29 Syrian coordinating committees and militias sign a petition stating that they are all Jabhat al-Nusra  29 ??????? ?????? ????? ?????? ??????? “?? ?????? ????????– ???? ???? ??????”

It seems that the US has provoked the formation of a counter-alliance against it even before Assad has fallen. Syrian militias established a new command that is estimated to be made up of roughly two-thirds of representatives of the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafist allies, according to Reuters.

The Syrian civilian opposition has failed to reach consensus on selecting the head of the transitional government. The next meeting about the issue will be Dec 15

Al-Jazeera – New Syrian Military command, led by Selim Idris makes its announcement – in Arabic

Syrian rebels elect head of new military command
Reuters – Sat, Dec 8, 2012 – Reporting by Khaled Yacoub Oweis

•  Article: End drawing close for Syria’s Assad: German spy chief, Sat, Dec 8, 2012

If you are interested in seeing Alawite officers have their heads chopped off, this video is for you. The title says they are suspected of participating in the Houla massacre. ??????: ????? ???? ?????? ???????? ???? ?????? ??????? ????? ?? ??? ??? ??#??????? ????? ???????? ?? ????? ?????? ??youtube.com/watch?v=dE7luG…????

Arwa Damon (@arwaCNN) 12/7/12, 4:11 PM – “moderate” islamist just told me nusra front wants #assad regime 2 last bc longer the fighting goes on the stronger & more popular they become.

Blake Hounshell ?@blakehounshell “Analysts in the Turkish capital believe that President Bashar al-Assad will be gone by the summer.” Guardian

Lara Setrakian ?@Lara  Our latest in Conversations: Kidnappings and Kids Hungry in Aleppo: http://bit.ly/VJojTc  @SyriaDeeply

For Iran, Unrest in Syria Is Noise, Not Brutal War
By THOMAS ERDBRINK: December 9, 2012, NYTimes

….“We are seeking a peaceful solution in which the Syrian government implements reforms,” said Hamidreza Taraghi, a politician who is close to Iran’s leaders. “But whatever the cost, we want to keep Syria in the group of resistance against Israel.”

Mr. Taraghi, who recently led an Iranian delegation to North Korea and met with the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un, said that Iran was willing to do “whatever it takes” to keep Syria as an ally. He said the Syrian government had not yet asked Iran for military help, but if that happened Iran would be compelled by its treaty with Syria to step in….But even opposition figures say the government has no choice but to stick with the current Syrian leadership to the bitter end. “That way,” Mr. Shamsolvaezin said, “we can at least influence the unrest that will inevitably follow his downfall.”

Syria: Rebel Prisoners On Their Religious War
Sky’s Tim Marshall gains rare access to a prison where he finds evidence that international jihadists are operating in Syria. They say they want Christians to pay the Jiziya’.
UK, Saturday 08 December 2012

Syrian Rebels Tied to Al Qaeda Play Key Role in War
In May in Damascus, Syrian workers removed debris from two car bombs that were linked to the Qaeda-backed Nusra Front.
By TIM ARANGO, ANNE BARNARD and HWAIDA SAAD, December 8, 2012

But blacklisting the Nusra Front could backfire. It would pit the United States against some of the best fighters in the insurgency that it aims to support. While some Syrian rebels fear the group’s growing power, others work closely with it and admire it — or, at least, its military achievements — and are loath to end their cooperation.

Leaders of the Free Syrian Army, the loose-knit rebel umbrella group that the United States seeks to bolster, expressed exasperation that the United States, which has refused to provide weapons throughout the conflict that has killed more than 40,000 people, is now opposing a group they see as a vital ally.

The Nusra Front “defends civilians in Syria, whereas America didn’t do anything,” said Mosaab Abu Qatada, a rebel spokesman. “They stand by and watch; they look at the blood and the crimes and brag. Then they say that Nusra Front are terrorists.”

He added, “America just wants a pretext to intervene in Syrian affairs after the revolution.”

The United States has been reluctant to supply weapons to rebels that could end up in the hands of anti-Western jihadis, as did weapons that Qatar supplied to Libyan rebels with American approval. Critics of the Obama administration’s Syria policy counter that its failure to support the rebels helped create the opening that Islamic militants have seized in Syria.

The Nusra Front’s appeals to Syrian fighters seem to be working.

At a recent meeting in Damascus, Abu Hussein al-Afghani, a veteran of insurgencies in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, addressed frustrated young rebels. They lacked money, weapons and training, so they listened attentively.

He told them he was a leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq, now working with a Qaeda branch in Syria, and by joining him, they could make their mark. One fighter recalled his resonant question: “Who is hearing your voice today?”

On Friday, demonstrators in several Syrian cities raised banners with slogans like, “No to American intervention, for we are all Jebhat al-Nusra,” referring to the group’s full name, Ansar al-Jebhat al-Nusra li-Ahl al-Sham, or Supporters of the Front for Victory of the People of Syria. One rebel battalion, the Ahrar, or Free Men, asked on its Facebook page why the United States did not blacklist Mr. Assad’s “terrorist” militias.

Another jihadist faction, the Sahaba Army in the Levant, even congratulated the group on the “great honor” of being deemed terrorists by the United States.

Even antigovernment activists who are wary of the group — some deride it as “the Taliban” — said the blacklisting would be ineffective and worsen strife within the uprising. To isolate the group, they say, the United States should support mainstream rebel military councils and Syrian civil society, like the committees that have sprung up to run rebel-held villages.

The Nusra Front is far from the only fighting group that embraces a strict interpretation of Islam. Many battalions have adopted religious slogans, dress and practices, in what some rebels and activists call a pragmatic shift to curry favor with Islamist donors in Persian Gulf countries. One activist said he had a fighter friend with a fondness for Johnnie Walker Black who is now sporting a beard to fit in.

Fighting Drives an Old Sense of Peace From Damascus
By an EMPLOYEE of THE NEW YORK TIMES in SYRIA and ANNE BARNARD, December 9, 2012

DAMASCUS, Syria — Business has been terrible for Abu Tareq, a taxi driver, so last week, without telling his wife, he agreed to drive a man to the Damascus airport for 10 times the usual rate. But, he said later, he will not be doing that again.

On the airport road, he could hear the crash of artillery and the whiz of sniper fire. Dead rebels and soldiers lay on the roadsides. Abu Tareq saw a dog eating the body of a soldier.

“I will never forget this sight,” said Abu Tareq, 50, who gave only a nickname for safety reasons. “It is the road of the dead.”….

But the security forces wield overwhelming firepower, and while they have been unable to subdue the suburbs, some rebel fighters say they lack the intelligence information, arms and communication to advance. That raises the specter of a destructive standoff like the one that has devastated the commercial hub of Aleppo…..

ATME, Syria — Most of them avoid reporters like the plague but in “liberated” northwestern Syria, it is difficult not to run into foreign jihadist fighters, both on the front lines and at rebel bases. “Secrecy shrouding the activities of foreign militants makes it extremely difficult to assess with any accuracy their extent, location and potential ramifications,” the International Crisis Group said in a report.

But while President Bashar al-Assad’s domestic foes have tried for months to downplay the impact of outsiders, now “foreign militants have had more direct involvement, fighting alongside Syrian insurgents,” the Brussels-based group added…..

Call for papers for the 2nd Postgraduate Conference at the Centre for Syrian Studies at the University of St Andrews

How credible are reports of Syrian WMDs? – al-jazeera
As the rhetoric heats up over possible chemical weapons, we ask what is driving US policy toward Syria.
Inside Story 08 Dec 2012
Hillary Man Levertt, Steve Clemons, & Tony Karon

“The United States and like-minded governments are rushing to fund and legitimize a newly formed Syrian opposition group amid fear that plans for a political transition are being outpaced by rebel military gains, U.S. and European officials said…In the meantime, Clinton said, the United States is worried about what Assad might do as his hold on power slips, repeating fears expressed earlier in the week by President Obama and others…’Our concerns are that an increasingly desperate Assad regime might turn to chemical weapons or might lost control of them to one of the many groups that are now operating within Syria,’ Clinton said.”

Chemical Weapons in Syria: Fact, Fiction, and Fib
by Aron Lund*
Syria Comment, December 8, 2012

On the WMD discussion in your last post, which I think was spot on: My guess is that what’s happening is that some intelligence agencies are really picking up signals of WMD motion on the ground, but that the dramatic “mixing sarin and putting it into bombs” info is pure propaganda. It seems designed to spook the public, make a case for intervention, and, to some extent, force the hand of the Obama administration.

In the unlikely event that Assad has really started activating his WMD capacity, it could be for a military purpose or as a political signal. There are basically three things he would be interested in: 1) to threaten any would-be intervention force, e.g. Turkey, 2) to remind everyone that he could carry out a lethal last strike on Israel if the regime falls, 3) possibly, to shift chemical material over to allies in Lebanon, to create a kind of second-strike capability if the regime is attacked and unable to respond.

None of these things involve gassing populated areas in Syria with air-dropped bombs. It could perhaps be done, but it would be hugely counter-productive, not least in terms of an international response, and it’s obviously dangerous on a complex close-quarters battlefield such as Syria’s. It is certainly possible that the regime could have an internal meltdown and start making irrational choices, but so far its decision-makers seem to be acting rationally and in their own best interest. Given that, they’re not going to be poison-gassing Aleppo anytime soon.

On the other hand, some opposition groups and their sympathizers try to plant these stories all the time. As you’ll remember, there was a similar WMD scare in Syria in the summer. That time, US officials eventually came forth and said that they were reassured that Syria had their WMD under control – reassured by Syria itself, I imagine. There’s an odd confluence of interests here. Neither Obama nor Assad want the media to report that a publicly declared US red line has been breached, since that would compel the US to either do something or lose face.

All that said, I think it’s very likely that Assad is currently shifting around his WMD infrastructure to retain control over it, which would mean there is some actual motion on the ground. For example, one of the main chemical warfare installations is allegedly in al-Safira (S/E of Aleppo). That means it would be liable to fall into rebel hands as of right now, if Assad didn’t do something about it. SCUD launch pads and other relevant material would also have to be brought out of rebel reach, or away from areas that have been deprived of effective SAM cover through the loss of air defense installations – rebels are taking these in large numbers. So it’s not surprising at all that the regime is moving stuff around.

As a backgrounder on Syria’s WMD situation, this 74-page report from Sweden’s FOI is very good: www2.foi.se/rapp/foir1290.pdf. It’s in English.

*Aron Lund is author of a report on Syrian jihadism for the Swedish Institute of Foreign Affairs, a shorter version is at Foreign Policy: “Holy Warriors: A field guide to Syria’s jihadi groups,” He also is author of  Drömmen om Damaskus (“The Dream of Damascus”) and a regular contributor to Syria Comment.

Islamism and the Syrian revolution
by Aron Lund*
Syria Comment, December 8, 2012
(See French version at Alternatives Internationales, n°57, Décembre 2012, p. 16-18s)

On November 11, the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces was established in Qatar, supposedly to lead the struggle against Bashar el-Assad. While not an insignificant event, the truth is that these exiled dissidents now have very little influence over the uprising. With Syria in a state of civil war since about a year, opposition leadership has drifted away from the politicians and diplomats, into the hands of guerrilla leaders.

Among these armed groups, things are taking a nasty turn, with the uprising’s sectarian character growing more apparent by the day. The regime is dominated by Syria’s religious minorities, particularly Assad’s own Alawite sect, while the vast majority of revolutionary activists hail from Sunni Arab majority. The exiled opposition retains a small number of Christian, Alawite and Druze leaders, but there is far less pluralism among demonstrators and rebels inside Syria; the armed resistance is almost exclusively Sunni Muslim.

This does not imply that all rebels are religiously motivated, since Syria’s sectarian dynamics are more a question of familial background than one of personal faith. But Islamism is gaining ground rapidly within the armed movement, as rebels grasp for ways to stake out their identity, formulate an ideological discourse, and privately seek solace with God. By November 2012, the ideological spectrum of Syria’s armed movement had narrowed to one ranging from apolitical Sunni conservatism or rural sufism, across the Muslim Brotherhood’s ikhwani Islamism, to the rigid ultra-orthodoxy of salafism. There was little or no room for secular ideologies.

The Free Syrian Army and the Syrian Liberation Front

Most of the armed units in Syria self-identify as part of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), a sprawling ”network of networks” which is backed by the USA, France, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkey, among others. Since its emergence in summer 2011, the FSA has seen a number of rival leaderships emerge, but in September 2012, a ”Joint Command” was presented by Col. Mithqal Bteish el-Noaimi at a conference inside Syria. This group is now popularly seen as the ”mainstream” FSA. The September conference also featured a speech by Adnan al-Arour, a popular Saudi-backed Syrian salafi. It was indicative of the slow convergence of FSA brigades around a nationalist-Islamist line of thought, as secular activism is squeezed out of the uprising entirely, while more radical groups drop off the other end to form their own alliances.

The USA and its regional allies hope that superior funding for the centrist-Islamist FSA alliance will enable it to act as a ”magnetic pole”, drawing cash-starved local commanders into its orbit, and preventing them from associating with more radical groups. Many Syrian dissidents agree: ”This new organization will pay salaries to soldiers, and they have good equipment and communication systems”, explains Abdulbaset Sieda, who recently stepped down as president of the Syrian National Council. ”It is a way of marginalizing the fundamentalists.”

The FSA is not the only player around, however. Just before the Joint Command was formed, several factions on the fringes of the FSA united under the banner of the Syria Liberation Front (SLF). While it has gone almost unnoticed by the foreign media, the overtly Islamist SLF overshadows the FSA in some areas of Syria. It includes powerful units such as the Farouq Brigades of Homs, the salafi-leaning Suqour el-Sham Divisions of Idleb, and the Ansar el-Islam alliance, which dominates the insurgency around Damascus.

Foreign funding and the Muslim Brotherhood

Many of the independent groups are able to turn down support from the FSA network, since they have other sources of funding. These include donations from individual states and private Islamic charities. The wealthiest such charities are funded from the Gulf and run by salafi preachers, like the Syria-born scholar Mohammed Surour Zein el-Abidine.

Another major non-state funder is the Muslim Brotherhood, often described as Syria’s largest opposition group. The Brotherhood lost most of its cadre inside Syria during a failed 1980s uprising, but its exiled leadership is now frantically trying to rebuild an internal structure. While comparatively weak on its own, the Syrian Brotherhood can draw on the financial resources of a vastly larger global network of ikhwani mosques, parties and preachers, as well as the support of governments such as Qatar, Egypt and Turkey.

Since the eruption of protests in early 2011, Brotherhood exiles have therefore been busily shipping money and equipment into Syria, targeting not only their old family contacts and sympathetic clerics, but also independent rebels of all stripes. ”The Muslim Brotherhood funds and supplies many armed groups on the ground, most of them Islamists and some of them even salafi”, agrees Raphaël Lefèvre, a French scholar and author of the Ashes of Hama, a book on the Syrian Muslim brotherhood. But according to Lefèvre, ”jihadis are the red line the organization is not ready to cross.”

There are good reasons for this prudence. While the private salafi and ikhwani contributions have been immensely helpful in weakening the Assad regime, they are viewed with suspicion by many Western and Arab governments, who fear a jihadi ”blowback” from the Syrian conflict. Several Gulf states have clamped down on private funding of the rebels, insisting that all support must go through government-approved channels. For example, in May 2012 Saudi Arabia banned a charity called the Ulema Committee to Aid Syria, fronted by the popular salafi preacher Mohammed el-Arifi.

Radical salafism and jihadism

The international concerns focus in particular on a shadowy salafi-jihadi group called Jabhat el-Nosra, which emerged in Syria in early 2012, probably as an outgrowth of the Iraqi wing of al-Qaida. It has specialized in suicide attacks against high-profile government targets, earning it a great deal of media attention. There is also the Ahrar el-Sham Brigades, a less famous but larger salafi group, which is well implanted in north-western Syria. Like Jabhat el-Nosra, it has enrolled foreign volunteers, engaged in suicide bombings, and seeks to establish a theocracy, but it still appears somewhat less extreme than Jabhat el-Nosra, and has a weaker connection to the international salafi-jihadi scene. Ahrar el-Sham funding sources are diverse, but known to include Gulf-based salafists such as the Kuwaiti sheikh Hajjaj el-Ajami, and even the Muslim Brotherhood.

Numerous smaller jihadi factions are active on the local level. For example, the Haqq Division alliance gathers radical Islamist groups in Homs, while the small town of Binnish, on the strategic Idleb-Aleppo road, has spawned a salafi network known as the Islamic Vanguard Group.

