provide all the needs of the Syrian market of imported goods and production inputs. …

Syria: ‘I saw rebels execute my boy for no more than a joke’ – Telegraph

Nadia Umm Fuad watched her son being shot by Islamist rebels in Syria after the 14-year-old referred to the Prophet Mohammed as he joked with a customer at his coffee stall in Aleppo. She speaks to Richard Spencer.

Mohammed Katta’s mother witnessed the execution of her son in three stages.

She was upstairs at home when she first heard the shouting. The people of the neighbourhood were yelling that “they have brought back the kid”, so she rushed out of her apartment.

“I went out on my balcony,” Nadia Umm Fuad said. “I said to his father, they are going to shoot your son! Come! Come! Come! I was on the stairs when I heard the first shot. I was at the door when I heard the second shot.

Palestinians in Syria find themselves displaced again – WP

To date, an estimated 55,000 Palestinians have sought sanctuary in Lebanon from the war in Syria, according to the United Nations, most of them descendants of families displaced by the creation of Israel in 1948.

Armed Factions: Sunni and Shi’i

Aron Lund profiles and maps a number of rebel fighting forces for the The Independent:

Obama Owes Syrians and Americans a Vision of Syria’s Future

By Joshua Landis
June 15, 2013

[Addendum (24 June) See Thomas Friedman’s op-ed of Sunday 23 for comparison of his three Obama options with my three. Putting it in the context of collapsing Ottoman Empire and nation building is also similar.

It is still unclear to me where the president is going with Syria, but I see only three possible strategies: the realist, the idealist and the God-I-hope-we-are-lucky approaches….

Will Obama be content if the Free Syrian Army can keep the north of Syria and finish taking Aleppo?

Will he decide that the rebels should take Damascus as well, pushing the regime and the Alawite religious group, which predominates within the regime, back toward the western coast-land, where Alawites constitute the majority of the population?

Or will Obama decide to back the rebels with enough firepower to destroy the regime altogether, occupying both the predominantly Alawite and Kurdish regions of Syria?

Now that President Obama has decided to champion the opposition militarily, he must set out clear goals and explain his vision for Syria’s future.

The obvious choices that Obama must choose from are three.

1. The one state solution: Preserving Syria as a unitary state by keeping the country one. This means supporting the Sunni Arab opposition with enough weapons and backing to conquer Hama, Homs and Damascus, as well as occupy both the Alawite and Kurdish regions. The same result could be reached by a political compromise (Geneva), but a negotiated solution seems unlikely. Without a foreign occupation of Syria to impose a solution on all sides, no incentive exists for either the Assad regime or opposition militias to make painful concessions that could diminish their authority.

The Taif Accords that ended the Lebanese Civil War, and are often pointed to as a model for Geneva, were agreed to by the disputing Lebanese parties largely because Syria occupied Lebanon and disarmed the various militias — that is all except for Hizbullah, which continues to defy central authority today. Without Syrian boots on the ground, the Lebanese militias would have been unlikely to lay down their arms or have agreed to live under a common government, even one as weak and dysfunctional as the present Lebanese government.

2. The two state solution: Divide the country into two states, which corresponds to the present reality. This means simply giving the rebels enough backing to stop the Syrian Army’s offensive in the north and empowering them to fully capture Aleppo, Deir al-Zur and their surrounding countrysides. Of course, the rebel forces are made up of over 1,000 militias. This means that the rebel-held north is anything but stable and offers only a rough patchwork security for those who live there. What is more, big hunks of the north are presently ruled by al-Qaida affiliated groups. Thus, Obama has set the US up for a two front war. One against Assad in the south and another against Jabhat al-Nusra and its allies in the east.

3. The three state solution: Divide the country into three, following the ethnic lines of the major combatant groups. This is the Balkan solution, pursued by President Clinton when he cut Yugoslavia into 7 states. This would mean creating an Alawite, a Sunni Arab, and a Kurdish state. Such a solution would be opposed by the rebels and much of the international community, but it would recognize the difficulties in putting Syria back together again.

If the US decides to help the Sunni Arab rebels go for a total victory, it must take responsibility for ensuring that ethnic cleansing of Syria’s minorities is not carried out by the empowered Sunni Arab majority.  Only an international peace-keeping force can guarantee against unnecessary bloodshed if Obama hopes to arm the Sunni militias for a clean sweep. Many of the militiamen make no bones about their desire for vengeance or their belief that Shiites no longer have a place in their country. This is to be expected after the brutal beating they have taken at the hands of the Alawite-dominated Syrian Army.

For those who dismiss the dangers of ethnic cleansing, it is worth remembering that after the defeat of the Third Reich in WWII, over 12 million Germans were driven out of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and other Eastern European states, where they had lived for hundreds of years. So too, were the Armenians and Greek Orthodox driven from Anatolia by Ottoman and Turkish troops during the terrible fighting that swept over the region from 1914 to 1922. Anatolia was close to 20% Christian in 1914. By 1922, less than 1% remained, as over three million Christians were cleansed or forced into a population exchange with Greece, which expelled some half a million of its own Muslims. More recently, Palestinians have been driven from their lands, destabilizing the region for decades. Iraqi Christians took flight from their native land as anti-Christian violence grew to a crescendo with the attack on Saydet al-Najat Church in 2010. Their numbers fell by over half. Ethnic cleansing is only one of the dangers that President Obama must protect against as he builds up the rebels into a more lethal fighting force.

If Obama wants rebels to take Damascus, he must guarantee that that fighting does not destroy the city, as happened to Aleppo. If he provides only howitzers, simple rockets and lighter forms of weapons, stalemate and fierce street-by-street fighting will ensure that Syria’s capital of some 5 million people is leveled. Another major wave of refugees will stream out of Syria.

President Obama is arguing that his new policy of supplying weapons in not really a change of policy at all, but rather a continuation of his previous policy of pushing for a political solution. But this doesn’t correspond to the Syria I know. I doubt that either the rebels or the Assad regime are willing or able to make the painful compromises needed to keep the country unified. This is a recipe for dividing the country along the present battle lines, give or take a bit.

He owes both the American and Syrian people a clear statement about what he sees as Syria’s future borders and how he plans to help Syria’s rebels build what he called a “stable, non-sectarian representative Syrian government that is addressing the needs of its people through peaceful processes.”

Clerics in Egypt Call for Global Jihad Against Regime’s Shiite Allies

by Matthew Barber

The last post contained a question from a reader wondering why Egypt has been largely off-the-radar as an important regional presence in the Syrian conflict. With interesting timing, the last few days may have inaugurated the beginning of a change to Egypt’s lack of involvement, a development coinciding with the U.S.’s own policy changes.

A few days ago, I received an email from a friend following the activities of religious clerics in the Middle East. In it, he said:

…today there was a big Islamic conference in Cairo for top Muslim scholars (TV figures) organized by the Muslim Brotherhood and attended by Qaradawi and other famous sheikhs such as al-‘Uraifi. They issued a statement calling on the Muslim world for jihad against Iran and Hezbollah. Furthermore, one of them [Dr. Safwat Hijazai, an Egyptian] called for forming military brigades under the banner of the World Union of Muslim Scholars, the League of Sunni scholars, etc. This means taking the conflict to the Muslim World and encouraging thousands to volunteer. … al-Qaradawi himself talked about Shiites being infidels and spoke of them cursing the companions of the Prophet. Another call later on was made to ban them from the hajj. This is wrong and will have serious consequences on relations between Sunnis and Shiites in the future.

Though the statement issued at the conference doesn’t explicitly call for jihad targeting Iran, it does make plain that the call to jihad is to counter Iran’s influence and actions; Iran is therefore openly depicted as the enemy that has made this jihad necessary. The second item in the statement says the following:

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

“The blatant aggression occurring in the land of Sham should be considered a declared war of the Iranian regime, Hezbollah, and their sectarian allies against Islam and Muslims generally.”

Though the injustices experienced by Syrians were the ostensible motivation for this conference and the call for jihad that it produced, the fact that it represents a line-up of influential Sunni clerics and the Muslim Brotherhood arrayed opposite several exclusively Shiite enemies is a very dangerous development. We have watched the sectarian character of the Syrian Uprising awaken the dormant tensions that underlie never-quite-solved disputes—divergent visions for the state that afflict the entire Levant and Iraq. Now, Egypt seems to be moving into position in its relationship with a regional conflict towards which most nations in the Middle East are oriented by sectarian affiliation.

To issue a call for such a jihad in the current volatile context, framing the three major “Shi’a” entities as the collective enemy, particularly without any nuance to affirm the humanity of Shiite people in distinction from their governments or non-state political actors, is highly irresponsible, especially after the terrible rise of targeted sectarian killings we’ve observed inside Syria. Despite a reference to the Iranian “regime,” the entire affair will serve only to whip up animosity toward Shiites generally.

Another feature of this rhetoric that will incite further division is the referring to Iran and Hezbollah’s involvement as a “war against Islam and Muslims.” Without any political context for the interests of these communities, the labeling of their objectives as a “war against Islam and Muslims” has the effect of asserting that they are not Muslims.

The indications of Egypt’s “movement into position” extend beyond the condemnation vocalized by angry clerics; in the same week that this conference took place, an Egyptian official expressed approval for Egyptians wishing to travel to Syria for jihad.

At the state level, the developments described above have occurred alongside an official decision to end all diplomatic ties with Syria, and the closure of the Syrian embassy in Cairo, a move that will increase the difficulties faced by the Syrian refugee population that has taken refuge in Egypt, who the Syrian opposition will be unable to assist in any meaningful capacity regarding travel documents and passports, marriage certificates, etc.

All of these changes (as well as the U.S. shift in policy) seem to follow the expansion of Hezbollah’s role on the ground. Iran has reportedly said that it will be sending 4,000 troops to assist the Syrian regime. If the sending of troops does take place, Iran will appear to have taken the lead in conducting the most literal form of “intervention.” But in contrast to such official state-level action, the states hoping to counter Iran’s growing role in the conflict appear to accept the use of an undefined and disorganized jihad that will see many young, unaccountable men going to their deaths, as was the case with the mujahideen in the Iraq war.

Though any serious (and strategically feasible) endeavor to resolve the Syria crisis and end the bloodshed would be laudable, the U.S. should carefully think through its decision to take sides in a greater sectarian conflict.

Egyptian official says citizens free to join fight in Syria – This article originally appeared on Ahram but seems to have been taken down. Several other sites have re-posted it.

A senior official in Egypt’s presidential office said that Egyptians are free to fight in the conflict in Syria, and will not be prosecuted on their return to Egypt.

In a response to an Associated Press question Thursday about the government’s stance on citizens going to fight alongside Syrian rebels, Khaled El-Qazzaz said that “the right of travel or freedom of travel is open for all Egyptians.”

He said that after the 2011 uprising, the government no longer punishes Egyptians for what they do in other countries.

El-Qazzaz, a foreign affairs adviser to Islamist President Mohamed Morsi, said the presidency does not consider Egyptian nationals in Syria to be a threat to Egypt’s security.

His comments come just days after influential Egyptian cleric Yusuf El-Qaradawi urged Sunni Muslims everywhere to join the fight against Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, who is a member of the Alawite branch of Islam.

On Saturday Morsi will attend a conference on Syria in the International Conference Centre in Cairo’s Nasr City, the Muslim Brotherhood announced on Wednesday.

The conference is part of a Syria solidarity week organised by the Muslim Brotherhood and will include other influential figures such as El-Qaradawi and Saudi sheikh Mohamed Al-Arifi. The conference is scheduled to start on Thursday 13 June.

Egypt Brotherhood backs Syria jihad, denounces Shi’ites – Reuters

Egypt’s ruling Muslim Brotherhood blamed Shi’ites for creating religious strife throughout Islam’s history, as the movement joined a call by Sunni clerics for jihad against the Syrian government and its Shi’ite allies.

In a striking display of the religious enmity sweeping the region since Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah committed its forces behind Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a Brotherhood spokesman in Cairo told Reuters on Friday: “Throughout history, Sunnis have never been involved in starting a sectarian war.”

Until recently, Egypt’s new Islamist president, the Brotherhood’s Mohamed Mursi, was promoting rapprochement with Iran, the bastion of Shi’ite political power and in February he hosted the first visit by an Iranian president in over 30 years.

But spokesman Ahmed Aref said Hezbollah had launched a new “sectarian war” last month by joining Tehran’s other key ally Assad in a fight that pits mainly Sunni rebels against a Syrian elite drawn from Assad’s Alawite minority, a Shi’ite offshoot.

For that reason, Aref said, the Brotherhood, which emerged from oppression after the fall of military rule two years ago to run by far the most populous Arab state, had joined a call made on Thursday by leading Sunni clerics for holy war in Syria.

That statement, made at a Cairo conference of more than 70 religious organizations from across the Arab world, urged “jihad with mind, money, weapons – all forms of jihad”, but stopped short of repeating an explicit call by high-profile Brotherhood-linked preacher Youssef al-Qaradawi for fighters to go to Syria.

Asked whether the Brotherhood would urge Egyptians to travel to the war, Aref said it was still considering its position and would coordinate with the other groups at the conference.

Mursi would address the assembly on Saturday, he added, saying that speech may clarify the Egyptian position: “Up to now there’s merely been talk,” he said.

“We need to coordinate well in terms of logistics.”

An aide to Mursi said on Thursday that Egypt disapproved of external intervention in Syria, notably that by Hezbollah. It was not sending fighters but, he said, the government could not stop Egyptians from travelling and would not penalize any who went to Syria, where he said many were engaged in relief work.

SAUDI CLERIC

Also on Friday, a leading Sunni cleric from Saudi Arabia, Mohammed al-Afifi, preached at an ancient Cairo mosque, calling for jihad in Syria “in every way possible”. Some worshippers waved Syrian rebel flags and dozens of men gathered outside afterward to chant their support for bringing down Assad.

Saudi Arabia, where the monarchy espouses the strict Wahhabi school of Sunni Islam, is locked in a regional rivalry with Iran and has been arming the Syrian rebels while Egypt’s leaders, who rose to power in the same wave of Arab Spring protests that began the Syrian civil war, have held back from such engagement.

The 7th century rift between Sunni and Shi’ite Islam has fuelled violence across the Middle East in recent decades, including the sectarian bloodletting unleashed in Iraq since the 2003 U.S. invasion and the Lebanese civil war of 1975 to 1990.

Egypt Cuts Ties With Syria: Mohamed Morsi Orders Closing Of Damascus Embassy In Cairo, Urges Hezbollah To Stay Out – HP

Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi said he had cut all diplomatic ties with Damascus on Saturday and called for a no-fly zone over Syria, pitching the most populous Arab state firmly against President Bashar al-Assad.

Addressing a rally called by Sunni Muslim clerics in Cairo, the Sunni Islamist head of state said: “We decided today to entirely break off relations with Syria and with the current Syrian regime.”

He also warned Assad’s allies in the Iranian-backed Lebanese Shi’ite militia Hezbollah to pull back from fighting in Syria.

“We stand against Hezbollah in its aggression against the Syrian people,” Mursi said. “Hezbollah must leave Syria – these are serious words. There is no space or place for Hezbollah in Syria.”

Mursi, who faces growing discontent at home over the economy and over fears that he will pursue an Islamist social agenda, said he was organising an urgent summit of Arab and other Islamic states to discuss the situation in Syria, where the United States has in recent days decided to take steps to arm the rebels.

Mursi, who spoke at a packed 20,000-capacity stadium and waved Syrian and Egyptian flags after his entrance, also urged world powers not to hesitate to enforce a no-fly zone over Syria. The crowd of his supporters chanted: “From the free revolutionaries of Egypt: We will stamp on you, Bashar!”

… Egypt’s U.S.-funded and -trained army is among the most powerful in the Middle East and effectively ran the country before the Arab Spring revolution of 2011 led to elections that saw Mursi, of the Muslim Brotherhood, take power a year ago.

There has been no suggestion, however, that Egyptian forces should get involved in the fighting in Syria.

Mursi said Syria was the target of “a campaign of extermination and planned ethnic cleansing fed by regional and international states”, partly in reference to Iran, though he did not name the Shi’ite Islamic Republic.

Mursi said: “The Egyptian people supports the struggle of the Syrian people, materially and morally, and Egypt, its nation, leadership … and army, will not abandon the Syrian people until it achieves its rights and dignity.”

The Brotherhood has joined calls this week from Sunni Muslim religious organisations for a jihad against Assad and his Shi’ite allies. Egypt has not taken an active role in arming the Syrian rebels, but an aide to Mursi said this week that Cairo would not stand in the way of Egyptians who wanted to fight in Syria.

BBC Video: Egypt to cut off diplomatic relations with Syria

Iran will send 4,000 troops to aid Bashar al-Assad’s forces in Syria – Independent

Washington’s decision to arm Syria’s Sunni Muslim rebels has plunged America into the great Sunni-Shia conflict of the Islamic Middle East, entering a struggle that now dwarfs the Arab revolutions which overthrew dictatorships across the region.

For the first time, all of America’s ‘friends’ in the region are Sunni Muslims and all of its enemies are Shiites. Breaking all President Barack Obama’s rules of disengagement, the US is now fully engaged on the side of armed groups which include the most extreme Sunni Islamist movements in the Middle East.

The Independent on Sunday has learned that a military decision has been taken in Iran – even before last week’s presidential election – to send a first contingent of 4,000 Iranian Revolutionary Guards to Syria to support President Bashar al-Assad’s forces against the largely Sunni rebellion that has cost almost 100,000 lives in just over two years.  Iran is now fully committed to preserving Assad’s regime, according to pro-Iranian sources which have been deeply involved in the Islamic Republic’s security, even to the extent of proposing to open up a new ‘Syrian’ front on the Golan Heights against Israel.

