[Centraal] Crisis in Syrië #266 Iran is altijd nr. 1

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 00:00 schreef reza1 het volgende:
Hij verdreef en onderukte niet-moslims uit Turkije en onderdrukte bijv. Koerden.

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Op maandag 11 mei 2015 23:39 schreef Atak het volgende:

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Dit had ik al eerder gezegd. Het is een uitputtingsoorlog om Iran al zijn geld en manschappen te verspillen in de regio. Wat Iran niet snapt is dat de coalitie een veel langere adem heeft. Uiteindelijk zal Iran geen resultaten boeken. Het doel is Iran te laten geloven dat ze dat wel kunnen. Daarom dat de VS de situatie niet verandert omdat op deze manier Iran zich lekker de stront in laat zakken.

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 00:02 schreef reza1 het volgende:

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Zowel de islam onderdrukken als niet-moslims onderdrukken.

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Op maandag 11 mei 2015 21:49 schreef Aloulu het volgende:

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Alleen vertrouwt Assad's leger ze niet om ze ver erop uit te sturen door de vele defecties al en kan ze daarom zeer beperkt gebruiken tot zover de cijfertjes en waar de praktijk begint.

Nasrallah heeft een grote fout gemaakt door de oorlog aan soennieten te verklaren in de Levant en daar komt hij nog wel achter in deze hele lange oorlog. Hij heeft de achterban er niet naar qua grote in de hele Levant om jarenlang verliezen te incasseren tegen een numerieke meerderheid.

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 00:08 schreef reza1 het volgende:

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Over welke seculiere partij heb je het nou dan?

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 00:09 schreef Geoffrey het volgende:

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degene die Raqqa_sl hebben gehackt

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 00:13 schreef IPA35 het volgende:

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Atsiz fanboys zijn denk ik niet 100% seculier, maar meer messed up positivistisch.

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 00:08 schreef PizzaMizza het volgende:
Denk jij dat Iran het gaat toestaan dat de rebellen of een andere groep het hart van Hezbollah raken? Ik voorspel je dat er 1) duizenden raketten zullen vliegen en rebellensteden inclusief alles letterlijk verdwijnen of 2) dat iran met duizenden soldaten het gevecht tot zich zal opnemen.

Hezbollah en Iran, is zoals Israel en VS. Diegene die Israel aanvalt, krijgt een invasie van VS.

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Op maandag 11 mei 2015 21:49 schreef Aloulu het volgende:

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Alleen vertrouwt Assad's leger ze niet om ze ver erop uit te sturen door de vele defecties al en kan ze daarom zeer beperkt gebruiken tot zover de cijfertjes en waar de praktijk begint.

Nasrallah heeft een grote fout gemaakt door de oorlog aan soennieten te verklaren in de Levant en daar komt hij nog wel achter in deze hele lange oorlog. Hij heeft de achterban er niet naar qua grote in de hele Levant om jarenlang verliezen te incasseren tegen een numerieke meerderheid.

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 00:08 schreef PizzaMizza het volgende:

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Denk jij dat Iran het gaat toestaan dat de rebellen of een andere groep het hart van Hezbollah raken? Ik voorspel je dat er 1) duizenden raketten zullen vliegen en rebellensteden inclusief alles letterlijk verdwijnen of 2) dat iran met duizenden soldaten het gevecht tot zich zal opnemen.

Hezbollah en Iran, is zoals Israel en VS. Diegene die Israel aanvalt, krijgt een invasie van VS.

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 00:29 schreef Atak het volgende:

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Haha. Als Iran wil eindigen als Irak moet Iran dat doen. Iran heeft niks te willen. Hopelijk is de mullah zo dom als jij denkt.

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Syria's Mercenaries: The Afghans Fighting Assad's War


His war only lasted from one dawn to the next. When the sun rose for the second time over the Syrian city of Aleppo, Murad, a farmer from Afghanistan, was still cowering on the second floor of the house he was supposed to defend to the death. That, at least, is what his Iranian officer had ordered him to do.

How, though, did he get to this war-torn city far away from his village in the mountains of Afghanistan? All he had wanted was an Iranian residence permit, he says. But at the end of his trip, he found himself fighting as a mercenary in the Syrian civil war on the side of the Bashar Assad regime.
On that morning in Aleppo, Murad didn't know how many from his unit were still alive, nor did he know where he was or who he was fighting against. His four magazines had been empty for hours. When a violent explosion caused the house he was in to collapse, he found himself thinking about his daughters, he says. "I screamed and thought I was suffocating. And then, everything around me was quiet."

Men arrived and pulled Murad, who was still screaming, out of the rubble. He was lucky, even if he didn't see it that way at first. "I thought they would kill me immediately. But they bandaged me up and took me to their quarters. There was someone there who spoke a bit of Persian and he told me I didn't need to be afraid."