Since most rebel forces are active only within their own home communities, local concerns will often trump national alliances and ideology. The sharp distinctions drawn by outside analysts between ”extremists” and ”moderates” count for little on the ground in Syria, where rebels typically fight side by side for the same immediate goals, and often have friends and family in groups other than their own. ”Everybody knows everybody else among the activists in Idleb, where I am working”, explains one Syrian dissident, who has spent much of 2012 travelling between Turkey and Syria. ”If any group runs into trouble, the others will be there right away to help, and you share facilities with others.”

Ultimately, the jihadis are only one strand within a larger Sunni insurgent movement, even if they play an outsized political role, by pushing the parameters of the conflict towards sectarian violence and coloring international perspectives on the uprising. And however unpleasant its effects may be, the primary danger in Syria is not the short-term rise of Islamism – it is the risk of a national collapse into anarchy, and protracted sectarian violence. Should this be allowed to occur, jihadism will be the least of the Middle East’s troubles.

*Aron Lund is author of a report on Syrian jihadism for the Swedish Institute of Foreign Affairs, a shorter version is at Foreign Policy: “Holy Warriors: A field guide to Syria’s jihadi groups,” He also is author of  Drömmen om Damaskus (“The Dream of Damascus”) and a regular contributor to Syria Comment.

A number of journalists have asked me if I believe Assad is likely to use chemical weapons. Here is the way I think about it:

Assad is unlikely to use chemical weapons at this time. He must know that as soon as he uses them, he will have written his death warrant. I do not think he is suicidal or about to pursue a “Samson option” as some have suggested.

The Alawite community of 2.5 million that lives in the coastal region of Syria is counting on his army to protect them from possible retribution from the rebel militias. Sectarian hatred has been driven to a high pitch by the brutality of the regime. Syrians have been putting hate in their hearts over the last two years, making the likelihood of some sort of retribution ever more likely and the ethnic cleansing a possibility, even if a small one at this time. Assad and his generals will want to protect their families who live along the Mediterranean coast.

Should Damascus become ungovernable, as I believe it eventually will — although that may be a long time from now — he will have to fall back with his army to the coastal region. Then he will have his back to the wall and the likelihood of his using chemical weapons goes way up. He would most likely threaten to use them should rebel militias begin pushing into the Alawite Mountains or attack the coastal cities. He will want to keep them as a deterrent.

The Chemical weapons scare now going on may be overblown. Speaking to a general at Central Command in Tampa yesterday, I was reminded that chemical weapons are difficult to arm and use. Sarin was used by Saddam in Halabcha, where bombs were dropped by planes, which means that Assad could do the same because he has an airforce. But for the rebels to use them effectively would be difficult, without proper missiles or systems to launch projectiles which are difficult to arm.

Here is a section from Tony Karon’s most recent Time article, which is excellent as always. It reflects my understanding of what the regime’s thinking may become:

Yet, such a fracturing of Syria could, in the minds of some of the hard men around Assad, offer the prospect of salvaging more than they might if the regime is defeated and replaced by a strong, Sunni-dominated central state.  Assad’s regime is not so much a personality-cult dictatorship as it is a system of Alawite minority rule and privilege, and its core remains a cohesive, heavily armed and highly motivated Alawite-dominated army that believes it is fighting for the survival of its community. Even once it recognizes that it can no longer rule the entire country, its sectarian communal logic may militate against making a desperate last stand in Damascus, a predominantly Sunni city.

(PHOTOS:Syria’s Slow-Motion, Bloody Civil War)

“Nobody knows what they’re thinking in the regime’s inner circles, but to the extent that the regime is making rational decisions, it doesn’t make much sense to take the ‘Samson option’ and use chemical weapons,” says University of Oklahoma Syria scholar Joshua Landis, referring to the Biblical figure who wanted to take down all with him as he died fighting. ”Unlike Gaddafi in Libya, Assad is ruling on behalf of a community, and the key decisions may not be his alone to make. The Alawite strongmen around him don’t want to commit suicide. They want to protect themselves and their families from the violent retribution they fear is inevitable if the regime falls.” That, argues Landis, may make them more likely to favor a retreat to the Alawite heartland along the coast, where they’ll have a greater base of strength than they do in Damascus. If so, the regime, as we know it, will have fallen, but the civil war would be far from over.

If the Assad regime’s Alawite security core, which could field significantly more than 50,000 men motivated by fear for their lives, was to abandon Damascus, its best hope would lie in Syria breaking up into warring fiefdoms rather than reconstituting as a strong Sunni-dominated central government. The regime’s earlier strategic decision to cede control of Kurdish areas to a separatist militia with no intention of bowing to any authority in Damascus appears to reflect a preference for Balkanizing those parts of Syria it can no longer control. The regime will therefore also hope to see its enemies divided by the schism in rebel ranks between more extreme Salafist groups and those deemed secular or more moderately Islamist. Right now, the Syrian opposition coalition recently formed in Doha, Qatar, at Western behest may be recognized by France, Britain and Gulf states as the “sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people,” but its control over fighting units on the ground remains an aspiration rather than an established fact.

Some of the most striking recent rebel victories in overrunning Assad’s bases have been chalked up by the Qaeda-inspired Jabhat al-Nusra militia, whose numbers are reportedly swelling to the point that its rivals estimate it fields up to 10,000 men, many of whom play the leading combat role on the fronts where they’re deployed.

Jabhat al-Nusra

The announcement by US officials that they are moving to proscribe Jabhat al-Nusra as a terrorist organization at this time is a bit confusing. It sends controdictory messages. Whose side is Washington on? Does it want to bring down Assad and support the rebels? Or does it want to start a civil war among the rebels? The latter would would be a boon to the Assad regime.

It sends a message to Qatar and Saudis: “don’t send money to Salafi groups or we will nail you for aiding terrorists and freeze any assets you have in the West.” It would also allow Congress to begin setting policy buy setting sanctions against any militia or regional authority that associates with Jabhat al-Nusra. The Treasury Department’s expanding anti-terrorism branch will also begin to set policy, as it must enforce this sanction.

Here is an NPR clip I did about this yesterday: Syrian Militia Leaders Depend On A Terrorist Faction – “Melissa Block talks with Joshua Landis about the ongoing conflict in Syria and whether the Bashar al-Assad regime has reached a tipping point.”

Here is what Tony Karon writes:

But it remains to be seen how a U.S.-authored move against the Nusra Front will be received by fighting units to whom the jihadists have become valuable partners in combat, while the U.S. is widely viewed by rebel fighters as having done little for their cause.

Still, the Lebanese paper As-Safir reported Tuesday:

Many expect a fierce battle to break out between the Salafists and the al-Nusra Front on one hand and the other armed groups on the other, under the pretext of uniting the [Free Syrian Army]… The FSA cannot unite without settling the Salafist and jihadist issue once and for all. That may happen if the West puts this as condition for sending arms, some believe.

Civil wars, within civil wars, along the lines of those fought in Lebanon between 1976 and 1992 may be viewed as the best hope of survival by the hard men of the regime who turned Syria’s rebellion into a bloody sectarian war almost two years ago. That war has steadily dismembered the Syrian state; rebuilding it on new terms could take many turbulent years. At least, that’s what the more far-sighted in Assad’s circles may be hoping.

It’s Time to Recognize the Opposition in Syria – Room for Debate  – New York times
“As Good as It’s Going to Get” by Joshua Landis, December 5, 2012

Washington should recognize and support the newly formed National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces. The United States has spent the last 21 months insisting on unity in what turns out to be a very fragmented Syrian opposition. This group is as good as it is going to get. It is filled with elite Syrians, who are educated, relatively pro-American, not too anti-Israel and not too Islamist — many of whom have gone to jail for their beliefs. This group will be able to retain popular backing from the West.

The problem is that events on the ground in Syria have largely overtaken this effort at statecraft. Hundreds of militias are bringing down the Assad regime. They have largely driven the Syrian military out of the north and east of the country at a tremendous cost. They tend to look at the coalition as a foreign concoction, selected by unknown hands, and representing only itself.

The Syrians fighting in the militias come from a very different background than those placed at the head of the coalition. They grew up in mostly rural areas and have only basic educations. Salafism is the ideology of the day, taking root with growing speed. Most come from the north of the country and the poorer towns outside of Aleppo, Idlib and Homs. Some have already rejected the coalition, others have said they will cooperate with it on the condition that it delivers money and arms soon, but none are likely to cede it real authority. The president and his two deputies all grew up in Damascus and hail from elite families. None have military experience.

The big question that haunts the coalition is how it will gain control of the armed elements of the revolution. Today, Syria is ruled by guns, radicals and tough guys. It will take a miracle for the U.S. to glue this new exile leadership on top of the militia lords in Syria.

From Juan Cole  – thanks Juan

The phone conversation above between two Alawite soldiers is very telling. They are caught in bases in the North that are about to fall to rebels, who presumable captured this recording and posted it to youtube. They are dispirited. Read this excellent article by Marlin Dick in the Daily Star about it.

…They both complain about the lack of support from other units, the inability to use many roads – “you just get blown up if you do” – and the isolation.

Throughout the rest of the conversation they make several brief references to the state of the war and the regime’s prospects for victory. The caller talks about being a “strike force” in the area while the second man, who is markedly demoralized, rejects the idea, based on the steady, bloody attrition.

“No … no … we’re not a strike force,” he insists, before asking: “What’s the point of being out here?”

The caller tries repeatedly to boost his friend’s morale but at one point blurts out: “There’s no solution.”

When the caller asks about defections, the demoralized officer’s response is: “No, there haven’t been any defections … there’s just … disgust.”

Neither man presumes to predict how or when the war will end. Since it is the Eid, the caller asks his friend if sweets, baklava, were offered at the base to mark the holiday.

“No, they didn’t bring me anything,” the demoralized officer responds immediately, before adding: “They brought me worries.”….As the caller laments a few times during the conversation, “There’s no one left from our graduating class.” ???? ?????? ??????? ?? ???? ????? ?????? ??????? ?????

Brookings: Al Qaeda 3.0: Terrorism’s Emergent New Power Bases |
2012-12-04

An American-Aleppine writes:

From Free Syrian Army sources it seems that FSA surrounds the city of Aleppo in a circle with wide gaps. The circle stretches 3 to 10 miles outside the city limits. The Syrian Army controls inside this big circle except the south half of the city. There is a narrow no-mans land (about 5 percent of the city area) between the two halves of the city where most of the face-to-face fighting is taking place.

Under siege by drones in Pakistan and Yemen, al Qaeda 3.0 has exploited the Arab Awakening to create its largest safe havens and operational bases in more than a decade across the Arab world. This may prove to be the most deadly al Qaeda yet. The …

The ways in which the Syrian regime has been portrayed are reminiscent of the common tendency to view violence generally as deeply irrational, and – from ill-defined but morally unwavering liberal perspectives— as always counterproductive, destructive and self-defeating. Indeed, the more violence the Syrian regime resorted to, the more it came to be portrayed as inherently inadequate and senseless. In his questioning of the irrational qualities habitually attributed to armed conflict and violence generally, one scholar, Christopher Cramer (2006), gave his book the title “civil war is not a stupid thing”. Similarly, but with far more modest objectives, I present my argument that, during the uprising in Syria, authoritarian governance and repression has not been a ‘stupid thing’ either; on the contrary, and moral considerations and judgments set aside, the Syrian regime’s responses to the uprising suggest that it is ‘in-touch’, calculative, ‘rational’, and learning –if by trial and error, and surely without necessarily quelling the uprising.  FULL TEXT AT

Bunker Mentality
2012-12-04 Telegraph View

Dec. 4 (Telegraph) — Even if President Bashar al-Assad remains rational, no one can be sure that he still controls Syria’s chemical arsenal, one of the largest in the world

With one miscalculation after another, President Bashar al-Assad has reduced Syria to a charnel house and his regime to a bloodstained gang with no aim save survival. Judging by their stark warnings, officials in Britain and America genuinely fear that he could crown his litany of crimes and misjudgments by unleashing Syria’s arsenal of chemical weapons….Mr Assad would be a latter-day Samson pulling down the pillars of
the temple

Free Syrian Army Fighters Destroy Statues of roman soldiers, calling them asnam, or idols.
The Internet – November 27, 2012

For one Syrian activist, second thoughts on the armed rebellion
By David Enders | McClatchy Newspapers, December 03, 2012
HASAKA, Syria

Hasaka is still controlled by the Syrian government, but even from the window of a taxi it’s obvious the people here have not been spared from the country’s civil war.

The lines at bakeries are daylong, and many schools are closed because they’ve become homes for refugees from other parts of the country. The power is out now as often as it is on, and fuel is in ever shorter supply.

Though she is happy to see him, Adam Ebrahem’s mother admonishes him for returning to his family’s home here.

“You shouldn’t stay,” she says. “The PYD will kill you.”

Ebrahem – it’s a pseudonym he uses for security reasons – is a 27-year-old revolutionary. A musician and a student, he was working and studying in Damascus when the rebellion against the government of President Bashar Assad began nearly two years ago. After months of demonstrating in Damascus, he returned to Hasaka to organize demonstrations. Now, as he travels across Hasaka province and in Deir al Zour province to the south, documenting the situation there, he openly wonders whether he and his fellow revolutionaries have done the right thing.

“What will we tell our children? That we started this revolution and destroyed the country?”

Ebrahem is a Kurd, the ethnic group that dominates Hasaka province and makes up about 10 percent of Syria’s population. The PYD is a Kurdish militia that is allied with the Syrian government; it’s the PYD that more or less controls the neighborhood Ebrahem’s family lives in. It also has clashed with anti-Assad rebels in northern Syria, heightening tensions between Kurds and Arabs.

The first demonstrations, particularly in Damascus, were hopeful ones and deliberate in their displays of unity among the country’s sects and ethnicities. But as the violence grew, it was the Sunni Muslim Arab population that armed itself. Though the narrative that has persisted is that arming the rebellion was the only choice, many peaceful demonstrators like Ebrahem are tepid in their support of that decision, and some oppose it outright.

Ebrahem’s family is making plans to leave Hasaka. They don’t expect it to remain free of widespread violence for much longer. No one does….

But his forebodings were right. A few days later, Ebrahem gave an update by phone.

“There was fighting between Kurdish and Arab students today at three schools in Hasaka,” he said.

The Confessions of a Sniper: A Rebel Gunman in Aleppo and His Conscience
By Rania Abouzeid / Aleppo

He hails from a Sunni military family in a town on the outskirts of Damascus, the capital. His uncle is a serving general in President Bashar Assad’s army, several of his other relatives are also high-ranking military officers. Apart from his parents and siblings, his relatives all think he’s dead — and that’s the way he wants to keep it….

He may look calm, but he’s deeply troubled. After some nine months of fighting with several Free Syrian Army units, first on the outskirts of Aleppo and then in the city itself after the rebel push into it in late July, he has grown disillusioned with the fight and angry with its conduct. “I did this when it was clean,” he says. “Now it’s dirty. Many aren’t fighting just to get rid of Bashar, they’re fighting to gain a reputation, to build up their name. I want it to go back to the way it was, when we were fighting for God and the people, not for some commander’s reputation.”

He refused an order in November to fight a proregime, ethnic Kurdish militia in a Kurdish neighborhood of Aleppo that the rebels had entered. “Why should I fight the Kurds?” he says. “It’s a distraction. This isn’t our fight.”

Syrians in the opposition, whether armed or not, have often said that there may be a revolution after the revolution to unseat Assad. The fault lines differ depending on whom you talk to. Some envision a fight between Islamist and secular rebels; others between defectors and armed civilians; some say it will be ethnic, between Kurds and Arabs; others simply territorial, between rebel commanders in a particular area, irrespective of ideology. Others say it won’t happen. The Sniper, like many fighting men, thinks that it will, and that it will be ugly: “We will not become Somalia after Bashar falls,” he says. “We will have many Somalias in every province.”…

And so rebel snipers, especially professionally trained ones, are in great demand. The Sniper says he has “been offered so much money, it is as if I am working for the mafia.”

“Some [rebel commanders] offered me money. Others would say, ‘Just tell me what you want.’ One told me, ‘I’ll bring your parents, take them to safety. Just come and work with me,’” he says. “It does not honor me to work with people like this who think they can buy and sell me.”

Instead, he has found a home with Liwa Suqoor al-Sha‘ba, an Islamist unit of the Free Syrian Army headquartered in Azaz, a town north of Aleppo in the vast band of countryside in rebel hands around the city. For the past few months he has been stationed in the northeastern neighborhood of Bustan al-Basha, a devastated wasteland emptied of all but three of its thousands of residents. “We cannot charge on [government] positions — if we do, they will eliminate us — nor can they advance on us,” he says. “It’s not that I’m tired, but I want something new. New territory. I’m sick of it here, I’m disgusted by it.” But he respects his adversaries, who he says have pinned the rebels down now for months….

