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Qaeda rebels to meet US officials: Sources
December 15, 2013   


BEIRUT/ISTANBUL: Syrian rebel commanders from the Islamic Front which seized control of bases belonging to Western-backed rebels last week are due to hold talks with US officials in Turkey in coming days, rebel and opposition sources said on Saturday.

The expected contacts between Washington and the radical fighters reflect the extent to which the Islamic Front alliance has eclipsed the more moderate Free Syrian Army brigades — which Western and Arab powers tried in vain to build into a force able to topple President Bashar Al Assad. The talks could also decide the future direction of the Islamic Front, which is engaged in a standoff with yet more radical Sunni Muslim fighters from the Al Qaeda-linked Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

A rebel fighter with the Islamic Front said he expected the talks in Turkey to discuss whether the United States would help arm the front and assign to it responsibility for maintaining order in the rebel-held areas of northern Syria.

He declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the talks, and gave no further details. Diplomatic sources in Turkey said that US Syria envoy Robert Ford was expected in Istanbul soon but his schedule was not yet confirmed.

The Islamic Front rebel told reporters that rivalry with the ISIL had already led to a spate of hostage-taking between the two sides, and that the Front’s decision to talk to the Americans had further escalated tension. Although he described the two Islamist forces as ideologically close, he said ISIL appeared set on confrontation, perhaps encouraged by some of their backers in Saudi Arabia.

“The front has to talk to ISIL via messengers because of the tense situation,” he said.

“ISIL sees things in black and white. They are very stubborn.”

“So far the Islamic Front has been restraining itself, having some sort of dialogue with ISIL,” the rebel said.

But he said that unless the hostages were released soon “there will be more discussions and a different decision will be taken.”

Contacts with the United States will not be undertaken lightly by the Islamic Front, which includes Salafi groups such as Ahrar Al Sham brigades which are mainly hostile to the West and have rejected US-Russian backed UN peace talks for Syria, due to be held in Switzerland next month.

The Islamic Front, formed by the unification of six major Islamist groups last month, seized control a week ago of weapons stores nominally under the control of the Free Syrian Army’s Supreme Military Command (SMC).

[Lusitano89]

ONU pede 4,7 mil milhões de €€€ para ajudar refugiados sírios


Valerie Amos, responsável pela ajuda humanitária da ONU, e António Guterres, Alto Comissário para os Refugiados lançaram hoje um apelo conjunto a favor da população e refugiados sírios. Os dois responsáveis consideram ser necessários 4,7 mil milhões de euros para responder, em 2014, às necessidades dos sírios, agora ameaçados pela fome.

"Estamos a enfrentar uma situação aterradora, no fim de 2014, a maior parte da população da Síria pode estar deslocada ou a necessitar de ajuda humanitária", afirmou Guterres que adiantou: "Isto vai para além de tudo o que já vimos há muitos, muitos anos, e torna ainda maior a necessidade de uma solução política".

Por seu turno, Valerie Amos descreveu a situação síria como "uma das maiores crises dos tempos modernos" e sublinhou que os refugiados sírios "pensam que o mundo os esqueceu".

Este apelo coincide com a publicação de um estudo do Comité Internacional de Resgate que alerta para o facto da fome ser agora uma ameaça para a população síria. O preço do pão, por exemplo, aumentou em 500% em algumas áreas e quatro em cinco sírios afirmam que a sua maior preocupação é que deixe de haver comida.

E enquanto os responsáveis da ONU lançam apelos urgentes de ajuda à população síria, no terreno a violência continua a fazer vítimas. No domingo, a aviação síria realizou um dos seus ataques mais mortíferos desde que entrou em ação há 18 meses. Os bairros rebeldes da cidade de Alepo (norte) foram os alvos dos ataques que, segundo o repórter da Al Jazeera no local, fizeram 125 mortos e um número indeterminado de feridos.

Ontem, e enquanto residentes procuravam encontrar vítimas entre os escombros, o Observatório dos Direitos Humanos sírio dava conta de 76 mortos identificados, entre os quais 28 crianças. Tudo indica que os ataques fazem parte da estratégia para retomar Aleppo.

