Levant crisis - III

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 08:58

The'Nimr'Tiger Souria4Syrians 11h11 hours ago

Do you know why the so called "Syrian rebels" (who are mostly jihadists & Al-Qaeda) fear the fall of ISIS?

because they know they're next

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 08:59

Within Syria‏ @WithinSyriaBlog Jul 25

First to behead : FSA
First to throw POW off buildings : FSA
First to rape and enslave women : FSA
First to practice cannibalism : FSA

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 09:00

the last important town in raqqa province called Madaan is about to be circled and attacked by SAA.
like DEZ it is a important crossing point on euphrates on the iraq to syria roads.

persians are very keen on madaan and dez because it avoids the troublesome anbar province on the persia to lebanon routes.

ISIS will not give up this without a fight. they are fighting hard in sukhnah also.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 28 Jul 2017 11:12

Iran made Shahed-129 UCAV against terrorist groups in Syria & Western borders

Exclusive new footage of Iranian Shahed-129 UCAV in combat over Syria

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 11:18

we continue to fall ever further behind in the uav RMA. iran launched a 250kg sat today which we probably did in late 80s some 30 years ago, yet we do not build domestic UAVs remotely near that size and weapons.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 28 Jul 2017 11:52

China CH4 UAV combat in Iraq

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 14:48

murky fragments of old news from the al tanf crossing on iraqi side/ seems some formation called 'hawks regiment' controls that from iraqi side and has 'promised to work with the al tanf rebels and prevent any iran pasand militias from using that crossing'
at the same time there are pix of syrian islamic resistance fighter walking over to iraqi side and mingling with PMU & liwa fatemiyun men and talking selfies with their hummers.

there is a vast open area between al rutba and al qaim in anbar where isis will disperse once they are defeated in the euphrates valley. this region is quiet for now barring isolated isis raids on outposts but could heat up again - KSA and jordan borders are nearby

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 28 Jul 2017 14:56

Singha wrote:we continue to fall ever further behind in the uav RMA. iran launched a 250kg sat today which we probably did in late 80s some 30 years ago, yet we do not build domestic UAVs remotely near that size and weapons.

4 Decades of Tough Sanctions has done Wonders for Iran Defence Industry both in Indiginisation and Reverse engineering they are second only to China.

Had there been no sanctions they would been another Saudi Arabia importing every thing from every where under the sun

Gyan · Post by **Gyan** » 28 Jul 2017 15:12

Deleted as out of context

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 21:29

4th article by robert fisk - about late gen fouad khaddour, who died in arak
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/syr ... 62636.html

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 21:31

video tigers moving across the desert https://twitter.com/Hamosh84/status/890839931324702720

the attack on madaan is about to start supported by ruaf air strikes

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 21:35

isis media gives a bio of a little turd named abu mujahid al faransi
https://twitter.com/Terror_Monitor/stat ... 2764732416

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 21:40

iraqi police/militia thrashing a african looking man, perhaps in mosul
could be innocent, could be isis, could be a basra man of african origin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXCjoXZP120

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 28 Jul 2017 21:47

isis distance education ramadan sniper class in yemen - looking at strong enrollment maybe they were giving a festival discount of 50%
https://twitter.com/Dr_E_Kendall/status ... 1123332100

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 29 Jul 2017 07:54

Singha wrote:iraqi police/militia thrashing a african looking man, perhaps in mosul
could be innocent, could be isis, could be a basra man of african origin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXCjoXZP120

Looks like rather pointless sadism after a while - gun to his head, cigarette-lighter to his beard and chin... stomping on his bleeding foot. The guy doing all that is definitely enjoying himself.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 29 Jul 2017 08:11

its hard to say who is isis, who is human shield civilian from the starved people crawling out of the ruins in mosul. all thin and covered in dust. even isis had families and kids, so just the presence of a family is not +ve id of a harmless civilian. bad situation for all trying to sort them out. but sadism like this cannot be encouraged. give the ISIS a trial and firing squad if need be.

no news of our indians so far.

recently i saw a very scary dude....short stocky guy, strong lower arms, long moustache matching the rogue operator in 'green zone' ... a waiter in a restaurant taking time off and standing outside. first he walks up and casually lands a brutal kick on a street dog who was sleeping nearby. laughs and then walks back to chat with the aeging old chowkidar who might be his buddy. he catches the chowkidars white hairs above the ears and painfully plucks out a few of them to yelps of protest. looks like a sadist happy to inflict pain.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 29 Jul 2017 10:27

yazidi boys brainwashed by isis now free but still suffer nightmares
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/en/orig ... m.amp.html

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 29 Jul 2017 10:31

syran college students in homs.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 29 Jul 2017 10:32

most of the college age males are fighting in the army or NDF. the NDF has a lot of late teen recruits.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 29 Jul 2017 15:21

al masdar news
https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/de ... tronghold/
BEIRUT, LEBANON (10:50 A.M.) – The Syrian Arab Army (SAA) has launched what is potentially their last attack on the Islamic State’s stronghold of Al-Sukhnah in the eastern countryside of Homs this morning.