“We were in school together. We grew up together. His mother was like my mother, that’s how close we were,” he says. The Sniper is pensive, takes several deep breaths and fidgets with his 10-mm handgun as he speaks of his friend, repeatedly flicking off the gun’s safety. The young men joined the army together and stayed in contact even after the Sniper defected. He was the only person outside of the Sniper’s immediate family who knew that he was still alive. “I would tell him to defect, he’d say, ‘Not yet, it’s still early.’ I’d say defect. I told him I’d come and get him, that I would go anywhere to see him, to help him defect, even to the gates of his brigade. Whatever he wanted, wherever he was, I would get him. He kept saying, ‘It’s still early, it’s early.’ He was scared that his family would go through the same thing my family went through.” The Sniper says his family members were interrogated, harassed, ostracized in their community. The only thing that saved them from greater harm, he suspects, was the clout of the loyalist military men in his family and the fact that they thought he was dead, not a defector.

Mohammad was eventually sent to Azaz, stationed at what was called the Shatt Checkpoint. Both the Sniper and his commander repeatedly urged Mohammad to defect, warning him that they planned to attack the checkpoint. He didn’t listen. “We were three snipers. We killed a colonel, a soldier and my friend. I don’t know which one I killed, I didn’t see their faces. They were soldiers in front of us, and we were ordered to kill them.” That was three months ago.

“He’s gone anyway, what good is thinking about it? I did — for a long time afterward. I thought, ‘Why? He was my friend. Why did I shoot at him? I shouldn’t have.’ But I have left those thoughts behind me. I have to move forward.”…

“Whoever is going to be in my sights will die. That’s it,” the Sniper says. “My heart has hardened. I returned to religion, but after I killed, my heart hardened. A sniper sees who he kills,” he says, pausing. “It’s hard. A sniper sees his victim.”

Its a Disaster Live iside a Syrian Refugee Camp
NPR

Aleppo: How Syria Is Being Destroyed
The New York Review of Books 20/11/12

Syria Moves Its Chemical Weapons, and U.S. and Allies Cautiously Take Note

Report: Syria Has Chemical Weapons Ready to Use
Leslie Horn

Mideast’s WMD ‘red line’ gauntlet
By Bennett Ramberg, December 3, 2012, Reuters

….Remember the ultimatums that called on Iraq to get out of Kuwait in 1991; the Taliban to surrender Osama Bin Laden in 2001, and the demand Saddam Hussein leave Iraq in 2003? Each failed and war ensued.

With red line failure more often than not, both the United States and Israel must map a response. As it turns out, however, Washington may face the more immediate problem…..

Al-Qaeda affiliate playing larger role in Syria rebellion
By David Ignatius

Syrian opposition leaders report an alarming growth within their ranks of fighters from Jabhat al-Nusra, an extremist group linked to al-Qaeda.

The Jabhat group now has somewhere between 6,000 and 10,000 fighters, according to officials of an non-governmental organization that represents the more moderate wing of the Free Syrian Army (FSA). They say that the al-Qaeda affiliate now accounts for 7.5 percent to 9 percent of the Free Syrian Army’s total fighters, up sharply from an estimated 3 percent three months ago and 1 percent at the beginning of the year.

The extremist group is growing in part because it has been the most aggressive and successful arm of the rebel force. “From the reports we get from the doctors, most of the injured and dead FSA are Jabhat al-Nusra, due to their courage and [the fact they are] always at the front line,” said a message sent today to the State Department by the moderate Free Syrian Army representatives, warning of the extremists’ rise.

These estimates are very rough, given the scattered and disorganized nature of the opposition. But they are based on detailed reporting from the field by the members’ military councils, which are the closest thing to an organized command structure among the rebels. In reports sent this week to the State Department, the NGO representing the Syrian moderates offered a detailed breakdown of the extremists’ growth:

* In Aleppo, the Jabhat force is reckoned at around 2,000, mostly in the Al-Bab area northeast of the city. This estimate is based partly on reports from a doctor in the area who has treated injured fighters. The total FSA presence in the Aleppo area is about 15,000.

* In Idlib province, west of Aleppo, Jabhat’s ranks number 2,500 to 3,000, or about 10 percent of the total number of FSA fighters there.

* In Deir al-Zor, to the northeast, the extremist group has about 2,000 of the FSA’s total force of 17,000, according to the reports. Among Jabhat al-Nusra’s most spectacular operations were recent seizures of the Al-Ward oil field and a Conoco gas field, the reports said.

* In Damascus, the Jabhat al-Nusra force is somewhere between 750 and 1,000. Another 1,000 fighters are spread around the country in Latakia, in northwest Syria, Homs in the center and Daraa in the south.

The Syrian reports paint a picture of a disorganized rebel force in which the extremists are filling the vacuum caused by the lack of clearly established command and control.

“In some areas, other extreme groups are merging with [Jabhat] al-Nusra, in others many are leaving it because they did not fulfill promises of support,” notes one report sent to the State Department.

In the chaos of the Syrian battlefield, smaller battalions drawn from neighborhoods or small towns are combining forces with larger groups to form brigades, many of them led by extremists. “This means more [mergers] of extreme groups within Jabhat al-Nusra as it becomes more and more franchised,” the report explains. “Their risk is paying off. They are on a high [rate] of growth.”

A message sent earlier this week from the Free Syrian Army representatives touted the new use of anti-aircraft missiles to down a Syrian helicopter: “It’s thrilling to see it [the anti-aircraft weapon] in action finally. The bad news is that it was not through the U.S. but from the regime bases fallen into the hands of the [FSA] battalions. The other bad news is that it’s not under the control or the supervision of the MC [Military Council] commanders.”

“We are feeling the heat, time is closing up, the fall of Assad appears to be in the very near future,” continued this message, sent last Tuesday.

As the rebels gain momentum, the spoils of war apparently are going to the rebel group that captures a particular Syrian army base. This is one factor boosting the rapid growth of Jabhat al-Nusra. Its fighters provide the muscle and weapons and, as a result, explained an official of the NGO that represents the moderate FSA fighters: “They will get all the goodies, reputation and recognition.”

Inside Jabhat al Nusra – the most extreme wing of Syria’s struggle
One of the men behind a series of jihadist attacks inside Syria tells Ruth Sherlock about their battle to overthrow President Assad.
By Ruth Sherlock, Beirut, 02 Dec 2012

…His accounts of the operations conducted by his wing of the Islamist group Jabhat al-Nusra provide an exclusive and terrifying glimpse inside the most extreme wing of the Syrian rebellion – one which many members of the more secular Free Syrian Army loathe, and which may prove to be the West’s worst nightmare.

They also give an insight into the further conflict to which Syria may descend, if or when the Assad regime finally falls….

Syrian rebel films himself shooting 10 prisoners
Reuters

…”I swear to God that we are peaceful,” begs one of the men to the camera, which is being held by the gunman. Cowering, the man gets up to plead with rebels. As he approaches a rebel off-screen, a shot is heard and he returns holding his bloodied arm.

The cameraman then points the camera along the barrel of his Kalashnikov assault rifle as he shoots the men.

“God is great. Jabhat al-Nusra,” he says,… the video said it was filmed in Ras al-Ain…

Syrian opposition edges toward appointing transition PM
By Khaled Yacoub Oweis
CAIRO | Fri Nov 30, 2012

(Reuters) – Syria’s new opposition coalition edged closer on Friday toward choosing a prime minister to lead a transitional government after three days of talks in Cairo that furthered the dominance of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Former Prime Minister Riad Hijab, a longtime apparatchik in President Bashar al-Assad’s Baath Party before he defected in August, is the strongest candidate for the job, delegates said.

Hijab, who is backed by Jordan and Gulf states, is likely to be chosen before or during a gathering in mid-December of the Friends of Syria, according to coalition insiders.

The grouping of dozens of nations had pledged mostly non-military backing for the revolt but is worried by the influence of Islamists in the opposition.

A popular uprising erupted in March 2011 against Assad’s autocratic rule in which 40,000 people have been killed and hundreds of thousands forced to flee the country

Coalition member Louay Safi said the prime minister would be the point man for the coalition with the international community and act as the head of an alternate Cabinet ready to fill the political and security void if Assad falls from power.

Members of the new government cannot be members of the coalition, which numbers 60.

“I think Hijab has the best chance. He has taken big risks to defect and has since come across as a balanced and composed choice,” said coalition member Munther Bakhos, a veteran opposition figure forced to flee Syria during the 1970s, as bloody repression by Assad’s father, late President Hafez al-Assad, intensified, eventually killing many thousands.

Under internal coalition rules reached late into the night, the prime minister will be elected by a simple majority in the coalition, in which the Brotherhood and its allies have more than 50 percent of the seats.

Candidates must have contributed to the 20-month revolt against Assad and not be tainted by corruption, according to internal rules reached at 2 a.m. (midnight GMT).

NEW EXECUTIVE BODY

The coalition earlier on Friday created an executive body, less than a month after the group came into being with Western and Arab support.

The 11-member “political assembly” will be headed by moderate preacher Moaz al-Khatib, the current president of the coalition.

They will include his two vice presidents and the coalition’s secretary general, Qatari-backed businessman Mustafa Sabbagh, who has emerged as one of the most powerful figures in the new structure.

But the delegates failed to agree on the names of the 11 members after a lengthy election procedure and postponed deciding on the issue, delegates said.

Hardball politics have overshadowed the three-day proceedings in Cairo, with the Brotherhood becoming an overwhelmingly powerful kingmaker.

Since the coalition was set up in Qatar earlier this month, the Brotherhood has swiftly assembled a de facto majority bloc, according to insiders keeping track of changes in the membership of the coalition.

The revolt against four decades of rule by Assad and his late father revived the Brotherhood’s fortunes after decades of repression that killed many thousands of its members, and opened more sources of financing for the organization from exiled conservative Syrians.

France, Britain, Turkey and Gulf Arab states have already recognized the coalition as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people. The United States has been more cautious….

Syria rebels say captured missiles downed army aircraft
(AFP) / 2 December 2012

Syrian rebels say a former army missile specialist in their ranks used captured shoulder-launched weapons to down two government aircraft in as many days last month.

Rebel commanders said that the army helicopter shot down on November 27 and the fighter jet shot down the following day were both hit with Russian-made surface-to-air missiles captured from an army base west of Syria’s second city Aleppo in mid-November.

Defence analysts cited by the Western media had said that the aircraft were likely brought down with surface-to-air missiles provided from abroad, including by the Gulf state of Qatar, an outspoken champion of arming the rebels, over the opposition of the United States.

The rebels said the expertise to use the SA-16 Gimlet missiles, which they said they captured from Base 46 along with other heavy weaponry, came from within their own ranks in the form of a former army missile specialist.

‘This is Musa Abu Omar. He shot down both of the aircraft,’ said Abu Abdel Rahman, a leading rebel commander in the town of Darret Ezza, 30 kilometres (20 miles) northwest of Aleppo, as he introduced the fighter to AFP.

‘Both the missiles came from Base 46,’ Abu Omar said. ‘We’ve got enough of them now to bring down the whole Syrian air force,’ he boasted, refusing to give any specific numbers.

Asked where he got his training on the use of the SA-16, a missile most famous for its use by Saddam Hussein’s forces against coalition aircraft during the 1991 Gulf war, Abu Omar said: ‘It was my specialism in the army during my three year service.’

The 27-year-old showed AFP a photograph of himself holding a shoulder-launched missile that he said was one of the two he fired. The picture’s authenticity could not be independently verified.

Abu Omar said instruction was now being given to other rebel fighters.

‘We’ll impose our own no-fly zone without any need from help from foreign governments,’ he added in reference to the repeated refusals of Western governments to heed opposition calls to intervene to close the skies to President Bashar Al Assad’s warplanes as they did in Libya last year….

But there have been contradictory reports about the likely source of the missiles with the Washington Post reporting on Thursday that they were likely part of a consignment of up to 40 supplied from abroad.

Some of the missiles were supplied by Qatar, the newspaper reported, citing two Middle Eastern intelligence officials it did not identify.

‘It should be worrying to everyone,’ one of the officials said. ‘When Assad is finished, terrorists could end up with these, and commercial flights would be at risk.’

Washington has consistently opposed providing SAMs to the rebels for fear they could fall into the wrong hands.

Flow of Arms to Syria Through Iraq Persists, to U.S. Dismay
By MICHAEL R. GORDON, ERIC SCHMITT and TIM ARANGO.
NYTimes December 1, 2012

WASHINGTON — The American effort to stem the flow of Iranian arms to Syria has faltered because of Iraq’s reluctance to inspect aircraft carrying the weapons through its airspace, American officials say.

The shipments have persisted at a critical time for President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, who has come under increasing military pressure from rebel fighters. The air corridor over Iraq has emerged as a main supply route for weapons, including rockets, antitank missiles, rocket-propelled grenade and mortars.

Iran has an enormous stake in Syria, which is its staunchest Arab ally and has also provided a channel for Iran’s support to the Lebanese Islamist movement Hezbollah.

To the disappointment of the Obama administration, American efforts to persuade the Iraqis to randomly inspect the flights have been largely unsuccessful.

US accelerates intervention in Syrian war
RT: 29 November, 2012,

The US government is contemplating significant intervention in the Syria conflict and has discussed employing Patriot Air and Missile Defense Systems in Turkey and directly providing arms to opposition fighters.

In an attempt to defeat Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, government officials told the New York Times that the US might bring its military resources to the region for either intimidation purposes or direct use in Syria.

NATO will likely decide next week whether or not to deploy surface-to-air Patriot missiles in Turkey, which would serve to protect the country from potential Syrian missiles that could contain chemical weapons, as well as intimidate Syrian Air Force pilots from bombing the northern Syria border towns.

The armed rebels currently control much of Northwest Syria along the border of Turkey, making the border a likely conflict zone should Syrian missiles be implemented.

Although State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said the Patriot missile system would not be used beyond the Turkish border, military sources told Israeli news service DEBKAthat all of northern Syria – including Aleppo and Homs – would become controlled by the Turkish-NATO team.

The US has so far hesitated to intervene on the ground in Syria, fearing the risks would be too great for their own soldiers and could worsen the conflict. But 18 months after the start of the civil war, intervention has increasingly entered the US radar.

“The administration has figured out that if they don’t start doing something, the war will be over and they won’t have any influence over the combat forces on the ground,” former Defense Intelligence Agency officer told the New York Times. “They may have some influence with various political groups and factions, but they won’t have influence with the fighters, and the fighters will control the territory.”

The US has so far provided nearly $200 million in humanitarian aid, but has not intervened militarily. But US officials believe the administration is now considering providing arms to the opposition groups. CIA officers located in Turkey have already determined which groups should receive such weapons, but have emphasized the difficulty of preventing them from falling into the wrong hands.

The Obama administration is also preparing to recognize Syria’s new opposition council as the official representation of Syria, likely during a Dec. 12 “Friends of Syria” conference in Morocco which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will attend, the Associated Press reports. The recognition will likely spur further US involvement in the conflict – if not militarily, then it will at least draw more humanitarian aid. Britain, France and several Arab countries allied with the US have already recognized the council as Syria’s sole representative.

But while the idea of providing arms may be considered, many still believe it to be a bad idea.

“Arms are not a strategy; arms are a tactic,” US Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford said during a conference in Washington. “A military solution is not the best way for Syria. Efforts to win this by conquering one side or the other will simply prolong the violence and actually aggravate an already terrible humanitarian situation. Syria needs a political solution.”

The US government has not made any official announcements that it was considering providing weapons, but the Congressional officials and diplomats told the Times that a decision would likely be made after Obama selects his new national security team.

Syria’s war exposes fault lines of sectarian divisions
Justin Vela, Nov 27, 2012, The National

ANTAKYA, TURKEY // For some Syrian Kurds, clashes between Arab rebels and a Kurdish militia in Syria are not just related to the country’s revolution, but the outcome of deeper societal fissures.

“The sectarian divisions are growing stronger,” said Nassir Al Dean Ehme, a hulking Kurdish refugee who founded Qamishli House, a leaky four-room house in southern Turkey providing temporary accommodation to Syrian refugees and activists.

“We had these sectarian and ethnic divisions in Syria before and now it has deepened. Maybe we were one country on the map but, if we think about the feelings of people, we see many divisions,” said Mr Al Dean Ehme, who named the house after his hometown of Qamishli, the main Kurdish city in Syria.