In years to come, historians will ask how America – after its defeat in Iraq and its humiliating withdrawal from Afghanistan scheduled for  2014 – could have so blithely aligned itself with one side in a titanic Islamic struggle stretching back to the seventh century death of the Prophet Mohamed.

… From now on, therefore, every suicide bombing in Damascus – every war crime committed by the rebels – will be regarded in the region as Washington’s responsibility. The very Sunni-Wahabi Islamists who killed thousands of Americans on 11th September, 2011 – who are America’s greatest enemies as well as Russia’s – are going to be proxy allies of the Obama administration. This terrible irony can only be exacerbated by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s adament refusal to tolerate any form of Sunni extremism.  His experience in Chechenya, his anti-Muslim rhetoric – he has made obscene remarks about Muslim extremists in a press conference in Russian – and his belief that Russia’s old ally in Syria is facing the same threat as Moscow fought in Chechenya, plays a far greater part in his policy towards Bashar al-Assad than the continued existence of Russia’s naval port at the Syrian Mediterranean city of Tartous.

For the Russians, of course, the ‘Middle East’ is not in the ‘east’ at all, but to the south of Moscow;  and statistics are all-important. The Chechen capital of Grozny is scarcely 500 miles from the Syrian frontier.  Fifteen per cent of Russians are Muslim.  Six of the Soviet Union’s communist republics had a Muslim majority, 90 per cent of whom were Sunni.  And Sunnis around the world make up perhaps 85 per cent of all Muslims.  For a Russia intent on repositioning itself across a land mass that includes most of the former Soviet Union, Sunni Islamists of the kind now fighting the Assad regime are its principal antagonists.

After the election of Hassan Rouhani, the Egyptian Islamists are not the only ones unhappy with Iran: BBC – Iran election: Israel issues warning after Rouhani win

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has warned that international pressure on Iran must not be loosened in the wake of the election of reformist-backed Hassan Rouhani as president.

Mr Netanyahu said Iran’s nuclear programme must be stopped “by any means” and there should be no “wishful thinking” about Mr Rouhani’s victory.

The cleric won just over 50% of the vote in Friday’s election. He said his election was a “victory of moderation over extremism”.

Putin’s message

One of Mr Rouhani’s main election pledges was to try to ease international sanctions imposed on Iran over its nuclear programme, and he has also promised greater engagement with Western powers.

But Mr Netanyahu said on Sunday: “The international community should not fall into wishful thinking and be tempted to ease pressure on Iran to stop its nuclear programme.”

He added: “Iran will be judged on its actions. If it insists on continuing to develop its nuclear programme the answer needs to be clear – stopping its nuclear programme by any means.” …

Is Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood backing a jihad in Syria? – CSM – Dan Murphy

Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood Calls For Jihad In Syria – AP

Egypt’s Morsi turns to Syria and soccer to polish his tarnished image – James Dorsey

Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi and his flailing Muslim Brotherhood have turned to foreign policy and soccer to improve their battered image in advance of a planned mass anti-government protest at the end of this month and mounting calls for his resignation.

In a bid to distract attention from his domestic woes, curry favor with the United States and Gulf countries and restore Egypt to a leadership position in the Middle East and North Africa, Mr. Morsi chose a Cairo stadium to announce to his rallied supporters that he was cutting diplomatic ties with the regime of embattled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The president’s ruling Muslim Brotherhood at the same time said it would field candidates for the board elections of storied Cairo soccer club Al Zamalek SC and other major football teams. The move is an effort to gain control of clubs in a soccer-crazy country whose huge fan base played a key political role in and since the toppling of Hosni Mubarak two years ago.

The fans, one of the largest civic groups in Egypt, are likely to participate in a mass opposition Tamarod (Rebel) march on the presidential palace scheduled for June 30, the first anniversary of Mr. Morsi’s inauguration as Egypt’s first freely-elected post-revolt leader, to demand his resignation and early elections. Egyptian media report that a petition calling for Mr. Morsi’s resignation has so far attracted 15 million signatures, two million more than the 13 million votes the president garnered a year ago. A significant number of militant soccer fans are believed to be among the signatories.

Criticism of Mr. Morsi has mounted in the past year as a result of his failure to halt Egypt’s stark economic decline, his haughty leadership style that many believe harks back to Mr. Mubarak’s authoritarianism and his perceived efforts to Islamize Egyptian society.

Militant, highly politicized, well-organized and street battle-hardened soccer fans have in the last year played a key role in protests against Mr. Morsi. The conviction to death of soccer fans and perceived leniency towards security personnel in a trial earlier this year against those responsible for the death last year of 74 fans in Port Said in a politically loaded brawl sparked a popular uprising in Suez Canal cities and violent protests in Cairo.

Prominent Egyptian artists, writers, actors, filmmakers and intellectuals camped out in front of the culture ministry in Cairo to demand the resignation of Minister Alaa Abdel-Aziz because of his alleged efforts to force the arts to conform to Islamic conservatism called last week on the militant soccer fans to protect them against attacks by supporters of Mr. Morsi.

The Brotherhood’s intention to increase its influence in soccer clubs, many of which are financially troubled as the result of long suspensions sparked by Egypt’s political turmoil since 2011, is the movement’s latest effort to come to grips with the country’s most popular pastime. Brotherhood officials initially toyed with the creation of their own soccer clubs but then opted for a promise to clean the sport of corruption, including the replacement of Mubarak-era officials.

… Islamists hardly endeared themselves to soccer fans by recently suggesting that their rivalries were a Zionist plot to destabilize Egypt. Al Hafiz TV, a Salafi television station critical of Morsi that promotes a return to the 7^th century lifestyle of the Prophet Muhammad and his immediate successors made the insinuation by airing a video portraying an alleged ultra-Orthodox Jew as advocating the instigation of strife between various groups in Egypt, including soccer fans.

Opinion on Intervention and U.S. Plans

Syria no-fly zone stirs debate – AP

The Obama administration, trying to avoid getting drawn deeper into Syria’s civil war, has pointed to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 as a symbol of what can go wrong when America’s military wades into Middle East conflicts.

But experts say the White House is looking at the wrong Iraq war, especially as the U.S. reluctantly considers a no-fly zone over Syria to stop President Bashar Assad from continuing to use his air power to crush rebel forces or kill civilians.

A no-fly zone is a territory over which warring aircraft are not allowed to fly. The U.S. and international allies have enforced them in several military conflicts over the past two decades.

When he took office in 2009, President Barack Obama promised to end the U.S. war in Iraq as an example of refocusing on issues that had direct impact on Americans. By the time the U.S military withdrew from Iraq in 2011, almost 4,500 American soldiers and more than 100,000 Iraqis had died. The war toppled Saddam Hussein but sparked widespread sectarian fighting and tensions that still simmer.

But when considering a no-fly zone, experts point to 1992, a year after the Gulf War. That’s when the U.S. imposed a weakly-enforced no-fly zone over southern Iraq and could not prevent Saddam, a Sunni Muslim, from persecuting and killing hundreds of thousands of Shiites whom he viewed as a political threat.

That failure is now being used as a case in point of why the U.S. should or shouldn’t police the Syrian sky to prevent Assad from accelerating a two-year death toll that last week reached 93,000.

The White House is undecided on imposing a no-fly zone over Syria, as some have demanded. Egypt’s president, Mohammed Morsi, on Saturday called for a U.N. endorsed no-fly zone.

Obama Acts on Syria—Is It Too Late? – New Yorker

Timing is everything: the White House’s announcement, on Thursday afternoon, that America’s intelligence agencies had concluded that Bashar al-Assad’s regime was deploying chemical weapons came just as the dictator appeared to be turning back the rebels in Syria’s terrible civil war. We can assume that President Barack Obama would only make such an pronouncement if he intended to act on it—to take decisive action to help the rebels, either with weapons shipments or airstrikes. Senator John McCain, one of the few elected officials to publicly push Obama to do more in Syria, told reporters on Thursday that the White House had informed him that it would begin to arm the rebels.

From Our Readers

Yamin sent the following in an email:

The Syrian Government ignores 70 percent of the Opposition fighters being Free Syrian Army and label all of them as al-Qaeda or Jabhat al-Nusra. To them any fighters, regardless of their just causes, are Moslem fanatics. Hilarious.

The Opposition ignores 95 percent of the forces opposing them and blames many attacks on Hizbollah. To them any Shiite fighter in Syria is Hizbollah, ignoring the fact that almost a half a million Syrian Shiites are up in arms too. No one had ever said that the Shiite fighters in Nebol and al-Zahra northwest of Aleppo were “Hizbollah forces” until last week. Suddenly, Hizbollah is attacking in Aleppo. Hilarious.

The hate between the two sides is larger by far than the hate between the French and the Ottomans on the Jaffa beaches in 1799.

A millennium of Sunni ascendancy in the Middle East has been haltered or eroded by three main events:

1. the rise of Russia (ceased the Moslem jihad or fatah north and west)
2. the unification of Persia (gave the Shiite Arabs their first solid base)
3. the foundation of Israel (halted Egyptian armies incursions into Syria)

Apple_Mini wrote in a comment:

Nowadays, you will find only Sunni taxi drivers in town (Damascus). It is a simple reality: Sunni drivers can go anywhere if they need to: rebels held areas (diminishing) and government controlled areas. On the other hand, all Alawite cab drivers have quit since it would be life-risking mission to go to rebel held areas or areas still threatened by rebels.

If you walk around areas with high foot traffic in Damascus, you will see many displaced people from countryside. Most of them are mothers with children, sometimes even toddlers or infants. You cannot find the fathers. And you probably already know why, those are military-age men from countryside.

When you see young mothers holding infants and begging for money, it strikes you with the thought that the mother might have already been a widow. How will they survive while raising those children regardless of the outcome of this conflict? How could they raise their children while providing opportunities for them to advance to higher social ladder?

Elliot emailed in the following question, for which our contributor Ehsani has provided a response:

Question: One reads how life in Assad controlled Syria has remained somewhat “normal”…students going to University, cafe life, traffic jams, etc. After more than two years of war, sanctions, loss of tourist revenues, oil revenues, some 60% of the country lost, it seems that Damascus would be really hurting financially. I’ve read that Iran is picking up the tab. Is it possible that Iran can do so indefinitely? It must be enormously expensive to fight a war and maintain at least some of the trappings of a peacetime society. Any thoughts on the financing of this situation?

Ehsani’s reply:

When it comes to anything to do with the finances of the Syrian state, facts are in short supply. Not surprisingly, the leadership treats such matters as national security. Any attempts to answer such questions must therefore be done with care. Some speculation is perhaps inevitable.

Syria has a large public sector. This means that it must pay salaries to over 1 million employees. Some speculate that the number is closer to 2 million. Such salaries are still largely being paid. The fall of the value of the Syrian Pound has made this financial obligation significantly easier to meet.

Prior to the start of the crisis, one US dollar (USD) used to buy 46 Syrian Pounds (SYP). The same USD now buys 168 SYP. Let us assume that the average salary of a state employee is SYP 12,000. Before the crisis, the USD cost to the government was $261 a month. The same salary now sets the government back USD $71. This means that the treasury now saves 73% on its wage bill.

The other major expense to the government is of course subsidies. The crisis has meant that large parts of the country no longer depend on the state largess when it comes to heavily subsidized fuel, gas or even electricity. This has resulted in significant savings for the state. For the record, the subsidies used to cost the state near USD 8 billion a year. Close to 63% of that went to energy-related items.

The other thing to note is that official imports into the country have come down significantly. This meant less demand for foreign currency. Prior to the crisis, the central bank used to supply such foreign currencies to the banking system to finance commercial imports.

While expenses have declined, so have revenues, of course. The largest hit came from the sanctions on the energy sector. This has starved the state of foreign currency revenues. It is important to note that income taxes do not constitute a large revenue item. Instead, indirect taxes are more widespread. These are easier to collect in this environment than income taxes. It is the case, however, that one is hard pressed to see significant sources of revenues for the state. The natural assumption is that Iran must be helping, but one can only speculate here. Perhaps companies like Syriatel and other privately owned companies are also doing their part in assisting the state to meet some of its obligations. Some have speculated that the government may have printed Syrian banknotes to ease the strain. While this is possible, I have yet to see credible evidence of such.

Elliot also emailed in another question:

Egypt, the largest and arguably most influential Arab Sunni power seems to have no interest in any sort of role in the conflict. Indeed, I have read that there have been visits of high level Iranians to the country. I noted that Egypt was hoping to increase Iranian tourism. I know Egypt is having its own severe internal problems but one would think that a Moslem Brother would be  more sympathetic to the the Sunni cause. What gives?

 What do you think?

 Observer wrote in a long and thoughtful comment:

In the early 1920 period the people of greater Syria chose the US as the mandate power because:
1. Woodrow Wilson spoke of the right of people for self determination and
2. The US was not an empire or a colonial power.

France and Britain got away with it and stayed sowing the seeds of instability as the book by Fromkin “A Peace to end all Peace” clearly shows.

In Syria, the elites formed by France were of two kinds: the urban elite educated in the French schooling system and the military that allowed less fortunate and rural young men to improve their lot.

The first coup d’etat by Housni Zaim was clearly aimed to allow the establishment of the pipeline of oil from KSA to the coast so that the Marshall plan can be fueled.

At that time Lebanon benefited from the gift of an international airport in Beirut, the transformation of the Syrian Protestant College to the AUB and the creation of the AUB medical center with the aim of having a base for the sixth fleet in case of a war with the Soviets.

The cold war brought the US into an empire and into using might makes right in helping any dictator decimate the communist party.

The urban elite concentrated all the efforts in urban centers and neglected the rural areas and continued a renter’s economy owning the land and never really allowing equal opportunities.

All of this got a significant boost when all and I repeat all of the Baath projects were laid down by non other than Khaled Azem the so called ” red prime minister in the early sixties. He for example wanted to organize the owners of the buses in Damascus into a holding company so that their resources can be combined and the city benefit from a true transportation system that is private with government oversight and help.

He for example went on to lay the ground work for the electrical grid for the port of Tartus for the Euphrates dam and others.

The Baath although bringing a dictatorship brought with it in my opinion an Arab nationalism that was subverted by authoritarian regime to its ends. Nevertheless and despite the fact that it had many a stupid economic decisions it went on to create a middle class that would allow for an employee to own his house within 15 years of work and savings and to insure that his children went to school and got a shot at university.

However, like all authoritarian regimes it was filled with inefficiencies and corruption and worst of all brutality. It had the seeds of its own destruction.

When the current regime fell under the control of the father, all bets were off as he transformed the Baath party to his engine of total control and went about dismantling the structures of any civil society and with a vengeance. Not only it was corrupt and brutal to the core, it was corrupting and diabolical in inducing a culture of impunity, of slave owner mentality and of a hatred for his enemies and his prejudiced populations to the very apparatus of governance,

Hence, and with the brood and the family mafia gone wild and with their complete incompetence and stupidity, they have left the country deeply scared and fractured and with sectarian final divisions.

So I would say that when the people of the ME revolted rightly against Ottoman tyranny and bought the idea of Arab Nationalism they actually killed the very idea and dream of their ideals the moment they agreed to remain divided in these artificial states and in these petty family and clan affairs.

… As Arab Nationalism got its mortal wound in 67 and its death in 91 with defeats and invasions, there remained a culture that has never been defeated for it is engrained to the core into the very genes of the people: their Islamic heritage. Case in point the Eternal Message of the Arab Nation of the Baath party slogan as formulated by none other than the Christian Michel Aflaq is based on Islam as the eternal message. It is perversion of the message for Islam is not for Arabs and not for Arabs to have as their own it is a universal religion with a universal message. Forget my lack of belief and my views on religion itself. I am honest enough to recognize that it is the glue that is keeping the society from descending into complete anarchy and this is despite the second perversion of the faith with fundamentalist fanatics that are using it for hatred and sectarianism.

… The very idea of what kind of Syria is going to come out of this mess is not clear at all to me.

Already on this blog you have those of the Christian faith who forget about Syrian nationality and revert to their religious identity with their insistence that whatever new regime comes preserves their rights and values and culture. All good and worthy except that they do not want it to come from the majority Sunni population. They want to remain Christian first while the Sunnis should be Syrian first. The majority should not crush any minority; to the contrary it should preserve the right of the minority but not favor one group over another. Under the law there is no difference, for culture and equal opportunity; the opinion of the majority should not deprive anyone of their diversity.

Read our Alawi colleagues who have an inconceivable view of a Syria where the majority Sunnis can organize as a religious political party. They want no political Islam at all. Being a member of the MB is a death sentence. How can they fit into a new secular Syria if they want to keep their Alawi fear of the Sunni majority.

How is it that we find it acceptable that Maliki declares he is a Shia first and a Muslim second and an Iraqi third in a country that has Kurds and Christians and Sunnis and Jews in its midst?

So it is clear the rallying ideas of Arab nationalism are dead and buried. The rallying ideas of political Islam today would exclude many non Muslims and many moderate Muslims and many non religious people.

Syrian nationalism has not seen the day of light.

So we are going to go on fighting for one side to prevail over the other. The minority regime in Syria cannot hope to continue to rule over the majority and they are betting on all or nothing strategy. I do not know how they think that they will continue to rule if they prevail: how are you going to rebuild, on what basis, on what justice system, on what elections system; on what constitution. If they think that they can continue to rule like before they are either incredibly stupid or incredibly brutal or both.

If the Sunnis are going to prevail what will they do with Christians? Exclude them, what will they do to Alawis? Declare them apostates? Kill them all?