Backed by heavy airstrikes from the Russian and Syrian air forces, the 5th Corps stormed the Islamic State’s last positions located at the western outskirts of Al-Sukhnah.

Using heavy artillery and tanks to penetrate the Islamic State’s well-fortified front-lines, the Syrian Arab Army’s 5th Corps is attempting to enter Al-Sukhnah before the end of the day.

Some local activists have begun claiming that the Islamic State has withdrawn most of their forces from Al-Sukhnah to the Deir Ezzor Governorate; however, this is still not confirmed.

What Al-Masdar can confirm at the moment is that the Syrian Arab Army is less than one kilometer away from Al-Sukhnah’s western gate.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 30 Jul 2017 08:03

Yuseef Yusha Verified Account @ MIG29_ 14h 14 Hours ago Not
More
Anatolia news agency reported the entry of 180 trucks loaded with US military equipment for Kurdish militants ... Http: // fb.me/8LPjYaheC

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 30 Jul 2017 08:06

So assuming the Kurds have some brains, they will shoot off one missile and save 3 more for a rainy day. Should make for interesting times in Turkey after this war is over. IMO neither Syria nor Iraq will be in a position to deny the Kurds their homeland.

CalvinH · Post by **CalvinH** » 30 Jul 2017 08:51

UlanBatori wrote:So assuming the Kurds have some brains, they will shoot off one missile and save 3 more for a rainy day. Should make for interesting times in Turkey after this war is over. IMO neither Syria nor Iraq will be in a position to deny the Kurds their homeland.

I think one of the objective, if not primary one, of this all from US/Saudi perspective was to weaken Turkey. Turkey will now go the drain like Pakistan once the war ends. ISIS leftovers will be equivalent of Mujaheddin coming back from Afghan war and they will implode Turkey from inside. Kurds are better version of restive Balochis with external support. Turkey will become the next Pakistan.

US/Saudi probably used Erodgans ambitions in the region and as Muslim Ummah leader to lure it into a Jihadi war in the neighborhood. Turkey is in for interesting times once the war is over.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 30 Jul 2017 14:14

https://twitter.com/Navsteva/status/891315751080128512
Navstéva ‏ @Navsteva 17h17 hours ago
.@brett_mcgurk labels #Idlib the largest al-Qaeda safe haven since Afghanistan in the 9/11 era

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 30 Jul 2017 14:22

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 30 Jul 2017 19:52

Hit and run by isis in raqqa inflicts 40 kia

https://mobile.almasdarnews.com/article ... eir-ezzor/

Gyan · Post by **Gyan** » 30 Jul 2017 22:24

CalvinH wrote:
UlanBatori wrote:So assuming the Kurds have some brains, they will shoot off one missile and save 3 more for a rainy day. Should make for interesting times in Turkey after this war is over. IMO neither Syria nor Iraq will be in a position to deny the Kurds their homeland.
I think one of the objective, if not primary one, of this all from US/Saudi perspective was to weaken Turkey. Turkey will now go the drain like Pakistan once the war ends. ISIS leftovers will be equivalent of Mujaheddin coming back from Afghan war and they will implode Turkey from inside. Kurds are better version of restive Balochis with external support. Turkey will become the next Pakistan.

US/Saudi probably used Erodgans ambitions in the region and as Muslim Ummah leader to lure it into a Jihadi war in the neighborhood. Turkey is in for interesting times once the war is over.

Turkey will take down Europe with it.

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 30 Jul 2017 22:26

IMO the West, Turkey and KSA will get the "thanks" due to them from the ISIS, Al Qaeda and all their other creations. In person. Like Putin sending 100,000 bottle of vodka via individual couriers. But then again, I have not understood how KSA has avoided being 'thanked' by the veterans from Afghanistan. Or Chechnya.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 31 Jul 2017 08:14

map of turkeys foreign trade
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DFK5OVrXcAAPnLL.jpg:large

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 31 Jul 2017 16:14

isis struck back hard in raqqa countryside yesterday but SAA was able to recover from these blows and stands poised to island Madan town
Leith Abou Fadel‏Verified account @leithfadel 22h22 hours ago
Over 40 soldiers lost in southeast Al-Raqqa these last 24 hours. Most were martyred by the 10+ suicide attacks launched by Da'esh :/

another 20km and they would be able to bring down artillery and grads on ISIS camps around deir azzor cued by drones and helicopters and arty spotters inside DEZ perimeter. this will make life more tough for ISIS to sustain the seige.