Are Syria’s rebels about to win?
Syrian rebels have made significant gains in recent weeks as support for Assad shows signs of fraying.
Hugh Macleod and a reporter in Syria – Global Post – November 30, 2012

A man looks out below the shutter of a burnt-out building in the northern city of Lattakia, a stronghold of support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. (Anwar Amro/AFP

LATTAKIA, Syria — With coffins stacking up at the airport in Syria’s Alawite heartland, and funerals now a daily routine for its mountain villagers, support is fraying among the community on which the Syrian regime depends.

“Day by day the military operations are getting harder and harder,” said Abu Haider, 40, a member of the Syrian security forces, near Qerdaha, the home village of President Bashar al-Assad.

“The Alawites will fight to the end to defend President Bashar but are paying a big price. Most of our men are serving in the army or security forces,” he told GlobalPost.

Ali, a 28-year-old Alawite living in Lattakia, the regional capital, said Alawite villages he recently visited had been nearly emptied of men after the regime enforced conscription for any member of the Alawite sect aged between 18 and 50.

Alawites are the minority off-shoot of Shiite Islam to which the president’s family belongs. The conflict in Syria has increasingly become a sectarian war between the Alawites and the Sunni majority rebels…..

“Rebel gains in recent days give them access to weapons that could tip the military balance in their favor in the north,” said Alison Baily, a Middle East analyst at Oxford Analytica, a global analysis and advisory firm. “The regime does not have the manpower to reverse these gains.”

Alongside the capture of another key base in Saraqeb earlier this month, rebels in the north are increasingly able to choke off supply routes for Assad’s troops battling to re-take Aleppo. Despite holding large areas of countryside, the rebels have yet to exert full control over a major city.

“Regime soldiers who joined us recently said some of their units had not been resupplied with food or fuel for weeks,” said Abu Abdu, a fighter with Liwa al Tawheed, a leading Islamist rebel group in Aleppo. “The regime is sending supplies by the airport, so that is what we will destroy next.”

In the remote desert region of Deir Ezzour, home to well-armed tribes that straddle the border with Iraq, rebel fighters also overran the military base at Mayadeen on the Euphrates River, giving them control over most of the river valley, stretching from the regional capital to the border crossing at Al Bou Kamal.

Two of the region’s three oil fields are now in rebel hands, with trucks lining up to buy $5 barrels of the light crude, a smoky but reliable fuel, as winter sends temperatures plummeting and government supplies dwindle to nothing.

Baily said Syria is now facing a de facto partition between tribes in the east, Kurds in the northwest, Islamist rebels in Aleppo and Idlib, and regime loyalists in Damascus and the Alawite heartlands of the west. This leaves the recently united political opposition, based outside Syria, with the challenge of gaining legitimacy inside the country.

“The rebels are in snowball process, strengthening with each base and arms depot they capture,” she said. “As the country fragments, the most likely scenario is that the regime is ground down into a well armed militia.”

In Damascus, Tense Anticipation of Strongest Push Yet by Rebels
By ANNE BARNARD
Published: December 1, 2012

A quiet tension prevailed downtown, but security checkpoints were proliferating and there were reports that President Bashar al-Assad was preparing loyal divisions to defend the city, the capital and heart of his power.

Military analysts warned that it was impossible to know whether a decisive battle for Damascus was beginning, especially as Syrians lost access to the Internet for 53 hours, limiting the flow of information, before it was restored Saturday. But they said that a government fight to defend its core could be the fiercest and most destructive phase yet of the 20-month conflict.

“We’re waiting for the big battle to begin,” said Emile Hokayem, an analyst based in Bahrain for the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

For decades, the Assad family has settled loyal military families, many from its minority Alawite sect, in the western outskirts of Damascus, where the presidential palace sits on a plateau overlooking the city. The current fighting suggested that the government was trying to insulate those areas, along with the city center and airport, from the semicircle of urban sprawl curving from northeast to southwest, where rebels have strengthened their position in recent days, overrunning a string of small bases.

Analysts say that Mr. Assad, knowing that losing Damascus could be a decisive blow, has been conserving his best and most loyal troops and much of his artillery for a battle there.

Jumblatt urges Syria’s Druze to join the revolution
November 29, 2012

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblatt condemned on Thursday the bombing that targeted the Jaramana suburb of Damascus , Syria on Wednesday, accusing the Syrian regime of president Bashar al Assad of orchestrating it with aim of eliminating the Syrian revolution by stirring sectarian tensions in the country.

Glenn Robinson, “Syria’s Long Civil War“, Current History, Dec. 2012
Here is an excerpt – (Read the whole thing – it is well written and argued)

…..A BIGGER LEBANON
Syria’s troubles go well beyond warring ethnic and confessional groups, to the fact that Syria as a political entity—as a nation—hardly exists. To be sure, the country’s two major cities, Damascus and Aleppo, have very long histories and strong localized identities. However, until the twentieth century, Syria was never a country unto itself. During the half millennium when it was part of the Ottoman Empire, Syria was not even constituted as a single administrative district within the empire, but was split among several districts. The invention of modern Syria following the First World War was based largely on agreements between the French and the British. Syria was not unique in this. Indeed, the modern borders of scores of countries in the developing world were based more on the interests of the colonial powers than on any historical or geographic reality. What was different about Syria was that both the French colonial power and the ruling Arabs in Damascus worked to deny the construction of a modern Syrian national identity…………….

WHICH OUTCOME?
Logically, the current round of Syria’s civil war must end in one of four ways: regime victory, opposition victory, stalemate with no end, or stalemate leading to a political  resolution. The first two outcomes are the worst for all parties, and the last is the best plausible outcome. But for the better options to be plausible, both sides must believe they can actually lose the civil war. This is key. Without an acknowledgment of possible defeat, neither the regime nor the opposition will accept a grand bargain in which  compromise is central………..

THE UNCONVENTIONAL OPTION
The United States and its allies are wise to resist direct military involvement in Syria in the form of invasion, an air campaign, or a “no-fly zone” (which would quickly lead to direct military engagement). Likewise, Washington has been smart to resist providing advanced military hardware, such as anti-aircraft missiles, to an opposition with significant elements that would just as easily turn these weapons against American targets.

That said, the flow of funds and small arms to the opposition from various parties has been an important source of balancing in the civil war, preventing the regime thus far from winning outright. However, the turn toward a Chechnya strategy of using airpower to destroy urban pockets of rebellion does threaten the opposition with outright defeat and should be countered in smart ways. The West was sometimes criticized for adopting a Machiavellian posture during the 1980s Iran-Iraq war by hoping that neither side won outright, but such criticism was not warranted.

A clear victory for either side would have been a disaster for the region and the world. The same approach is warranted in Syria: working to prevent either side from winning a total victory so that both sides will be more inclined to reach a compromise. To accomplish this, the United States and its allies must consider the use of unconventional warfare techniques undertaken directly by very small numbers of allied forces, not indigenous Syrian ones. For example, Turkish special forces, working secretly with their American ally, could surreptitiously shoot down a handful of Syrian jets that are attacking Syrian cities. That alone might ground the Syrian Air Force entirely;….

Such a balancing approach might get us to the best plausible outcome—a negotiated solution— and it would likely prevent either of the two worst outcomes. It is not pretty, but it might actually work.

(Read all of Glen Robinson, “Syria’s Long Civil War”

The Struggle for Abu Kamal: Peace after Defeating the Dictator’s Forces
Asaad al-Saleh, an Assist. Prof. at the University of Utah.

Located on the bank of the Euphrates near the borders with Iraq, Abu Kamal, the city and its towns, has been an active participant in the revolution. The first significant demonstration was as early as 22 April 2011.  This YouTube video shows people chanting with slogans intended as an affront to the regime. Shoes are thrown on a concrete portrait of Hafez al-Assad, as demonstrators gather in the center of the city. In the early stage of the uprising, repeated news of the demonstrations in Abu Kamal and other Syrian cities began to embarrass the regime’s media, particularly when Aljazeera and Alarabiya began to cover the protest in this traditionally neglected area. At that point, the government pretended that there was only a “crisis,” rather than a full-blown revolution, and people were not protesting against al-Assad’s rule. Abu Kamal, just like other restive areas, was slightly covered by the Syrian news agency, SANA.

Eventually, the army was sent to the city to quell the increasing protest. After initially cheering for the soldiers, hoping that the soldiers would either restrain from targeting civilians or, even better, defect, the residents of Abu Kamal gradually showed resistance to the presence of the army in their area. The last army stationed in Abu Kamal was the colonial French force. Yet, this foreign force was kicked out of Abu Kamal after a feud with the Uqaidat tribe that caused the death of French soldiers and, in retaliation, the chief of the tribe.

When both the rebels and the regime’s forces were fighting inside the city, the latter were overwhelmed by fighters who knew how to maneuver inside the area. The rebels destroyed many of the army’s vehicles and forced the soldiers to take shelter outside but still close to the city. For more than ten months, the regime was continuously shooting at commercial and residential areas, forcing almost all residents to leave the city and move either to the towns or to cross the borders to Iraq as refugees.

The regime’s last resort (to achieve almost nothing beyond destruction) was to use its air force to shell the city and some of the towns. One of the towns that were targeted by the military jets was al-Jalaa, the birthplace of the defected Syrian ambassador to Iraq and one of the Ugaidat’s leading figures, Nawaf al-Fares. Raids were launched almost daily from September 2012, mounting to 70 raids by 14 November, according to the official Facebook page representing the Local Coordination in Abu Kamal. The regime used heavy artillery against civilians and more than 1,000 mortars landed in the city. The bases for these attacks were the security headquarters and the only airport in the city, Hamdan airport. The rebels attempted to take over the heavily secured airport in early September of 2012, but were unsuccessful and some of them fell in the assault. Since then, they were preparing themselves to capture the airport and to terminate this center of regime’s power and destruction.

On 8 November 2012, the regime’s security headquarters, called the “security square” by the rebels, became under siege. This fortified area included the public hospital, where snipers were located, the military recruiting center, and the military intelligence building. Two days later, air raids showered the city to prevent the besieging rebels from taking over these bases. These raids left 16 people dead, five of them were women. On Thursday 15 November 2012, the rebels finally liberated the security square and downed a helicopter; but lost three fighters in the operation. The next and last important target was the Hamdan airport, which fell in their hands on Saturday 17 November. The regime’s soldiers and officers in the airport fled into the dessert, leaving behind them the last base of the regime in Abu Kamal. Freeing the airport was the bloodiest encounter for rebels, who lost 15 men. The casualties were from Abu Kamal and the towns’ participants, and one of the fallen heroes was from the town of al-Salhiya and is a relative to the author. Since then, peace returned to Abu Kamal and the regime did not (maybe could not) attack it again.

The advantages of liberating the airport and removing the regime’s forces from Abu Kamal are many but here are the most important ones. Since the fall of the airport, Abu Kamal did not witness any more air strikes, a situation that saved many lives and will allow more fighters to regroup and move to the other few areas under the control of the regime in Dayr al-Zour. Many of Abu Kamal’s fighters have appeared on videos addressing al-Assad by this warning: “Do not leave, we will come to you in Damascus.” This might be a serious threat if rebels across the country free their areas and start moving to the capital.  Additionally, according to Professor Juan Cole in his blog Informed Comment, there is an economic factor that should be noted when considering the liberation of Abu Kamal:

“70% of the goods coming into Syria were coming from the Iraq of PM Nouri al-Maliki, who had refused to join a blockade of Syria because of his new alliance with Iran. But al-Maliki’s attitude is irrelevant if the revolutionaries have Abu Kamal. This development is a nightmare for the Shiite-dominated government of Iraq, since it is fighting a low-intensity struggle with its Sunnis, who predominant in the areas abutting Syria. If Sunni fundamentalists in the FSA hook up with their Iraqi counterparts, that is trouble for al-Maliki and Iran. And, Iraqi Sunnis can now more freely export arms and goods to their Syrian co-religionists.”(Juan Cole).

Even though “70% of the goods” may be too good to be true—as the eastern Syrian region and its borders with Iraq have been out of government’s control since last year—any future trade with Iraq before the fall of al-Assad would be hard to imagine when this area is controlled by the revolutionaries. Professor Cole’s allusion to the Shia/Sunni binary can be seen within the context of Westerners magnifying these sectarian divisions when, at least in the completely Sunni Abu Kamal, people still emphasize that the fight is against al-Assad not his sect. More to the point, there were no reliable reports that Sunni Iraqi fighters assisted the FSA fighters in Abu Kamal.

The peace that Abu Kamal enjoys now is due to the operations that liberated it from the regime’s military and security presence, particularly after its airport was neutralized. If there is one lesson to be learned from liberating Abu Kamal, it is that a no-fly zone is urgently needed. Such a no-fly zone will save many lives and this will mean that the regime cannot kill more civilians and that the FSA, from all over Syrian cities and towns, will continue to remove al-Assad from Damascus.

End

News Round Up Follows

To Retrieve Attack Helicopters from Russia, Syria Asks Iraq for Help, Documents Show
Pro publica, by Michael Grabell, Dafna Linzer, and Jeff Larson, Nov. 29, 2012

But it is unclear whether Iraq permitted the fly-overs described in the documents. The Syrian cargo plane scheduled to pick up the helicopters did not land or take off from Moscow at the appointed times this month, suggesting that those flights did not happen…..

Syria’s Internet shutdown leaves information void, may signal escalating war – Wash Post

….Omar Abu Laila, a spokesman for the rebel fighters in the eastern city of Deir al-Zour, said communications have been down for so long there that the new disruptions will have no impact. “The communication outage did not affect us,” he said. “You should report that we’re happy the rest of Syria joined us.”

Lakhdar Brahimi on Charlie Rose Show

I hope — I hope we don’t get there because military intervention is an — at best, at very best, a very, very risky thing.  You don’t want an Iraq, an intervention like Iraq.  You don’t want the intervention ala Afghanistan.  You don’t want an intervention ala Libya.  And I think — I really think you don’t need that because in the present circumstances, you will have that outside of the Security Council because you are not going to have a resolution that will allow military intervention.  That’s out of the question for the moment.  So you’ll have to do it from outside.  If you do it from outside, you’ll have a lot of opposition to hit from day one.  And it is — I mean, look, Libya is 6 million people.  They had no army, practically.  And you see the amount of destruction that has taken place.  You see how long it took, and you see the results.  So people — you know, a lot of people in Syria are saying, “Why not Libya?”  And they are wondering why the Americans and others don’t want to repeat.  But the Americans say, “No, you know, Libya was not a good experience for us.  We don’t want to repeat –“

-Damascus clashes cut off airport, Emirates suspends flights
By Oliver Holmes, 29 November 2012, Reuters News
* Fighting along airport road heaviest during crisis
* Internet down in Damascus, phone lines disrupted
* Rebels advancing but “not last days yet” for Assad

BEIRUT, Nov 29 (Reuters) – Syrian rebels battled forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad just outside Damascus on Thursday, forcing the closure of the main airport road, and the Dubai-based Emirates airline suspended flights to the Syrian capital.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that fighting along the road to the airport, southeast of Damascus, was heavier in that area that at any other time in the 20-month-old uprising against Assad.
“As of 20 minutes ago, there was heavy fighting along all the areas along the road,” the British-based Observatory’s director Rami Abdelrahman told Reuters by telephone. He said clashes were particularly intense in Babbila, a southern suburb bordering the insurgent stronghold of Tadamon.

Residents said Internet connections in the capital went down in the early afternoon and mobile and land telephone lines were only working intermittently, in what they said was the worst disruption to communication since conflict erupted last year.

Emirates said it was suspending daily flights to Damascus “until further notice”, but other airlines continued operations. Airport sources in Cairo said an Egypt Air flight that left at 1:30 pm (1130 GMT) had landed in Damascus as scheduled.
“The Egypt Air plane has arrived … and passengers are all safe but the pilot was instructed to take off back to Cairo without passengers if he felt that the situation there is not good to stay for longer,” an official at Cairo airport said.
Elsewhere in the capital, warplanes bombed Kafr Souseh and Daraya, two neighbourhoods that fringe the centre of the city where rebels have managed to hide out and ambush army units, opposition activists said.

“NOT LAST DAYS YET”
The past two weeks have seen military gains by rebels who have stormed and taken army bases across Syria, exposing Assad’s loss of control in northern and eastern regions despite the devastating air power which he has used to bombard opposition strongholds.

A senior European Union official said that Assad appeared to be preparing for a military showdown around Damascus, possibly by isolating the city with a network of checkpoints.
“The rebels are gaining ground but it is still rather slow. We are not witnessing the last days yet,” the official said on condition of anonymity.

