Following the news that the Obama administration, in a sudden about-face, is asking Congress for $500 million to train and equip “vetted” members of the “moderate” Syrian opposition, The Associated Press yesterday published a list, headlined “Syrian rebels likely to receive US aid.” The list raises more questions than it answers — two of the listed groups have been designated by the US as terrorist organizations.
The five groups listed as potential recipients of the additional US military aid are, in the order in which they appear: the Free Syrian Army’s Supreme Military Council; breakaway factions such as Harakat Hazm, the Syrian Revolutionaries Front led by Jamal Maarouf a. k.a. Abu Khaled, and the Islamic Army headed by Zahran Alloush; the Islamic Front; the Al Nusrah Front; and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham (ISIS).
We can breathe a sigh of relief as at least, according to the AP article, the US won’t be giving the aid to Al Nusrah, or, although the article doesn’t expressly say so, to the ISIS. But that relief is short-lived if you look at the rest of the list.
The Free Syrian Army has been in considerable disarray for months, and yesterday The Telegraph reported that Syrian National Coalition prime minister Ahmad Tomeh announced that the SNC has “decided to disband the Supreme Military Council and refer its members to the government’s financial and administration committee for investigation.” Brigadier General Abdelilah al-Bashir, the FSA’s chief-of-staff, has been sacked, and the SNC has called for its “revolutionary forces on the ground” to thoroughly revamp the FSA’s command structure.
As for breakaway groups such as Harakat Hazm, Syrian Revolutionaries Front, and Islamic Army, all of which are fairly recent creations arguably established in part to put a more “moderate” face on the Syrian rebels, there is no evidence that they can be relied upon to operate independently of, or avoid sharing arms and supplies with, the hardcore Islamist forces that dominate the rebel ranks on the battlefields.
And there is evidence to the contrary. The Harakat Hazm works with the Syrian Revolutionaries Front, whose leader, Jamal Marouf, has admitted to sharing weapons with Al Nusrah and said that fighting al Qaeda is “not our problem.” [See LWJ report, The shadowy flow of US weapons into Syria, and Threat Matrix report, Chief of Syrian Revolutionaries Front says al Qaeda is ‘not our problem.’] Zahran Alloush, a Salafist leader in the Islamic Front whose forces have flown the black flag of al Qaeda, is not known as a moderate. His Army of Islam faction participated with Al Nusrah in the sectarian attack on Adra in December, in which as many as 40 civilians were massacred.
And finally, with regard to the Islamic Front, described by AP as “an alliance of seven powerful conservative and ultraconservative rebel groups that merged in late November,” the article states that some of the aid could go to factions within the Islamic front, but likely “not to ultraconservative factions such as Ahrar al-Sham.”
The problem with wishful distinctions like this is that they ignore the realities on the ground. As the most powerful of the Islamic Front’s constituencies, Ahrar al Sham would likely be free to take any supplies it wanted from those given to other factions within the Islamic Front. And similarly, but in a larger sense, the battlefield alliances of the Islamic Front, which fights in all of Syria’s provinces, are both fluid and varied, embracing both FSA rebels and uncompromising Islamist fighters from groups such as Al Nusrah, with which it frequently partners. Indeed, the only group with which the Islamic Front seldom, if ever, collaborates is the ISIS.
Perhaps you read to the end of the AP article with the wistful hope that some other deserving groups might appear on a subsequent page. But that was the end of the list.
And if you have been following the war in Syria closely, you probably also recognize that indeed, there are no significant independent, moderate fighting groups in Syria to support at present. Those that do exist must coexist with the prevailing Islamist forces, with all that entails.
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5 Comments
At this point, we would have better luck finding moderate rebels on Craigslist.
All these groups you mention indeed cooperate with ISIS in the Qalamoun region, but other than that, nothing. Even in Ghouta, ISIS is starting to attack other rebels, but the ISIS fighters in Qalamoun have an agreement with other rebel groups to pool their resources together to fight government-allied forces in the region.
No moderate person, let alone any Syrian, has a stake in weakening the Assad regime, because that entails indirectly empowering the jihadists.
Of course, if the jihadists are no longer in the picture, one could argue otherwise.
If you want to belatedly apply the Nixon doctrine of supplying freedom fighters but not sending your own troops, you have to have some freedom fighters to support. These horses may be balky, ill-tempered, broken down nags but if that is all you have, praise them to the skies and pass the ammunition.
Honestly speaking ,the generosity or the largesse designated by The US to the Syrian opposition and moderate groups such as FSA which has fallen into a desperate disarray is too late and non efficient. The ISIS advance in both IRAQ AND SYRIA has diluted some supporters belief in the Moderate Syrian opposition esp Europian and THE us.
I believe ,although ,BASHAR AL ASSAD as an political pariah will never be able to regather his long lost ambiance,the opposition due to breakaway factions has faced a blockade.
a shadowy figure in The Syria opposition has recently confirmed that in order to revamp the FSA structure the CHIEF of THE the group has been recently sacked .
the National collision ,vetting the candidates for while has designated HADI AL BOHRA as the manger and hope to make some promotion.
to get the conclusion ,I suppose ,without marking any kind of breakaway and approve their moderation The SYRIAN opposition wolud be able to make some breakthrough.