Islamist Rebels Fight Each Other While the Russians Bomb Them

[Bleipriester]

It is happy hour again for the Syrian ground and air forces. While the terrorists steal a march on the Syrian ground forces and kill each other, the Russian air force delivers explosives to the terrorists to maximize the results of their "efforts".

"A peculiar series of events are transpiring around Syria, as several Islamist rebel groups are fighting each other over petty rivalries and frivolous disputes that have only added to their plight inside the provinces of Idlib and Dara’a.

Yesterday, reports surfaced of violent clashes taking place between the Syrian Al-Qaeda faction “Jund Al-Aqsa” (Jabhat Al-Nusra offshoot) and their ally “Harakat Ahrar Al-Sham” inside the city of Al-Tamaneh, which is located in the Idlib Governorate’s southern countryside.

Both Jund Al-Aqsa and Harakat Ahrar Al-Sham make-up two of the largest factions in the conglomerate of Islamist militias that is dubbed “Jaysh Al-Fateh” (Army of Conquest).

However, a recent tiff over Jaysh Al-Fateh’s new policy to also fight ISIS seemingly caused friction between the two Islamist factions; especially, following Jund Al-Aqsa’s announcement that they were planning to withdraw from this coalition in protest of this policy.


To make matters worse for the Islamist rebels, the Russian Air Force indiscriminately bombed both Jund Al-Aqsa and Harakat Ahrar Al-Sham on Wednesday, striking the aforementioned groups inside the city of Al-Tamaneh while they were fighting one another.

Meanwhile, in southern Syria, the other Syrian Al-Qaeda faction “Jabhat Al-Nusra” and their close allies from the Free Syrian Army’s “Southern Front Brigades” began to fight one another over an unknown dispute.

The Russians did not bomb Jabhat Al-Nusra and the Free Syrian Army’s Southern Front Brigades; however, they didn’t need to, as both Islamist groups did enough damage to one another.

The duration of these disputes is unknown, but if these Islamist factions continue to fight each other, they will find themselves in a world of trouble against the advancing the Syrian Arab Army (SAA)."

 

[waltky]

Kinda strange, it took the involvement of Russia for Obama to finally get serious about arming the Syrians rebels...

Syrian rebels receive more US-made weapons as Assad's troops backed by Russian jets advance in Aleppo
Oct 19, 2015: Rebels battling the Syrian army and its allies near Aleppo said on Monday they had received new supplies of US-made anti-tank missiles from states opposed to President Bashar al-Assad since the start of a major government offensive last week.

The rebels from three groups contacted by Reuters said new supplies had arrived in response to the attack by the army, which is backed up by Russian air strikes and on the ground by Iranian fighters and Lebanon's Hezbollah. The delivery of the US-made TOW missiles to rebels in Aleppo and elsewhere in Syria appears to be an initial response to the new Russian-Iranian intervention. Foreign states supporting the rebels include Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Qatar. But officials from one of the Aleppo-based rebel groups said the supplies were inadequate for the scale of the assault, one of several ground offensives underway with Russian air support. "A few (TOW missiles) will not do the trick. They need dozens," said one official, declining to be named due to the political sensitivity of the military support programme.

A number of rebel groups vetted by states opposed to Assad have been supplied with weapons via Turkey, part of a programme supported by the United States and which has in some cases included military training by the Central Intelligence Agency. These groups fight under the banner of the "Free Syrian Army" — a loose affiliation of rebels that do not operate with a centralized command structure and have been widely eclipsed by jihadist groups such as the Nusra Front and Islamic State. "We received more supplies of ammunition in greater quantities than before, including mortar bombs, rocket launchers and anti-tank (missiles)," said Issa al-Turkmani, a commander in the FSA-affiliated Sultan Murad group fighting in the Aleppo area. "We have received more new TOWs in the last few days ... We are well-stocked after these deliveries."

TOW missiles are the most potent weapon in the rebels' arsenal. FSA-affiliated groups have also been using TOWs against government forces to fend off another offensive in Hama province, southwest of Aleppo. Rebels there said last week they had plentiful supplies of the missiles. Since the start of the Russian air strikes, ground offensives by the Syrian army and its allies have mostly hit areas controlled by insurgent groups other than Islamic State in parts of western Syria that are crucial to Assad's survival.

'Last three days were bad'

See also:

US airdrops ammunition to Syrian Arab rebels
Oct 13, 2015: US forces airdropped small arms ammunition and other supplies to Syrian Arab rebels, barely two weeks after Russia raised the stakes in the long-running civil war by intervening on the side of President Bashar al-Assad. One military official said the drop, by Air Force C-17 cargo planes in northern Syria on Sunday, was part of a revamped US strategy announced last week to help rebels in Syria battling Islamic State militants.

Last week, Washington shelved a programme to train and equip "moderate" rebels opposed to Assad who would join the fight against Islamic State. The only group on the ground to have success against Islamic State while cooperating with the US-led coalition is a Kurdish militia, the YPG, which has carved out an autonomous zone in northern Syria and advanced deep into Islamic State's stronghold Raqqa province. On Monday, the YPG announced a new alliance with small groups of Arab fighters, which could help deflect criticism that it fights only on behalf of Kurds. Washington has indicated it could direct funding and weapons to Arab commanders on the ground who cooperate with the YPG.

Amnesty International, in a new report, accused the YPG of committing war crimes by driving out thousands of non-Kurdish civilians and demolishing their homes in Kurdish-controlled areas. A YPG spokesman called it "a false allegation." The US military confirmed dropping supplies to opposition fighters vetted by the United States but would say no more about the groups that received the supplies or the type of equipment in the airdrop. Syrian Arab rebels said they had been told by Washington that new weapons were on their way to help them launch a joint offensive with their Kurdish allies on the city of Raqqa, the de facto Islamic State capital. The Russian intervention in the four-year Syrian war has caught US President Barack Obama's administration off guard. Washington has been trying to defeat Islamic State while still calling for Assad's downfall.

Dangerous consequences

Russian President Vladimir Putin was rebuffed in his bid to gain support for his country's bombing campaign, with Saudi sources saying they had warned the Kremlin leader of dangerous consequences and Europe issuing its strongest criticism yet. The head of Syria's Nusra Front, an offshoot of al Qaeda, took aim on Monday at the Russian intervention, urging insurgents to escalate attacks on the strongholds of Assad's minority Alawite sect in retaliation for what he called Russia's indiscriminate killing of Muslim Sunnis. Describing Russia's action as a new Christian crusade from the east that was doomed to fail, the audio message from Abu Mohamad al-Golani posted on YouTube said, "The war in Cham (Syria) will make the Russians forget the horrors of what they faced in Afghanistan." "The new Russian invasion is the last dart in the weaponry of the enemies of Muslims and the enemies of Syria," said Golani, whose extremist Muslim Sunni fundamentalist group is one of the most powerful forces fighting Assad's government.

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