That was seven months ago. Since then, Murad and another Afghan have been sitting in a makeshift prison belonging to the "Damascus Front," one of Aleppo's larger rebel formations. They are being held in a neon-lit basement, next to a roaring generator. The walls are crumbling, a product of the myriad explosions that have shaken the city. In addition to Afghans, Pakistanis and Iranians have also been taken prisoner by other rebel groups, all of them fighting on the front lines.

The war in the northern-Syrian city of Aleppo -- but also around both Hama and Damascus and down to Deraa in the south -- has taken on an Afghan face. Or, to be more precise, a face with distinctly Asian features. Many of those Afghans that have been sent into battle come from the Hazara, a Shiite minority that are the poorest of the poor in Afghanistan.

Running Out of Soldiers

The Assad family dictatorship is running out of soldiers and is becoming increasingly reliant on mercenaries. Indeed, from the very beginning the Assad regime had an opponent that it could never really defeat: Syria's demography.

In order to prevent the collapse of Syrian government forces, experienced units from the Lebanese militia Hezbollah began fighting for Assad as early as 2012. Later, they were joined by Iranians, Iraqis, Pakistanis and Yemenis -- Shiites from all over, on which the regime is increasingly dependent. But the longer the war continues without victory, the more difficult it has become for Assad's allies to justify the growing body count. In 2013, for example, Hezbollah lost 130 fighters as it captured the city of Qusair and has lost many more than that trying to hold on to it. Indeed, Hezbollah has begun writing "traffic accident" as the cause of death on death certificates of its fighters who fall in Syria.

The Iraqis have almost all returned home. Rather than fighting themselves, they largely control the operations from the background. The Iraqi militia Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq, for example, organizes the deployment of Pakistani volunteers in Syria. But no ethnic group is represented on all of the regime's fronts to the degree that the Afghan Hazara are. Exact numbers are hard to come by, but some 700 of them are thought to have lost their lives in Aleppo and Daraa alone. What's worse, most of them don't come completely on their own free will.

Up to 2 million Hazara live in Iran, most of them as illegal immigrants. It is an inexhaustible reservoir of the desperate, from which the Pasdars -- as Iran's Revolutionary Guards are called -- have recruited thousands for the war in Syria over the last year and a half.

Forty-five year old Murad Ali Hamidi, the man who is now sitting in the Aleppo prison, was previously a farmer in the northern Afghanistan village of Chaharzad Khane, or "400 houses". He had a small field measuring 50 meters by 50 meters (27,000 square feet), but there was no electricity, running water or school. He fled to Iran without valid travel documents and worked illegally in a rock quarry -- until he was arrested in Septmeber 2013. "They accused me of selling drugs, but that isn't true," he says. For 15 days, he says, he was whipped with heavy cables and beaten.

A circular scar on his back would seem to provide evidence for his story that he was also burned with a cigarette. "They are racist in Iran. They don't want us only because we are Afghans. Hardly any of us received refugee papers." Such credentials would have allowed him to at least send his children to school and to receive some food.

'Suddenly, There Were Raids'

Murad claims he was sentenced to six years in prison. After serving the first year in notorious Evin Prison in Tehran, he received an unexpected visit from a visitor wearing the green uniform of the Pasdars. "Why are you here?" the man asked.

"Drugs," Murad replied.

"Do you want to have the final five years of your sentence commuted?"

Murad didn't say no. He would have to join the war in Syria for two months, the officer told him, saying that he would only be given simple tasks and guard duty. When he returned, the officer promised, he may even receive a residency permit. The other Afghans in his cell also agreed to trade in the rest of their sentences for two months of service in Syria. They were promised a monthly salary of 2 million toman, the equivalent of $700.

Said Ahmed Hussein, who is being held with Murad, mentioned the same sum. Hussein had spent years working in construction in an exclusive residential district in northern Tehran. "Suddenly, there were raids and I was one of 150 illegal immigrants arrested. All of us were Hazara. Then, the Pasars came and promised us money and residence permits if we would voluntarily go to Syria. But they said 'we're sending you there no matter what.' Everybody signed up."

From prison, they were sent to different military bases near Tehran for Kalashnikov training. "The trainer told us we would be fighting terrorists in Syria," Murad says. Dressed in civilian clothes, they were taken by bus to Tehran's Imam Khomeini Airport for the flight, in a passenger plane, to Damascus. "There were even families on board. Nobody was supposed to see that we were soldiers," Murad relates.

Two Iranian officers welcomed them upon arrival in Damascus and they were given tea. They then traveled further, to the coastal city of Latakia, and then by bus to a military base on the outskirts of Aleppo, where they stayed for 10 days. "Here, the Iranians weren't so friendly anymore, much less the Syrian soldiers who looked after us. When we spoke Persian to each other, they yelled at us."