So I would say that if we cannot live together let us separate peacefully. If we do it by force, many will die and all remaining entities will not be viable. If we do it as a federation then perhaps we can survive.

So in summary I see a completely bankrupt ideological desert today in the ME. All of the intellectuals have been killed and exiled and I will give you two examples: one Baker Sadr in Iraq a real thinker of Islam is dead under Saddam and in Syria people like Haitham Maleh who always brought the rule of law as his protest was imprisoned and exiled.

So what we have are nothing more than criminals committing crimes against humanity on a large scale and on numerous small scale having created a complete desert of ideas. Like the Ghouta that shrank from 130 000 acres to 28 000 acres and the huge desertification of Syria and the huge destruction of the educational and justice system you have now complete destruction of the country by force of arms.

So I have seen how Syrian society was destroyed under the rule of the Assads: corrupt justice, brutal security services, sectarian hatred, incredible divisions of groups, economic extraction of people’s wealth, educational disaster, and defeats against outside enemies from 67 to 73 to 82 to 91 to 03 to 05 to 2011. …

Now this tells you that I am optimistic to the hilt about the revolution. For the people to revolt against such a combination of terrible regime is a miracle. … Deep inside there is no doubt in my mind that this is the bravest and most intelligent and most resourceful people on the planet that can continue to make a living in such brutal destructive conditions. …

Qusayr, Hezbollah, and Regional Sectarianism

Syrian war widens Sunni-Shia schism as foreign jihadis join fight for shrines – Guardian – Syrian rebels say they respect all holy sites but damage to Sayyida Zeinab shrine has spurred 10,000 Shias to volunteer

Photograph: Reuters. Iraqi Shia fighters salute the shrine of Sayyida Zeinab in Damascus.

Not long after a friend called from Damascus to tell him one of the holiest shrines in Shia Islam had been damaged by Syrian rebels, Baghdad student Ammar Sadiq was on the move.

Raging with a desire for vengeance, the 21-year-old set off for the border, a six-hour drive through Iraq’s western deserts. He was one more jihadist on a road to war, a well-trodden path through lands that not long ago were used by jihadists coming the other way. When he got to Syria, however, he did not plan to join the Sunni insurgents now blazing through the north, but the equally vehement Shia groups defending the capital.

“It was like a thunderbolt hit me,” said Sadiq. “My friend was telling me that wahhabis from Saudi and Afghanis were trying to destroy the [Shia] shrine of Sayyida Zeinab. I did not wait even to tell my parents. All I was thinking of is to go to Syria and protect the shrine, though I have not used a weapon in my life.”

Sadiq was trying to join a group named Abu Fadl al-Abbas, which over the past 14 months has emerged as one of the most powerful in Syria.

Interviews with serving and former members of Abu Fadl al-Abbas suggest that upwards of 10,000 volunteers – all of them Shia Muslims, and many from outside Syria – have joined their ranks in the past year alone. The group’s raison d’etre is to be custodian of Shia holy sites, especially Sayyida Zeinab, a golden-domed Damascus landmark, but its role has taken it to most corners of Syria’s war. It is now a direct battlefield rival, both in numbers and power, for Jabhat al-Nusra, the jihadist group that takes a prominent role among opposition fighting groups.

Word of Abu Fadl al-Abbas has spread to Baghdad and elsewhere in the Shia diaspora. Many of its volunteers hail from Iraq’s Shia heartland, where the group started some time last year with a fatwa delivered in Najaf by the renowned cleric Abu al-Qasim al-Ta’ai, who gave religious authority to the Shia going to fight in Syria.

The effect led to a surge of young Iraqis wanting to wage jihad and a groundswell of community support for a sectarian war in a neighbouring state, less than five years after similar bloodletting had ravaged Iraq.

Recruitment centres soon opened; militia leaders who had guided the rampage against the Sunni rebellion from 2004, first against the occupying American army, then against the ancient theocratic foe, were again mobilised. Cadres were called to arms, just as they were in 2006 when al-Qaida in Iraq succeeded – twice – in destroying another holy Shia mosque, the Imam al-Askari shrine in Samarra.

For Sadiq, however, joining Abu Fadl al-Abbas did not prove easy. First, Iraqi border guards advised him not to cross into Syria. They eventually let him pass after believing his story of trying to reach his family. He made it as far as Deir al-Zour, a city largely in control of rebels and the al-Qaida-aligned Jabhat al-Nusra, a group that no young Iraqi Shia wants to encounter without support.

Sadiq found the leaders in Damascus of Abu Fadl al-Abbas and soon learned that recruitment carried with it strict duties and obligations that he had not expected.

“The moment you join the brigade, you have to join the Syrian government army,” he said. “You have to fight with President Bashar al-Assad before you fight for [the brigade]. The Syrian army will tell you that you have to know that you are protecting Syria, not only the shrine.”

His quest wavering in the face of a very different role to the guard duty he had anticipated and relentless pressure from relatives back home, Sadiq gave up on his quest for jihad and returned to Baghdad.

Abu Fadl Al-Abbas has been more prominent in recent months than at any time since it started operating around in about March last year. Its increased role on the battlefields has come at the same time as Hezbollah has publicly stepped up its involvement, particularly in leading the attack on the border town of Qusair. Over the same period a weary Syrian army has had a boost in both morale and energy. A war that was starting to look unwinnable now looks to have an end point after all.

“There is no major fight anywhere, except the far north and east where Abu Fadl al-Abbas isn’t deployed,” said a Syrian businessman who has helped integrate Shias from outside Syria into the group. “Its influence is very important and growing.”

The increased organisation of the group was evident in Baghdad, according to Sadiq. “The first step is to register with one of the Shia Islamic resistance offices, like Righteous League [Asaib al-Haq], Mukhtar Army or Iraqi Hezbullah.”

Then comes a trip to a boot camp in Iran. “You have to enrol on a 45-day training course in Iran to be specialised in using a specific weapon like rocket launchers, Kalashnikov, sniper rifle or RPGs [rocket-propelled grenades]. After the course, you will be handed over to an Iranian middleman who will take you to Syria to join the brigade.”

Murtadha Aqeel, 21, a college student from Baghdad, decided to join the jihadists in Syria at the end of 2011. He registered his name and was told that he had two choices, either to join the fighting near Sayyida Zeinab or in Darayya, south-east of Damascus, home to another Shia shrine, Sukayna, named after a daughter of Imam Hussain.

“If you go to Syria, you have one choice only, which is to die,” Murthada said. “You stay for two or three months and come home for two months. Then you return.” Murthada trained with a Kalashnikov on the plains of southern Iraq; gruelling 12-hour days with a thousand other would-be jihadists. He said he was sent to Mashhad in Iran, then to Beirut, and on to Damascus by aeroplane.

“Once you get to the capital, there is a training centre near the shrine where all volunteers have to do a quick session of military training. Then they meet with Abu Ajeeb ([the commander of Abu Fadl al-Abbas] who asks all the volunteers to be careful and to go home safe,” Murthada said.

“All of the volunteers come from abroad. We have everything to facilitate our fight. There are all kinds of weapons, no shortages at all. Three meals and hotels to host the fighters, mobiles and internet which are never cut.”

In spite of the presence of the Sayyida Zeinab shrine, the battle to control the area, which is an essential approach to Damascus, has descended into a grinding but lethal stalemate.

“We face repeated attacks by the FSA [Free Syrian Army] all day, especially by mortars and artillery,” Murthada said. “We were able to fortify the shrine … but the mortars are giving us a hard time. The attacks get even more intense at night. Four of my colleagues were killed by snipers; one of them was Iraqi, another was Lebanese and the other two were Iranians. More than 35 others were wounded.

“There is no need for the Syrian army in Sayyida Zeinab. The brigade’s fighters are protecting everything from the airport to the capital to Sweida [a Druze town near the Golan Heights], including residential areas, hospitals, government buildings, police stations, schools, mosques and hospitals.”

Just over the barricades that now carve a jagged path through central Damascus and surround the gold-topped shrine, Syrian opposition fighters have been monitoring the prominence of the Shia group. Almost all the rebel fighters, a mix of mainstream Syrians who want to replace Assad and jihadists whose battle has little to do with the country they are fighting in, rail against their enemy on the issue of Sayyida Zeinab, accusing the regime of using it as a pretext for inviting Shia fighters to join the conflict.

Abu Ahmed, an FSA commander operating near the Sayyida Zeinab shrine, said he and other Sunnis had no wish to damage it. Many in his ranks used to be local shopkeepers, whose livelihoods depended on the Shia tourist trade. He said the siege of the shrine began last July after a bomb killed four senior Syrian security figures in central Damascus. “The Shia went down to the streets with their arms and blocked all the roads and began to detain people,” he said. “They killed a lot of our fighters. Then they began to gather around the shrine with members of Hezbollah, the [Iraqi] Mahdi Army and Syrian Shia.

“Since last July till today, we are fighting with them every day. We suggested a buffer zone around the shrine, but they refused. We are the biggest losers if the shrine is destroyed as we will lose our businesses,” Abu Ahmed said.

A leader of Jabhat al-Nusra in Damascus, who called himself Abu Hafs, said: “These Shia fighters have been in Syria since the beginning of the revolution fighting with the regime. We know that Iran and Iraq are sending fighters to Syria – only now it has become public.”

Jabhat al-Nusra, which includes large numbers of foreign fighters in its ranks, has made little effort to hide its hatred of the Shia branch of Islam and its willingness to attack shrines that are important to its followers.

Groups that fight under the banner of the Free Syria Army, however, are much less inclined to view the Shia as a theocratic foe, regarding them instead as a powerful backer of their main enemy, the regime. “Now, they are in Qusair,” said Abu Hafs. “They kill everyone they see on their way, even children. They slaughter them by knives. We are in a continuous fight with them in Damascus and Qusair.

“We worship God and they worship graves, but we also avoid attacking religious sites. A week ago, the Syrian army was hiding behind a church – we cancelled our attack in order not to destroy the church.”

Abu Hafs’s claim to be a protector of shrines is derided by Shia fighters. One of them, Jamal al-Ali, a member of Hezbollah who had volunteered to fight with Abu Fadl al-Abbas, said: “You have to know that the aim of these rebels is to destroy the Alawite state in Syria and to start that they have to destroy all the shrines. They are issuing endless calls for jihad against Hezbollah and Abu Fadl al-Abbas.

Back in Baghdad, Sadiq is preparing for a second bid at jihad. Hoping to make his next trip more successful than the last, he is waiting for a chaperone – a Lebanese woman based in the US – to take him to Beirut and finally back to Syria.

Hezbollah’s Vietnam? – by Michael Young

The only thing odd about Hezbollah’s intervention in the Syrian conflict is that it took over two years for the party and its backers in Tehran to make the decision. That’s because whatever one thinks of Hezbollah, the triumph of Syria’s rebels always posed an existential threat to the party and its agenda.

… Hezbollah’s deepening involvement in the Syrian war is a high-risk venture. Many see this as a mistake by the party, and it may well be. Qusayr will be small change compared to Aleppo, where the rebels are well entrenched and benefit from supply lines leading to Turkey. …

Many will be watching closely to see how the current crisis in Turkey affects Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ability to react to the Syrian situation, particularly if the epicenter of the fighting shifts to Aleppo. Erdogan has faced the displeasure among many in Turkey’s southern border areas with their government’s policy in Syria. At the same time, a defeat of the Syrian rebels in and around Aleppo is not something that Turkey can easily swallow so near to its borders, particularly if Hezbollah is instrumental in the fighting.

Hezbollah is willing to take heavy casualties in Syria, if this allows it to rescue the Assad regime. The real question is what time frame we are talking about, and how this affects the party’s vital interests elsewhere. For now, Hezbollah has entered Syria with no exit strategy. The way in which Hassan Nasrallah framed the intervention indicates that it is open-ended. This will prompt other parties to take actions and decisions they might otherwise have avoided for as long as the Syrian conflict was primarily one between Syrians.

Hezbollah is already a magnet for individuals and groups in Syria keen to take the air out of the region’s leading Shiite political-military organization – or simply to protect their towns and villages. As Qusayr showed, the presence of Hezbollah only induces its enemies to fight twice as hard against the party. As a proxy of Iran, Hezbollah will prompt governments to do the same, and they will see an opportunity to wear down the party and trap it in a grinding, no-win situation.

Playing in the favor of Hezbollah’s enemies is that the party has little latitude to alter its strategy in Syria. It must go all the way, predisposing it to sink ever-deeper into the Syrian quagmire, or until the point where the Syrian regime and pro-regime militias can capture and control territory on their own. That is not easy in a guerrilla war in which rebels have often out-matched the army.

Hezbollah, by contrast, benefits from coordination between the Syrian regime and Russia and Iran. Hezbollah’s entry into the conflict in Syria was, clearly, one facet of a broad counter-attack agreed by the Russians and Iranians, who have slowly but effectively reinforced and reorganized Syria’s army and intelligence services in the past two years. …

Hezbollah Don’t Take No Mess – Pepe Escobar

The “Friends of Syria” are appalled. Their much vaunted “rebel held” stronghold of Qusayr is gone. This BBC headline sums it all up: “Syria conflict: US condemns siege of Qusayr.”

For White House spokesman Jay Carney, “pro-government forces”, to win, needed help from by their “partners in tyranny” – Hezbollah and Iran. Right: so the “rebels” weaponized by Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the CIA, not to mention jihadis of the Jabhat al-Nusra kind, are partners in what, “freedom and democracy”?

Spin out, facts in. This is a monster strategic defeat for the NATO-Gulf Cooperation Council-Israel axis. The supply lines from Lebanon to Homs of the Not Exactly Free Syrian Army (FSA) gangs and the odd jihadi are gone. The Syrian Arab Army (SAA) will next move to Homs and the whole Homs governorate. The final stop will be two or three Aleppo suburbs still controlled by the FSA.

There’s absolutely no way Qusayr can be spun in the West as yet another “tactical withdrawal” by the FSA. The rebels insist they “withdrew”. Nonsense. It was a rout.

This, in a nutshell, is how it happened. Qusayr had been under control of the Homs-based al-Farouk brigade, part of the FSA, for no less than 18 months. Six months ago, the SAA had already cleared the Syrian north-south highway, not far from the city – essential for all Damascus-Aleppo business.

Qusayr was strategically crucial as a key weaponizing depot for the FSA; Sunnis in Lebanon were relentlessly shipping them weapons through the Bekaa valley. So the first thing the SAA did was to encircle Qusayr. Then Hezbollah stepped in – as most of Qusayr’s population of 30,000 had already left for either Lebanon or Jordan.

The final, wily SAA tactic was to allow the Aleppo-based al-Tawhid brigade to sneak into Qusayr to help the al-Farouk. So when these twin top FSA brigades were properly encircled, the SAA pounced. Virtually no civilians were in town, apart from a few farmers nearby. There was no “genocide”.

And then Paris went chemical

When will the NATO-GCC axis ever learn? Hezbollah’s Sheikh Nasrallah staked his reputation by going on air and promising a victory. Once again, he delivered. Contrary to Western spin, Hezbollah did not do it by itself; it was a combination of SAA, Hezbollah and Iranian specialists applying superior tactics and displaying crack urban warfare knowledge.

It’s also easy to forget that a prime wet dream among US Think Tanklanders these past few months was the possibility of pitting Hezbollah against al-Qaeda-linked jihadis inside Syria. They got their wish.

Hezbollah fighters though don’t need to overextend themselves and venture inside Syria further than Qusayr – which is roughly 10 km from the Lebanese border. Their “mission” is in practice to secure the Syrian side of the Lebanese border.

And talk about precious timing; the “fall” of Qusayr totally blew away a monster chemical weapons propaganda orchestrated by Paris. French Minister of Foreign Affairs Laurent Fabius is breathlessly spinning that “Bashar’s army” used sarin gas against the “rebels”. French media is gung-ho for a military intervention.

There is a slight problem though. Buried in sensationalist reports in Le Monde or Liberation is the fact that the French scientific analyses – based on two samples, one of them collected by Le Monde reporters – do not specify who used sarin, the government or the “rebels”. Even UN experts, in their official report, have admitted as much.

So once again – don’t mess with Hezbollah. One can imagine the ear-splitting wrath levels in Washington, London, Paris, Tel Aviv, Riyadh and Doha. Their “response” – or revenge – may include setting Lebanon on fire. The usual imperial courtiers, Brookings Institution-style, are already mourning a Middle East prey to an “aggressive Russian-Iranian axis”. [3] What about the aggressive NATO-GCC-Israel axis bent on totally destroying Syria to install an Islamist, pro-Western puppet state?

The Susan and Samantha show
And now, to compound the drama, we have Susan Rice as the new US National Security Adviser and Samantha Power as the new US ambassador at the UN Security Council. It’s always helpful to remember that along with Hillary Clinton, these were the Three Graces of “humanitarian intervention” that forcefully pushed for the bombing and destruction of Libya. …

Armed men declare Al-Qusayr a “Shiite city” – NOW

A video posted Saturday on YouTube showed gunmen purportedly speaking with a Lebanese accent declaring Syria’s Al-Qusayr a “Shiite city,” after rebels lost the battle for this strategic area. The men shown in the video raised a Shiite flag that read “Ya Hussein,” one of the Shiites’ most revered religious figures, on one of the city’s Sunni mosques. They were also chanting “we are the sons of Ali,” another key figure in the Shiite and Alawite Muslim confessions.

Qusair – the Syrian city that died – BBC’s Lyse Doucet was the first western journalist to enter Qusair after it fell and returned a day later to see how it had changed

There is a maxim that’s often been invoked in war – to save a city, you have to destroy it. That has been the fate of Qusair.