“On the outskirts of Damascus, there are mortars and more attacks. The regime is thinking of protecting itself … with checkpoints in the next few days … (It) seems the regime is preparing for major battle on Damascus.”

In the north of the country, rebel units launched an offensive to seize an army base close to the main north-south highway that would allow them to block troop movements and cut Assad’s main supply route to Aleppo, Syria’s biggest city.
The Observatory’s Abdelrahman said that rebel units from around Idlib province massed early on Thursday morning to attack Wadi al-Deif, a large base east of the rebel-held town of Maarat al-Numan.

Wadi al-Deif has been a thorn in the side of rebel units who first besieged the station in October but have met fierce resistance from government forces, backed up by air strikes.

If Wadi al-Deif fell to rebels, who already control northern border crossings to Turkey, Assad would be dependent on a single land route – from the Mediterranean port of Latakia – to supply his forces fighting to win back Aleppo.
Assad is fighting an insurgency that grew out of peaceful protests 20 months ago and has escalated, after a crackdown, into a civil war in which 40,000 people have been killed.

Most foreign powers have condemned Assad but have said they will stop short of providing arms to rebel fighters as they fear heavy weapons could make their way into the hands of radical Islamist units, who have grown increasingly prominent.
(Additional reporting by Dominic Evans and Erika Solomon in Beirut; Yasmine Saleh in Cairo, Praveen Menon in Dubai and Justyna Pawlak in Brussels; Editing by Mark Heinrich

the New York Times reports that Washington is considering a range of options to speed the departure of embattled President Bashar al-Assad. According to an anonymous administration official, several alternatives are under consideration, including directly arming rebels, deploying CIA operatives on the ground, and stationing surface-to-air missiles in Turkey. All these options have been discussed before, but according to the unnamed source quoted by the Times, rebel military success “has given this debate a new urgency, and a new focus.”

Opposition claims a total of 4 jets and a helicopter shot down today

Comment by Syrialover November 28th, 2012, 6:29 am said:

davidfrum ?@davidfrum

Do we have grounds for confidence that the Syrian rebels will represent an improvement over the regime? In ME, worse is always possible.

Mike Doran ?@Doranimated  .@tcwittes @davidfrum If it only deals a strategic blow to Iran and Hezbollah it’s a huge win, sez I.

Syria Debate between Radwan Ziadeh, Ayssar Midani, Joshua landis Claude Guibal, Ole Solvang is online – France 24 TV

Foreign Policy

According to Syrian state media, twin car bombs planted in Jaramana, a suburb just outside of Damascus, killed at least 34 people. Many Druze and Christian minorities live in that neighborhood. Meanwhile, witnesses claim that insurgents downed a government aircraft that was bombing the town of Daret Azzeh, west of Aleppo and near the Turkish border, although it’s still unclear exactly how they did so. “We watched a Syrian plane being shot down as it was flying low to drop bombs,” said Ugur Cuneydioglu. This comes just a day after the opposition recorded another major tactical success. On Tuesday, the opposition shot down a military helicopter outside Aleppo with surface-to-air missiles. As of now, it’s unclear if these gains are long-term and thus able to present a challenge to Assad’s air-power. In another tactical gain, members of the opposition have overtaken two military bases, both of which were used by the Syrian air force. The opposition has gained control of about six bases in just a week. Valerie Amos, the United Nation’s humanitarian chief, accused Syria of bombing refugees near the Jordanian border who are trying to flee the country.

En Syrie, la communauté alaouite, base du régime, cherche une porte de sortie
27 novembre 2012 | Par Caroline Donati in Medipart

La capitale Damas bunkérisée, Qardaha, le village natal des Assad en colère, la communauté alaouite divisée… La résistance armée parvient-elle à percer les lignes de défense du régime des Assad ? Plusieurs événements récents le laissent penser. Il y a d’abord des témoignages recueillis à Damas. Selon plusieurs témoins, la capitale n’est plus seulement quadrillée par des barrages. Des murs de béton sont désormais érigés pour protéger les principaux centres de sécurité du régime. Le pouvoir se bunkérise et Damas est comparée à Bagdad et à sa zone verte, cette enclave ultra-sécurisée où sont regroupés les centres de pouvoir.

Depuis le mois d’octobre, les quartiers généraux de l’appareil de répression sont visés par des attaques spectaculaires revendiquées par des brigades de l’Armée syrienne libre (ASL). Début novembre, à Kfar Soussé, où résident de hauts dignitaires du régime, les bureaux du premier ministre et des services ont essuyé des tirs qui ont même atteint le palais présidentiel. Puis, deux quartiers alaouites de Damas, habités par des recrues miliciennes, respectivement Mezzeh 86 et Hay al-Wouroud, ont été secoués par des explosions.

Le régime a également perdu le 26 novembre le contrôle de Marj al-Sultan, le plus important aéroport militaire de la capitale, à vingt kilomètres du palais présidentiel, après avoir été contraint d’abandonner d’autres sites stratégiques à l’est de Damas.

Les combattants de l’ASL avancent sur d’autres territoires jusqu’alors solidement tenus par le pouvoir : la plaine et la montagne côtière alaouite, d’où sont originaires les dirigeants. Sur le point de contrôler la zone nord, ils sont désormais aux portes du « réduit alaouite ». Ce territoire en majorité habité par des Alaouites, part du littoral jusqu’à la montagne voisine, et pourrait servir de base de repli si le régime venait à perdre Damas.

La vidéo ci-dessous a été tournée par les brigade Hijra lil-Allah dans le village de Kandassiyeh, aux portes du réduit alaouite :

Début octobre, une brigade a même poussé jusqu’aux portes de Qardaha, le fief familial des Assad. « C’était une opération symbolique destinée à montrer au pouvoir qu’aucune région n’est stable et que l’ASL pouvait entrer à Qardaha à tout moment », commente le responsable du réseau médiatique La Syrie en direct.

Pour Peter Harling, de l’International Crisis Group (ICG), « l’ASL est décidée à porter le conflit sur le territoire de l’adversaire et de sa base sociale, jusqu’à s’en prendre aux zones alaouites épargnées par les destructions ». C’est de ces quartiers que le pouvoir bombarde en effet les banlieues révolutionnaires ou que les miliciens impliqués dans la répression sont originaires. « Les tirs qui ont visé le palais présidentiel constituent un changement majeur, reconnaît l’opposant Abdel Raouf Darwich, membre du collectif du 15 mars pour la démocratie en Syrie. L’armée libre a décidé de s’attaquer aux zones vitales pour le pouvoir. »

Le pays alaouite constitue un verrou majeur pour le régime Assad. C’est en effet dans ces zones marginalisées de la montagne et dans les périphéries des villes côtières, que le pouvoir a recruté ses hommes. Exploitant la longue histoire de persécutions de cette communauté, le régime des Assad a offert à ces alaouites paupérisés emploi et protection contre allégeance. Soutenir Assad, c’est se protéger en tant que minoritaires face à la majorité sunnite, selon la formule de l’ancien président Hafez al-Assad : « Tu es avec Assad, tu es avec toi-même. »

Des affrontements mortels

Mais cette solidarité de minoritaires se fissure. Car le pays alaouite enterre chaque jour sa jeunesse. « Il n’y a pas un jour sans qu’il n’y ait un enterrement dans les villages de la montagne, raconte une opposante originaire de la région. Les gens sont usés. » Le régime reconnaît avoir perdu 7 300 hommes, ce serait probablement le double. Tous ne sont pas morts dans des combats : certains ont été tués pour avoir désobéi aux ordres du régime. Dans la montagne, certaines familles s’opposent aux hommes d’Assad venus enrôler leurs enfants.

« Dans les villages, les familles sont perdues et commencent à évoquer ouvertement le départ de Bachar al-Assad, poursuit cette opposante. Ce n’est pas la révolution mais le début des divisions au sein de la communauté. » Devant l’incapacité du pouvoir à venir à bout du soulèvement, les langues se délient. « Dès l’été, on pouvait entendre des familles se dire que le moment venu, le président Assad partira avec les siens et les laissera face à l’inconnu, une chose impensable avant », raconte l’opposant Abdel Raouf Darwich, qui revient de cette région dont il est originaire.

Dans la montagne alaouite.© S.Winter

La petite classe moyenne a profité de la politique confessionnelle du régime en accédant à des postes au sein de l’administration : elle se sent aujourd’hui de plus en plus exposée aux représailles même si elle n’est pas impliquée dans la répression. Ces craintes sont nourries par la radicalisation de groupes armés de l’opposition qui exécutent des soldats de l’armée loyaliste et des miliciens. Mais les familles alaouites peuvent aussi être victimes des exactions des milices loyalistes. « À Homs, les chabiha rackettent des Alaouites faute d’autres clients, rapporte un analyste occidental. Les Alaouites veulent se convaincre qu’ils représentent l’État et combattent pour l’intérêt de la nation, mais ils savent que c’est une illusion car ce système est en réalité lié à une personne, Assad. »

Perceptible depuis des mois, la tension qui couvait a fini par éclater au grand jour le 28 septembre au cœur du fief des Assad : des affrontements mortels se sont produits à Qardaha opposant des hommes du clan Assad et leurs alliés à des familles respectées de la communauté alaouite, les Al-Khayyer, les Othman et les Aboud. Surnommé le « Seigneur de la montagne » pour la terreur qu’il y fait régner avec ses milices, Mohammed al-Assad, le cousin du chef de l’État, aurait ouvert le feu pour rappeler à l’ordre ses coreligionnaires qui critiquaient Bachar al-Assad… La fusillade qui a suivi aurait fait une dizaine de morts et plus de trente blessés.

« Les Alaouites sont divisés sur la gestion de la crise, explique l’historien Stefan Winter, spécialiste du Proche-Orient et de la Syrie ottomane à l’UQAM (Université du Québec à Montréal). Les proches de la famille Assad et les voyous, c’est-à-dire les contrebandiers et trafiquants de la montagne, estiment que la violence peut tout régler et qu’ils vont donner une leçon aux sunnites, et rappeler qui sont les vrais maîtres du pays ; tandis que les grandes familles de notables et les intellectuels prônent depuis le début la modération et une solution politique.»…..

Descendant d’un petit notable de Qardaha, les Assad appartiennent à un clan peu puissant et à l’une des tribus les moins considérées de la montagne côtière, les Kalbiyeh. Pour gommer ce handicap, l’ancien président s’était appuyé sur des personnalités religieuses de second plan, et avait noué des alliances avec les familles de notables par des mariages et des cooptations. Des membres de la famille al-Khayyer ont ainsi appuyé le président Hafez al-Assad. Les Assad ont ensuite soumis la communauté en éliminant leurs concurrents. Tous les officiers alaouites qui auraient pu s’opposer à leur ascension au sommet de l’État ont été écartés voire éliminés, tant sous Hafez al-Assad que sous Bachar….

« Les familles d’intellectuels ou de religieux sont respectées par la classe moyenne alaouite urbanisée, qui est capable de penser une identité religieuse alaouite moderne hors du leadership d’Assad, explique l’historien Stefan Winter. Mais à la différence des grandes notabilités druzes, aucune figure alaouite n’a assez de charisme et de capital social pour rallier la communauté qui est très fragmentée et n’avait jamais connu de véritable leader politique avant les Assad. » ….

Pas de prise sur l’armée

Les leaders de la montagne n’ont pas non plus d’ascendant sur les effectifs alaouites de l’armée. « Les allégeances tribales historiques ne comptent pas au sein de l’institution militaire car l’armée et les forces spéciales ont offert une promotion sociale aux alaouites en tant qu’individus et tous clans confondus, poursuit Stefan Winter. Les amitiés qui se sont créées durent et les réseaux sont si forts, ils dépendent tellement du régime qu’il est difficile d’imaginer qu’ils se rebellent contre Assad. » Trop compromis dans la répression, les hauts gradés savent aussi qu’il leur sera difficile de négocier une clémence quand bien même ils seraient en mesure de fomenter un coup d’État…..

Coincés entre un régime qui les mène à la catastrophe et la peur de l’après, les Alaouites pourraient choisir la fuite, vers la montagne côtière syrienne et le littoral, ou encore dans l’arrière-pays alaouite en Turquie. Selon nos informations, des familles entières de Damas ont franchi le pas. Les spéculateurs aussi : à Tartous, sur le littoral, les prix de l’immobilier ont déjà flambé.

Business Insider: The War For Syria Is Also A War For Iraq
2012-11-28

Divided by history, geography and God, Abu Mohammed and Abu Hamza both smoke Marlboro cigarettes and agree on one point: The war for Syria is also a war for Iraq. Driven from their homes by the 2003 US-led war in Iraq, both men, now in their 40s, …

Syrian rebels take two military bases in heavy fighting

BEIRUT — Rebel fighters took over two military bases in Syria after heavy fighting Tuesday, an additional sign that the ragtag force may finally be breaking a weeks-long stalemate and making progress in its battle against the government of President Bashar al-Assad….In the past week alone, rebels have taken control of about a half-dozen military bases across the country as well as the Tishreen hydroelectric dam near the Turkish border….

In a video posted online Tuesday, which reportedly showed one of the captured bases, fighters affiliated with the Free Syrian Army stomped on a bust of Assad’s father, Hafez, at the 666th air force battalion base south of Damascus.

The second base, southeast of Aleppo, was overrun by fighters from Ahrar al-Sham and Jabhat al-Nusra, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Both are religious extremist groups suspected of having ties to al-Qaeda.

That the two air bases were taken over by such radically different groups among the opposition indicates that the recent rebel gains may not have been coordinated by any sort of unified leadership. It also hints at potential problems ahead if Islamist and secular groups begin to fight one another for control of territory….

Hizb Allah’s Role in the Syrian Uprising
Chris Zambelis – Nov 28, 2012 – Combating Terrorism Center – West Point

…..The fall of the Ba`athist regime would certainly take Syria out of the Resistance Axis. This does not mean that Hizb Allah and its allies will stand idle. It is conceivable that Nasrallah’s explanations for Hizb Allah’s activities in Syria reflect this reality. A deployment of Hizb Allah operatives in strategically important areas along the Syrian-Lebanese border, especially in and around villages that are home to communities sympathetic to Hizb Allah or possibly the Ba`athist regime (or apolitical communities opposed to the FSA), ensures the group an operational foothold in Syria in any post-Assad scenario. A Hizb Allah presence in these areas also emboldens the Ba`athist regime, thereby allowing it to devote valuable military resources to other theaters. At the same time, Hizb Allah is also a relatively small organization that has worked hard over the years to foster its reputation as a Lebanese entity that exists to defend Lebanon against Israel. Hizb Allah, therefore, must be careful not to overextend itself in operational as well as political terms, especially as the Ba`athist regime continues to draw the international community’s scorn.

Some predict that the potential collapse of its patron in Damascus will leave Hizb Allah irreparably weakened and vulnerable in the face of its numerous Lebanese and regional foes, especially Israel. Subscribers of this view, however, would be advised to revisit Hizb Allah’s evolution over the years, specifically the period of tensions surrounding the “war of the camps” (1984-89) characterized by the years of open warfare between Hizb Allah and its present-day allies the Amal Movement and Syria during Lebanon’s civil war (1975-1990).[27] Hizb Allah has long established itself as an organic Lebanese organization that is able to wield tremendous social, political, economic, and military functions in Lebanon. Hizb Allah will remain relevant in Lebanon and beyond should the Ba`athist regime fall.

Shabiha Militias and the Destruction of Syria
Stephen Starr – Combating Terrorism Center – West Point

….The Syrian regime is running out of funds[20] and is losing territory to rebel forces.[21] Although the full extent of the government’s losses in the north and east of the country have not yet been fully realized and accepted by the regime and its shabiha enforcers, their reaction to the news that rebel forces are at the gates of Damascus—whenever that happens—will likely see them turn increasingly violent against local Sunni populations. Areas within their reach and previously known for resistance to the regime are likely to suffer most, and Dariya-like massacres may well become commonplace in the time until rebel forces finally overthrow the al-Assad regime.

The quickening rate of violence now coloring the revolt-turned-war means groups like the shabiha will play an increasingly central role in conducting violence as law and order breaks down in the major cities. If and when rebels reach Damascus after having taken control of much of the rest of the country, the shabiha, making a last stand, will likely unleash ferocious reprisals on Sunni-dominated neighborhoods and regions.

