Syria in 2016 (April-June)

[OUTLAW 09]

NEW MAP: N-#Homs - S-#Hama | #SYRIA
Jarjisah & al-Zara back to Opposition after 3 months.
HD http://goo.gl/cM6FFn

Aleppo Byzantium St. Simeons monastery badly damaged by airstrikes
http://wikimapia.org/#lang=de&lat=36...43488&z=16&m=b …

Regime tanks & artillery shelling #Houla towns in NW #Homs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayc03FMN_8g …
http://wikimapia.org/#lang=de&lat=34...22160&z=13&m=b …

Aleppo More foreign Shia-forces killed in Rashedin in SW #Aleppo -tried to pull out their dead from days b4

Multiple regime airstrikes targeted Saraqeb in rural #Idlib this morning

[OUTLAW 09]

SYRIA: Hezbollah announces death of Mustafa Badreddine, country’s top military commander - @AFP

Jaish al-Sunnah rebels claim Mustafa Badreddine was killed in rebel attack on #Hezbollah ops room in Khan Touman,

Pro Hezbollah/Iran regime ppls highly suspect Russia gave Israel intelligence to kill several of its leaders in Syria

If you remember not long ago Russia also stopped missile shipments to Iran after they ended up with Hezbollah

For more on Mustafa Badreddine, read @disgraceofgod’s excellent article on @thedailybeast:
http://thebea.st/1gD8fiD

Many people have speculated that #Hezbollah was losing interest in the #Syria fight; Badreddine’s death would *definitively* end that.

Badreddine has set up meetings between Bashar al-Assad & #Hezbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah. He operates under numerous aliases.

Badreddine has never been issued a passport, ID card, no bank records, no property etc - a “virtually untraceable ghost."

[OUTLAW 09]

Assad regime transport aircraft Il-76 enroute from #IRGC base in #Abadan to #Damascus in #Syria.

Russia believes it can compel the West to “love us as we are” - The withdrawal that wasn’t
http://econ.st/23K485j

No Friday prayers in the #Damascus suburb of #Daraya today because of regime shelling

[OUTLAW 09]

Daughter of former Hezbollah deputy Amin Shiri arrested by Lebanese authorities after it was found she had $7 million dollars in her account furthermore she also has several companies in Nigeria to engage in money laundering for Hezbollah

Lebanese bank freeze account of Hezbollah MP Noire Sahili over $22 million, Nasrallah always claimed they don't hide money in bank accounts

[OUTLAW 09]

Armed confrontations now between Assad regime & Druze community in Damascus
http://en.eldorar.com/node/2265

Iranian Al Alam TV just announced that Russian airstrikes accidentally bombed Iranian forces in Aleppo 😂 thanks Russia

Aleppo: Syrian Rebels destroy regime tank in Humayra

[OUTLAW 09]

Utterly unacceptable.
Seems islamist rebels from #Nusra and Ahrar Al-Sham indeed killed Alawite civilians in #Zara. https://twitter.com/ArtWendeley/stat...70841639108610 …

Jabhat al-Nusra led the capture of a majority Alawite town - Al-Zara - today, during which several civilians (including women) were killed.

Several other groups (inc. Ahrar al-Sham) were involved in the Al-Zara attack. Those responsible must be identified & brought to justice.

Syria: rebels Kataib Furat Jarabulus (#FSA/#SDF) on the eastern bank of the Euphrates, overlooking Jarabulus

[OUTLAW 09]

After a brief offensive pause, its clear #ISIS is attempting to re-escalate operations, around #Palmyra, Al-Shaer, Deir ez Zour & N #Aleppo.

Charles Lister ‏@Charles_Lister
US must significantly increase support to moderate #Syria rebels to shift battlefield.
@NicholasAHeras gets it.
http://www.cnas.org/sites/default/fi...ion-160505.pdf …

However, arguably too late to develop a single rebel command structure. I’d advocate working with decentralized model.

