Iraq & Syrian Civil Wars - Page 180

On April 08 2014 20:59 Disregard wrote:
If you're bombarding cities and destroying each other in densely urban areas without discretion, this ongoing garbage about who has chemical weapons is just pointless. Just stirring up content for news and media to hype about.

Syrian insurgents have released the first videos showing them using US-made M220-series TOW heavy anti-tank weapon systems, indicating that a state sponsor is supplying them with a new type of guided missile.

The three videos were uploaded to YouTube between 1 and 5 April by members of the moderate insurgent group Harakat Hazm. Two of these show TOWs being fired at targets near the town of Hish in the Idlib Governate; the third is of the missile system in the back of a pick-up truck.

Weighing nearly 80 kg without a thermal sight, the M220 series is comparatively heavy, which limits its tactical utility as an insurgent weapon, but its missiles have a longer range and more effective warheads than most contemporary anti-tank guided missile systems.

The system has been widely exported, including to Saudi Arabia and Turkey - which both support the Syrian opposition - and Iran, the Syrian government's main backer. The militaries of Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the other two Gulf states widely believed to have supplied weapons to Syrian insurgents, use European anti-tank guided missiles (HOT and MILAN), rather than TOW.

The TOWs in the insurgent videos are unlikely to have been supplied to pro-government forces by Iran and then captured by the insurgents. They are in good condition, so almost certainly do not date back to the mid-1980s when thousands of US TOWs were illegally transferred to Iran, and have the standard day sight/tracker, so cannot be the Iranian-made Toophan version, which has a different sight.

(ANF/KOBANÊ) The YPG has released official casualty figures for the month of March, which witnessed heavy fighting between the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS) and the YPG as the former launched a series of attacks against the Kobanê Canton. According to YPG figures at least 419 ISIS members were killed in clashes with the YPG and the El Ekrad Front and 10 more were taken prisoner. 13 YPG fighters also lost their lives in the defense of the city.

The fighting began when the ISIS, which had established itself in the region between Azzaz and Aleppo last year began to pull out of the region after an ultimatum from the El Ekrad Front. ISIS fighters from Aleppo, Idlib, Hama, Homs and Latakia moved into areas around Kobanê and launched a three front attack against the canton beginning on March 8th.

The ISIS opened their assault with mortar fire against the villages of Fiyonte, Bir Ketik and Evdik to the east of Kobanê. The YPG responded to the ISIS attacks in the village of Bir Kino, where they killed 4 gang members. The same day the ISIS launched an attack on a passenger bus in which one woman and one child were killed.

Between March 8th and April 8th there was fighting every couple of days. In addition to killing over 400 ISIS members and capturing 10 more, the YPG was able to seize a large quantity of military equipment. Among the ISIS dead were fighters from Saudi Arabia, Azerbaijan, Tunisia and Egypt. Documents recovered from ISIS fighters also confirmed they were receiving support from the Saudi and Turkish governments.

Heavy close-range fighting around Air Force intelligence building in Aleppo

JNS.org - Hezbollah is facing a growing financial crisis, according to new reports.

A report in Asharq Al-Awsat, citing sources in Lebanon, said Hezbollah is facing increasing financial pressure over austerity measures by the Iranian government since President Hassan Rouhani took office last summer, as well as strain over the terror group’s involvement in the Syrian civil war.

Additionally, the report said Hezbollah is facing financial pressure from more aggressive prosecution by the United States and Europe over foreign sources of funding from Latin America and Africa.

Last week, several members of the U.S. Congress proposed a new bill to increase sanctions on Hezbollah by targeting its banks and other financial institutions that support the terror group.

BEIRUT (AP) — The Syrian government and rebel forces say poison gas has been used in a central village, injuring scores of people, while blaming each other for the attack.

The main Western-backed opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, says dozens of people were hurt in a poison gas attack Friday in the village of Kfar Zeita.

State-run Syrian television on Saturday blamed members of the al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front for using chlorine gas at Kfar Zeita, killing two people and injuring more than 100.

(Reuters) - Online videos show Syrian rebels using what appear to be U.S. anti-tank rockets, weapons experts say, the first significant American-built armaments in the country's civil war.

They would signal a further internationalization of the conflict, with new rockets suspected from Russia and drones from Iran also spotted in the forces of President Bashar al-Assad.

None of that equipment, however, is seen as enough to turn the tide of battle in a now broadly stalemated war, with Assad dominant in Syria's central cities and along the Mediterranean coast and the rebels in the interior north and east.

It was not possible to independently verify the authenticity of the videos or the supplier of the BGM-71 TOW anti-tank rockets shown in the videos. Some analysts suggested they might have been provided by another state such as Saudi Arabia, a U.S. ally, probably with Washington's acquiescence.

Jordanian air force fighter jets have destroyed a number of combat vehicles trying to cross into the kingdom from neighboouring Syria, according to the army.

A Syrian military source cited by state television in Damascus said, however, that the vehicles that were struck on Wednesday did not belong to Syria's armed forces.

The air strikes were the first time Jordan has used fighter jets to deal with such infiltrations.