The psychology that Syria is “Assad’s Syria,” a country ruled by Alawites, is so prevalent that pro-Assad militias are unlikely to be easily brought to a negotiating table. This is further complicated by the fact that there are no immediately obvious shabiha leaders who could bring the roving militias under control. Little is known of the shabiha leadership, where it exists today, but prominent figures are likely to be trusted relatives of powerful Alawite groups such as the Shalish, Makhlouf and Deeb families.[22]

Once it becomes clear there is no future for the al-Assad regime, pro-government paramilitaries will likely flee Damascus and other mixed-religion areas around the country for the rural villages and towns of Qardaha, Shaykh Badr, Ain al-Tina and others in Syria’s coastal mountains—the Alawites’ ancestral home. Without what they perceive as protection, thousands of Alawite civilians may also migrate to these safe areas because of fear of retribution from rebels and Sunni civilians. Yet for shabiha gangs cut off from safe zones and unable to get to the mountains along the coast, bloody “last stand” scenarios may occur.

The arguments outlined in this article paint a grim future for Syrians and their country. Given the growing acceleration of violence[23] and the international community’s reluctance to get more directly involved in solution seeking, less bloody outcomes for Syria’s immediate future are scant. The violence will continue and likely worsen before the al-Assad regime leaves or is forced from power.

?Afrin: Fighting near Qastal Jindu

KURDWATCH, November 28, 2012—On October 28, 2012, armed conflicts broke out near the Yazidi village of Qastal Jindu near ?Afrin. The conflicts occurred between units of the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and the Free Syrian Army’s (FSA) Storm of the North Brigade, led by ?Ammar al?Dadikhi alias Abu Ibrahim. Fighters for the Storm of the North Brigade conquered the PYD checkpoint and arrested two PYD supporters. Shortly thereafter fighters for the ?Amr ibn al??As unit led by Ahmad ?Ubaid forced the Storm of the North Brigade out of Qastal Jindu; the PYD returned to the village. The exact reasons for the conflicts between the PYD and the various FSA units are unclear, but it is certain that the conflicts were not, as the PYD claims, anti-Yazidi attacks by the FSA on Qastal Jindu.

Ra?s al-?Ayn: Dozens dead after Syrian Air Force attacks

KURDWATCH, November 24, 2012—On November 12, 13, and 14, 2012, Syrian Air Force planes, supported by ground-to-ground missiles, attacked Free Syrian Army (FSA) positions in Ra?s al??Ayn (Serê Kaniyê). In the process residential districts in which FSA fighters were entrenched were also bombed. As many residents had already fled the city shortly after the FSA’s invasion on November 8, 2012 [further information], the number of civilian deaths—at least twelve—remained relatively low. Turkish ambulances brought the injured to the nearby Turkish city of Ceylanp?nar. There are no reliable figures on the number of dead among the ranks of the FSA.

Ra?s al-?Ayn: Heavy fighting between PYD and FSA

KURDWATCH, November 23, 2012—On November 19, 2012, armed confrontations between the Free Syrian Army (FSA) and units of the Democratic Union Party (PYD) took place in the eastern part of the city of Ra?s al??Ayn (Serê Kaniyê). An activist from Ra?s al??Ayn told KurdWatch that prior to the fighting, FSA representatives demanded that all PYD flags between Ra?s al??Ayn and al?Malikiyah (Dêrik) be removed. FSA representatives explained that this was an order from the Turkish government, who supports them. The chief negotiator for the PYD wanted to discuss the matter first. The activist from Ra?s al??Ayn further stated: »At first [on November 8,2012] approximately five hundred FSA fighters came from Turkey. Around a hundred stayed at the border; the remaining four hundred marched into the city. Later, around two hundred additional fighters came from ar?Raqqah; they were joined by other people from the area. It isn’t really very many, but they are Islamists and they have come to die.« According to his estimates, the PYD has around one thousand armed fighters in the region.

CBS News: Firsthand view of deady car bombing in Syria
2012-11-29

(CBS News) DAMASCUS – In Syria’s civil war, at least 34 people were killed Wednesday when two car bombs ripped through a suburb of Damascus. The Assad dictatorship has been trying to crush a rebellion that broke out more than a year-and-a half ago. …

Turkey, Syria and the NATO umbrella: A reading from Brussels
Marc Pierini is a visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe and a Turkey

Based on a Turkish request, an agreement is being reached in NATO about the deployment of a temporary missile defense system. NATO units (possibly drawn from Dutch, German or U.S. forces) will position Patriot missile batteries in southern Turkey against threats coming from the Syrian regime. This is in response to the worsening Syrian crisis and the explicit threats from Damascus to use force at regional level.

The purpose of the Patriot deployment should not be mistaken for what it is not. Missiles such as these are used against incoming ballistic/tactical missiles and against aircrafts. Since the Syrian government alluded on July 24 to the use of chemical or biological weapons if “exposed to external aggression,” the main threat coming from the Bashar al-Assad regime is thought to be Scud missiles with chemical warheads. This is a purely defensive posture.

This is not equivalent to declaring a no-fly zone, not even implementing a safe area for displaced persons within Syria. Such objectives would need many more steps to be taken, both legally and technically. At this stage of the Syrian crisis, it is also out of question to take decisions such as sending troops into Syrian territory or aircrafts in its airspace. The Patriot deployment is typical of the “no-boots-on-the-ground-nor-in-the-air” posture of Western powers.

With such relatively limited objectives, what is the meaning of the Patriot deployment?

First and foremost, it draws a clear red line for Damascus: the Turkish territory is off-limit to the Syrian army and air force. Bashar al-Assad is known, like his father Hafez, for his inclination to internationalize a conflict…

The al-Assad regime has maneuvered itself in a corner. With a usable territory soon to shrink to Damascus and/or the Alawite mountain, how soon will the Assad-Makhlouf clan understand the hard fundamentals of their situation? That is the next question. At least, by now, they know that neighboring countries are off-limits.

“Syria Love:” Watching Syrian Propaganda in Iraq
Edith Szanto*

Ramadan 2010 was the last time I visited Syria.  I have been aching to go back, but the situation there does not allow it.  For the last year, I have been sitting across the street, in a manner of speaking, talking with neighbors,  and watching the events from a safe distance.  The place where I have been observing Syria is neighboring Iraq.  Iraqi Kurdistan to be exact.  From here, I have spoken with Syrians who have left before and during the current crisis.  Some of my students are Iraqis who have spent years in Syria.  They grew up in Syria and they miss it just as I do.

In the beginning, when I first I came to Iraq in the fall of 2011, Syrian friends in Iraq (but not all of my Iraqi students who lived in Syria) univocally supported the uprising.  Many have since reconsidered their stance.  They want neither religious factions to take over, nor do they want civil war.  They were optimistic in the beginning.  They were certain the regime would fall quickly.  Today, they expect Syria to turn into another Iraq, predicting a decade or more of violence.

Among the many questions raised by the uprising is why the Syrian government has lasted this long (in contrast to the Tunisian and Egyptian governments, which fell relatively quickly).  Moreover, what has the Syrian government done (besides employ sheer force) to remain in power?  In this article, I examine two Syrian TV channels through which the Syrian government has tried to promote itself and gain support.

When I settled into my new apartment in September 2011, I browsed the satellite TV channels in search of news about Syria.  I found Syria News and Syria Drama, the usual channels.  I was, however, surprised to discover channels entitled Syria Education, Syria Medicine, Syria Love, and Syria Balad…..

Leader of Aleppo’s powerful Islamic militia – Liwa al-Tawhid – explains (in Arabic video) why his troops and people want an Islamic democracy and why Syria’s revolution is an “orphan revolution.” Abdal Qadr al-Salih explained that just as Europe’s leaders are Christian because the people are Christian, Syria’s leaders would be Islamic and that Syrians want Islam to govern them. The US has not supported the Syrian revolution, he claimed, because it knows that Assad best protects Israel. Syria’s revolutionaries will want to liberate Jerusalem after liberating Syria.

France announced that it plans to give $1.5 million in emergency aid to the newly formed Syrian National Coalition for Opposition and Revolutionary Forces.

Syria’s Jabhat al-Nusra militia looks pretty serious
By Dan Murphy, CSM / November 27, 2012

Some eye-catching video shows a disciplined jihadi militia on the move in eastern Syria after ransacking a regime artillery base.

Video was placed on YouTube today of Syrian rebels celebrating a crushing victory in Mayadin, a town in Syria’s oil-rich northeast last week.

The cameraman is traveling in a convoy of fighters from the Jabhat al-Nusra, the main jihadi fighting group in eastern Libya and one that has attracted veterans of both the war against Muammar Qaddafi in Libya last year and of the wars against the US military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Though the men are clearly delighted with their victory and seizure of a temporary government artillery base in Deir al-Zour Province, with shouts and smiles as a captured tank charges along the desert sand next to the road, there is very little of the random shooting in the air and other goofing off common among rebel militias. Though the scene looks chaotic, these fighters are disciplined as such groups go….

Now it appears that rebels aligned with the Free Syrian Army have scored their first hit of a government helicopter with a surface-to-air missile (hat tip to Peter Bouckaert of Human Rights Watch), with video released online of the shot… rebels reported securing a cache of surface-to-air missiles earlier this month. The missiles look like Russian-made Strela-2s, a type of heat-seeking missile that’s been in service sine the 1970s….

Islamist militias have been the most committed and capable fighters of the wars in Iraq, Libya, and Syria. Syrian Euphrates river towns like Mayadin have strong tribal and general cultural ties to Iraqi  Euphrates river towns to their southeast, like Haditha, Ramadi, and Fallujah. It was in those tough Sunni Arab towns, clinging to a narrow river valley in the middle of the desert, where Al Qaeda-inspired fighters found their most success during the US war in Iraq, and they were helped from their cousins to the north. Now the Iraqis, and other jihadis, are returning the favor….

High stakes as Syrian opposition tries to form government, Reuters
By Khaled Yacoub Oweis
CAIRO | Tue Nov 27, 2012

Syria’s new opposition coalition will hold its first full meeting on Wednesday to discuss forming a transitional government crucial to win effective Arab and Western support for the revolt against President Bashar al-Assad.

The 60 or so delegates, chosen after marathon talks in Qatar this month, are meeting in Cairo ahead of a gathering of the Friends of Syria, a grouping of dozens of countries that had pledged mostly non-military backing for the revolt but which are worried by the rising influence of Islamists in the opposition.

“The objective is to name the prime minister for a transitional government, or at least have a list of candidates ahead of the Friends of Syria meeting,” said Suhair al-Atassi, one of the coalition’s two vice-presidents.

Atassi is only one of three female members of the coalition, in which the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies account for around 40 to 45 percent.

The two-day meeting will also select committees to manage aid and communications, a process that is developing into a power struggle between the Muslim Brotherhood and secular members.

Rivalries have also intensified between the opposition in exile and rebels on the ground, where the death toll has reached 40,000 after 20 months of violence.

But the new coalition has given rise to hopes that Assad’s enemies can set aside their differences and focus on securing international support to remove him.

“We have ideological differences with the coalition, but it will achieve its mission if it brings us outside military help,” said Abu Nidal Mustafa, from Ansaral-Islam, an Islamist rebel unit in Damascus….

Syria’s Islamist Militia Leaders Explain what they are expect from the new Syrian National Council and why they made their “Islamic State” video in Syria’s new opposition in race to convince skeptical Islamists By Erika Solomon and Mariam Karouny

“We are with the coalition – for now. We want to see what it is going to do for us,” said a fighter from one of the biggest Islamist brigades in the capital Damascus.

“It is known that we want weapons, we want a no-fly zone. Can it do that? We will see. We are not going to wait forever. With or without them, we are fighting and we are going to win.”….

Some put their frustration on display earlier this week when they announced the creation of an Islamic state in a video rejecting the National Coalition.

The immediate backlash from most rebel leaders and Syrian activists pushed many fighters in the video to retract their remarks the next day. But it laid bare the deep mistrust which the coalition has to overcome.

“Our video caused a big racket internationally, which is what we needed,” said one fighter present at the Islamic state meeting, who asked not to be named.

“We need to know we are going to get help and support from the coalition because Jabhat al-Nusra don’t want us to have anything to do with them. And right now, al-Nusra is our main support. So they need to show us they can do something for us.”

Iraq tensions rise as Syria crisis deepens
By Lauren Williams | November 28, 2012 12:45 AM
The Daily Star

BAGHDAD: The crisis in Syria is threatening to rupture Iraq’s precarious sectarian divide, which some say may re-ignite into a civil war.

Wedged between Syria’s greatest ally, Iran, and its greatest foe, Turkey, with its own volatile ethnic makeup, oil riches and fresh out of years of civil strife, Iraq is desperately clinging to a neutrality on the Syrian crisis.

That policy is being increasingly put to the test as players from across Iraq’s fragile political spectrum begin to take sides in a war of increasing sectarian dimensions.

“This situation is not going away,” said U.S. Lieutenant Colonel Joel Rayburn, former U.S. military intelligence officer in Iraq, now at the National War College.

Fighters from across Iraq’s Sunni, Shiite and Kurd communities have crossed from Iraq into Syria to assist their compatriots in Syria.

Sunni fighters from Iraq’s Anbar province, where familial and tribal affiliations span a porous border, openly told The Daily Star they are assisting mainly Sunni fighters battling President Bashar Assad’s forces with money, men and weapons.

Syrian Kurds are being trained to fight alongside other Kurdish forces by Iraq’s semi-autonomous northern Kurdistan government against Free Army and Assad forces.

And Shiite fighters, encouraged by clerics in Najaf and northern Mosul, are reportedly being sent from Iran and Iraq to Syria to defend Shiite shrines and fight alongside Assad’s regime, dominated by members of the Alawite sect….accusations are rife that Maliki is pursuing a sectarian agenda to consolidate Shiite power in Iraq and that the crisis in Syria is pushing Iraq closer to Iran’s orbit.

Facing a revived Sunni insurgency that has killed hundreds of Shiites inside Iraq this year alone, and without the cover of recently departed American troops, Maliki is wary of a Sunni-led state in Syria that could join forces with the Sunni opposition at home.

Iraq’s Sunni Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, whose Iraqiya parliamentary bloc reluctantly entered a power-sharing agreement with Maliki’s Dawa Party and is now facing multiple death sentences in absentia on terror charges, has accused Maliki of stoking sectarian tension.

Mass arrests of former Baathists and Sunnis accused of terrorism are frequent, along with allegations that Maliki is stacking parliamentary bodies, the army, and security institutions with Shiite sympathizers.

Hamed Obeid al-Mutlaq, an MP with the Iraqiya bloc who sits on Iraq’s parliamentary security and defense committee, said sectarian strife is a direct result of Iranian intervention.

“The best way that the government can avoid these consequences is by not taking sides with the Syrian government, but by being neutral and fair,” Mutlaq said. “We must not comply with Iranian pressure to stand by Assad. We must have a good relationship with the Syrian people because I believe the Assad government will be finished eventually.”…

Rayburn said Maliki’s motivations on Syria were a combination of “sectarianism and pragmatism.”

“They have made up their mind that the outcome of a Sunni Syrian state would result in the transport of Sunni jihad through their borders,” he said. “That is their overriding concern, second is Iranian pressure.”…..

Political analyst Ibrahim al-Soumaydaie said he is “terrified we are on the brink of a new civil war.”

“Arab … monarchies are trying to push the bad Arab Spring to Iraq. They are trying to remove the Shiites from the region.”

He said he feared that may “push” Baghdad to take preemptive action by “taking total control of the security forces and tacitly supporting Shiite militia to confront Sunni insurgents.”

Moreover, he said there was a danger Kurdish forces may align with Sunnis in confrontation with Baghdad.

Government troops and Kurdish Peshmerga forces clashed last week in the disputed northern oil-rich province of Kirkuk.

“It is a very dangerous situation. The sectarianism here in Iraq is deeper than in Syria. When someone triggers the sectarianism here, no one can stop it,” Soumaydaie said.

Sunni Leaders Gaining Clout in Mideast
By NEIL MacFARQUHAR- NYTimes

The United States is left somewhat wary about the rising Sunni Muslim alliance of Egypt, Qatar and Turkey and its potential for anti-Western sentiment….For years, the United States and its Middle East allies were challenged by the rising might of the so-called Shiite crescent, a political and ideological alliance backed by Iran that linked regional actors deeply hostile to Israel and the West.

But uprising, wars and economics have altered the landscape of the region, paving the way for a new axis to emerge, one led by a Sunni Muslim alliance of Egypt, Qatar and Turkey. That triumvirate played a leading role in helping end the eight-day conflict between Israel and Gaza, in large part by embracing Hamas and luring it further away from the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah fold, offering diplomatic clout and promises of hefty aid.