[OUTLAW 09]

Samantha Power ‏@AmbassadorPower
#Syria regime today blocked aid convoy to #Darayya carrying baby formula, vaccines. Would have been 1st UN delivery in 3 years. Inexcusable

Kyle W. Orton
‏@KyleWOrton
What does "inexcusable" mean in this context? What's the penalty? What's the mechanism to force compliance

UN and it's UNSC is and has failed badly from the beginning in Syria and sometimes one must wonder does the UN work together with Assad?????

Words mean nothing unless there is an enforcement mechanism....even Obama seems to understand that has he avoids any word that requires the use of force...even his "red lines" mean actually nothing as we have seen.

[CrowBat]

Utterly unacceptable.
Seems islamist rebels from #Nusra and Ahrar Al-Sham indeed killed Alawite civilians in #Zara. https://twitter.com/ArtWendeley/stat...70841639108610 …

Slowly - and cautiously, PLEASE.

There is a major problem with all of reporting - and therefore with understanding - of what's actually going on there in the Ra'astan-Talbiseh Pocket (RTP). I do not blame anybody: the area is de-facto besieged since four years and reliable reports as scarce as snake's sweat.

1.) There are two 'Homs Operations Rooms':
- Harakat Tahrir Homs of the Free Syrian Army, including units like Liwa 313, Liwa Shuhada al-Bayada etc.

This is controling central and southern parts of the RTP, and was exposed to immense volumes of regime's air strikes, artillery barrages, and ground attacks in the last 6-7 months - without any success at all.

- Homs Operations Room, including Ahrar, JAN, Ajnad and few other groups of Salafists and Jihadists (or at least Syrians that pledged alegiance to the JAN).

This is controling western and eastern parts of the RTP, and was largely left untouched (except for a minor offensive of the Ba'ath Party Militia on its northern/north-eastern side, back in November of December last year).

2.) Meanwhile, and despite all the bombardment to which it is exposed, the HTH reached a sort of a cease-fire agreement with the Ba'ath in Jarjisah and Zarah, north of the RTP. At least there was a sort of 'nobody attacks' pact.

3.) However, on the night from 11 to 12 May, the Ba'ath Party Militia (BMP) plastered Ra'astan with a volley of BM-21s - killing three civilians (apparently: all women):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctdmynsuRzY

4.) Now, while all of the RTP originally used to be under the control of the Farouq Brigade FSyA (the first ever brigade of the Free Syrian Army, those times are long since over. As described above, various elements have meanwhile sided with different other factions, usually because Salafists and Wahhabists could afford to pay their troops much better. Therefore, most of the Farouq sided with Ahrar, just for example. But, some have sided with the JAN too.

Who exactly is holding what part of Ra'astan, is unclear.

Whatever... after that rocket attack, the Homs OR - which, as should be well-known to everybody since at least 28 February - is no part of any kind of a cease-fire, launched a 'counter-attack': they caught the BPM in Zahra by surprise, and overrun its positions, and then the entire village.

Now, the YouTube quickly removed most of videos that were subsequently posted - majority of which were showing one T-62M, one BMP-1, piles of small arms and even larger piles of ammo captured by the Homs OR in the course of this action, together with bodies of plenty of BPM's combatants.

Whatever is left are stills like posted here, some showing the captured tank and IFV, and others showing combatants of the Homs OR walking between bodies wearing civilian clothes - but which were BPM's militiamen. The latter were caught asleep and shot at the spot (I'm not absolving anybody, but simply 'not the least surprised' - after all the people in the RTP went through, the last five years).

Now, the 'problem' if you like, is that Zahra is an Alawite village, and Alawites - as we all should know by now - are 'holier than holly' in this war.

Therefore, it took only a few hours until somebody (a regime fan) 'informed SOHR' that 'it is not known what happened to dozens of families who were kidnapped earlier by rebels & JN in al-Zara'.

Complementary statements add '19 civilians including 6 women ...killed'. How do they want to know: nobody knows. Then the RTP - and now Zahra too - is not regime-controlled, civilian population was supposedly 'hijacked' and thus there is no way to know.