Lusa

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Saudis' big deal for anti-tank missiles may be meant to help Syrian rebels
Analysts suggest Saudis' huge order for US anti-tank missiles may allow it to send its existing stockpile of such weapons to anti-Assad rebels
PUBLISHED : Sunday, 15 December, 2013, 6:05am
UPDATED : Sunday, 15 December, 2013, 6:05am

No one is expecting a tank invasion of Saudi Arabia anytime soon, but the kingdom just put in a huge order for US-made anti-tank missiles that has Saudi-watchers scratching their heads and wondering whether the deal is related to Riyadh's support for the Syrian rebels.

The proposed weapons deal, which the Pentagon notified Congress of in early December, would provide Riyadh with more than 15,000 Raytheon anti-tank missiles at a cost of over US$1 billion. According to the International Institute for Strategic Studies' Military Balance report, Saudi Arabia's total stockpile this year amounted to slightly more than 4,000 anti-tank missiles. In the past decade, the Pentagon has notified Congress of only one other sale of anti-tank missiles to Saudi Arabia - a 2009 deal that shipped roughly 5,000 missiles to the kingdom.

"It's a very large number of missiles, including the most advanced version of the TOWs [tube-launched, optically tracked, wire-guided missiles]," said Jeffrey White, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "The problem is: what's the threat?"

A military engagement with Iran, the most immediate potential threat faced by Riyadh, would be largely a naval and air engagement over the Persian Gulf. Saudi Arabia has fought a series of deadly skirmishes with insurgents in northern Yemen over the years, but those groups have no more than a handful of military vehicles.

And Iraq, which posed a real threat during Saddam Hussein's day, is far too consumed by its internal demons and the fallout from the war in Syria to ponder such foreign adventurism.

But one Saudi ally could desperately use anti-tank weapons - the Syrian rebels. In the past, Riyadh has been happy to oblige: It previously purchased anti-tank weapons from Croatia and funnelled them to anti-Assad fighters, and it is now training and arming Syrian rebels in Jordan. Charles Lister, a London-based terrorism and insurgency analyst, said that rebels have also received as many as 100 Chinese HJ-8 anti-tank missiles from across the border with Jordan - and indeed, many videos show Syrian rebels using this weapon against Bashar al-Assad's tanks.

While most of the rebels' anti-tank weapons were seized from Assad's armouries, Lister also believes that several dozen 9M113 Konkurs missiles, an old Soviet weapon, were provided to Islamist rebels in northern Syria this summer.

The Saudis can't send US anti-tank missiles directly to the rebels - Washington has strict laws against that. Recipients of US arms are not allowed to transfer weapons to a third party without the explicit approval of the US government, which has not been granted.

But while the latest American anti-tank weapons might not be arriving in Aleppo anytime soon, that doesn't mean the deal is totally disconnected from Saudi efforts to arm the Syrian rebels. What may be happening, analysts say, is that the Saudis are sending their stockpiles of anti-tank weapons bought from elsewhere to Syria and are purchasing US missiles to replenish their own stockpiles.

"I would speculate that with an order of this size, the Saudis were flushing their current stocks in the direction of the opposition and replacing them with new munitions," said Charles Freeman, a former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia.

[HSMW]

Relatos de massacres por parte dos rebeldes.

17 de Dezembro.
Brace yourselves winter is coming.

[HSMW]

Camiâo bomba contra o hospital Kindi em Aleppo.  :shock:

BMP-1 com blindagem melhorada.  

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http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset ... 2013en.pdf

19 December 2013
Syria: Harrowing torture, summary killings in secret ISIS detention centres

Torture, flogging, and summary killings are rife in secret prisons run by the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), an armed group that controls large areas of northern Syria, said Amnesty International in a briefing published today.

ISIS, which claims to apply strict Shari’a (Islamic law) in areas it controls, has ruthlessly flouted the rights of local people. In the 18-page briefing, Rule of fear: ISIS abuses in detention in northern Syria, Amnesty International identifies seven detention facilities that ISIS uses in al-Raqqa governorate and Aleppo.