thereafter the core area left of ISIS will be the belt below
Within Syria‏ @WithinSyriaBlog

IndraD · Post by **IndraD** » 31 Jul 2017 16:39

with fall of Aleppo one was hopeful Syria is inchin towards some peace..may be there is some peace around Damascus but else where in Syria it looks like free for all with many types of jihadis fighting each other and Sy army.
Lets see what happens to Iraq after Mosul fall.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 31 Jul 2017 16:50

7000 ppl are being shipped from arsal barrens refugee camps to idlib after hezbollah swatted the nusra front there.
The lebanese army will run the next phase to evict isis from border tracts

Gagan · Post by **Gagan** » 31 Jul 2017 20:17

UlanBatori wrote:I have not understood how KSA has avoided being 'thanked' by the veterans from Afghanistan. Or Chechnya.

KSA's Jails are full - packed like sardines, full of political opponents, radicals, anti-establishment, dissenters.
They seem to have cast the net pretty wide and have a security clampdown in place 24x7.

The Hajj season must be a lot of fun for their security walas, with Iranians coming in in huge numbers and there being shia-sunni riots almost every year.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 31 Jul 2017 22:00

Shia areas in eastern saudia are under a north korean type police state with no fairness. Towns are kept under lockdowns and people executed dissent like shiek nimr al nimr

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 31 Jul 2017 22:13

Well, then there's hope.

CalvinH · Post by **CalvinH** » 31 Jul 2017 22:31

SA for Jihadi wars is like USA in WW 1/2. Far from the real battlefields to be really impacted by the war itself. In Saudi's case its the money. They work through proxies (CIA and others) so things can't be directly traced back to them. This is not the case with Pakistan and Turkey. They are directly involved and war is next to their borders.

Inside SA the population is kept well fed to rat out the outsiders. Local folks wont support the outsiders.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 01 Aug 2017 13:05

https://lecourrierdumaghrebetdelorient. ... -lhorreur/

--translation--
The vast majority of the media, at least European and American, have accustomed their public to cover with much complacency the wars carried out by the West in the Middle East or Africa.

This was the case in Iraq, in 1991, then in 2003; The same was true in Libya in 2011; In Mali, since 2012; And this was also true of the Battle of Mosul in 2016 and 2017.

Very few "war reporters" dared to denounce the events that occurred in Mosul after the assault of the Iraqi armed forces and Shiite militias on the city, supported by the aviation of the member states of the coalition led By Washington and by the special units deployed on the ground by several of these countries.

Very few of them, mainly because the majority of correspondents and special envoys wrote their "reports" or spoke in newspapers-spoken from Erbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan, without ever venturing to In Mosul itself, one of the most dangerous theaters of war of the moment. They were thus ignorant of the reality, contenting themselves with passing on the "information" communicated to them by the press service of the armed forces against the Islamic State. At best some of them ventured into the villages freed from the plain of Nineveh, surprised to discover so many ruins, but satisfied to be able to show themselves as a "field of war" in front of the camera.

As for those who made their way to the field of battle, they hesitated to describe what they saw there, sweetening their words at best, so as not to appear too contrary to the sacrosanct doxa dominant Which formats the speech of all journalists concerned not to put their careers at risk. This is how the mainstream press now works: it must be said just like everyone else, for fear of being right alone, which only brings about the ostracism and the banning of the system.

Thus, few "correspondents" and "special envoys" warned those who listened to them against the obvious risks of the massacre that was being prepared; Too busy praising the effectiveness of the coalition strikes and singing the victory of the international community and the Iraqi army over the Islamic state without asking the right questions without seeing what was actually happening.

Today, however, it is no longer possible to hide the horror and the feathers are necessarily untied, all together and too late; The evil is done, and the press has not yet fulfilled its democratic mission which is to inform and alert public opinion.

While the eastern third of Mosul, mostly inhabited by a Kurdish and especially Arab Shiite population, has been more or less spared, most of the city has disappeared, populated by mostly Sunni families, completely shaved under bombs Of the coalition aircraft.

I had seen the ruins of Sirte, in Libya, destroyed by the bombing of NATO; I witnessed the bombing of Homs and Aleppo as an embedded reporter with the rebel brigades of the Free Syrian Army and Jabhet al-Nosra. But I had never seen anything like the ruins of Mosul where Even the reinforced concrete skeleton of the most modern buildings has sometimes not resisted the extreme violence of armaments used to defeat the fighters of the Islamic State.