At the same time, characters in question ignored the issue with FSyA's cease-fire, and regime's insistence on 'no cease-fire' with the JAN, and they are using expressions like 'rebels' instead of 'Islamist militants' or 'Jihadists' - as usually: I.e. somebody wants to make us think this would've been an action of the FSyA.

So, let's wait for the dust to settle before screaming 'war crimes' and whatever else. To me it appears some BPM was drunk enough to fire a salvo of BM-21, kill civilians in Ra'astan, and then the Homs OR - which is NOT bound by any kind of cease-fires - hit back (and not only 'in fashion').

[OUTLAW 09]

Local rebel source confirm "road connection established btw #Rastan & #Houla pockets" in northern #Homs

Ongoing fighting between #ISIS against #SAA in the vicinity of Tyias T4 airport, And in Gazal &Sha'ar fields near #Palmyra #Syria , May 13

E of #Damascus now
The "cessation of hostilities" in #Syria remains a #myth/local occurrence
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rNF0mkTHm0 …

Great piece by @m_tsvetkova detailing how the Kremlin,since 2012,has helped insurgents leave Russia and go to Syria https://twitter.com/specialreports/s...12173028675584 …

[OUTLAW 09]

CrowBat........appears Iran is in for the long haul......question is are they ramping up in order to provoke KSA and Turkey into entering Syria??

Due to high demand, Qassem Suleimani reportedly decreed that only one man per family would be allowed to join deployments to #Syria

However many Iranians, young and old, circumvent restrictions by recruiting from other cities. Many join Afghan & Pakistani brigades

#IRGC ordered to select only most well-trained, experienced volunteers. But if limits lifted, Iranians would “go by the millions” to #Syria

[CrowBat]

More info from RTP, i.e. Zahra/northern Homs:

- Ridha's citation (same link as posted above) of the SOHR report - and thus the Reuters report here, actually leaning on Ridha's statements is BS: Ridha used SOHR as a source but is twisting the actual statement.

SOHR said that about dozen of civilians 'either fled or were captured by rebels in Zahra, but we can't confirm this' (HOR denied this meanwhile).

Furthermore, SOHR said inside their new article: 'Civilians were killed but our sources say they were killed during combat, not executed.

...and civilians that made statements about executions were interviewed on state TV, which means sorry: but that has to be taken with a truck-load of salt.

Overall, nobody was 'executed' and no civilians kidnapped.

Here a JAN-released video showing them 'in urban combat'...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrayqXkqtao

[CrowBat]

CrowBat........appears Iran is in for the long haul......question is are they ramping up in order to provoke KSA and Turkey into entering Syria??

Sure. They'll be fighting their 'final battle' and 'win the war of the right ones', in the name of God, of course, and as usually... That's IRGC.

Due to high demand, Qassem Suleimani reportedly decreed that only one man per family would be allowed to join deployments to #Syria

Soleimani has no say there any more. He was removed from his position in disgrace after failing to recover Tikrit (at least not without US help) - and reduced to symbolic figure.

And the rest of that citation: hm, not really sure if there are that many recruits. So far, the IRGC was rather struggling with finding any at all - at least in Iran (is another reason why are they using Iraqis, Afghans, Pakistanis, Azerbaijanis etc.).

[OUTLAW 09]

More info from RTP, i.e. Zahra/northern Homs:

- Ridha's citation (same link as posted above) of the SOHR report - and thus the Reuters report here, actually leaning on Ridha's statements is BS: Ridha used SOHR as a source but is twisting the actual statement.

SOHR said that about dozen of civilians 'either fled or were captured by rebels in Zahra, but we can't confirm this' (HOR denied this meanwhile).

Furthermore, SOHR said inside their new article: 'Civilians were killed but our sources say they were killed during combat, not executed.

...and civilians that made statements about executions were interviewed on state TV, which means sorry: but that has to be taken with a truck-load of salt.

Overall, nobody was 'executed' and no civilians kidnapped.