“Those abducted and detained by ISIS include children as young as eight who are held together with adults in the same cruel and inhuman conditions,” said Philip Luther, Amnesty International’s Director for the Middle East and North Africa.

Former detainees describe a shocking catalogue of abuses in which they or others were flogged with rubber generator belts or cables, tortured with electric shocks or forced to adopt a painful stress position known as aqrab (scorpion), in which a detainee’s wrists are secured together over one shoulder.

Some of those held by ISIS are suspected of theft or other crimes; others are accused of “crimes” against Islam, such as smoking cigarettes or zina, sex outside marriage. Others were seized for challenging ISIS’s rule or because they belonged to rival armed groups opposed to the Syrian government. ISIS is also suspected of abducting and detaining foreign nationals, including journalists covering the fighting in Syria.

Several children were among detainees who received severe floggings, according to testimonies obtained by Amnesty International. On one occasion, an anguished father had to endure screams of pain as ISIS captors tormented his son in a nearby room. Two detainees related how they witnessed a child of about 14 receive a flogging of more than 90 lashes during interrogation at Sadd al-Ba’ath, an ISIS prison in al-Raqqa governorate. Another child of about 14 who ISIS accused of stealing a motorbike was repeatedly flogged over several days.

“Flogging anyone, let alone children, is cruel and inhuman, and a gross abuse of human rights,” said Philip Luther. “ISIS should cease its use of flogging and other cruel punishments.”

Amnesty International is calling on ISIS to end its appalling treatment of detainees and for the group’s leaders to instruct their forces to respect human rights and abide by international humanitarian law.

Several former detainees told the organization that they were seized by masked gunmen who took them to undisclosed locations, where they were held for periods of up to 55 days. Some never learnt where they were but Amnesty International has identified ISIS prisons at seven locations: Mabna al-Mohafaza, Idarat al-Markabat and al-Mer’ab, all in al-Raqqa city; Sadd al Ba’ath and al-‘Akershi oil facility, both elsewhere in al-Raqqa governorate; and Mashfa al-Atfal and Maqar Ahmed Qaddour in Aleppo.
 
The Sadd al-Ba’ath prison is beside a dam on the Euphrates River at al-Mansura, where the local Shari’a court judge, who invariably appeared wearing an explosives belt, has instituted a reign of terror over its detainees.

Former detainees accuse him of presiding over grotesquely unfair “trials” lasting no more than a few minutes as other detainees look on, and handing down death penalties which are subsequently carried out. At his direction, detainees have been mercilessly flogged; on at least one occasion, he is said to have personally joined in the flogging.

At al-‘Akershi oil facility, which ISIS also appears to use as a military training ground, detainees were subjected to the aqrab as a means of torture, according to the testimonies of two men who were held there in recent months. One spent 40 days in solitary confinement, for part of which he was chained up in a tiny room full of electrical equipment with fuel on the floor.

“After years in which they were prey to the brutality of the al-Assad regime, the people of al-Raqqa and Aleppo are now suffering under a new form of tyranny imposed on them by ISIS, in which arbitrary detention, torture and executions have become the order of the day,” said Philip Luther.

Amnesty International is calling on the international community to take concrete steps to block the flow of arms and other support to ISIS and other armed groups implicated in committing war crimes and other serious human rights abuses.

“The Turkish government, in particular, should prevent its territory being used by ISIS to bring in arms and recruits to Syria,” said Philip Luther.

“As well, Gulf states that have voiced support for the armed groups fighting against the Syrian government should take action to prevent arms flows, equipment or other support reaching ISIS in view of its appalling human rights record.”

Amnesty International also renews its call to the Syrian government to allow unfettered access to Syria by the independent international Commission of Inquiry and by international humanitarian and human rights organizations, and to end its violations of human rights and international law, including the use of torture in its own detention centres.

[HSMW]

Poucos combates e muitos crimes de guerra.

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Syrian minister: Saudi Arabia is our top enemy

By Agence France-Presse
Friday, December 20, 2013 21:52 EST

Syria now views Saudi Arabia as its number one enemy and accuses it of trying to destroy the country by arming jihadists and other rebels fighting to oust President Bashar al-Assad.