Before it was plunged into battle some 18 months ago, it was a thriving border city of 30,000 set in lush groves of olives and apricots. Now, local officials tell us, only about 500 people still live in a place that lies in utter ruin.

On our second visit to Qusair since it fell to government forces in the early hours on Wednesday, we found a calmer place, with none of the edginess or frenzied celebration we witnessed in the immediate aftermath of battle.

There is more traffic on the streets but it is almost all soldiers travelling in tanks and trucks, on motorcycles and bicycles.

Most are piled high with mattresses, TVs, fridges and furniture as soldiers move from one abandoned building to the next, taking away as much as they can carry.

We only came across one family returning to their house. They fled a year ago when rebels captured Qusair. They came back to a place they didn’t recognise as home.

Blood Group Lists

Abu Samar sifts through one pile and holds up a rifle scope, a holster for a pistol, someone’s notes from classes in Islamic teaching, a games console. Shirts with symbols of the Free Syrian Army’s Farouk Brigades are thrown on a chair.

Taped to the wall is a handwritten list of the blood groups of fighters who lived here.

Abu Samar’s wife quickly bundles up possessions her own family had left behind, including children’s stuffed toys, glass plates still in their boxes, and plump cushions.

“Will you come back here to live?” I ask. “No, never,” she declares, fighting back tears.

They quickly drive away in a car bulging with their goods through a city where every house on every street is as ravaged as their own. But even more worrying than Qusair’s immense physical damage, the social fabric of society has been ripped apart.

Down a desolate street, a battered Church of St Elias symbolises how many Syrians of many faiths once lived here together. This Christian place of worship has not just been destroyed, it’s been desecrated by the fighting. Its marble floor is now carpeted in rubble and broken glass. Religious icons are defaced, prayer books burnt, the altar smashed.

On the other side of Qusair, next to a shattered hospital used over the past year by both sides as a base, we ask a group of soldiers about the terrible price the city has paid.

“It pains me to see these ruins,” says one young man doing military service who wears civilian clothes. “This hospital cost a lot to build, from the taxes my family and other families paid.”

“People will return,” insists another young soldier who joins our conversation. “They will come back to a city that will be even better, and their lives will be even better than before.”

They all blame the rebels for this wasteland of war. “This is what they call freedom,” declares a soldier who stops to show us improvised artillery pieces wrapped in cling film and packed with explosives. “They use these against us because they hate us.”

The battle lines in Qusair and across much of Syria are harshly drawn along political and increasingly sectarian lines. They’re even more defined now that Hezbollah fighters from neighbouring Lebanon have publicly joined forces with Syrian troops. They move openly in the streets of Qusair. One man boldly approaches us wearing a headband in the movement’s distinctive yellow and green colours, and a ribbon around his wrist.

I ask about the latest battle. “It wasn’t hard,” he confidently replies and then confirms reports that Lebanese fighters are now going in and out of Syria on rotation, moving across a border so close you can see it from the edges of the city. “It was easy as pie,” boasted another as he challenged me to guess his nationality.

I ask some Syrian soldiers what they make of the controversial presence of Hezbollah. “Why shouldn’t they fight with us?” one demands. “The other side is sending in fighters from Libya, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Afghanistan. Half the world is fighting in Syria.” …

Hezbollah fighter details ops in Qusayr – NOW

… NOW talks to Hezbollah fighter Abou Ali, who has been deployed to Qusayr.

Why are you fighting in Syria?

Syria has supported the resistance for over 30 years, we need to remain loyal to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.

Don’t you worry that Hezbollah’s involvement in Syria will significantly weaken Hezbollah? Do you believe that you can still fight Israel while waging war on another major front?

People have to understand that Hezbollah is now a regional party. The war in Syria is a preemptive strike on an enemy that was going to export the Syrian conflict into Lebanon; and Hezbollah will not allow for its military and strategic interests to be threatened without responding to such a threat. It will also not enter a war unless it is sure it can win it. Hezbollah can still fight simultaneously on three fronts: in Syria, in the south against Israel, as well as internally. We are expecting to fight a war internally because we feel that those [foreign backers] who are spending money locally are now going to make use of it. All the indicators point in that direction.

Does the war waged by Hezbollah against the Syrian rebels bear any similarity with the war with Israel?

It’s actually very different from Lebanon, with the exception of the battles of Bint Jbeil (in the south), where the terrain and towns with houses built very close together are in many ways similar to Qusayr. Elite and special forces that are now deployed in Qusayr are using the training in street fighting they received in Iran, which was done in mock cities specifically built for this purpose.

Who is Hezbollah fighting in Syria? Is it possible that in a country as big as Syria the rebellion might be solely comprised of foreigners?

Most militants I met were foreign fighters: Europeans, Gulf Arabs, Chechens, Jordanians, and even Filipinos from the Abu Sayyaf movement! Syrians only play a supporting and secondary role in the rebellion unless they fought in Iraq or Libya. These takfiris are savage enemies; they chop off their enemies’ heads because they believe beheading will promote them (on earth and in heaven). Gulf  Arabs are also respected by rebels because they are usually wealthy and can offer a certain financial support to brigades. Jordanians and Somalis are those participating the most in suicide bombings.

Fighting in Qusayr has entered in its third week; why has it been so hard for you to take over the border area?

Qusayr was initially divided in 16 military areas, today an area of five blocks still remains in the control of rebels from the Nusra Front who have taken civilians hostage. We are trying to avoid civilian casualties as much as possible, which is slowing down the process. Rebels who are arrested are immediately transferred to the Syrian intelligence so that they can be used in hostage exchange operations.

Rebels are using guerrilla techniques against you in Qusayr. How are you responding to them and what weapons are being used?

We have called upon our specialists to neutralize the tunnel networks built by rebels in certain sectors of Qusayr. These specialists helped Hamas build their tunnel networks in Gaza. Tunnels usually have a basic structure, it is easy for specialists to understand how they work, and they are helping us to destroy them by booby-trapping access and exit points. Rebels have also booby-trapped houses, so the only way to secure a certain perimeter is by blowing up walls to make holes. We are also relying on massive air raids in our military operations to wear down the rebels. Weapons used are mortars, PKK, Dushka, Russian 75, 106, as well as 155.

Many Hezbollah fighters have died in Qusayr. Some have attributed the high death toll to the inexperience of fighters who were sent initially. Is it true?

No it’s not. Reservists who were first sent to Qusayr had received from one month to three or six months training here in Lebanon. It is now the elite and special forces of Hezbollah who are fighting in Qusayr. Everyone who goes to fight in Syria has received a taklif sharii (a religious command).

Is Hezbollah present all over Syria?

At the beginning of the war, elite forces were initially responsible for protecting Shiite shrines. They have now been deployed in different Syrian areas. Besides Qusayr, we are now fighting in Aleppo and rural areas surrounding it, as well as the suburbs of Damascus, Hama, and Idlib. In the Damascus suburbs and Aleppo, we are leading similar operations than those launched in Qusayr due to the nature of the terrain.

Are Iranians fighting in Qusayr?

No, but there are Iraqis in certain Damascus areas more particularly around Shiite shrines.

What is Hezbollah’s role in the current Syrian war? Is it collaborating with the regime’s new People’s Army?

Hezbollah is leading operations in Qusayr; the Syrian army is only playing a secondary role, deploying after an area is completely ‘cleaned’ and secured.   Hezbollah officers coordinate with the People’s Army but fighters never interact. The People’s Army is usually last to deploy after the Syrian army, as they have a better understanding of the area and its residents.

Gulf Arabs pledge sanctions against Hezbollah members over Syria – Reuters

Gulf Arab states on Monday promised sanctions against members of the Lebanese Shi’ite militant group Hezbollah in retaliation for its intervention in Syria’s civil war in support of President Bashar al-Assad.

Both Sunni and Shi’ite Arab states long backed Hezbollah as a bulwark against Israel, but the Arab League, heavily influenced by Sunni-led Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, last week strongly condemned Hezbollah’s intervention, highlighting how Syria’s war is widening sectarian divisions in the region.

The six Sunni-led members of the Gulf Cooperation Council issued a similar condemnation on Monday, according to a statement from the GCC secretariat carried by the Saudi Press Agency. “The GCC ministerial council has decided to take measures against those enlisted in the party (Hezbollah) residing in the member states, whether with regard to their residencies or their financial and commercial dealings,” it added, without giving any specific details.

Saudi Arabia and Qatar, both GCC members and U.S. allies, have been explicit in calling for Assad to go, and have been helping to arm the mostly Sunni rebels seeking to oust him and his mostly Alawite establishment, members of an offshoot of Shi’ite Islam.

But the rebels suffered one of their biggest setbacks last week when Hezbollah fighters helped Assad’s forces to retake the Syrian border town of Qusair, which controls vital supply lines.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said last week that Syria and Lebanon faced a common threat from radical Sunni Islamists. …

Is Qatar guilty of sectarianism in Syria? – Michael Stephens

Let’s be clear here, Qatar lost in Qusair. It is embarrassing and undermines two years and $3bn of financial support to the rebel movement. And it is time that Qatar began to take some responsibility for things Qaradawi has said, and is saying with regards to Syria.

Much has been made of the increasing sectarian dynamic in the Syrian conflict. The entry of Hezbollah to defend Shia in Syria and the use of Shia fighters to aid the Army of Bashar al Assad in taking the town of Qusair has brought this particular angle under the spotlight. Increasingly we are beginning to think of this conflict as an all-out sectarian death match in which Islam’s two sects fight a zero sum game.

Whilst the extent of sectarian motivations held by Syrians themselves is still reasonably up for question, there can be no doubt that external fighters lack the nuance of the vast majority of their coreligionists inside Syria. Hezbollah and Shia fight to defend Shia shrines and villages from being destroyed by Sunni extremists: Sunnis fight to prevent Sunni civilians and towns from being destroyed by an Allawi Iran-backed Army.

Behind these Sunni fighters stand Saudi Arabia, Turkey and of course Qatar. Qatar especially has become increasingly associated as promoters of Sunni interests in the region directly at the expense of Shia, which has caused a rift between itself and its once strong ally, Hezbollah.

In an interesting piece about Qatar’s break in relations with Hezbollah Emirati commentator Sultan al Qassemi notes ‘a media war is in full swing between Hezbollah and its allies in Iran and Syria against Qatar, which is returning the punches via Al Jazeera Arabic which reflects the spiralling of relations between both parties’. True, Qatar’s relationship with Hezbollah is irreparably damaged as a result of its actions in Syria, and Hezbollah’s response. Likewise there is undoubted tension between Qatar and Iran, which is only alleviated by both sides’ need to maintain cordial relations over the maritime enormous gas field they both share.

But the break with Hezbollah is not just reflected by television stations. Qatar plays host to an icon of the Muslim world, Sheikh Yussuf Qaradawi the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual leader, and an immensely influential force across the Sunni Muslim world.

Qaradawi has struggled to maintain coherence since the outbreak of the Arab Spring. His more recent sermons have rambled into incoherent self-contradictory tirades against whomever he has deemed worthy of finding fault with that week. His knee-jerk rejection of protests in neighbouring Bahrain as simply being a sectarian attempt by Iranian backed Shia to harm Sunnis first got me wondering whether he was really seeing events in the Arab world outside of sectarian parameters. Those who follow Bahrain closely will know that it is a far more complex conundrum than a simple Sunni-Shia paradigm.

Last week Qaradawi revealed his true colours when he called Hezbollah the party of Satan and urged “a jihad in Syria against Bashar al-Assad and Hezbollah, which are killing Sunnis and Christians and Kurds.” One hardly expects that Kurds and Christians will run to the Sheikh’s call, and so it is Sunnis alone who will be spurred into action to defend Syria, something the garrulous Sheikh of course intended. Unsurprisingly Saudi Arabia’s Grand Mufti Abdulaziz Al sheikh has backed Qaradawi to the hilt.

In true fashion the rhetoric of these Sunni clerics is designed to paint Hezbollah as the sectarian actor, and their position as merely that of standing up against a “repulsive” movement. They are of course correct, Hezbollah’s motivations in Syria are clearly sectarian, but being correct about Hezbollah does not vindicate Qaradawi’s view as moral or just. Both Al Sheikh and Qaradawi see Syria as a war between Sunni and Shia, they stand firmly on the Sunni side and would rejoice in the defeat of Bashar, Hezbollah and Iran and the crippling of the Shia axis.

Qatar’s relations with its own Shia population, estimated at being between 7-10% of the population, are fairly good. Issues to do with the distribution of Shia literature and vetting of clerics have arisen in the past, but as I have previously written Shia can worship, gather, and celebrate their religious festivals without interference. That is not to say some Qataris do not possess anti-Shia views, some certainly do, and many are deeply distrustful of Iran and its intentions for Shia across the region. However Qatar itself is not a country riven with sectarianism, and the leadership has never supported any action that would divide Qataris along sectarian lines.

Given this fact it is important to understand that Qatar’s actions in Syria are not part of some elaborate strategy to destroy Shia or Allawis. Their goal is to remove Bashar and for better or worse this has been the only major driver behind their actions in Syria, dealing a bloody nose to Iran is merely an added bonus.

Yes, it is absolutely the case that Qatar, through a mixture of over-exuberance, lack of foresight, and shoddy vetting, has aided in the arming and financing of groups who hold extremely sectarian views and have acted in sectarian ways. But it would be wrong to assume that Doha picks up the phone to Jabhat al Nusra and orders them to burn down a Shia mosque; they do not and have never supported the sectarian aims held by extremist Sunni fighters.

But let’s be clear here, Qatar lost in Qusair. It is embarrassing and undermines two years and $3bn of financial support to the rebel movement.  We are at a crossroads now, the Shia world has played its trump card and the stakes have increased. Qatar’s decision makers will be anxiously wondering what they can do to respond and stop their side from losing, all the while their most famous guest has begun whipping up the Sunni world and inciting it to Jihad.

The question is whether Qatar stands behind this man and his call for Sunni Jihad. Qaradawi is not the Emir of Qatar, and there is no explicit support for his views from the ruling elite. However the linkage between the elite and Qaradawi is not clear, leading Middle East commentator Marc Lynch has claimed that ‘Like Al Jazeera Qaradawi’s stances now seem to more closely follow Qatari foreign policy’.

It is time that Qatar began to take some responsibility for things Qaradawi has said, and is saying with regards to Syria. Qatar has repeatedly insisted in discussions with international diplomats that it abhors sectarianism, and is deeply troubled by the sectarian drift in Syria. But remaining silent as Qaradawi spews fire from his pulpit hardly instils much confidence.

If Qaradawi continues to urge Jihad we can only assume that Qatar tacitly supports this as a tactic for turning the tide back in favour of the rebels.  Qatar’s leadership needs to understand that whilst there are internal and external complications associated with rebuking Qaradawi; continually allowing him to pontificate from Doha will mean they become tarred by his naked sectarianism.

Top Egypt cleric condemns ‘sectarian’ foes in Syria – Reuters

Egypt’s most senior Muslim cleric, a leading voice of mainstream Sunni Islam across the Middle East, has condemned Shi’ites for engaging in “hateful sectarian strife” in Syria.

In a statement that highlighted a deepening rift in the region since Hezbollah committed itself in the Syrian civil war, Grand Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb also condemned the Lebanese Shi’ite militia for turning away from its struggle against Israel.

… “Syria is nothing but a theatre of the absurd in this battle which has become a Shi’ite-Sunni struggle,” Tayeb, who heads Cairo’s 1,000-year-old al-Azhar academy, said in comments made on Monday.

“We would have wished that the Shi’ites would reject this bait, but the last few days have led one to believe that they have fallen into the trap of hateful sectarian strife.”

Al-Azhar, like the Muslim Brotherhood which now governs Egypt, has historically been more open than Saudi clerics toward Iran and Shi’ite Arabs.

But the Syrian war hardened attitudes and the latest actions by Iran-backed Hezbollah on the battlefield have alienated many Sunnis in the region who once admired its fight against Israel.

“Everyone has now become busy, looking away from the Zionist entity, and especially after Hezbollah joined in the fighting alongside the regime against the Syrian people,” said Tayeb, who has previously criticized Hezbollah but in less harsh terms.

“Liberating Jerusalem does not pass through Qusair or Homs; al-Azhar can do nothing but condemn this intervention, which contributes to yet more bloodshed and the tearing apart of the national fabric of Syria and the region.”

Syria Is Now Saudi Arabia’s Problem – The battle for a town on the Lebanese border marks the kingdom’s first attempt to lead Syria’s fractured opposition. – Hassan Hassan – FP

The opposition’s talks in Istanbul lasted for more than a week, and the coalition’s Brotherhood-dominated General Assembly first refused to accept the expansion plan, despite ferocious pressure from Western ambassadors and representatives from the Gulf states. But according to Gulf sources, the coalition members were given an ultimatum a day before they finally accepted the expansion plan — either accept it or Idriss would announce the creation of an FSA political wing that would supersede the coalition altogether. The General Assembly members backed down and accepted an even worse deal than what had initially been proposed.

To be sure, the Saudis could not have bolstered their leverage within the opposition without help from countries like the United States and Jordan. Riyadh works closely with almost all the players in the Syrian conflict, barring Qatar and Turkey. Contrary to popular belief, the kingdom supports moderate groups within the Syrian rebels to counter the influence of the Brotherhood and its Qatari patrons. As a result, Saudi Arabia’s increased influence may help temper some of the rising fears of extremist trends within the armed opposition. Of course, the kingdom also supports Salafi-leaning groups to counter jihadi groups such as the al Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra.

