Iraq & Syrian Civil Wars - Page 178

New leaks reveal Turkey head of intelligence offers a false flag attack to invade Syria

Jabhat Al-Nusra Spokesman: We secured the passage for Armenians to Turkey.

Video showing rebels in another town in Latakia province. (Sign says "ANNABAIN")

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — The Obama administration is considering allowing shipments of new air defense systems to Syrian rebels, reversing its earlier opposition to introducing the weaponry into the conflict, a U.S. official said.

President Barack Obama's possible shift would likely be welcomed by Saudi Arabia, which has been pressing the White House to allow the man-portable air-defense systems, known as "manpads," into Syria. Obama arrived in Saudi Arabia on Friday evening for meetings with King Abdullah.

Allowing manpads to be delivered to Syrian rebels would mark a shift in strategy for the U.S., which until this point has limited its lethal assistance to small weapons and ammunition, as well as humanitarian aid. The U.S. has been grappling for ways to boost the rebels, who have lost ground in recent months, allowing Syrian President Bashar Assad to regain a tighter grip on the war-torn nation.

The actual manpad shipments could come from the Saudis, who have so far held off sending in the equipment because of U.S. opposition.

The president is not expected to announce a final decision on the matter during his overnight trip to the Gulf kingdom. U.S. and Saudi intelligence officials have been discussing the possibility of injecting manpads into the crisis for some time, including during a meeting in Washington earlier this year.

As recently as February, the administration insisted Obama remained opposed to any shipments of Manpads to the Syrian opposition. The U.S. has been concerned that the weaponry could fall into the wrong hands and possibly be used to shoot down a commercial airliner.

Among the reasons for Obama's shift in thinking is the greater understanding the U.S. now has about the composition of the Syrian rebels, the official said. However, the official added, the president continues to have concerns about escalating the fire power on the ground in Syria, which has been torn apart by more than three years of civil war.

(Reuters) - Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Saturday called for domestic support for his militants after a year of growing sectarian violence in Lebanon following the Shi'ite militant group's intervention in the Syrian war.

"Some in Lebanon say the resistance (Hezbollah) has nothing to do with Syria," Nasrallah told supporters via a television link from a secret location in South Lebanon.

He justified sending his forces to a foreign war by saying that Sunni rebel groups would "eliminate everyone in Lebanon" if they won in Syria.

"The problem in Lebanon is not that Hezbollah went to Syria, but that we were late in doing so," he said. "This resistance will remain solid, with its head hung high, protecting its people and its nation."

Established nearly 30 years ago to confront Israel's occupation of south Lebanon, Hezbollah once won praise from Sunnis and Shi'ites across the Middle East. But its fight alongside Assad has lost it much domestic and international support.

Shi'ite Muslim Hezbollah fighters have helped turn the tide for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in the military struggle against rebels. Assad now has a firm hold on much of central Syria around the capital and the Syrian-Lebanese border.

But the three-year-old conflict in Syria has fuelled Sunni-Shi'ite tensions in neighboring Lebanon and across the wider Arab world. Syria's rebels are mostly Sunnis, while Assad belongs to the Alawite faith, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam.

Syrian rebel groups and Lebanese supporters have carried out several suicide bombings in Hezbollah-controlled areas in Beirut and elsewhere, killing dozens of people. They have vowed to keep attacking Hezbollah until it withdraws its forces from Syria.

BEIRUT — Syrian government forces backed by militia fighters and warplanes pounded rebel units in Latakia province on Monday in a desperate effort to regain control of towns and villages in President Bashar Assad’s ancestral homeland recently lost to an opposition offensive.

Activists said fighting between Assad loyalists and rebels was concentrated in the northern edge of Latakia province. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human said government troops bombarded rebel positions with artillery as they tried to capture several strategic hilltops. Fighter jets also carried out several airstrikes.

State TV said army troops captured one of the hilltop positions known as the Observatory 45. It is a strategic post that is key to both sides because it has a commanding view of the contested surrounding mountains and green plains below. The rebels and opposition groups have not confirmed its capture.

It later showed footage of what it said were rebels killed in the area during the government offensive. Several bearded men in military uniforms lay dead, covered with blood, as government troops stood in the background.

Opposition fighters from several conservative and hard-line Islamic groups, including the al-Qaida-affiliated Nusra Front, launched their assault on the northern stretches of Latakia province along the Turkish frontier March 21. So far, they have seized a border crossing, several villages and the predominantly Armenian-Christian town of Kassab. They’ve also gained control of an outlet to the sea for the first time since Syria’s uprising began three years ago.

What is the death toll of Hezbollah fighters in Syria?