The oil-rich Gulf monarchies have sided with the opposition from the start of Syria’s conflict in March 2011, with Riyadh leading calls for the fall of Assad.

Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Muqdad told AFP this week that Saudi Arabia was providing unfettered support for “terrorist groups” in Syria, while other nations had reviewed their positions.

“I think that all those who supported these terrorist groups have the feeling now that they have made big mistakes,” Muqdad said in an interview on Thursday, referring to the rebels seeking to topple Assad.

“The only party who is declaring the full support to the terrorist groups, to Al-Qaeda, is Saudi Arabia,” he said.

Muqdad urged the world to press Saudi Arabia to halt its support for the rebels, to prevent what he said was “another 11 September incident”.

“I think that if the world wants to avoid another 11 September incident, they must start telling Saudi Arabia ‘enough is enough,’” he said, referring to Al-Qaeda’s 2001 attacks on the US.

Earlier this month, Assad’s government urged the United Nations to take a stand against Saudi support for Islamist groups whose influence has grown on the battlefield.

“We call on the UN Security Council to take the necessary measures to put an end to the unprecedented actions of the Saudi regime, which is supporting takfiri (Sunni extremist) terrorism tied to Al-Qaeda,” the foreign ministry said in a message to UN chief Ban Ki-moon.

It was the first time the Syrian government has appealed to the international body to take action against Riyadh.

“Saudi Arabia is not content to merely send weapons and to finance but also mobilises extremist terrorists and sends them to kill the Syrian people,” the Syrian message said.

Saudi ‘not to stand idle’

Saudi-Syrian relations had been tense for years, long before the start of the brutal conflict that has now killed an estimated 126,000 people.

The Sunni-ruled kingdom severed diplomatic relations with Damascus following the February 2005 assassination in Beirut of Lebanese ex-premier Rafiq Hariri who had close ties with Riyadh.

Four years later, diplomatic ties resumed and Assad, who belongs to the Alawite Shiite sect, paid an official visit to Riyadh in March 2009.

Saudi King Abdullah, who rarely embarks on official visits abroad, reciprocated in October that year and made a landmark visit to Damascus to seal ties.

But relations deteriorated from the onset of the Syria war and were finally severed, with Riyadh repeatedly calling for the end of Assad’s regime.

Saudi officials have simultaneously chided the West for its reluctance to intervene militarily on the side of the armed opposition.

On Tuesday, the Saudi ambassador to Britain, Prince Mohammed bin Nawaf bin Abdul Aziz, published in The New York Times a bluntly worded assessment of the West’s policies on Syria and Iran.

“We believe that many of the West’s policies on both Iran and Syria risk the stability and security of the Middle East,” he wrote in the commentary.

The senior diplomat said Saudi Arabia has “global responsibilities”, both political and economic, and vowed it will continue to support the rebel Free Syrian Army and opposition fighters.

“We will act to fulfil these responsibilities, with or without the support of our Western partners,” wrote the ambassador.

He also acknowledged the threat of Al-Qaeda-linked groups in Syria, arguing however that the best way to counter the rise of extremists among the rebels was to support the “champions of moderation”.

Muqdad on Thursday told AFP that “Saudi Arabia should be put on the list of countries supporting terrorism.”

Outside regime circles, there is also growing animosity towards Saudi Arabia.

Earlier this month, a film which depicts the Saudi royal family in an unflattering light was screened at the Damascus opera house.

“It was important for me to show this movie,” said director Najdat Anzour of his “The King of Sands” movie, which opens with Al-Qaeda’s 9/11 attacks on the US.

“Al-Qaeda didn’t come from Mars but from Saudi Arabia, from the Wahhabi, extremist way of thinking,” Anzour told AFP.

Anzour said a Saudi cleric has issued a fatwa, Islamic decree, authorising his killing.