For the United States and Israel, the shifting dynamics offer a chance to isolate a resurgent Iran, limit its access to the Arab world and make it harder for Tehran to arm its agents on Israel’s border. But the gains are also tempered, because while these Sunni leaders are willing to work with Washington, unlike the mullahs in Tehran, they also promote a radical religious-based ideology that has fueled anti-Western sentiment around the region…. The Gaza conflict helps illustrate how Middle Eastern alliances have evolved since the Islamist wave that toppled one government after another beginning in January 2011. Iran had no interest in a cease-fire, while Egypt, Qatar and Turkey did.

But it is the fight for Syria that is the defining in this revived Sunni-Shiite duel. The winner gains a prized strategic crossroads….

The new reality could be a weaker Iran, but a far more religiously conservative Middle East that is less beholden to the United States.  Already, Islamists have been empowered in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia, while Syria’s opposition is being led by Sunni insurgents, including a growing number identified as jihadists, some identified as sympathizing with Al Qaeda. Qatar, which hosts major United States military base, also helps finance Islamists all around the region.

The emerging Sunni axis has put not only Shiites at a disadvantage, but also the old school leaders who once allied themselves with Washington….“The resistance,” said Tha’er al-Baw, 23, referring to Hamas, “proved that they are much better than the negotiating camp. In the days of Arafat, we used to think peace could be achieved through negotiations, but nobody believes this now.”…. Mr. Morsi changed little from Mr. Mubarak’s playbook, though his tone shifted. He sent his prime minister to lift morale. Ten foreign ministers, including those of Turkey and the newly Islamist government in Tunisia, also part of the new axis, visited Gaza during the fighting…. Those countries will not supply arms, however, so Hamas will maintain contacts with Tehran. Khaled Meshal, the Hamas leader,told CNN that ties are “not as it used to be in the past, but there is no severing of relations.”…

Israel’s View of the Syrian Crisis. Itamar Rabinovich.

A PRECARIOUS BALANCING ACT: LEBANON AND THE SYRIAN CONFLICT
Middle East Report N°132 – 22 November 2012 – Good ICG report

Conflict has left Syria a shell of its former self
Millions of homes, schools, mosques, churches and hospitals have reportedly been damaged or destroyed since the uprising began in March 2011.

Much of Syria has become a disaster zone: In September, the opposition group Syrian Network for Human Rights estimated that more than 2.9 million homes, schools, mosques, churches and hospitals had been damaged or destroyed since the uprising began in March 2011. More than half a million are a complete loss, it said.

Weeks later, the group’s founder, Sami Ibrahim, estimated that 600,000 more buildings had been shelled or bombed, as the government of President Bashar Assad escalated its campaign with daily airstrikes by helicopter and warplane. The rebels are fighting back, claiming to have captured half a dozen military bases in recent weeks in eastern and northwestern Syria and around Damascus. On Monday, they said they captured a hydroelectric dam in northern Syria.

Although the toll on structures is impossible to verify, the weapons the government is turning against civilian populations have become increasingly destructive, activists say, with TNT barrel bombs and vacuum bombs wiping out entire buildings in one blow…..

“Truly they have burned the country,” Melad said. “For the country to stand on its feet again it needs 20 years, because the country has become a mere skeleton.”

A friend writes me that a new set of government profiteers are emerging in Aleppo who demand exorbitant fees to process government papers. He writes:

1 . I renewed my mother’s passport. She is too sick to go to the passport office. We had to bring guy home. Total cost of renewal was 25,000 syp
2. I needed to renew my wakale to register a piece of land in Kasab. The official fee is 100 syp. There is no way to get anyone to do it, so I asked our moukhtar who had been working on it for two weeks. Got it done yesterday but before I got the paper in my hands, I had to pay 20,000 syp.

Flight records say Russia sent Syria tons of cash
By Dafna Linzer, Michael Grabell and Jeff Larson, ProPublica, November 26, 2012- (via War in Context)

This past summer, as the Syrian economy began to unravel and the military pressed hard against an armed rebellion, a Syrian government plane ferried what flight records describe as more than 200 tons of “bank notes” from Moscow. The records of overflight requests …..

Many believe the planeloads of banknotes sent from Russia are fueling the recent inflation in Syria, as the government is simply printing money at this rate.

Prospects for Syria’s civil war in 2013
Monday, November 26 2012
An Oxford Analytica Prospect

The stalemate between government and rebel forces is set to break in 2013. The balance of power has begun to tip in the rebels’ favour with their attacks growing, the political opposition forming a new and more effective body, and the government losing control of increasing swathes of territory. However, the regime remains united and is escalating its use of heavy weapons and air power. The manner of its fall will shape the government which follows it, and alter geopolitical alliances in the region.
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Strategic summary

· A wide-scale humanitarian disaster is likely as the conflict intensifies — and could prompt more active Western intervention.
· Rises in border violence and refugees will add to the severe internal challenges faced by Jordan and Lebanon.
· Tensions will escalate between Saudi Arabia and Qatar on the one hand, and Iraq, Iran and Hezbollah on the other.
· France, the United Kingdom and Turkey are likely to provide more active support to the opposition.

What next
A re-organised opposition will enable greater Western support — however, this will fall short of military intervention. The civil war will intensify and the regime of President Bashar al-Assad is likely to collapse by the end of 2013.

Analysis

The regime has failed to dislodge opposition militants from Aleppo and the Damascus suburbs. Its Praetorian Guard, the most reliable part of the armed forces, can no longer control large parts of the country consistently. Rebel groups cannot defeat the regime, but are able to attack military bases, economic targets and intercept main communication routes.

The economy is suffering from sanctions and damage to its infrastructure. The regime is being propped up by a flow of money, oil and other assistance from Iran, Iraq and pro-Syrian groups in Lebanon, but can no longer deliver basic services to the people (see SYRIA: Civil war driving country to economic collapse – November 6, 2012).

Tipping points
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Syria’s new opposition body is on course to achieve wide international recognition
The balance will change in favour of the opposition in early 2013 in several areas:

· Organised opposition. The formation of the National Coalition for Revolutionary and Opposition Forces (NC ) under a moderate and inclusive leadership, will not resolve the differences that have undermined the political (and largely external) opposition, but will enable its leadership to achieve greater focus, provide a more credible body to liaise with militants inside Syria, and pave the way for a government in exile.

· Arms flows. The NC will enable the West to provide non-lethal support to the fighters and this is likely to encourage the Saudis, Qataris and others to provide anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons.

· Western intervention. The West is also engaged in contingency planning for more direct involvement if the humanitarian situation or concerns about Syria’s chemical and biological stockpiles warrant it. Russia and China will remain opposed to this in the UN, but the West may seek to bypass it.

Rebels gain strength
Efforts to improve communication and cooperation between the mainly locally organised militants will be stepped up via the main umbrella group, the Free Syrian Army (FSA), based in Turkey. Improving their capacity to mount larger scale attacks will be key. The West and the NC will seek to reduce the influence of jihadi groups who are prominent in Aleppo.

As the rebels gain in strength, the regime will lose its northern strongholds, facilitating the establishment of a largely-contiguous rebel area by mid-2013. This should provide a launchpad for an effective campaign on the remaining regime forces concentrated in Damascus (see SYRIA: Rebel gains clear way to partition – November 21, 2012).

Main scenarios
The three main scenarios in decreasing order of probability are as follows:
· War of attrition. The regime shrinks to enclaves in the Allawi heartlands and Damascus where its elite troops remain stationed in force. The rest of the country falls into the hands of local groups with varying degrees of loyalty to the NC and FSA.

· Coup. New leaders try to negotiate a settlement with the opposition after removing Assad. The narrowing down of the regime to a core of Allawi clans commanding the Praetorian Guards makes this less feasible than in early 2012.

· Negotiated settlement. Assad seeks a negotiated settlement, in line with Russian and Chinese preferences. However, this is unlikely; Assad continues to rule this out, believing that he can win.

Post-Assad Syria
The post-Assad regime will need massive international support to establish its authority over the whole of Syria, bring stability to peoples’ lives, rebuild the economy and deal with systemic issues, such as the grossly over-manned public sector.

The transition could be prolonged and difficult. A particular problem will be the role of the Allawi community and other pro-Assad minorities in the new government. Kurdish areas have acquired a significant degree of autonomy (see SYRIA: Kurdish autonomy could divide post-Assad state – August 29, 2012. Parts of its leadership have strong links with the Iraqi Kurdish administration, whilst the Turkish Kurdish militant group the PKK has also established itself in the region. The post-Assad regime will also have to deal with jihadi groups.
Regional fallout
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Lebanon and Jordan are most vulnerable to overspill
The fighting’s intensification will have a profound effect on Syria’s neighbours:

· Lebanon. The assassination of an anti-Syrian intelligence chief and clashes between pro- and anti-Assad groups in Tripoli have indicated the potential for greater instability in 2013. However, Hezbollah, Syria’s main ally, has a major interest in maintaining a stable Lebanese government, of which it is a part, and may well remain on the sidelines. As the civil war escalates, it could come under greater pressure to choose between its domestic interests, and its alliance with the Assad regime which is a vital conduit of support from Iran (see LEBANON: Assad’s fall will upend political landscape – October 11, 2012).

· Jordan. The refugee flow has placed an extra burden on the economy and already overstretched water and power resources. King Abdallah faces growing unrest as he imposes subsidy cuts to alleviate the budget deficit. He will come under greater pressure from public opinion and his Gulf and US donors to increase support to the Syrian opposition — which incurs the risk of fighting spreading into Jordan (see JORDAN: Syria overspill will test stability – August 16, 2012).

· Turkey. Ankara will step back from unilateral intervention even as the fighting on its border increases. However, further artillery strikes against Assad’s forces appear likely, and the Turkish military may begin providing active support for Syrian rebel operations from its side of the border (see TURKEY: Syria policy carries regional risks – October 12, 2012). Ankara is keeping a close eye on the PKK’s activities in Syria and may act if it becomes a serious threat.

· Iraq. The Shia-dominated government in Baghdad is helping Assad and remains nervous about a Sunni regime in Damascus which it believes would strengthen the hand of its own Sunni population.

· Iran. Iran will seek to salvage its influence in post-Assad Syria. After over 30 years bolstering the regime, strong social, economic and military ties are likely to remain (see IRAN: Tehran will stand by Assad despite risks – August 31, 2012).

International implications
The regime’s fall will pose a problem for Moscow, which has provided weapons to Syria and has a strategic stake in the country. Russian leaders say that they are not committed to Assad, but have profound fears of the impact of Syria’s emergent jihadi Islam on Muslims in Russia and the former Soviet states. They and the Chinese will try to ensure that the UN stays involved and will reject Western efforts to sideline them or use the UN mandate for the Libyan campaign as a precedent for Syria.

Riyadh sees Assad’s downfall as a means of reducing Iranian influence in the region, but, unlike Doha, does not want the Muslim Brotherhood to dominate a successor regime.

Battling Rebels, Syria Flattens ‘Slums’
WSJ

DAMASCUS—All that remains of Abu Mohammed’s ancestral home here in Syria’s capital are two small adobe brick rooms and a few fig, loquat and mulberry trees.

It was bulldozed as part of a government slum-clearance program that appears to have a political motive: isolate neighborhoods sympathetic to Syria’s armed insurrection, and then obliterate them, according to critics, human-rights groups and even some officials within the government itself. “We are like gypsies now,” says Mr. Mohammed, who took his wife and five children to another part of the city after sections of his neighborhood, Qaboun—one of the first to rise up …

Senior security officials within the Assad regime say partial demolitions of pro-rebel neighborhoods in and around Damascus are a key element of an ambitious counterinsurgency plan now unfolding. The plan also involves the expansion of regime-funded militias known as “Popular Committees” within the capital.

These officials say the strategy applies lessons learned from other offensives against the rebels since the start of the conflict more than 20 months ago, most notably in the central city of Homs.

The government’s official position is that the destruction is part of a long-discussed master plan to rid Damascus of illegal slums. City officials say illegal settlements account for nearly 20% of the capital’s 26,500 acres.

Based on several extended visits to Damascus and vicinity last month—some of which coincided with demolition by military authorities—the destruction appears to be occurring only in areas where opposition fighters have been active. In addition, much of it has been overseen by the military rather than municipal authorities, residents say.

“There’s still work to be done, we are not finished yet with cleansing operations that are in response to popular demand,” says Hussein Makhlouf, a relative of Mr. Assad and governor of Rif Damascus, the province surrounding the capital.

In his Damascus office, Mr. Makhlouf praised the government’s official slum-destruction decree, known as “presidential decree No. 66,” as a model for urban renewal. He said demolitions will soon begin in Daraya, Harasta and Yalda, all suburbs that have been at the center of the insurgency against Mr. Assad. Mr. Makhlouf was forthright about the motives behind the demolitions, saying they were essential to drive out rebels, or “terrorists” as he called them.

MEDVEDEV SAYS RUSSIA ISN’T CONSIDERING GIVING REFUGE TO ASSAD – BN 11/27 12:56
MEDVEDEV SAYS ASSAD, OPPOSITION ARE BOTH TO BLAME FOR CONFLICT
MEDVEDEV SAYS RUSSIA ISN’T TRYING TO PROP UP ASSAD’S REGIME

Syrian Refugees: A Moral and Humanitarian Imperative for the United States
Peter Billerbeck, Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

Ensuring refugee camps in neighboring countries do not devolve into permanent squalor and misery is not only a moral and humanitarian imperative but also a necessary bulwark against broader trans-border sectarian instability and clashes with the potential to engulf the entire region…..

Killer Swarms
It wasn’t the Russian winter that stopped Napoleon.
BY JOHN ARQUILLA | NOVEMBER 26, 2012 – FP

Throughout the Cold War, and on into the post-9/11 era, the swarm — simultaneous attack from several directions — has been the favored fighting method of insurgents and terrorists. The Viet Cong swarmed helicopter landing zones and American foot patrols in Vietnam. Hezbollah did the same to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in southern Lebanon during the long war to evict the IDF — and then did so again during the 2006 conflict there. The Free Syrian Army today regularly strikes many places at once, too, giving the Assad regime’s military a problem it cannot solve. Iranian naval strategy embraces swarming as well, the idea being to attack the relatively few, large vessels of the 5th Fleet from all directions with hundreds of small, explosive-laden boats. Even in cyberspace one sees swarms in the form of the millions of hits to single sites, coming from all over the world, that often characterize debilitating “distributed denial-of-service” attacks. If al Qaeda were ever to develop a capacity for sustained swarming in the United States, rather than just mounting rare, one-off attacks, the consequences would be truly dire.

Palestinians in Syria
By Babak Dehghanpisheh and Ahmed Ramadan, 27 Nov 2012, The Washington Post

Palestinian refugees in Syria, in comparison with many countries in the region, are more integrated into society and have greater rights, such as the right to own property. As a result, the Assads have long touted themselves as ….

Other Palestinian groups have also been targeted. At least half a dozen commanders from the Palestine Liberation Army, an armed group that has been folded into the Syrian military, were assassinated this summer. There are conflicting accounts about whether they were targeted because of their loyalty to the Syrian government or because of their refusal to follow orders in taking part in the crackdown.

Yarmouk, home to about 150,000 Palestinians, has been ground zero for clashes among various Palestinian factions and between Palestinian fighters and the Free Syrian Army.

The Free Syrian Army and the Syrian military also have fought in the neighborhoods around Yarmouk, and on occasion Syrians have fled into the camp to escape the fighting.

The Syrian government, for its part, has turned to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command, a radical Palestinian group, to clamp down on any unrest in Yarmouk. In recent weeks, heavy clashes have broken out between the group and the rebels in and around the camp. And on Sunday, rebels took control of a PFLP-GC base on the outskirts of Damascus after heavy fighting.

“The General Command is almost a battalion of the Syrian army, pretending to protect the Palestinian camps but only sending their troops to attack the citizens and clashing with the Free Syrian Army,” said Abu Mohammed al-Maqdisi, a 24-year-old Palestinian activist who lives in Yarmouk and supports the Syrian uprising. “They even physically attacked activists and delivered them to state security.”

The Syrian military has shelled the camp repeatedly while clashing with rebel fighters in the neighborhoods near it. At least 50 Palestinians were killed in Yarmouk in the first two weeks of November.

While Yarmouk has been the hardest hit, half a dozen other Palestinian camps in the country have faced similar attacks, spurring thousands of Palestinians to flee to neighboring countries.

Since the beginning of the Syrian uprising in March 2011, roughly 10,000 Palestinians have crossed the border to Lebanon, already home to some 450,000 Palestinian refugees, and 1,600 have fled to Jordan, according to the U.N. Relief and Works Agency.