Here a JAN-released video showing them 'in urban combat'...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrayqXkqtao

CrowBat.....saw one comment where several of the women killed were actually involved in fighting actually shooting at JaF others had been previously killed by BM21 shelling.

[OUTLAW 09]

Dataset of Russian Attacks Against Syria’s Civilians via @bellingcat

https://www.bellingcat.com/resources...ias-civilians/ …

[OUTLAW 09]

Op-Ed @OrientNewsEn

All-in or all-out: Iran’s ’Vietnam Moment’ in Syria
http://www.orient-news.net/en/news_s...oment-in-Syria …

Pro-regime religious song: "We'll make Syria prosperous...We'll liberate Khan Touman w Haj Qassem...this is like the 8-year Sacred Defense."

[Audio] http://qasemsoleimani.ir/article/8226.html …

[OUTLAW 09]

More info from RTP, i.e. Zahra/northern Homs:

- Ridha's citation (same link as posted above) of the SOHR report - and thus the Reuters report here, actually leaning on Ridha's statements is BS: Ridha used SOHR as a source but is twisting the actual statement.

SOHR said that about dozen of civilians 'either fled or were captured by rebels in Zahra, but we can't confirm this' (HOR denied this meanwhile).

Furthermore, SOHR said inside their new article: 'Civilians were killed but our sources say they were killed during combat, not executed.

...and civilians that made statements about executions were interviewed on state TV, which means sorry: but that has to be taken with a truck-load of salt.

Overall, nobody was 'executed' and no civilians kidnapped.

Here a JAN-released video showing them 'in urban combat'...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrayqXkqtao

Long #JN video of the #Zara attack. Intense battle obviously.
https://twitter.com/jn_homs7/status/731143251785289728 …

Statement regarding alleged #Zara massacre:
- People killed were armed, no civilians
- bodies sefies=misbehavior

Syria, Hama sth rif|Zara|Homs Operation Room – Statement concerning 2 women killed
Homs Operation Room has issued the following statement about women killed during the battle in Zara (South of Hama rif).

The statement mentions pictures published in social media pages showing 2 women killed in Zara They were killed because they were armed and shot at the fighters killing one them.

According to Islamic moral standard, it is legitimate to retaliate to any ennemy shooting regardless the source.

Most of the civilians in the village of Zara were armed. The attack on Zara happened after Shabbiha shelled intensively Al Hola (Hula, Hola) area from the village and attempted to cut off alHola area from the northern rif of Homs to besiege the civilians living in that area.

Their strategy is to isolate women and children and elderlies during the battle and is against any desecration of bodies (aganst religion and revolution principles). Homs Operation room will carry out an inquiry about that isolated case.

[CrowBat]

CrowBat.....saw one comment where several of the women killed were actually involved in fighting actually shooting at JaF others had been previously killed by BM21 shelling.

...best part is where 'several of the women' killed in Zahra were wearing those distinct wests with ammo pouches.

Guess, nobody told them that joining the Ba'ath Party Militia means becoming a combatant and makes it possible to get killed too.

BTW, regime-fans are meanwhile in hypermodus with the entire affair. Some are using photos of (Sunni) victims of Baniyas massacre as 'evidence for massacre in Zahra'...
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CiUdVmlWwAEOxgV.jpg

[OUTLAW 09]

Hassan Hassan ‏@hxhassan
The Syria bureau chief of Iranian state-owned Alalam TV suggests Russian airstrikes hit bases of Iranian militias
http://fb.me/1jnE26PoO

[OUTLAW 09]

Russian Embassy in the U.K. makes an embarrassing Twitter mistake over Syria - read on -
http://uatoday.tv http://uatoday.tv/society/russian-em...ia-647821.html …

Putin has Russia use it's military to bolster #Assad's sieges & setup parallel aid structures to subvert the @UN's: https://twitter.com/mod_russia/statu...51500788994048 …

@UN: (@mod_russia backed) Syrian regime setting unacceptable conditions for entry of aid.
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20...-entry-of-aid/ …