By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on November 6, 2014
SRF leader Jamal Marouf
What a disaster. With American and coalition jets in the air overhead, ostensibly to do battle with Salafi-jihadists, al-Qaeda has been allowed to push rebel brigades the United States purports to support out of almost all of Idlib Province. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on October 21, 2014
Abu Omar a-Shishani, while in Georgian military, now as I.S. leader in Syria/Iraq
The Syrian rebellion, on Oct. 5, took over areas of Tel al-Hara, near Nawa, a major town twenty miles north of Deraa City, which is a strategic gateway to the road networks that keep the Assad regime alive in Deraa Province. The videos (1/2/3) showed FSA-branded rebels like Liwa al-Furqan and Jabhat Thuwar as-Suriya (the Syrian Revolutionaries’ Front) in control. Jabhat an-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda, had an important presence, but it was not dominant. So this seemed like good news on its own terms.
Two days later the plot thickened when a further video was uploaded to YouTube, showing the rebels touring a captured regime intelligence station in Tel al-Hara: Continue reading