Washington has recently stepped up financial monitoring efforts to ensure that any aid to the Syrian rebels goes through Idriss, according to informed sources from the Gulf. These measures will of course be difficult to enforce, owing to the activities of private donors with established channels with the Syrian rebels — and also due to the poorly regulated financial institutions of some countries, such as Kuwait. But they nevertheless mark an attempt to empower Idriss, and consequently the Saudis.

Nonetheless, Qatar can still pull a few strings within the opposition. A Syrian activist told me that Turkey-based representatives from Qatar had declined to meet a rebel group from Idlib a week before the opposition’s talks in Istanbul. But after the expansion of the coalition, the representatives called the group back and apparently provided it with the ammunition it needed. Doha’s influence may have decreased, but it can still use its established channels to maintain leverage over armed groups.

As it consolidates its takeover of the opposition, another factor that favors the Saudis is its tentative rapprochement with the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood. Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal met last month with the Brotherhood’s deputy leader, Mohammed Tayfour, for the first time. The Brotherhood had requested the meeting to mend its relations with the kingdom, which had shunned the group and stated privately on more than one occasion that it rejects the Brotherhood’s dominance of Syria. The meeting was not an indication that the kingdom has opened it heart to the Brotherhood, as some have argued, but was meant to contain the group as Riyadh takes over from Qatar.

Still, the Saudis currently have little leeway to exercise their newfound influence. Washington and Moscow are still intent on organizing a “Geneva 2” conference, intended to bring together representatives from the Syrian regime and the opposition to reach a negotiated settlement. The preparations for Geneva 2 have meant that military options, such as increased aid for the rebels, are on pause until the talks take place or fail. …

In Shift, More US Officials See Assad Gaining Momentum – WSJ

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is gaining momentum in the country’s civil war with aid from Hezbollah and is unlikely to fall in the foreseeable future, a growing number of U.S. intelligence and defense officials believe, in what officials say is a sharp divergence from the Obama administration’s long-held view.

The shifting views have fueled a behind-the-scenes debate within intelligence agencies as President Barack Obama and his top advisers this week renew consideration of options to aid anti-Assad forces, including one that would provide moderate fighters with American arms.

Some intelligence analysts now think Mr. Assad could hold onto power or even prevail in the conflict. That view is at odds with those of others within the intelligence community who think recent military gains by Syrian government forces and Hezbollah fighters aren’t likely to alter the overall trajectory of a conflict that they still think will end with Mr. Assad’s removal, the officials said.

… A decision to provide U.S. arms to moderate rebels would be an about-face for Mr. Obama, who opposed a similar proposal last year because of concerns the weapons could end up in the hands of radical Islamists aligned with al Qaeda.

Underscoring such concerns, the battle last week for the strategic town of Qusayr pitted the Syrian regime, backed by Shiite militia Hezbollah, against rebels whose ranks included the Sunni Jabhat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda linked group.

The new proposal to arm rebel groups has gained traction inside the White House, even though some of Mr. Obama’s top defense and intelligence advisers have made clear in recent months that they think the idea makes little military sense and may be riskier than ever.

Administration officials say they believe they can put in place sufficient safeguards to prevent American arms from reaching the Islamists.

Why Iraq Is On the Precipice of Civil War – Atlantic

…we can identify some of the factors that are feeding Iraq’s present security nightmare.

The immediate threat is a renewed Sunni-Salafi insurgency.

In 2007-08, afflicted by a “surge” of additional American forces, a relentless Special Forces campaign and suffering the fury of alienated Iraqis, Al Qa’ida in Iraq ( AQI) was gutted. Its mid-high ranks were decimated and its operational mobility severely restricted. The consequences were profoundly positive — violence plummeted. Sadly, the peace hasn’t lasted. Now, facing an Iraqi government that lacks the intelligence targeting capabilities of the U.S. government, AQI’s effective successor, the Islamic State of Iraq ( ISI), is wreaking havoc. Waging a campaign of murder against Iraqi Shia, these terrorists want to exacerbate an ongoing government crackdown against Iraqi Sunnis. Their sustaining objective is unambiguous — fostering a cauldron of chaos in which Iraqis detach into base sectarian alliances. In short, they desire a civil war.

So what’s behind the ISI’s empowerment?

Put simply, the ISI’s reconstitution is a symptom of Iraq’s deeper political dysfunction. In the 2010 parliamentary elections, (the Sunni supported) Iraqi National Movement of Iyad Allawi won a plurality of seats. But Iraq’s current Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, didn’t accept the outcome. Following in a troubling tradition of authoritarianism, he was unwilling to give up power. Instead, Maliki promised to form a unity government with Allawi. The idea was that this co-operation would cool tensions and build trust. It hasn’t happened. In fact, the opposite has occurred; we’ve seen renewed arguments over oil sharing, serious disagreements over regional sovereignty, and allegations of high level political harassment. For Maliki it seems, after years of oppression under Saddam Hussein, the incentive for reconciliation isn’t an abiding concern.

Then, in April, the crisis literally exploded. First, the Iraqi Government launched a bloody attack against a Sunni protest camp. Next, in a move that reeked of sectarian persecution, Maliki suspended the licenses of a number of media outlets, including Al Jazeera. On May 17, more than 75 Sunnis were killed in various terrorist massacres. Collectively, these actions have fed into a growing groundswell of sectarian anger. Trust is perishing and in the fear, extremists have found new roots of sympathy. With unrelenting ISI attacks, growing government crackdowns and resurgent Shia hardliners, the storm clouds of civil war are gathering.

Unfortunately as if the above weren’t bad enough, Iraq’s crisis is further complicated by the broader sectarian tensions that are rippling through the Middle East. In Syria, the Lebanese Hezbollah is now waging an open and unrestrained war against the Sunni-dominated rebellion. In Lebanon, suspected Sunni extremists are responding in kind. In a similar vein, the ISI recently claimed responsibility for the killing of over 40 Syrian soldiers who had taken shelter in Iraq. …

Iraq increasingly drawn into Syrian battlefield – AP

Signs are growing that stretches of Iraq and Syria are morphing into a single battlefield for militants, exacerbating Iraq’s slide into renewed deadly chaos a year and a half after U.S. troops pulled out. …

Covering the Syria crisis in light of regional sectarianism is a project from ECFR MENA (European Council on Foreign Relations, Middle East and North Africa) consisting of 8 essays on regional players in the conflict. Four essays are available now (they are: The Gulf, Iran, Iraq, and Jordan), and four more are forthcoming (they will be: Israel, the Kurds, Lebanon and Turkey). The project can be accessed here: “Syria: Views from the Region“

ECFR’s Syria: Views from the Region project aims to explore the regional ramifications of the Syrian uprising. While the conflict is first and foremost a domestic struggle, it has also become the epicentre of a wider struggle – part power-projection, part sectarian, part ideological – with implications for the shaping of a region in flux. The regional aspect of the struggle not only complicates prospects of producing de-escalation and a resolution within Syria but also raises the spectre of a spill-over impact, destabilising and re-shaping the region well beyond Syria’s now porous borders.

The conflict is already sharpening sectarian divides, reinvigorating extremist forces, and exacerbating tensions within the GCC and between the GCC and Iran. Among the immediate neighbours, many teeming with Syrian refugees, Lebanon and Iraq are on a knife’s edge, Jordan nervous, Israel bristling and Turkey deeply embroiled; while Kurdish ambitions have received a new shot in the arm. While there are more unknowns than knowns, what is clear is that as different regional forces play out in the conflict the regional landscape will be profoundly impacted.

Boy Killed for Blasphemy, Foreign Jihadis Participate in Beheading, Attack on Shi’ite Village

Brown Moses provides translation of accounts of rebel execution of boy for blasphemy: English Transcripts Of Witnesses Describing The Execution Of A 14-Year-Old For Blasphemy In Aleppo – Visit page for videos

Today there’s been a number of reports on the execution of Mohammad Katta, a young coffee seller in Aleppo, by men described in some reports as foreign Islamist rebels for blasphemy after telling another boy that “even if Muhammad comes down, I will not give it as debt” when asked to give coffee on credit.  An extremely graphic photograph of the boy has been posted online, showing him shot through the mouth and neck, and videos have now been posted online of the boy’s parents and a witness to the execution, which I’ve had translated into English, with notes from my translator in italics:

0:01 Mother: My son is second only to Hamza al-Khateeb (A boy from Daraa whose torture and execution by Assad’s troops shocked the world in May 2011). No, he is second to none, he is the grand martyr because he was innocent and didn’t hurt anybody. They shot him dead in front of my eyes. This act is against religion and against Sharia. I want to ask Muhammad Hassan (A prominent Egyptian cleric) and the Saudi king whether my boy deserved death or not. If they say there is a rule, I will not object to it.
After he was accused of blasphemous language against the prophet [Muhammad], he replied that he is ready to sacrifice his soul for the sake of Muhammad, expressing his great love for him. He repeated it in front of them, and when they asked him to get in the car he agreed saying that he isn’t guilty. He was only 14 years old and he didn’t reach adulthood (As in civil law, Sharia rules aren’t applied to minors).
Those who killed my son must be brought to justice if it was proved that what they did was out of Sharia rules. My son didn’t join neither part of the war. They just slaughtered him as if he was a lamb or an animal. He was just a boy and had his rights. He used to work in order to provide for us because his father is ill. He was blindfolded and he was bleeding in front of my eyes. I cried: shame on you, why did you do this? There were a crowd of around 300 to 400 men standing there watching and no-one tried saving the boy. He was shot three times; in his head, neck the third in his chest.
3:37 Interviewer: Did you see the men? Were they Islamists?
3:39 Mother: Yes, I saw them. They spoke standard Arabic (Spoken by very religious people only, or what can be called the strict clergymen) and were long-bearded and were wearing short garbs with trousers underneath. One of the three men was from Aleppo and he was seated next to the driver.
4:04 Interviewer Did you recognize him?

4:05 Mother: No, I couldn’t see his face well, but I knew he was from Aleppo by his accent. He told the men to let the boy go but they refused. After they returned with the boy he was hardly able to sit down due to the torture they inflicted on him. His face was covered with his shirt. May God and punish them.

0:01 Father: I am Abd-Alwahab Katta’. My son was 14 years old and he used to sell coffee in front of “Sarj al-Lawz”. He was arguing with a customer and saying that he wouldn’t buy on credit anymore even if Muhammad descended down to earth. I sell in cash only.
At that moment three unidentified men were passing by and heard the boy. They were wearing short garbs and were long-haired spoke standard Arabic. They asked the boy why he was blaspheming but he denied doing so. They ordered him to get in the car and took him away. My younger son came here and told me that they took his brother. He added that they were going to punish him and get back. I said let them punish him by beating or whipping if really said blasphemous words.
After half an hour they came back and put the boy near the coffee stall. My wife heard that there were a crowd of around thirty men in the street and after that we heard the sound of gunshots. My wife cried that they killed the boy because she heard a man reading from a paper. I was giving prayers when I heard two gunshots. I then rushed downstairs to find my son’s body lying on the street. After that the men ran over the boy’s arm and dashed away.
1:34 Interviewer: They said before killing the boy that God accepts the repentance if one blasphemes him unlike when one blasphemes the Prophet and in this case he deserves death.
1:42 Father: Yes, they said this and my son denied blaspheming.
1:52 Interviewer: Whom do you accuse of killing your son? Are they FSA or Islamists?
1:55 Father: I don’t know whether they were FSA, Islamist or Afghans, but they spoke standard Arabic. There are now too many battalions and I can’t distinguish one from the other.
2:05 Interviewer: What was written on the car?
2:07 Father: The car was black and there were three men inside. Those who saw them said that they carried the boy out of the car as he wasn’t able to stand on his feet as a result of severe torture.
2:29 Interviewer: Did he blaspheme?

2:30 Father: No, he didn’t. They asked the crowd to listen to the rule by which my son was killed. “God accepts the repentance if one blasphemes him unlike when one blasphemes the Prophet and in this case he deserves death”.
3:04 Interviewer: Are you going to file a suit?
3:07 Father: I filed a suit to the Sharia [Court] and they came here and I am waiting for what will they do. They gave me its number, here it is.
3:16 Interviewer: What did they say?
3:18 Father: They said they will deal with it.

Following this event, Sheikh Ya’qoubi has issued a fatwa asking foreign jihadists to leave Syria:

Sh. Al-Yaqoubi calls upon foreign fighters to leave Syria
Denunciation of the execution of a boy in Aleppo
By H. Eminence Shaykh Muhammad Al-Yaqoubi

A group of Muslim fighters in Aleppo executed yesterday a fourteen-year-old boy in after accusing him of blasphemy against Prophet Muhammad PBUH.

We denounce this inhuman un-Islamic crime; and we demand that the murderers be captured and brought to justice. They are but a gang of criminals who use religion to cover their thirst for power.

What these criminals just committed is one of the most cruel crimes ever perpetrated by the name of Islam. They murdered an innocent life and executed a child who happened to be a good Muslim from a righteous family who observes Islam; and we confirm that what the child said is not balsphemy against the Prophet of Islam in any form.

In response to the crime, we have issued a detailed fatwa on the impossibility of the implementation of Islamic penalties in today’s Syria. We explained with valid proofs all the errors and fallacies in this crime which was wrongly done in the name of Islamic Shari’a.

On this painful occasion, we call upon all foreign fighters to leave Syria and go back to their homelands. We know our country better and we confirm that we do not need fighters and we thank everyone who sincerely wants to help our people. Yet, we announce that what our people need most is food and medicine and what the Free Syrian Army needs most is ammunition.

Last but not least, we offer our sincere condolences to the family of the boy, praying that Allah grant them patience and forbearance and that their child precede them to the Heavens. We pray that Allah bestow His Infinite Mercy to the martyrs of our country and that He grant our people victory and relieve them from their agony.

Several of the above articles dealt with the foreign presence of Hezbollah supporting regime forces in Syria. Long prior to this development, the presence of foreign jihadis fighting with the rebels grew into a troubling phenomenon. This problematic presence has recently been highlighted by the blasphemy case and other incidents such as the beheading of a prisoner:

Seduced by War, Europeans Join the Fight in Syria – Daily Beast

Men from The Netherlands and other European countries are taking up arms in Syria. But are they even more dangerous than the local fighters? Nadette De Visser reports.

The gruesome video of a beheading in Syria that surfaced on the Internet recently was shocking by any measure. But when people in Belgium and The Netherlands listened to the voices in the background, the terror hit home. The men brutally sawing through their victim’s throat were speaking Dutch, or perhaps the Belgian variant, Flemish, and sometimes switching to French. Suddenly, both Brussels and The Hague, while trying to gauge the authenticity of the footage, are starting to rethink the impact of the Syrian war on Europe.

“We want to know what the hell these guys are doing in Syria,” says Edwin Bakker, an expert on terrorism and counterterrorism at Leiden University and an advisor to the Dutch government. Bakker thinks the footage is genuine and says it is being taken very seriously. “We need to invest in good intelligence,” Bakker says. “We want to know what these guys are doing in Syria, who they’re with, and what they are like when they come back. Is it someone who has regrets, is disappointed? Or is it someone who has experienced many things, gained lots of knowledge, and we should watch him 24 hours a day and, if we can, should we arrest him?”

The Belgian newspaper De Morgen recently published excerpts from transcripts made by the Belgian security service, which was monitoring the radical Sharia4Belgium organization. In the phone calls made from Syria, members of the group describe brutalities committed in the fighting near the city of Aleppo. They claim to have raped and murdered. De Morgen makes a link between those conversations and this video or similar beheadings.

In recent months, law enforcement has been faced with the growing concern of young men heading to the Syrian front from northern European countries to fight against President Bashar al-Assad’s forces. Fighters from Britain, France, Belgium and The Netherlands (there are an estimated 150 to 200 young men from Belgium and The Netherlands alone) have been traveling to the battlefield in Syria to take arms alongside the Islamist rebels against the government troops. Some are from Muslim backgrounds, some are converts to Islam, but all are potentially dangerous because of the military skills they acquire and the shock of what they’ve experienced.

The young men involved in the Sharia4Belgium organization reportedly are commanded by 22-year-old Houssien Elouassaki, whose background is Moroccan but who comes from Vilvoorde, near Brussels. In the phone taps, the group talks of killing imagined enemies of the “true faith,” according to an extremist reading of the Sunni Islam. When Elouassaki talks to his brother in Belgium, he says: “Three days ago we were all allowed to cut someone’s throat.” “You shouldn’t do that,” his older brother, Abdelouafi, answered. “Ah, well, a Kalashnikov or a knife, what difference does it make? They are Shiite and Alawite, so they have to die.” …

The original footage of the beheading has been posted here (Belgian Jihadis, Syrian Rebels Behead Man), but please note my serious warning before viewing: the graphic video shows the decapitation of the prisoner with a knife—this traumatic video should only be consulted as a record of evidence. The poster makes the following comments (merely reading them should be sufficient for many):

I know this is some pretty heavy stuff (it is not my intention to post gore), the main reason I’m posting this is because I’m shocked I’m hearing Dutch (Flemish Dutch) yelled by these savages.

About 100 ‘Belgians’ are ‘fighting’ alongside Al Nusra. This is what they do.

0:40: “Turn around”
0:50: “Turn him on his stomach, yeah that’s good”
0:58: “Hold onto his feet”
2:04: “The knife isn’t good”

This must be the first time in history ‘Belgians’ are decapitating people in the name of their religion. It’s 2013.

If you read Dutch, you can read original reporting here.