This issue is still a matter of debate since the beginning of Hezbollah’s intervention in Syria on the side of the Syrian regime. And Hezbollah adds to this ambiguity, by not providing any numbers or other comprehensive information.

The only official statement from Hezbollah came in early December 2013, when its secretary general, Hassan Nasrallah, revealed that the number is less than 250. Around the same time, Syrian opposition(s) and anti-Hezbollah Lebanese groups claimed that the death toll is higher than 500, and even exceeds the 1,000 threshold. Only the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) was in range with Hezbollah’s declaration. It put the number of casualties at 232 on December 1, 2013. The latest SOHR count on March 13, 2014 stands at the number of 332. (Note that SOHR doesn’t provide any list or details.)

To know the real number of killed Hezbollah fighters, I decided to follow the funerals.

The official Hezbollah news agencies and sites are the primary source of this research. However, they do not cover all funerals, and their information are not categorized, thus making it hard to find all the required data. To complement this research, I looked also into pro-Hezbollah websites, and cross-referenced the information. These websites are rife with mistakes, for example, citing the same killed fighter several times under different combinations of his name, his father’s name, his nom de guerre, etc.

Three mortar rounds landed on Turkish soil, fired during fighting between the Islamist rebels in Syria and forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for control of the Armenian Christian village of Kasab, Turkey's Dogan News Agency said.

Islamist insurgents launched an offensive about ten days ago into Syria's Latakia region on the Mediterranean coast, taking both the border crossing and Kasab on the Syrian side.

Since then, Assad has sent army and militia reinforcements, backed by air power, to repulse the rebels, leading to heavy fighting across the strip of territory along the Turkish border.

"Our artillery troops have fired back at the region from where the shots originated," the Hatay governor's office said in a statement on its website.

More than 1,052 pro- and anti-Assad fighters have been killed in fighting for Syria’s northeastern Latakia province since March 21, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported Monday.

Meanwhile, in a video posted online, the Islamic Front’s Ahrar a-Sham claimed Sunday to have fired four Grad missiles at the Bassel al-Assad International Airport southeast of Latakia targeting government troops as well as “Hezbollah and Iranian combatants.” In a separate video, the group announced Monday it had fired six additional Grad missiles toward shabiha headquarters in Qardaha, the birthplace of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Pro-regime media reported rebel-launched Grad missiles fell “without causing injury” near the northern Latakia suburb of Zighreen, as well as in farms near al-Qardaha and al-Jableh, causing only “material damage.” Under the rubric of the “Anfal battle,” rebels including the Islamic Front and Jabhat a-Nusra argue the fight for Latakia will “turn the tables” on the Syrian regime by striking at the ancestral homeland of Syria’s Alawite community.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has surprised many after his party's victory in the local elections by declaring that Turkey is at war with Syria. Experts, however, say the declaration is problematic in a legal sense.
Onur Öymen, the former deputy chairman of the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), told Today's Zaman that Erdoğan's remarks about declaring war on Syria do not comply with either national law or the principles of international law. “Turkey cannot declare war on a country unless an attack happens first. This [declaring war] is not possible without a reason,” said Öymen.

During his “balcony speech,” Erdoğan, surrounded by a former Cabinet minister and family members who have been implicated in alleged corruption, stressed that Syria is in a state of war with Turkey. He also criticized the leaking of a recorded conversation concerning whether Turkey should conduct a military operation in Syria ahead of Sunday's elections, allegedly between Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu and certain government officials.

“How can you threaten our national security? Syria is in a state of war with us. They are harassing our planes. They have martyred 74 of our brothers, and the Tomb of Süleyman Şah is our land. An attack on there is an attack on 780,000 square kilometers. Can we remain silent about such a thing? But these traitors wiretapped this meeting and leaked it to the world,” the prime minister said in his speech.

Information made available to The Daily Star revealed that a high-ranking Iranian lieutenant colonel, identified as Mahmoud A., arrived recently in Lebanon to provide counsel as Hezbollah radically reforms its security apparatus.

The changes are a response to violations committed within party ranks, documented by Israeli as well as Western intelligence, as well as the party’s missteps in dealing with the sensitive security situation in Lebanon – not to mention the conflict in neighboring Syria, where the party has suffered from almost daily information leaks.

The colonel is expected to be involved in a series of changes and new appointments in a number of leading security posts, as well as reorganizing groups and cells in line with amendments relating to the party’s communication structure.

Information made available by reliable sources said that Hezbollah arrested one of its field commanders in Syria, after it was alleged that he was dealing with the Israeli Mossad and played a role in leaking information to agents, leading to the Israeli raid on the Janta area.

The commander has been moved to Haret Hreik and his case – supervised by the Iranian colonel – is being investigated.