In the face of this spectacle of total destruction, the question that immediately came to my mind was: " But where are the 250,000 men, women and children who had not evacuated Mosul-West?" "

And this, less because they were forced by the IE to serve as "human shields" (the myths of war propaganda have always been hard skinned) and because they feared reprisals from the Shiites of Baghdad The Iraqi army is made up of more than 90% of Shiites), as these Sunni families had, in 2014, welcomed the liberating jihadists when their 800 fighters drove out the 65,000 soldiers of the Iraqi army from Mosul.

Where have they gone, all these people ?!

Under the rubble!

This month of July 2017 is particularly scorching in Iraq, and the unsustainable putrid odor that floats over the gravas answers the question without any ambiguity.

As for the wandering dogs, who scrape here and there among the debris of the dwellings and tear from the bowels of the battlefield scraps of flesh, they confirm the answer, if need be. Just as the clouds of black flies leave no doubt about the presence of the corpses and make it possible to locate them easily.

Sometimes, at the turn of a crater, we see a leg or an arm emerge, gray by the cement dust which has covered everything and on which the sun is reflected to produce a blinding, almost immaculate whiteness. Bodies of bodies that the incessant rotations of the Iraqi army's bulldozers fail to make all disappear, these titanic machines that crush the remains under their enormous wheels and flatten them with their large heavy shovel.

No, nothing does: the dead call their presence.

It is also for the army, which has now been joined by the militias, to rake the last pockets of resistance.

Not all jihadists were killed. Every day, they emerge from the long and numerous tunnels they have dug under the city. How many are they still in this vast subsoil? None of the officers I encountered advances to quantifying what remains of the forces of the Sunni enemy.

But the Shiites no longer make the slightest quarter; And the uncertified rumor that the Iraqi General Staff has given orders not to make a prisoner any more and to finish very quickly with everything that still lives in Mosul. This is also why bulldozers are so active; To fill with heavy shovelfuls of bursting concrete blocks the accesses of those tunnels from which death still springs daily; To bury alive those who hide there.

Show no mercy ! And so much the worse for civilians; They are in any case Sunnis ... It is probably the explanation of the corpses that one sees floating on the Tigris, every day, and that come to run aground on the banks of pebbles, where they blacken and swell in the sun, Like skins ... Some have their hands tied behind their backs.

It stinks so much that you can not stay long in Mosul-West without being nauseated; And returned to the hotel in Erbil after a three hour drive, the smell had so permeated my clothes that people asked me about what was going on there ...

The victors do not show any sympathy for the Sunnis, and acts of revenge are no longer counted, as was the case in Tikrit and Fallujah, two precedents that should have led the coalition of Washington to put sufficient pressure on Baghdad To avoid horror. But probably, the coalition being now busy in Raqqa, Syria, the humanitarian issue was the least of its concerns.

It is thus that in Iraq the end of three years of war, in the intoxication of the blood, is celebrated, which the heat and the stench excite even more than victory, enraged soldiers become as fools. Henceforth, religious antagonism, which has never ceased to exacerbate itself since 2003, can no longer be disguised: loudspeakers fixed on armored cars of the army broadcast songs to the glory of Imam Hossein, figure Emblematic of Shi'ism, while soldiers track down the last survivors, backed up by swarms of helicopters that constantly fly over the ruins and fire their deadly missiles at the slightest movement. And it is not the officer in charge of the press who will turn the tables, even repeating to anyone who wants to hear him and smile on his lips: " There are no Shiites or Sunnis, right here ! We are all Iraqis! "

As in Sirte or Aleppo, the number of civilian victims of this battle is unlikely to be known.

One last thing, finally, to return for a moment to the profession of "war reporter" ... It would be dishonest to pretend to ignore that the Russian press, for its part, is not so quick to seize the terrible exactions Committed in Mosul to denounce the Washington coalition struggling with the Islamic state as the Western press did without any nuance of events in Aleppo where the Russians were fighting al-Qaeda (Jabhet al-Nosra).

The fact deserves to be pinned as Moscow prepares to support the offensive of Bashar al-Assad's army against the last stronghold of the al-Nosra Front in Syria: Idlib, where more than one million Civilians are trapped.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 01 Aug 2017 13:08

http://www.atimes.com/article/new-silk- ... go-syria//

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 01 Aug 2017 13:12

hezbollah takes 40 journos on a day tour of arsal barrens
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/mi ... be4da949d3

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 01 Aug 2017 19:01

AQ is said to be flush with cash while ISIS takes the rap and is investing heavily in the khalifa cub pipeline.

two of their more talented lads attacked the iraqi embassy in kabul this week