Reports emerged yesterday of a Tuesday rebel attack on Hatlah, a Shi’ite village in Deir Ezzor. The attack is being called a massacre. Throughout this conflict, the Syrian regime has maintained a trend of punishing civilian towns and districts whenever small numbers of rebels are believed to be operating there. Single instances of air raids destroy homes and entire neighborhoods where the regime believes rebels are active. More and more now, the instances of rebels carrying out similar attacks of collective punishment are growing. The regime’s narrative is that the attack on Hatlah was directed at civilians; the opposition narrative is that the attack was directed at loyalists who remain aligned with the regime. In either case, it seems clear that the violence was directed at a community (and residential homes), that the attack was sectarian in nature, that foreign jihadis were key participants, and that it resulted in civilian deaths.

A Sunni Muslim militant from Kuwait boasts of killing Shiites in the Syrian village of Hatla, and warns he and his men are about to find more Shiites in their homes and kill them, in a video posted to YouTube on June 11, 2013. / YouTube/CBS

Syria “rebels” behind alleged massacre of Shiites – CBS

Rebels fighters in Syria have attacked a village in the country’s east, killing dozens of Shiites. A Syrian government official denounced the attack, saying it was a “massacre” of civilians.

An opposition group based in London, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of thousands of sources inside Syria from both sides of the conflict, said many of those killed were pro-regime loyalists, but video posted online from the village revealed a much darker side to the war.

The killings, which took place Tuesday in the eastern Deir el-Zour province, highlight the sectarian nature of Syria’s conflict that has killed more than 80,000 people, according to the U.N.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 60 people were killed in the village of Hatla in the oil-rich province that borders Iraq.

With a steady drumbeat from some U.S. and European politicians calling for the West to arm Syria’s rebels, the composition of the rebel force on the ground is vital to understand, and the men who committed at least some of the killings in Hatla were not Syrian, and were not men who the West would want to arm.

In a video posted Tuesday on YouTube, a man shows the dead bodies of several Shiite Syrians in Hatla, and angrily calls on his fellow Sunnis to “massacre” their Shiite compatriots. The man speaking is not Syrian, he is Kuwaiti, and very few of the armed “rebels” seen with him in the video sound Syrian — the accents are largely Kuwaiti and Iraqi. There were other, similar videos posted of the alleged massacre in Hatla.

Thousands of rebels took part in the attack and at least 10 of them were killed in the fighting, said the Observatory. Not all of the fighters will likely have been hardcore Sunni extremists like the Kuwaiti man in the video, but many will have been. This sort of “Syrian rebel” forms a large part of the disparate forces fighting against Assad in Syria.

… In the video seen by CBS News, the Kuwaiti militant who shows off the bodies does not refer to the slain men as fighters, and before his call on Sunnis to kill Shiites, he warns that he and his men are, “now preparing to storm the homes of Shiites who support al-Assad’s regime in the village.”

NYT

Dozens of Shiites Reported Killed in Raid by Syria Rebels – NYT

At least 30 Shiite Muslim residents of a village in eastern Syria were killed in a reprisal raid by rebels, the government and opposition fighters and activists said Wednesday, the latest in a string of massacres underscoring the increasingly sectarian nature of the Syrian conflict.

The Syrian government called the killings, which were reported to have taken place on Tuesday in Hatlah, a village in the oil-rich province of Deir al-Zour, a massacre of civilians, saying that 30 died. Anti-government activists put the toll at 60 and said most of the dead were pro-government militia fighters who had attacked rebels one day earlier. But some of the activists nonetheless condemned the Hatlah attack as a destructive act of revenge that showed the powerlessness of moderates among the mostly Sunni rebels to rein in extremists.

What was not in dispute was that several battalions of Sunni rebels, including members of extremist Islamist groups, stormed the village and, in video posted online by anti-government activists, could be seen setting houses on fire as they shouted sectarian slogans, calling Shiites dogs, apostates and infidels.

“This is your end, you dogs,” a man off camera said as he panned across what he said were the corpses of “pug-nosed” Shiites, including one with what appeared to be a gunshot wound to the head.

“We have raised the banner of ‘There Is No God but God’ over the houses of the rejectionist Shiite apostates,” one fighter chanted in another clip as a black cloud billowed above the village and jubilant gunmen brandished black flags often used by the extremist Al Nusra Front and other Islamist fighting groups.

“Here are the jihadists celebrating their storming of the rejectionists’ houses! The Shiite rejectionists!,” the fighter added. Some extremist Sunnis refer to Shiites as rejectionists because the sect arose from a group that rejected the early successors of the Prophet Muhammad in the seventh century. …

In Kuwait, a Sunni sheik who has used sectarian invective against the Assad government appeared to applaud the “slaughter” of Shiites in Hatlah and to threaten the Shiite villages of Nabl and Zahraa in Aleppo province, in a video noted by Hassan Hassan, a columnist for the Abu Dhabi-based newspaper The National, who is from eastern Syria. …

The Hassan Hassan article mentioned in that last paragraph is here. He says the following about the Kuwaiti sheikh (and it seems a bit surprising to hear a sheikh proclaim “today we slaughtered Hussain and his son”):

Meanwhile, one of Kuwait’s most outspoken supporters of the Syrian rebels acknowledged the killing of the civilians because of their Shia affiliation. Sheilk Shafi Al Ajmi, who has been spewing sectarian venom since the early months of the Syrian uprising, spoke about the killing outside the Lebanese embassy in Kuwait.

“The reality is what [Hizbollah] will see not what it hears. We are not among those who say and do not do. Today, we took the village of Hatla and slaughtered the bad ones with knives as you slaughtered out wives and children in Qusayr, we slaughtered one of your symbols, Hussain, who lived in Hatla, today we slaughtered him and we slaughtered his son with him. This is today. As for tomorrow, we have a date with Nubl and Zahraa [villages in Aleppo] which Hizbollah has come to save, nay. The lions and herose are besieging them. I swear by God that Syria will be a burying ground for Hizbollah.”

Odds and Ends

The curious case of flight SYR602 – MATT NASH – NOW – A SyrianAir flight not listed on the departures board may regularly leave for Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

Every other day for at least the past month, SyrianAir flight number 602 departs from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia in the middle of the night. It’s not listed on the airport’s departures board, nor could any of the half-dozen travel agents that NOW contacted book an interested passenger a seat.

In fact, only SyrianAir’s representative in Beirut could find a record that the flight existed. Other travel agents were simply stumped.

“I’m sorry, sir, there is no flight 602.” …

In Syria, Kidnapping Becomes a ‘Big-Money Business’ – Peter N. Bouckaert, the Geneva-based emergencies director at Human Rights Watch, explains the sudden rise in kidnappings across Syria – Syria Deeply

Karen Leigh, managing editor, Syria Deeply: Can you talk about the rise in kidnappings and the types of kidnappings?

Peter N. Bouckaert: The kidnappings have been going on for about a year, it’s really intensified. It started mostly when fighting broke out in Aleppo, and developed and grown since then into a broader trend across many parts of Syria, and also spilling into neighboring countries. A couple different kinds of kidnapping take place. A lot of them are criminal in nature by groups that say they have an affiliation with Jabhat al-Nusra, and they try to kidnap wealthy Syrians and some journalists for ransom.

A second kind is more sectarian in nature, “tit for tat” kidnappings between different sides. So a Sunni will get kidnapped by Alawites or Shia, and his relatives will go kidnap Alawites or Shia, hold them hostage and try to make an exchange. We’ve especially seen that in the Lebanese border area.

Then there are [random] disappearances, where people are taken by unknown gunmen and never seen again. That’s the case with the two archbishops of Aleppo, and it’s not necessarily a case for ransom. As the fighting has become a lot more sectarian in the last months as fighting increases with Hezbollah, there are fears we’ll see a significant rise in kidnappings that lead to executions based on a sectarian basis.

KL: In the extortion cases, do they target their victims?

PNB: Many of the cases I’ve looked at definitely involved people who did their homework. They targeted specific people in the community who they knew had a specific amount of wealth or standing in the community. Two weeks ago, a prominent member of the Armenian community in Aleppo was traveling from Aleppo to Beirut by bus, and the bus was stopped, and they asked him by name to get off the bus because they knew the Armenian community would pay the ransom.

KL: Who are the kidnappers?

PNB: In most cases, we are talking about criminal gangs who are using weapons that are floating around quite freely in Syria, as well as the chaos that’s reigning in many parts of the country. There are a number of kidnappings that have been carried out by opposition groups looking to fundraise to buy weapons and allow them to continue to fight. In these cases it’s not just kidnappings, it’s also extortion, where people in the community that have wealth are asked to “contribute,” and if they refuse to do so, they are liable to kidnapping.

Some groups have been associated with specific incidents, like the [Free Syrian Army’s] Northern Storm group, implicated in the 2012 kidnapping of a group of Lebanese Shia. One of their members was just photographed with [U.S. Senator John] McCain at the border [during McCain’s May visit to northern Syria], causing a bit of controversy. This was a group of Lebanese Shia that went to Iran for a pilgrimage and were on their way back to Syria when they were kidnapped.

KL: Why are kidnappings on the rise?

PNB: In general, instability is on the rise in Syria, and these kidnappings are part of this instability. Kidnappings are a part of the dangers that civilians in general face in this conflict. In cities like Aleppo, the kidnappings for ransom that are taking place have very significantly undermined support for the opposition. Because in general, civilians are very fearful of these kinds of kidnappings, especially people with wealth. [Bashar al-] Assad’s regime was known for brutality, but this kind of insecurity didn’t exist for wealthy business people. They knew if they stayed out of politics, they could live secure lives.

Armenia Builds a New Aleppo – Eurasianet.org

To make sure exiles from Syria feel at home in Armenia, the government has commissioned the construction of an entire settlement called New Aleppo.

A counter-narrative from Musa al-Gharbi, University of Arizona, in an ongoing debate: A Reply to George Abu Ahmad

Finding Hope in Syria – HP – Joyce Dubensky

… One of our Peacemakers is Hind Kabawat, a lawyer from Damascus, who recently returned to Syria through Turkey to provide training in a village that had been “liberated” by those fighting the Syrian president, Assad. Below, in her words, are Hind’s observations of people who are suffering, who hope, and who are preparing for a new Syria based on dreams and ideals. Her story is one we rarely hear in the news of battles, violence and horrific acts of hate.

From Hind:

My message is message of hope. In this anthology of anecdotes from my last trip to the liberated areas of Syria, I carry the aspirations of a new Syrian generation who are yearning for a brighter future for their nation and are searching for a new way to build their dreams.

Surreal and perplexing feelings overwhelmed me as I crossed the borders from Turkey to northern Syria on a cold March morning. The crisp fresh breeze of freedom that welcomed me brought childhood memories of joyful children’s faces — children who waved at passing cars with foreign plates and cheered when my dad and I gave them candies on our vacation trips to the North.

Alas, the barefoot children meandering in the alleys between the destroyed houses of this village no longer wave to anybody. Instead of smiles, they wore sadness and tears. Instead of waves, their hands gestured in shivers. Instead of cheers, they sighed worries and interrogations. “Why us? Why are you here? Are you a journalist? What can you do for us?” Their feeble voices bombarded me with questions, to which all I could answer was, “I am a Syrian like you, from Damascus, coming to tell you that you are not alone, and that all of humanity is standing in solidarity with your blessed hearts.”

Rima, a five-year old girl, smiled in relief, held my hand, and whispered that her dream was to go back to school. Abdul-Majeed, who was pinching and pushing his friend Fatima, said the same. Fatima, one of seven siblings whose childhood was rocked by the loss of her father, had little to say. When she did speak — with tears in her eyes — she murmured, “I have no more dreams, I want to sleep and never wake up.”

I continued to walk, holding Rima’s hand, gazing at the horizon as penetrating sun rays flickered on the pale olive trees of our sacred land. Here, we encountered and greeted a group of youths holding their rifles in readiness.

“Where is your camera?” one boy, Ramzi, asked.

“I am not a journalist. I am only a Syrian citizen who wanted to come and see you,” I responded. “Son, what are you going to do with your weapon once the fighting is over?”

“I will sell it to pay my tuition fee,” Ramzi said, hysterically laughing with hope. “My dream is to be a university student.”

Further into the village, Abu Hamid, an older gentleman covered in a black outfit with a headband, smiled at me and cut me out a piece of the bread he was eating, saying, in a thick Northern accent, “to our health and freedom.” I couldn’t hide my tears from Abu Hamid, who concealed a warm smile behind his big beard.

I asked, “What can I do to make these little kids smile again?”

“Just be with them, just be with them,” he said.

In another part of the village, tears welcomed me as I entered the house of one of my mentees’ family. The family matriarch, Oum Mounzer, pointed right away at the picture of a handsome young man, her son, who got arrested while attempting to defect the army. “We don’t know what will happen to him,” her tearful husband added. Through his tears, he helped me sit on the sparkling clean floor, and called his younger children to come and greet me. Their warm and excited hugs left me flabbergasted. Where do they get all of this love from, while their stomachs are empty, their school, along with the whole village, lays destroyed, and their childhood has been stolen by disease, death, and hunger? How can Abou Munzer, Abu Hamid, and everyone, be so warm and caring to a complete stranger, wearing a cross, and walking around with a Canadian-made outfit in an ultra-conservative area, Jabal Al-Zawia?

We shared a meal consisting of fresh bread baked by Oum Abdo and olive oil. This has been the only staple food available to the village for months. Oum Abdo, a 60-year-old lady, proudly repeated to me that she has a grade 9 certificate, which enabled her to read the Qu’ran every night, and recently to read all the flyers and newspapers and hence spread information to others. She added that she got her son and son-in-law to both defect from the army and join the rebels, threatening to disown them otherwise, “You are no children of mine, if you help kill your own people.” She said that she obtained civic identities for both of them, hid them in her chest pocket, and went to visit the young men in the army troops. While there, she passed their new identities to them and threw her verdict on them. In addition to being a brave mother, a good neighbor, and a rebel by nature, Oum Abdo is also helping develop her own community by teaching young women how to bake, a necessary skill after the village’s only bakery was bombed.

Nayfah, a pharmacist who is working now in the field, is Abu Munzer’s eldest and another Syrian I spoke with during my stay. Her eyes shone with joy as she recalled her five years at the University of Aleppo. Today, she works for 14 hours a day, together with her brother Munzer, helping the injured. “How can someone who went to university, and has had the privilege of knowledge, destroy his country?” Nayfa asks, referring to Bashar Assad, a doctor who graduated from schools in the UK.

After the meal, we headed to a small, partially destroyed building with no windows at the end of the alley where I was giving a workshop on conflict resolution and dialogue to a group of teachers, doctors, and members of the local committee. I was greeted by pictures of local martyrs decorating the grey walls around the new freedom flag, as well as by a group of young men and women who had enthusiastically waited since the early morning for the workshop. Despite the bad logistic conditions of the room, I have never been as ecstatic. I interacted with incredibly passionate and impressive individuals who braved the cold wind seeping from the broken windows and the noise of rowdy children playing on the street for many hours to enthusiastically engage in the workshop activities and contribute new ideas for rebuilding their community and the whole country.

It was indeed a most interesting group. Mohammad is an English teacher who is offering small classes in the village to substitute for the destroyed school. Mariam is a strong personality who is able to win the room with her arguments, stressing in every word she utters that the revolution is finally giving voice to women. Hayat, an engineer, explained how she managed to get phone lines efficiently working in the village.

After many years of community work in Syria, this time was different and refreshing. It was the first time I truly sensed people freely expressing themselves without fear of a secret agent reporting on the group. It was the first time I witnessed a new generation who is getting armed with knowledge and is committed to building a new future for the whole country.

Knowledge and education, however, are a constant struggle for Syrians all over the country, even in liberated areas. “The worst challenge we are facing on a daily basis is the inability to effectively teach our children. We don’t have books, we don’t have pencils. How can we send all our kids together to one school, when it could be suddenly bombed by jets?” Mariam asks. To deal with this predicament, children are assigned into groups, and each group is allocated to a basement of the different houses of the village. Old women run communal nurseries, taking care of the village toddlers and infants while their mothers teach in underground schools or help in field hospitals.

Dreams of learning and hopes of getting back to schools were echoed in every village I visited. In Kafranbel, I spent a day with refugee children in a deserted school playing hand in hand and flying balloons with the colors of the rainbow. Mona, a little girl from Maarat al-Neman, told me her dream was to get back to her village.

“But Khaleh (Aunty in Arabic), I can’t go back to my school, it is completely destroyed!!!” said a cute little voice in entrancing crescendo.

“We will build a new one all together,” we all exulted.

On my way back to Kansafra, I asked Mustafa, a young rebel from the Free Syrian Army, about his dreams. He replied with fervor, “to get my son to study at the university!”

“Mustafa, you are too young to have a university-age boy, aren’t you?” I was baffled as I heard his words. Mustafa was eager to prove his point. He ran, dragging me with him, to a garden partly destroyed by missiles and called over two women, his wife and mother, to offer me coffee, while he disappeared into a backroom with windows covered with plastic sheets. Mustafa came back with a newborn in hand. “Mohamad,” he proudly said, raising the infant towards the sky, “my son, I want him to go to university. A child born in the revolution is blessed, and deserves to live free and to have the opportunities that we were denied.”

Indeed, Mohamad is entitled to that right.

Undeniably, children of the revolution have a better future ahead of them. But the responsibility on our shoulders is massive. Freedom is a big dream for them, but knowledge is their ultimate dream.

Hind Aboud Kabawat, a lawyer, is president of the Syrian Centre for Dialogue and is a Tanenbaum Peacemaker in Action.

