Damascus has provided military support to Kurdish forces to help them battle Islamic State, Syrian media have reported. The move would mean President Bashar Assad and his Western enemies could be backing the same forces against Islamist militants.
The main Syrian Kurdish party, which has repeatedly denied that it has cooperated with the Damascus government, described the report as propaganda.
Assad has mostly left the Syrian Kurds to their own devices and ceded control of some Kurdish areas in Syria to Kurdish militants while focusing his firepower on insurgents fighting to unseat him.
Kurds in Syria complain of years of marginalization under Assad but also fear Sunni Muslim militants.
An October 27 report from the state news agency SANA denied a claim, which it said some Kurdish members of the Syrian government had made, that Damascus was not helping Syrian Kurds besieged by Islamic State, the most powerful anti-Assad militant group.
"The support provided by the government to Syrian Kurds is known and documented and comprehensive, including military support," SANA quoted the media source as saying.
It said that the aid included direct and indirect military support but did not say which groups were recipients or when Damascus last sent military aid to Kurds.............http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/1.62305127/10/14
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Syrian Kurds Refuse To Fight Assad Army. Kurds will not fight in Syria on Turkey’s behalf against Bashar al-Assad (Kurdish Leader)
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Fighters linked to al Qaeda have seized territory from a moderate Syrian rebel group in a three-day campaign that has expanded their control into one of the few areas of northern Syria not held by hardline Islamists...
ReplyDeleteSyrian opposition activists and a military commander said the Nusra Front had taken several villages in Idlib province from the Syria Revolutionaries' Front led by Jamal Maarouf, a prominent figure in the moderate opposition to President Bashar al-Assad.
"This has happened before and we came through it. But this time the mobilisation is very large," said a military official in the Syria Revolutionaries' Front..............http://www.todayonline.com/world/al-qaeda-seizes-territory-moderate-syrian-group
28/10/14
Syria’s moderate rebels clash with al-Qaeda ...
ReplyDeleteModerate Syrian rebels clashed on Tuesday with al-Qaeda-linked group the al-Nusra Front in several areas in Idlib province, activists said.
Syrian opposition activists and a military commander said the Nusra Front had taken several villages in Idlib from the Syria Revolutionaries’ Front led by Jamal Maarouf, a prominent figure in the moderate opposition to President Bashar al-Assad, according to Reuters news agency.
“This has happened before and we came through it. But this time the mobilisation is very large,” said a military official in the Syria Revolutionaries’ Front.
Twenty of the group’s fighters had been killed on Monday, the official said.
“Jamal remains steadfast,” said the official, who declined to be named because he is not an official spokesman for the group. Speaking via Skype, he added that the Syria Revolutionaries’ Front had taken 25 Nusra fighters prisoner.
The Nusra Front is al-Qaeda’s official affiliate in the Syrian civil war and one of the strongest insurgent groups fighting to topple Assad. But it has been overshadowed by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which has seized swathes of northern and eastern Syria and is being targeted by U.S.-led air strikes...................http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2014/10/28/Syria-s-moderate-rebels-clash-with-al-Qaeda.html
28/10/14