[HSMW]

Operation in Dzhobare. Part 1. Start

Battle for Eastern Ghouta

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http://syriapolicy.com/

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http://rt.com/news/lavrov-west-syria-jihadists-714/

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the ... l#photo=10

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Syria inks oil, gas exploration deal with Russian firm: AFP
December 25, 2013 02:30 PM (Last updated: December 25, 2013 06:00 PM)

DAMASCUS: Damascus signed a major oil and gas exploration deal with a Russian company in the Syrian capital Wednesday which will allow for exploration in a section of Syrian waters, an AFP journalist witnessed.

The agreement was signed by Syrian Oil Minister Suleiman Abbas, Syria's General Petroleum Company and the Russian Soyuzneftegaz company.

The deal permits the exploration of an area of 2,190 square kilometres (850 square miles) in the Mediterranean off the Syrian coast.

The contract "is the first ever for oil and gas exploration in Syria's waters," head of the General Petroleum Company Ali Abbas told AFP.

"It will be financed by Russia, and should oil and gas be discovered in commercial quantities, Moscow will recover the exploration costs," Abbas added.

Oil Minister Abbas meanwhile said during the signing ceremony that the contract covers "25 years, over several phases," adding that: "The cost of exploration and discovery is $100 million."

Russia is one of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's main backers, as well as a key proponent along with the United States of peace talks slated for January in Switzerland.

[listadecompras]

To give you an overview of the latest news, we’ve organized the latest Syrian developments in a curated summary.

Opposition Talks Say No Geneva Talks Unless Aleppo Raids End

The Syrian opposition said it will not attend the Geneva peace talks in January unless Assad ends his escalated assault on Aleppo.

Reuters reports that “the opposition’s Syrian National Coalition said in a statement that it ‘cannot in good conscience participate in peace talks in Geneva as Assad regime forces continue to bombard the city of Aleppo and surrounding areas for the ninth consecutive day.’

“Syrian authorities say they are battling rebels in control of parts of the city, once Syria’s business hub. But rights groups have condemned the use of barrel bombs – oil drums or cylinders packed with explosives and metal fragments – in particular as an indiscriminate form of bombardment.”

Iraq Closes Border with Syria

Al-Arabiya reports that Iraq has closed its border with Syria in conjunction with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s massive military hunt for al-Qaida hideouts in his country’s western desert.

“Iraq’s Prime Minister Maliki has been a strong supporter of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and reports suggested that his government was facilitating the transfer of Iranian arms to Syria,” the network says.

“But as Iraq began to feel the spillover of the Syrian violence, with many Jihadists returning back from Syrian well-armed and trained and carrying out deadly attacks across Iraq, Maliki appeared obliged to revise his approach to the crisis in Syria. On Monday an al-Qaida-linked militant group claimed an attack on two Iraqi television stations that killed five journalists.”

Syria’s War, and Its Past, on a Street Called Straight

Rania Abouzeid has a haunting dispatch from Damascus in which she describes changes to the Syrian capital.

“The taxi pulled up to the curb near Bab Touma, and it was clear, even before it came to a halt, that this place, in the Christian quarter of Damascus and one of the oldest parts of the city, was not the same as it had been in the late summer of 2011, just a few months into the uprising, when I was last here. But then, why would it be?

That Syria is gone, replaced by a country of shards,” she writes at NewYorker.com.

“Damascus is still a city where the country’s multi-sectarian, multi-ethnic communal mosaic is on display, and, if anything, it has been accentuated by the influx of thousands of people displaced by violence elsewhere. It’s not like Baghdad, carved into cantons by a maze of concrete blast walls keeping its people apart based on sectarian affiliation, but it is a city of barricades.”

Syrian Electronic Army Strikes Again

The New York Times reports that the Syrian Electronic Army, a hacking group whose goal is “to offer a pro-government counter-narrative to media coverage of Syria,” has struck again, adding to its list of high-profile targets.

“On Tuesday, the Federal Bureau of Investigation dispatched warning notices that the S.E.A. was at it again, according to two people who received the notices, which included various digital clues to help companies block attempted cyberattacks,” reports Nicole Perlroth.

“On Tuesday, some members of the media, including at the New York Times, received emails containing malicious links purporting to be a CNN news article about the conflict in Syria. The emails, which appeared to come from colleagues in some cases, redirected recipients to fake Google log-in pages that requested their usernames and password credentials.”