The regime digs in – The Economist

“YA GHALI,” says a driver greeting the soldier manning a checkpoint of concrete blocks painted with the Syrian flag and plastered with pictures of Bashar Assad in regime-controlled central Damascus. This salutation was never in use in the capital before the war but is now standard at checkpoints. “Ghali”, or precious, is used in the coastal homeland of the Alawites, the sect from which Mr Assad hails. It is a sign both that the president is in control here and that, for all its talk of a state for all of Syria’s communities, his regime has been largely reduced to a sectarian militia, though the most powerful in the country.

This may be a harbinger of the future. The balance of power between the regime and the rebels has ebbed and flowed during the 27-month conflict, but the government’s recapture of the town of Qusayr from the rebels on June 5th has reinforced a feeling that Mr Assad has recently won the advantage. Rebels still control swathes of the north and east of the country and continue to clash with the regime in the countryside around the main population hubs of the west: Damascus, Homs and Hama. But nearly all the city centres are tightly in Mr Assad’s grip. In his determination to assert control, he has shown willing, if need be, to reduce rebellious towns to rubble.

In the aftermath of the fall of Qusayr, reports have circulated suggesting that the regime may capitalise on its gains by attacking Aleppo, the northern commercial hub that has been contested since last summer. Those reports may be premature, but the army has certainly dispatched reinforcements northward. Rumours now abound that Mr Assad will also try to cut a deal with Kurdish leaders in the north-eastern province of Hasaka, from which the regime tactically withdrew many of its forces last year. Officials in Damascus have regained confidence. They talk, albeit too grandly, of soon being able to take back the eastern provinces from the rebels.

Only a year ago Mr Assad’s throne seemed to be wobbling. While suffering dramatic military losses to the rebels, his political response was cack-handed. He owes his turnaround in fortune largely to the support of Iran and Hizbullah, the party-cum-militia it sponsors in Lebanon. Iran, say people in Damascus, has helped the regime to think strategically, while Hizbullah is training Mr Assad’s men in urban warfare. A new 60,000-strong national defence force (set to grow to 100,000) compensates for the regular army’s weaknesses. Defections have slowed as the forces have been pared down to a loyal core; morale among them has risen.

In such circumstances a peace conference in Geneva mooted for next month looks increasingly unlikely to take place on time. For one thing, the opposition’s main political front, the Syrian National Coalition, refuses to attend while the regime’s attacks and advances continue. For another, Mr Assad will be more loth to compromise as he gains on the battlefield.

… Besides, the rebels are losing support, in part because the regime has had some success in stirring sectarian fears. Many Syrians originally sympathetic to the rebels have been horrified by events such as the reported execution on June 9th of a 14-year-old boy by jihadists in Aleppo, allegedly for insulting the Prophet Muhammad. Downtrodden Sunnis who six months ago were the mainstay of the opposition may be thinking again. “I hate the regime,” says a woman from a poor Damascus suburb. “But if forced to choose, perhaps I would rather live under them than the rebels. I am tired of the violence.”

Qatari and Saudi support for the opposition has also scared a lot of Syrians. “This is now a war in Syria, but not a Syrian war,” says a dissident artist in the capital. “I have no illusions that the Gulf backers are interested in us having democracy.” Unlike the opposition abroad, many in Damascus were pinning their hopes, however unrealistic, on the Geneva conference as a way to persuade the regime to share power and thus bring the war to a close.

But in rebel-held areas sentiment is harsher. Many there have lost so much that the idea of the regime remaining in place, even in a transitional power-sharing format, is abhorrent. “I’d rather chaos for a few years than live under them again,” says a man from Tafas, a town in the south that is shelled daily. Ali Haidar, the government minister charged with national reconciliation, boasts of the regime’s efforts to support those affected by the violence. But whispered conversations in the streets of Damascus and continuing arrests hark back to darker days under Hafez Assad, the previous president and father of the present one. The UN says the regime’s crimes still far outweigh those of the rebels.

An Iranian drone captured in Syria? – Aviationist Blog

Austria begins withdrawal from Golan Heights – al Jazeera – Deteriorating security forces Vienna to remove troops from occupied area as UN scrambles to find replacements.

Austria began pulling out its UN peacekeepers from the Golan Heights days after Vienna decided to quit the mission over deteriorating security concerns.

An AFP photographer said on Wednesday 20 soldiers in jeeps accompanied by tanks entered the Israeli side of the Quineitra Crossing – the only direct passage between Israel and Syria.

Another 50 soldiers out of the 378-strong force were to pull out throughout the day, according to sources on the ground. The Austrian defence ministry said the full withdrawal would be completed by June 24.

Vienna’s decision on Tuesday came after Syrian opposition rebels briefly seized the Quneitra crossing late last week, in an incident in which two UN troops were injured.

The crossing lies in the demilitarised zone on the Israel-Syria armistice line and is monitored by about 1,000 UN peacekeepers, including the Austrians.

Replacements needed

On Tuesday, a senior Israeli official said dozens of Austrian soldiers had already left the mission’s headquarters. Israeli public radio said they were administrative staff.

“But the majority of soldiers will remain in place until the UN has found a country that can send troops to replace the Austrian ones,” said an Israeli official, who asked not to be named.

The UN is trying to persuade Austria to slow down its withdrawal.

The country has played an important role as part of the UN force monitoring a ceasefire between Syria and Israel since 1974.

Japan and Croatia have also withdrawn their forces in recent months, as battles between Syrian government and opposition forces spill into the ceasefire zone.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said last week that troops from his country could replace the Austrians, but under the terms of the 1974 accord that created the force, members of the UN Security Council are not allowed to take part.

Intervention: Opinions and U.S. Military Proposal

The Risks of America Doing Too Much in Syria – Richard Haass offers his opinion on the Syria conflict and intervention in a video interview (follow link to view video)

Richard N. Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, the American foreign policy think tank, sat down with Rendezvous’s editor Marcus Mabry to talk Syria. Mr. Haass gave a long laundry list of what issues are more important to the United States than the bloodbath in Syria, even as he detailed the risks of that widening conflict.

The Dangerous Simplicity Of the Interventionists – Monitor – Kip Whittington

The pro-intervention crowd has been quite vocal, and their arguments have become commonplace: “US credibility is at stake,” “implement a no-fly zone,” “arm the moderate rebel groups,” “create a humanitarian corridor,” “let’s stop the chemical weapons use” and so on.

Many of these voices are influential thinkers and experienced practitioners outside of the decision-making process who feel the slaughter occurring in Syria is unjustifiable. Others argue that US strategic interests are at stake. These arguments are usually well-intentioned, but that does not mean the United States and NATO should intervene in Syria. While the United States and NATO are undoubtedly capable of changing the balance — note that I didn’t say end the violence — in Syria, it is by no means easy.

… For instance, the no-fly zone argument is familiar: Remove the threat posed by Assad’s airpower to Syrian civilians to allow for the establishment of humanitarian corridors and safe zones that can be supplied by friendly neighbors. This is the popular military operation advocated for by pro-interventionists. Largely because the United States and its allies successfully instituted variations of no-fly zones in Libya, Iraq, Kosovo and Bosnia, and it supposedly avoids putting large numbers of troops in foreign war zones — no one is willing to argue for large troop numbers after the war weariness created by Iraq and Afghanistan.

In essence, since the United States and its allies have such unrivaled air capabilities it means they can easily destroy Syria’s dangerous air defense systems and succeed in protecting civilians. In light of the recent Israeli air incursions into Syria — with no Israeli casualties — many feel their argument has been vindicated. No mention is made of the potential ramifications of an Israeli involvement in Syria. These lines of thought are dangerously simplistic and merely advocate for an operational tool with no clear objective.

At “Abu Muqawama,” blogger Dan Trombly did an excellent job explaining the very real differences between a US imposition of a no-fly zone and a few Israeli airstrikes on Syrian territory:

“You cannot create a persistent no-fly zone through repetitive raiding in the Israeli style, because these raids rely on minimizing time over Syrian airspace and avoiding air-to-air combat. No-fly zones, to be effective, must do precisely the opposite. You want your aircraft to spend as much time as practically possible over the airspace you are patrolling in order to deny enemy aircraft windows of opportunity to operate. This renders your aircraft vulnerable to enemy anti-aircraft fire, which is why destroying [a] hostile IADS [integrated air defense system], commonly referred to as suppression of enemy air defense (or SEAD) is such a vital prerequisite to no-fly zones (and would involve, as in many other cases, massive amounts of standoff fire and more direct attacks by specialized SEAD strike aircraft).” … (read the rest)

Ed Miliband: government is too focused on arming Syrian rebels – Guardian – Labour leader says David Cameron and William Hague should put energy into Geneva peace conference

Outside powers must not impose solutions on Syrians – Hassan Hassan

I know Assad – and I know it’s time to arm the Syrian rebels and bring him down, says Tory MP who visited dictator’s house for tea – Mail Online – Brooks Newmarks

Meetings: Mr Newmark met with the Syrian President on several occasions and also had a private talk with his British-born wife Asma

I first met President Assad on a trip to Damascus in 2006. I had asked the Syrian Embassy in London to arrange for me to meet senior Syrian political leaders, but on arrival in the capital, was surprised to receive an invitation to meet the President at his modest private house, away from his palace where he meets most dignitaries.

For a man now reviled for massacring his own people, Assad is incongruously softly spoken. But he was always forthright, did not seem to mind that I gave equally forthright answers and regularly invited me to meet him again on subsequent visits, right up to 2011, when the civil war started.

While I abhor the Assad regime and its hostility towards Israel (I am Jewish), I have a long- standing interest in Syria and the Middle East and am a firm believer in the adage ‘Diplomacy becomes a little lazy if all you do is talk to your friends’.

Turkish Protests

Muslim Light: What’s Behind Turkey’s Islamization and the Protests Against It – Cinar Kiper – Atlantic

It has been a long time, ninety years in fact, since Turkey has had its latest facelift. It is about time considering it happens once every nine decades or so: after the modernizing Tanzimat reforms of the 1830s and the Westernizing Kemalist reforms of the 1920s, the 2010s are ripe for a whole new round of social engineering — this time at the hands of the religiously conservative Justice and Development Party (AKP).

Back when the secular republic was established in 1923, the facelift came in the form of renouncing all things Ottoman and many things Muslim, some benign — hats instead of fezzes! — others not as much. The idea being, to paraphrase the old adage, if it looks like a Westerner, writes like a Westerner and even drinks like a Westerner, then it probably is a Westerner. As a country that got stuck in the middle — too European to be Middle East, too Middle Eastern to be Europe — Turkey took its symbols very seriously; bars serving fancy cocktails and public displays of affection in one camp, headscarves and a mosque’s call to prayer in the other.

The social reforms might have been strict, but each one served to create a secular, homogenous and above all modern nation-state; a republic that could comfortably mingle at any European party. Yet the authenticity of the revolution was questioned since the beginning: in “A Journey to China, or Things Which Are Seen,” Toynbee wrote of a 1929 visit to Turkey right at the height of enthusiasm for the revolution. But even then he was distinctly aware of some of its superficiality, such as a tram in Istanbul where a curtain separating the sexes had been removed but men and women still didn’t mix — “The curtain had become invisible, but it was still there, all the same” — or how hats had successfully replaced fezzes, sort of — “Many a self-consciously behatted man is still wearing an invisible fez.”

Such invisible relics of Islam didn’t mean the social engineering failed — it did pave the way for Western-living, secular Turks after all — but that even those who couldn’t or didn’t want to play along were adorned in the trappings of the West. Regardless, for the next 90 years Turkey’s genuine secularists saw themselves as spearheading the drive towards Westernization and, perhaps more importantly, wanted the acceptance of Europe — to mixed results. But just as Turkey may not have been readily accepted by the West, it was also too foreign for the East.

Many throughout the Middle East perceive Turks as “Muslim Light,” the casual semi-faithful. Imagine the frustration of the devout Turk, so full of religious conviction yet never really accepted as part of Club Islam. One only has to hear the indignation of an AKP deputy recounting a visit to Mecca — where Saudi authorities were so rude as to doubt his faith and tested his knowledge of common prayers — to see his embarrassment at being indentified with those contemptible secularists. When Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan picks his crusade of the month, whether againstabortions,adultery or the arts, it is over his frustration of Turkey’s image among his fellow Muslims; the same frustration secular Turks felt for decades trying to be accepted by Europe.

And so it is no surprise that it was in Istanbul, a city literally divided between the continents of Europe and Asia, that a nationwide clash over appearances began this weekend. Istanbul’s Taksim district on the European side has always been the heart of the country’s secular life: its countless bars, nightclubs, bookstores, and galleries stand as testament that there are Turks who enjoy more of life than simply shuttling between work and prayer. As the centerpiece of Turkey’s window to the world, the area has been at the forefront of the country’s image wars for years, with more religious elements wanting to dress it in mosques and Islamic architecture to show where it really belongs.

The latest chapter of this tug-of-war took place last week, when the government gave start to an urban redevelopment plan to replace Taksim’s main green space, Gezi Park, with a giant replica of an Ottoman artillery barracks. What began last Monday as a peaceful sit-in to save the park escalated by Friday into a stand against Erdogan’s vision for Turkey. The movement quickly spread to other cities, as did the ubiquitous tear gas; coverage mainly focused on the arbitrarily violent riot policing and the solidarity between the protesters fed up with Erdogan’s authoritative style, but beneath it all was a long-standing clash over two very different expressions of Turkey.

Though he had declared his intention to ” raise a religious youth ” openly, Erdogan has waged more of a shadow war of sorts against the visibility of the secular lifestyle. His desire to limit it to the home, or at least behind closed doors, is only matched by his zeal to erect bolder and bolder monuments to an “Islamically appropriate” lifestyle. And while the Occupy-style protestors have been his villains of the week, Taksim has something else he has always despised: alcohol, one of the most overt displays of un-Islamic activities out there. Prohibited by the religion, alcohol’s visibility everywhere is a clear message: Turkey, or at least large parts of it, is indeed Muslim Light.

The AKP’s crusade against alcohol over the years has included a set ofrestrictions passed in 2011, an official crackdown during Ramadan banning outside seating at cafes and bars, an abrupt last-minute cancellation of alcohol licenses for a music festival in 2012, not to mention years of exorbitant taxes on alcohol that have succeeded in turning off many from drinking. But the AKP took its latest great leap towards a less “Islamically embarrassing” society just two weeks ago, with parliament passing yet another comprehensive set of restrictions on drinking. The 17-hour marathon session featured harsh insults, parliamentarian-on-parliamentarian kicking and a walk out in protest by almost every non-AKP deputy — a level of tension and tantrum that captures the determination of the religious and the anxiety of the secularists.

The AKP’s harshest critics, from the opposition parties to secular journalists to the involuntarily sober, all note how it is engineering a conservative Islamic society. It’s a claim the AKP frequently denies, though its arguments aren’t very believable when so much of its legislation so neatly aligns with Islamic sensibilities. Often picking and choosing the Western laws and restrictions that suit its values, the government has argued for years that its alcohol policy is one of public health, despite numbers that indicate no such health problem exists in Turkey. OECD data shows Turks only consume 1.5 liters of alcohol per capita, way below the 10.7-liter average of the EU. Similarly a 2010 WHO report shows that number hasn’t changed much since 1961, and adds that Turkey has the highest rate of abstention among the countries listed; four-fifths of men (83.6 percent) and nearly all women (97.1 percent) abstain from alcohol, with 65 and 92 percent respectively having never had a drink in their lives. As for the young people — “we don’t want children drinking night and day and wandering around tipsy; they are going to be alert, their minds full of knowledge” Erdogan has said — 83.9 percent of Turks aged 15-24 have never once consumed alcohol, according to data from the Turkish Statistical Institute.

In the end, Turkey’s alcohol restrictions are simply about Erdogan’s personal biases. Defending the ban of campus sales at the Global Alcohol Policy Symposium in April, he argued “of course [students] who imbibe alcohol will get intoxicated, pick up a knife and charge their friends; they’ll forget all about their computers and books.” Given that he thinks the only thing standing between academic success and a stabbing spree is happy hour, Erdogan’s surreal perception of alcohol’s capabilities would rival even the most devout Christians of the Temperance movement. Meanwhile, back in reality, alcohol is rarely the culprit in the countless cases of violent bullying for not fasting during Ramadan or the groups who chant Islamic slogans as they attack random people for kissing in public .

Just on Sunday, during a live interview with channel Haberturk, Erdogan fumbled a couple responses on alcohol — first declaring anyone who ever drinks an alcoholic, then suggesting those who enjoyed the occasional cocktail but voted for him didn’t count. He would later try to save it by reiterating they were not banning alcohol. To be fair, there seems to be no reason to do so: it’s effectively a tax on a Western lifestyle — the kind enjoyed by those least likely to vote for the party in the first place — and a useful source of revenue. Erdogan isn’t against drinking as long as no one can see it; “if you are going to drink, then drink your alcohol in your own house” he told the nation last week . Just as secularists once sought to sweep Turkey’s religious element under the rug, it is now the AKP’s turn to do the same.

Many of his opponents, including the Gezi park protesters, warn of the Islamization of Turkey. But as the party of those left behind by the 1923 revolution, it doesn’t really need to socially engineer much. The party keeps winning elections in landslides, and its values are already shared by the majority of Turks . If he is trying to gain converts, he’s already halfway there, as he so graciously pointed out earlier this week when he reminded the nation how he’s keeping his supporters from intervening against the Taksim protests on his behalf.

Back at the alcohol policy symposium in April, Erdogan had dismissed how the “top-down, domineering modernization mentality” of the government back in the 1920s “encouraged and incentivized alcohol consumption with a copycat mindset of modernity and civilization.” But he of all people should know how such a mindset doesn’t work: “fortunately social values, the societal fabric, resisted the government’s attempts to encourage alcohol, keeping it in check.” It is this patriarchal attempt to impose a lifestyle on those who disagree that is fuelling much of the Gezi protests.