One evening, weapons and uniforms were distributed and they were driven in cars to a collection point for some 300 men from Afghanistan. "We began walking, the whole night, until three or four in the morning. Then they pointed into the darkness at a multi-storied building and ordered a dozen of us to storm it and to hold it at all costs! They kept telling us that we couldn't surrender because the terrorists would cut off our heads," he says. "Don't surrender, don't surrender," he keeps repeating, like a mantra.

'Incredibly Tenacious'

Two rebel commanders who likewise took part in the battle, but on the other side, say that the Afghans were like machines. "They are incredibly tenacious, run faster than we do and keep shooting even after they have been surrounded. But as soon as they lose radio contact with headquarters, they panic."

"All of us were afraid," Murad says. "I asked myself, what am I doing here? This isn't my country." When the interpreter asks him why he allowed himself to get into such a situation in the first place, Murad became angry for the only time during our discussion. "Fifty meters by 50 meters of poor soil! How are five people supposed to live off of that?!" He wearily raises his hands and continues telling his story: "We started running. Luckily, the building was empty and we spread out among the different floors. We came under fire and didn't even notice that, aside from us, no one else was there. Inside the house was an Iranian officer who yelled at me: 'You have to fight or I'll kill you!' I fired off all my ammunition without looking where I was shooting."

Abu Hassanain, one of the two rebel commanders involved in the fight that night, recalls: "It made absolutely no sense for them to keep fighting. But they didn't surrender. So we blew up the entire building." That was the explosion that buried Murad and Said, the only two from the original group that survived.

Now, they are prisoners in a city that is more dangerous than any prison and are at risk everyday of being blown apart by a barrel bomb dropped by the army they came to fight for. The bombs, too, show just how desperate the regime -- which has suffered significant military defeats in recent weeks -- has become. Every morning between 8 a.m. and 9 a.m. is "barrel time" in eastern Aleppo. That is when most of the barrel bombs, which are now produced in industrial quantities, are rolled out of military helicopters, tumble to the ground and destroy everything within two dozen meters.

"Come after nine," the man responsible for the Afghan prisoners recommends. It's Sunday, May 3, shortly before the SPIEGEL team in Aleppo is to head out to the rebel prison, when we hear a massive detonation in the neighboring quarter of Saif al-Daula. On the way to our meeting with the prisoners, we keep seeing people with horrified looks on their faces, some with tears in their eyes, as they walk towards Saif al-Daula. It seems surprising at first. Most barrel bombs only hit empty ruins, and even if there are casualties, people here normally don't run through the streets. Death comes quickly in Aleppo and the stoic resistance of the last 100,000 residents who have remained behind is expressed in their refusal to leave.

Beyond Hope and Desperation

But this bomb, dropped shortly before 9 a.m., scored a direct hit on the only school in the quarter, a four-story building that has been turned into a rubble-filled crater. The remains of the floors hang into the crater like gigantic rags. Sunday, was exam day, the only day on which schoolchildren still gather together. It is the same day that exams take place in the western part of the city as well, which is under regime control. It is almost certain that the pilots knew what they were doing.

At least six children and a teacher were killed instantly, with doctors unsure if several other children will survive. Late that afternoon, a man on a motorcycle stops next to the rubble and asks those still digging whether they had found his daughter. He says he has gone to every hospital in the city and visited every morgue, but hasn't been able to find her. He is met by silent head shaking. "My daughter," he sighs with a tone beyond hope and desperation -- and drives off.

As though their fates were momentarily intertwined, Murad, the Afghan, had said the same thing in almost the exact same tone a short time earlier: "My daughters." They haven't heard anything from their father in more than two years. He doesn't have any brothers in the village and his parents are dead. Only his mother-in-law is still alive, but she too is bitterly poor. "Who is taking care of my family? Do they have enough to eat, do they have clothes, did they get through the winter?"

He says that his fate is not in God's hands. Using an imam and the Red Crescent as intermediaries, the rebels from the Damascus Front have tried to exchange him and other Afghans for their own men being held in regime prisons. That, though, is not cause for hope for Murad. Rather, he thinks it would just be another type of horror. "What do I do if they give me back to the Syrian army? They'll just put me right back into one of their suicide commandos like last time. I don't want to do that again. I want to go back to Afghanistan." Back to the misery that he once tried to escape.
For the moment, it doesn't look like there will be a prisoner exchange, says Sheikh Abdulqader Falas, who is leading the negotiations. "In the past, we have exchanged Syrian officers, and the regime is particularly willing to release prisoners in exchange for Iranians and Hezbollah fighters. But for the Afghans, nothing. We have contacted the International Committee of the Red Cross, but again, nothing. Those two will likely stay with us until the end of the war.