Governments in the region are concerned that the new refugees might inflame political tensions in their own countries. This is especially true in Lebanon, where rival political factions supporting the Syrian government and opposition have clashed repeatedly in recent months. So far, there have been no major incidents of violence.

“There is an effort by the Palestinian leadership to keep the Palestinians as much as possible distanced from what is happening, in an effort to protect them,” said Hoda Samra, a spokeswoman for the U.N. agency in Lebanon.

Syria Renews Border Attacks as NATO Seeks Missile Sites
By Selcan Hacaoglu and Brian Parkin on November 27, 2012 – Bloomberg

Syrian warplanes attacked targets close to the Turkish border for the second consecutive day as North Atlantic Treaty Organization officers arrived to select missile sites to counter President Bashar al-Assad’s forces.

U.S., Dutch and German officers representing the three NATO countries with Patriot surface-to-air missile batteries visited Turkish provinces near the Syrian border today, authorities said. As work began, Assad’s jets struck the town of Harim, the state-run Anatolia news agency said. That followed yesterday’s bombing of a Turkish-sponsored refugee camp near the Syrian town of Atma that sent thousands of people streaming toward the frontier.

Russia renewed its opposition to NATO’s involvement today, with Deputy Foreign Minister Andrey Denisov telling a Berlin press conference “we don’t like this plan.” The alliance’s aims were unclear: “Who’s threatened? Where’s the threat coming from?” he said. Iran has also opposed the move.

Turkey’s military said yesterday that the Patriots were a purely defensive measure and won’t be used to enforce a “no-fly zone” or to launch attacks….

The Associated Press reports:

Activists say Syrian rebels have captured a hydroelectric dam on the Euphrates river in the country’s north in a strategic victory that followed days of fighting. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says the Tishrin Dam, near the town of Manbij, fell to the rebels before dawn on Monday.

Rami Abdul-Rahman, who heads the Observatory, says the dam supplies several areas of Syria with electricity. The rebels have been making strategic advances recently. On Sunday, they briefly captured a regime helicopter base outside Damascus.

Syria: Rebels shut down key government supply lines
Tom A. Peter | The Christian Science Monitor | Nov 20, 2012

After months of fighting, Syrian opposition forces in Aleppo say that in the past week they’ve captured several critical areas from government forces that may soon give them the upper hand in northern Syria. The new ground will allow opposition groups to strain or potentially cut off supplies to government troops fighting in Aleppo Province….

FSA fighters say the final step to closing off supply lines for the Syrian Army in Aleppo will mean taking control of the city’s airport, which the opposition group says it is now close to doing. As the group takes hold of an increasing share of ground and cuts off more government supply routes, however, it’s confronted with the realities of trying to advance farther with extremely limited supplies.

“We’re trying to cut the supply lines for the regime inside the city,” says Abu Tawfik, a commander of Liwa Tawheed, one of the largest FSA units now fighting inside Aleppo. “The airport is the most important part of the city now. If we can control the airport, we can cut their supplies and win the war here.

The road connecting Aleppo and Damascus is already under rebel control, which means that the regime forces are now almost entirely dependent on resupplying their troops by air. According to FSA fighters, most of the regime forces’ supplies for Aleppo Province are brought to the airport, where they are picked up by helicopter and delivered to the surrounding bases.

The airport is now surrounded on three sides by FSA fighters, but they have so far been unable to capture one area near the airport that is populated by Assad loyalists. Fighting is likely to drag on there for some time to come.

Syria Opposition Aims to Raise $60 Billion for Rebuilding
By Dana El Baltaji and Dahlia Kholaif – Nov 21, 2012 – Blookberg

A coalition of groups battling Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is seeking to raise $60 billion from allied nations to help rebuild the country when fighting ends, an opposition leader said.

Syria will need the money for reconstruction in the first six months after the conflict ends, Syrian National Council leader George Sabra told reporters in Dubai today. The United Arab Emirates may provide funds “soon,” he said…..

Tawhid backs Syrian National Coalition
November 21, 2012  By Marlin Dick in Daily Star

Syria now running a war economy as conflict spreads
Wed, Nov 21 – By Suleiman Al-Khalidi

AMMAN (Reuters) – At a rebel-controlled border crossing in northern Syria, camps housing thousands of refugees trying to flee the country occupy an area that less than two years ago was usually crammed with lorries queuing to pass through customs.

The capture of Bab al-Hawa, previously a throughfare for exports from Turkey and the Gulf to the rest of the Middle East and Europe, highlights the loss of transhipments through Syria as conflict has spread, causing a sharp drop in income from customs duties.

Plunging public revenues are a sign of the fiscal pressures Damascus is facing in the wake of the 20-month-old uprising against President Bashar al-Assad’s government, which has crippled industrial output and oil production and triggered a sharp depreciation in the Syrian currency.

As the government focuses on trying to overcome the rebels it is directing economic resources to Assad supporters by maintaining high subsidies, increasing public sector wages and stockpiling wheat and other staple goods – on top of having to increase defense spending.

That is putting a severe strain on public finances, raising the risk that the authorities will eventually have to resort to printing money to support the economy, something Damascus has long tried to avoid for fear of fuelling hyperinflation and further social unrest.

Finance Minister Mohammad Juleilati, unveiling next year’s budget last month, announced a 13 percent rise in public sector salaries and a 25 percent increase in subsidies on food, fuel, power and agriculture.

“This is a war budget in which the bulk is spent on the army and state employees to keep the government machinery going so that it continues to function, especially in the areas that are still under its control, and to show that the state is still on its feet,” said Samir Seifan, a prominent Syrian economist.

He was involved in policymaking before the crisis but has since fled the country.

Juleilati’s 2013 budget was 4 percent larger than this year’s at 1.38 trillion Syrian pounds ($19.62 billion) despite plummeting revenues, notably from oil, which used to account for 45 percent of budget income. Now it contributes only 20-30 percent, economists estimate, as oil production has halved since the crisis to around 200,000 barrels a day.

“Revenues have deteriorated and the authorities have used up their reserves and what is keeping them afloat is some financial aid from Iran and possibly Russia,” said Seifan.

The budget, moreover, does not fully reflect the state of the economy or government finances given secrecy surrounding military spending and a flourishing unofficial economy in which hundreds of thousands of Syrians pay no tax on income from working in small workshops, doing seasonal agricultural work or conducting illicit smuggling.

Sanctions imposed by Western countries banning the import of arms from Syria and blocking the Assad government’s access to Western financial systems are aimed at choking off the money Assad needs to fund the Syrian military.

Seifan estimates that Syria’s gross domestic product shrank by at least 30 to 40 percent last year due to the collapse of tourism, which used to account for 11 percent of GDP, and the drop in oil output which previously contributed 23 percent of GDP.

A near 65 percent drop in the Syrian pound since the crisis began has sent the cost of importing fuel and other goods surging and shortages are also evident.

“The shortages in gasoline and diesel are mainly due to rising demand by the army,” said a Syrian civil servant working in a non-defense ministry, interviewed via Skype.

The government’s budget deficit had been a manageable 3-5 percent of GDP before the crisis but the 2013 budget forecasts a 745 billion Syrian pound deficit, or nearly a quarter of the country’s pre-crisis GDP of $50 billion-$60 billion.

Subsidies on a range of goods from diesel to electricity to sugar and rice consume almost 40 percent of government spending while electricity costs eat up around 15 percent of the budget.

Sanctions against money transfers meanwhile have depleted remittances from Syrians living abroad, whose transfers of $800 million annually had provided a social safety net. Their loss has added to the plight of a population where military conflict has displaced hundreds of thousands and reduced many towns and city districts to rubble.

Bankers in Damascus reported in June that the authorities had already released new cash, printed in Russia, into circulation to ensure the payment of public sector salaries and expenses, although Syria’s central bank denied such a move…..

Economists say it may soon be forced to print money on a much bigger scale.

“If they don’t get enough loans from their allies Russia and Iran they will print money and the pound will just jump from 100 to 200 to 300 against the dollar,” said Seifan.

“The state is afraid of printing money because it will create a social time bomb,” he said. “But it could be increasingly forced to do so to pay the army’s salaries.”

With Syria’s eastern oilfields in rebel hands, a brisk business in pirated crude grows
By David Enders, McClatchy Newspapers

SHAHEL, Syria — Syrian rebels have captured two of the three major oilfields in the country’s southeastern Deir al Zour province and are extracting oil that they say is helping to support their rebellion

“We are at the beginning of winter, and people need oil to run the bakeries and to heat their homes. The weather is very cold here,” said a rebel leader here who, for security reasons, identifies himself by his nom de guerre, Abu Mohamed.

The capture of the fields is another blow to the Syrian government’s attempt to offset inflation and shortages of various goods in the areas it still controls. It also has set off a booming oil trade in this impoverished area. Dozens of trucks wait in line 24 hours a day to fill up at rebel-held wells, which produce a light crude that can be burned without refining, though the result is dense smoke. Some farmers insist the unrefined crude can be used to power farm equipment, though it seems primarily to be used for heat….

Among the groups profiting from the wells are Jabhat al Nusra, whose members have won admiration from some Syrians for their effectiveness as fighters against the government while inspiring fear and suspicion in others because of their calls for a Syrian state based on Islamic law and their alleged links to al Qaida.

Rebels have also said they are planning a push into Hasaka province to the north, the country’s other major source of crude oil.

Abu Mohamed said that two of the three main fields around Deir al Zour – the captured fields are known as al Warde and Taim – are under rebel control, and that rebels would capture the third, Sheikh Omar, after they found engineers who could operate the wells.

Rebels said locating engineers had been a challenge because most of the people who were employed in the oil sector in Syria were Alawites, the religious minority to which President Bashar Assad belongs and who make up about 10 percent of Syria’s population. Virtually all of the armed rebels in Syria are Sunni Muslims, who make up the majority of the country’s population. A main rebel grievance is that the country’s political, economic and military elites have been dominated by Alawites for decades.

It appears the antagonism between Kurds and Islamist FSA fighters is heating up. Nearly 40 dead from fighting in Ras Al-Ain, is indicative of a hot firefight.

Jihadist rebels in standoff with Syria Kurds: NGO
Thursday, 22 November 2012

Hundreds of Kurdish militiamen massed in the Syrian border town of Ras al-Ain on Thursday in a mounting standoff with mainly jihadist Arab-led rebels who had seized much of the town from government forces, a watchdog said.

It was the latest in a string of largely peaceful drives for control of mainly Kurdish inhabited areas of the northeast and northwest that neighboring Turkey fears has given succor to the rebel Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) it has been fighting for nearly three decades.

The Turkey-backed rebels of the Free Syrian Army accuse the Democratic Union Party (PYD) of having links to the PKK, which has been fighting for self-rule just across the border in southeastern Turkey since 1984, and charge that it is in cahoots with the government of President Bashar al-Assad.

The PYD insists its fighters are entirely Syrian but Washington has backed Ankara in insisting that Syria will not be allowed to become a rear base for the PKK in the face of the 20-month uprising against Assad’s iron-fisted rule.

The standoff between the Kurds and the Arab-led rebels — most of whom the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said were drawn from hardline Islamists opposed to the new opposition coalition recognized some Arab and Western states — highlighted a growing dilemma for the rebels’ supporters.

Some 200 fighters from the Al-Qaeda loyalist Al-Nusra Front and 100 from the allied Ghuraba al-Sham advanced on Ras al-Ain, backed by three tanks they had captured from the Syrian army, the Observatory said.

They were faced by 400 Kurdish militiamen in the northeastern town which has already been largely deserted by its residents, thousands of whom have poured across the border into Turkey, the Britain-based watchdog and residents said.

Youth Bulges and the Social Conditions of Rebellion
By: Jack A. Goldstone | Feature

Commentary on generational conflict and the radicalism of youth goes back at least as far as the ancient Greeks. Such conflict is probably always present to some degree in every family and every generation. Yet the coalescence of individual youthful impatience with the ways of the older generation into social movements of rebellion or revolution is something that happens more rarely and only when certain economic, political and social conditions prevail.

Maloula Journal
Mountaintop Town Is a Diverse Haven From Syria’s Horrors
By JANINE DI GIOVANNI, New York Times, November 21, 2012

MALOULA, Syria — In a country clouded by conflict, where neighbors and families are now divided by sectarian hatred, this mountaintop town renowned for its spiritual healing qualities and restorative air is an oasis of tolerance. Residents of the ancient and mainly Christian town — one of the last places where Western Aramaic, the language of Jesus Christ, is still spoken — vowed at the beginning of the Syrian conflict 20 months ago not to succumb to sectarianism and be dragged into the chaos….

Mahmoud Diab, the Sunni imam of the town, said: “Early on in this war, I met with the main religious leaders in the community: the bishop and the mother superior of the main convent. We decided that even if the mountains around us were exploding with fighting, we would not go to war.”

Born and raised in Maloula, Mr. Diab, who is also in Syria’s Parliament, sat in the courtyard of his mosque, shadowed by olive and poplar trees and a fading poster of Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, whom he supports. “It’s a sectarian war, in politics, it’s another name,” he said with a shrug. “But the fact is, there is no war here in Maloula. Here, we all know each other.”….

Government forces bombarded a local shift hospital in Aleppo, Sha’ar neighborhood, killing many. (video)

In Syria, An Act Of Reconciliation Stirs Fierce Debate
by Deborah Amos, November 20, 2012

Supporters of President Bashar Assad speak with U.N. monitors who were arriving in the town in May. The monitors have since left.

After 20 months of violence in Syria, acts of reconciliation are scarce.

When one took place earlier this month in the town of Tel Kalakh, near the border with Lebanon, it touched off a fierce debate.

The man at the center is Ahmad Munir Muhammed, the governor of Homs, who has long been known as a loyalist of embattled President Bashar Assad.

However, Muhammed made an official visit to Tel Kalakh, where the majority of neighborhoods are controlled by the rebels.

With the rebels guaranteeing his safety, the governor drove into Tel Kalakh in early November to see a city where revolutionary flags flutter from most mosques. He was reportedly shocked by the devastation from army bombardments and paramilitary attacks on this border town.

His visit was approved by the rebel commander of Tel Kalakh, Abdul Rathman Wallo. The men were even photographed together.

Tangible benefits followed. The Syrian Red Crescent delivered humanitarian aid to the besieged civilians. More than a dozen Syrian soldiers who had defected, men wanted by the Syrian regime and some of them seriously wounded, were allowed to slip across the border to Lebanon for medical treatment.

Media Reports Ignite A Debate

Syrian state TV covered the event and reported the governor’s promise to resume “all public services to guarantee the return of the families affected by terrorism.” State television also declared this reconciliation a victory over “terrorists” who tried “to sabotage and make [Tel Kalakh] a lifeless city.”

The Syrian regime refers to all armed groups as “terrorists.” But no amount of propaganda could erase the image of the governor holding cordial talks with the “terrorists.”

The details of the event were also recounted in As-Safir, a Lebanese newspaper, which described the events as a “surprising scene.” The governor was quoted as saying he was “putting an end to Syrian bloodshed” and would take similar steps in all the towns under his authority.

So how was the visit viewed elsewhere in the country? The competing narratives began as soon as the visit became public.

The governor “shook hands with murderers,” screamed the pro-government media, accusing him of nothing less than embracing al-Qaida in Syria. He “surrendered” Tel Kalakh, according to those who consider any recognition of the Sunni rebels an existential danger to Assad’s rule and to the surrounding Alawite villages. The reaction shows the difficulty of any negotiated settlement to end the crisis.

But this unusual meeting also appears to be recognition of reality.

“Life must go on. They are pressed by the reality on the ground,” says a former Syrian government official who spoke on condition on anonymity because of the sensitivity of the meeting.

The rebels of Tel Kalakh took up arms after peaceful protesters were targeted by the security police and the army, the former official said.

In May 2011, at least 40 civilians were killed when police opened fire and soldiers blasted the town with tank-mounted machine guns. Hundreds more were arrested.

Within days, almost half the Sunni Muslim population had fled over the river frontier into Lebanon. The Syrian regime stepped up the retribution with relentless bombardments, but the village did not change its mind. It continued to support the rebels.

The rebels maintain a strong presence in Tel Kalakh, though the damage is massive….

Turkey Finds It Is Sidelined as Broker in Mideast
By Tim Arango | The New York Times

 “Turkey’s new foreign policy has but one premise, to become a regional actor,” said Soner Cagaptay, a Turkey expert at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “To this end, Ankara needs to have persuasive power on all countries of the region. In the past decade, Ankara has won that power with the Arabs but lost it with the Israelis.”