And just as secularists weren’t able to secularize all of the religious, it doesn’t seem likely the religious can convert most of the secular-ish Turks … but it doesn’t mean they can’t be swept under the rug. The lesson to be learned from Erdogan’s statements in April, and the nationwide protests still going strong, is just how much resentment and antagonism can arise from having a lifestyle forced on people who don’t want to play along. Marx once wrote that history repeated itself “first as a tragedy, then as a farce.” If Erdogan is able to point out the mistakes of 1923, he shouldn’t be repeating them again in 2013. Maybe in the 2100s, when the time for the next facelift rolls around, the country will have finally learned to coexist … or at the very least learned to be farcical about it.

Turkish protests affect the lira – Daily Star

Without Irony, the U.S. Rebukes Turkey for Cracking Down on Protesters  – David Harris Gershon

Turkish police clear Taksim Square – FP

Istanbul’s Taksim Square was calm Wednesday morning after a night of violent clashes as Turkish riot police worked to clear out entrenched demonstrators. Police detonated sound grenades and fired water cannon, tear gas, and rubber bullets at the thousands of mostly peaceful protesters who repeatedly converged on the square, until crowds were dispersed early Wednesday morning. Some protesters threw rocks and petrol bombs. Many of the protesters have regrouped in the nearby Gezi Park, the site of the first protests nearly two weeks ago. While officials said they would not intervene in the park, there were reports of police firing tear gas into Gezi Park overnight. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is set to meet with some of the protest leaders, whom he selected, Wednesday afternoon. Some are refusing to attend in light of the police violence. Meanwhile, Turkey’s broadcasting watchdog imposed fines on four opposition television channels, accusing them of incitement for broadcasting footage of the protests. Additionally, between 50 and 70 lawyers who staged a sit-in in support of the protests were detained after skirmishes at Istanbul’s High Court.

New Resources

Visit the new blog, Levantoday, created by several graduate students.

New website offers detailed profiles and histories of armed groups in Syria: Syria Conflict Monitor

SCM has compiled an extensive, searchable database of self-published opposition videos. To date, over 4,000 videos have been catalogued based on variables that track the strength, location, and organization of armed groups. The database transforms the disparate information published by the opposition into highly informative visual representations that layout the organizational structure of each groups, its affiliates and allies, fighting strength, and geographical location.

Beyond the database itself, we present for the first time the SCM Timeline Series-Alpha. Our timelines take a deeper look at the major fighting groups on the ground in Syria. Beginning with each group’s founding, the timelines visually reconstructs the major activities of each group and allows the user to follow with a few scrolls of the mouse the entire operational history of each group. We are launching the site with two thorough timelines and are working laboriously to release more in the coming weeks.

Report from the Syria Center for Policy Research, “Socioeconomic Roots and Impact of the Syrian Crisis” – available here.

Report on the “Convoy of Martyrs in the Levant” – interesting look at a group of mujahideen in Syria with individual profiles of jihadis and graphs exploring percentages of fighters by country.

Policy brief from ECFR MENA: Syria: the Imperative of De-Escalation

Let ‘Lawfare’ Shape the Conflict, Not the Flow of Arms

By David Falt for Syria Comment

If we fail to act swiftly, the decision to lift the arms embargo will most likely backfire and serve only to fuel the opposition’s existing frustration with the international community.

The European Union put a lot at stake last week when they decided to lift the weapons embargo following desperate pleas from both the armed opposition in Syria and the Cairo-based political opposition. The big question remains: what practical difference will this make? It’s easy to argue that this move has come too late and with too many strings attached to impact events on the ground. At this point, it seems likely that the only sentiment the disparate opposition groups share is the sense of being left alone with empty promises.

However, the decision to arm the opposition is but one of several pivotal steps the international community can take in order to help the opposition topple the existing regime. A natural and prudent course of action now would be to help the interested parties engage in the process of implementing a transitional justice platform as a tool for conflict resolution: a strategy we call ‘lawfare’.

Traditional Transitional Justice vs. ‘Lawfare’

What do we mean by transitional justice? The International Center for Transitional Justice (a New York-based non-profit specializing in the field) defines transitional justice simply: ‘an approach to achieving justice in times of transition from conflict and/or state repression.’ The traditional concept of transitional justice refers to a variety of judicial and non-judicial measures such as war crimes tribunals, truth and reconciliation commissions, lustration, and reparations. Such measures are combined to form a larger effort to promote the reconstruction of fractured societies by establishing the rule of law and encouraging access to truth.

That said: you can now forget the traditional concept of transitional justice. Rather than a set of post-conflict tools aimed at cementing lasting peace and national reconciliation, our vision of transitional justice utilizes ‘lawfare’ as a tool in a carrot-and-stick approach to resolve the conflict. While ‘lawfare’ has its roots in transitional justice and adopts many of the same concepts, there is a crucial distinction: whereas transitional justice mechanisms typically take root in a post-conflict setting, ‘lawfare’ focuses on pragmatic immediacies such as targeted prosecutions and the encouragement of regime defections in order to facilitate conflict resolution itself.

We have been working with opposition leaders for months securing buy-in for this approach. Back in the fall of 2012, Dr. Jason McCue introduced a ‘lawfare’ plan that was very well received in both government circles and among opposition groups. Washington Post columnist David Ignatius also came out strongly in favour of the initiative.

One critical factor that has slowed the process of going live with a comprehensive ‘lawfare’ plan is the lack of international coordination. Right now, several disparate projects which approach the conflict from the wider prism of traditional transitional justice are floating around, but they lack the necessary focus to get sovereign donors’ attention. We have spent most part of the last year carefully selecting participants to form a consortium of experts, led by Dr Jason McCue and Toby Cadman from UK based Omnia Strategy, which can be recognized by the international community and Syrian opposition leaders as the appropriate platform to consolidate and implement the various aspects of a transitional justice programme.

Unity Will Lead to Recognition

There is also an urgent need to unify the fragmented opposition into a cohesive and effective representative group that is widely acknowledged as the de facto transitional government with both domestic and international capability and capacity. Progress has been made recently in Aleppo, where the technocrat Yahia Nanaa has been elected chairman of “the Local Council of Aleppo and is working hard to prop up civil service institutions. So far, however, this has been the exception and not the rule. It remains to be seen whether the Syrian National Coalition can develop into a cohesive transitional government that can attract the full recognition and support of the international community.

The opposition is united in victimhood and their universal will to seek justice for the actions of the Assad regime.  To curtail further bloodshed, the opposition knows it must now find a way to unify Syrians on more than the sole dynamic of anti-Assad sentiment; it must garner international support and entice more members of the regime to defect from it. Opposition unity extending beyond the anti-Assad dynamic is sadly lacking—understandable during a revolution—but now is the time to build unity through other dynamics, and justice is a universal concept that unites any and all opposition.

To this end, further war crimes and crimes against humanity must be deterred through fear that the sword of justice will be used and, in fact, is being used against transgressors. One cannot simply talk about justice; it must be done. On the other side of the sword, those who have not committed war crimes will find assurance in the strength and protection of the ‘lawfare’ system, which will impart the needed confidence to break with the regime. The sword of justice must be unsheathed to prevent the conflict from escalating any further by enabling the assimilation of the regime—top to bottom—into the opposition.

The Question of Arms

It is unlikely that we will see an instant flow of weapons to the Syrian National Coalition, and even less likely that we’ll see it land in the hands of the Free Syrian Army. The Cairo-based opposition is under tremendous pressure to help fighters inside the country (in part to buy themselves political capital for the future), but to date they have struggled to meet basic expectations. If the external opposition is going to play any role in shaping Syria’s future, they need to prove that they are doing more than holding meetings in Doha’s expensive hotels. However, without a solid transitional justice plan in place, simply facilitating arms transfers is a deficient approach that poses serious risks.

In a meeting I hosted in January between top Syrian National Coalition representatives and key EU diplomats, I was shocked by the laissez faire attitude the parties displayed concerning the legal issues surrounding arming the FSA. It was not at all evident from that meeting that the parties agreed on the need to arm only the vetted FSA commanders operating under General Idris; all that was clear was that ‘all avenues should be explored.’ Alarmingly, what was also apparent from various parallel meetings was that the Coalition representatives were prepared to sidestep any existing boundaries or legal implications that such arms would involve. The international community is thus faced with very good reasons to tread carefully in the arming of the opposition, and all such efforts ought to be linked to the implementation of a credible and pragmatic framework of transitional justice.

The simple argument for providing weapons to the opposition is that it will serve as a carrot and a stick: a carrot for the opposition to participate in negotiating with the regime, and a stick for the regime to do the same. We believe that ‘lawfare’ works according to the same dynamics, but with distinct advantages: 1) it is neutral, and 2) it visibly targets key regime figures and supporters, speeding up the regime’s inevitable fall.

Additional Advantages of Establishing a ‘Lawfare’ Programme

In addition to facilitating an end to the conflict, establishing a ‘lawfare’ programme would deter future crimes as well as avert vengeful retaliation for crimes already committed. Establishing a system of tribunals to hear cases and punish criminals provides an alternative method of dealing with miscreants and discourages vigilantism. It strikes a statesmanlike blow to Assad by providing a legitimate alternative to ‘Assad’s justice’, which by its very nature demonstrates how his regime has failed.

A ‘lawfare’ programme will deliver an all-inclusive Syrian process designed to protect all Syrians, including minorities, through justice and the rule of law. By demonstrating a basis for the rule of law going forward, it appeals to potential defectors by building the courage of regime members to switch sides.

In addition, transitional justice provides a buffer against counter-revolution and post-conflict insurgency because its founding purpose is to facilitate and empower peace and reconciliation. Its implementation is thus a bold statement by the Syrian opposition that it intends to create a unified, lasting peace for Syria.

Support Justice to Bring an End to the Conflict

The international community has an obligation to help the opposition, but sending arms is not enough. At this stage of the conflict there is a great need to support fledgling civil structures in Syria. These can be bolstered by establishing a transitional justice system allowing innocent individuals to seek refuge from the current regime. Through conflict resolution, impartial tribunals, and techniques like lustration and truth commissions, the implementation of a ‘lawfare’ programme will lay the foundations for the re-establishment of the rule of law in Syria and develop an all-inclusive process that protects all Syrians.

David Falt has worked with numerous governments as a transitional justice activist and is part of the consortium of experts advocating for “lawfare” as a conflict resolution tool. The former Director of Government Relations for Europe at the Syrian Support Group, he currently serves as a volunteer adviser to a number of opposition NGOs and individuals focusing on justice and accountability in Syria.  Twitter: @davidfalt

by Aron Lund for Syria Comment

The al-Qaida emir, Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, is a grumpy old man, but who wouldn’t be in his position?

Like his late predecessor Osama bin Laden, and indeed many grumpy old men, he has a habit of haranguing the world for its faults while angrily wagging his finger.

Today, for example, al-Qaida’s al-Sahab media agency issued a 20-minute voice recording of Zawahiri marking the 65th anniversary of the creation of the “occupation state of Israel”. In it, Zawahiri talks very little about Israel itself – because what is there to talk about, from his perspective? It’s evil, end of story – but he spends a lot of time using the Palestine issue to advance his own pet agenda. That’s also a habit he picked up from his predecessor.

Zawahiri’s first target is the USA. Obviously not a new enemy of his, but he’s unusally energetic in trying to redirect Muslim antipathy for Israel towards its main ally. He spends several minutes lambasting Washington as the driving force behind Israeli criminality, saying that the Americans are responsible for creating it, funding it, arming it and aiding it in every conceivable way. The US is also held to account for protecting corrupt Arab dictatorships which in turn help protect Israel.

Which brings us to his second target: the Muslim Brotherhood, or Ikhwan. They and other reformist Islamists are blamed for keeping the peace with Israel, for failing to implement sharia, and for helping to cover up the culpability of the USA. This is also not a new argument for al-Qaida, but it has gained a whole new importance since the 2011 revolutions, which brought some of these groups into positions of power.

He singles out a few places of concern: Tunisia (ruled by al-Nahda, a pseudo-Ikhwani group), Egypt (ruled by the Muslim Brotherhood itself), Palestine (partially ruled by Hamas, a Muslim Brotherhood franchise) and Libya (which isn’t really ruled at all, but where Ikhwanis and other Islamists are very active in what passes for politics).

To bolster his argument, Zawahiri then runs a clip by Omar Abderrahman, the Egyptian “blind sheikh” who is imprisoned in the USA for his involvement in the 1993 WTC bombing. On the recording, Abderrahman describes Egypt’s ex-president Anwar al-Sadat (and by extension his successors and anyone else responsible for upholding the peace with Israel) as being “a traitor, an infidel, an oppressor, and corrupt”. In 1981, Zawahiri was part of the organization that assassinated Anwar al-Sadat, to widespread acclaim among his fellow Islamists.

These days, of course, it is the Muslim Brotherhood that is upholding Sadat’s peace agreement, and therefore…

Omar Abderrahman is a religious heavyweight, and his word carries much greater weight than Zawahiri’s own – particularly in Egypt. So a radical fringe politician like Zawahiri has every reason to try to piggy-back on the blind sheikh’s credibility among more mainstream Islamists.

Having made these two arguments, which basically constitute the pre-2011 and post-2011 parts of the al-Qaida agenda (refocusing local struggles on the USA & undermining more moderate Islamists which threaten to sap his base of support), Zawahiri moves on to the rest of the world.

He first runs through the list of al-Qaida affiliates across the world, to praise the mujahedin in Somalia, Iraq and elsewhere. This is a standard feature of Zawahiri statements. It’s not like he and his guys in Pakistan are contributing much to the cause, so he needs to keep the base happy by giving credit where credit is due.

Zawahiri on Syria

The last third of the tape is exclusively dedicated to Syria. There’s no limit to the importance that Zawahiri attaches to this conflict. He presents the jihad in Syria – for which he uses the word al-Sham, which can also refer to the wider Levant – as a panacea for all ills afflicting the Muslim world.

Like with Israel, Zawahiri doesn’t pay much attention to Bashar al-Assad and the Baath, which is written off as an adjunct of the vast Shia conspiracy against Islam. Rather, the jihad in Syria is described as a two-front war against the USA and Iran.

Zawahiri claims that jihad in Syria is a way of achieving all goals of the Muslim world: it will aid in re-establishing a caliphate, in imposing sharia law, and in overthrowing the corrupt Arab and faux-Islamist governments now in place; it is also a way of combating Shiism and the global US hegemony, and therefore, so conveniently, a great way to liberate Jerusalem.

The USA is accused of trying to exploit the sacrifices of the Muslim world. It wants jihadis to do the heavy lifting in the battle against the Baath, while it is quietly building up a pro-Western opposition that can swoop in and seize power after Assad falls. This will serve the purpose of (again momentarily recalling his original subject) securing Israel’s borders. He calls on his followers to realize the danger and avoid falling into this trap – don’t leave the trenches and do not put down your arms until you’ve set up a proper Islamic state, he says.

To realize this goal, Doc Zawahiri says all Muslims must support the jihad in Syria, either by going there or by – for example – sending money. Such support is, by his reasoning, a “fard ein”, an individual duty incumbent on every able-bodied Muslim. It’s not something you leave to your government, or to the mosque, or to anyone else: but something YOU must do or suffer God’s punishment for neglecting.

He makes no similar call for the conflicts in Algeria, Somalia, Mali, Afghanistan, Iraq and so on – at this moment in history, it’s to Syria you should go. The priorities are clear.

The Jabhat al-Nosra and ISI split

In his statement, Ayman al-Zawahiri makes no explicit mention of Jabhat al-Nosra or the Islamic State of Iraq, or of the recent confusion about whether they should merge under the ”Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham” name or not. (Background here & here, and a recent piece by Aymenn Al Tamimi here.)

This is entirely in keeping with his tradition. Zawahiri has never even mentioned Jabhat al-Nosra by name. Instead, in the very vaguest of terms, he just calls on jihadis in Syria to unite around their common goals and rise above narrow party interests – and that’s all he says on the topic most important to al-Qaida in Syria right now.

But don’t let that fool you. This is just al-Qaida playing by the book. The original Jabhat al-Nosra and ISI statements in April came on the heels of a similarly vague Zawahiri statement. The timing then was probably no coincidence, and it is now likely to repeat itself. Just hours after the Zawahiri release, a leading Jabhat al-Nosra figure who goes by the nom de guerre of al-Gharib al-Muhajer al-Qahtani announced on Twitter (of all places) that “good news” about the unity of jihadis will be coming within two days.

So, it is possible that some form of an agreement has been reached on the future name, leadership and structure of the Syrian al-Qaida affiliate, in so far as there was a dispute about this before. Whether or not Zawahiri himself has been involved in deciding or mediating, we don’t know – but it seems very likely given the weight of the issue.

The intended timing of this statement is a little tricky to pin down. He speaks about how “these days” it’s 65 years since Israel’s creation was “announced”, which – if true – should put its production date sometime around May 14, three weeks ago. But it’s quite likely that its release now could be somehow coordinated with a statement from the Syrian branch(es), and that lends additional credibility to al-Gharib al-Muhajer al-Qahtani’s talk of “good news”.

So – keep your eyes on the jihadi forums, because big news about Jabhat al-Nosra may be about to arrive. Perhaps the al-Qaida wing in Syria will go by the new name of the ”Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham”, or perhaps it will stick with “Jabhat al-Nosra”; and perhaps there will be a merger with the Iraq organization, or perhaps not; perhaps there was really an internal split, or … perhaps not. Everything is still very unclear, but perhaps we’ll know one day, and perhaps that day will be Friday or Saturday.

— Aron Lund