A rebel commander from Aleppo, who is leading negotiations for six other Afghans, at least managed to reach one of the most powerful Syrian officers on the telephone: Colonel Suhail al-Hassan, called Nimr, or tiger, by his supporters. The colonel's answer was succinct: "Do what you want with them. You can kill them, they're just mercenaries. We can send you thousands of them."

Spiegel.de

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The Assad family dictatorship is running out of soldiers and is becoming increasingly reliant on mercenaries. Indeed, from the very beginning the Assad regime had an opponent that it could never really defeat: Syria's demography.

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In order to prevent the collapse of Syrian government forces, experienced units from the Lebanese militia Hezbollah began fighting for Assad as early as 2012. Later, they were joined by Iranians, Iraqis, Pakistanis and Yemenis -- Shiites from all over, on which the regime is increasingly dependent. But the longer the war continues without victory, the more difficult it has become for Assad's allies to justify the growing body count. In 2013, for example, Hezbollah lost 130 fighters as it captured the city of Qusair and has lost many more than that trying to hold on to it. Indeed, Hezbollah has begun writing "traffic accident" as the cause of death on death certificates of its fighters who fall in Syria.

The Iraqis have almost all returned home. Rather than fighting themselves, they largely control the operations from the background. The Iraqi militia Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq, for example, organizes the deployment of Pakistani volunteers in Syria. But no ethnic group is represented on all of the regime's fronts to the degree that the Afghan Hazara are. Exact numbers are hard to come by, but some 700 of them are thought to have lost their lives in Aleppo and Daraa alone. What's worse, most of them don't come completely on their own free will.

Up to 2 million Hazara live in Iran, most of them as illegal immigrants. It is an inexhaustible reservoir of the desperate, from which the Pasdars -- as Iran's Revolutionary Guards are called -- have recruited thousands for the war in Syria over the last year and a half.

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Op maandag 11 mei 2015 21:08 schreef Richestorags het volgende:

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De rest volgt snel, SAA zit er al dicht op ten zuiden van het ziekenhuis.

twitter:

archicivilians twitterde op dinsdag 12-05-2015 om 01:41:58 #Syria: Rebels took several villages in Northern #Aleppo countryside after clashes with #Daesh. Map for the area will be released tomorrow. reageer retweet

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 01:30 schreef PizzaMizza het volgende:

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Iran crusht elk land in het middenoosten, dat kan ik je beloven. Vooral papertiger Turkije.

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 01:57 schreef Atak het volgende:

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Assad is bijna op. De volgende is Iran. Als je denkt dat Iran onbestraft hier van af zal komen ben je wel heel erg naïef. Azerbeidzjan zal veel land krijgen van Iran wanneer het voorbij is.

http://www.business-class(...)_boekestijn_/id/1287

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Hezbollah's desperate recruiting in the Bekaa


With a shortage of manpower, Hezbollah is trying to recruit young men from the Bekaa Valley to fight in Syria by tempting impressionable young men with cash.
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Hezbollah fighters carry the coffin of fellow Shiite militant Hamza Hussein Zeiter, killed in Qalamoun, Syria, during his funeral on 5 May 2015 in the town of Baalbek in eastern Lebanon

Aïsha, a veiled woman in her early 60s, resident of a small town in the Bekaa, was stuffing zucchinis, sitting on a small chair at the doorstep, on a small terrace surrounding her house. She said with a low voice: “The finest young men in town are gone. They went to fight the enemies who are threatening our security. It is sad to say this but what more can I say? The call of duty has to be answered.” Aïsha was referring to young men who recently left their towns in the Bekaa Valley to join Hezbollah ranks in Syria.

Recently, Hezbollah has been losing ground in Syria, though there are no official numbers for its fatalities. According to an Al-Modon report, in pro-Hezbollah circles, “words are being whispered about great losses. Some people have gone even further and said that the size of losses in Syria exceeds the total losses incurred by the party since the beginning of its conflict with the enemy in 1982.” Consequently, Hezbollah has started to take unusual measures, recruiting heavily from various parts of Lebanon, including teenagers—endeavoring to uphold its Syrian front as long as possible.

Supporters and refuters of Hezbollah’s ideology

When it comes to ideology, Hezbollah is very adept at indoctrinating its youth and encouraging them to become jihadists. “I am not scared of armed groups as long as Al-Sayyed [Hassan Nasrallah] is protecting the borders of Lebanon,” said 45-year-old Ahmad, a father of five who lives in Baalbek. The yellow ribbon—the color of the Hezbollah flag—tied to the fence of his garden preemptively announces his political affiliation. “We are the men of the Sayyed. We are ready to give him our blood if he asked for it," Ahmad told NOW. "My older son, who is 26, joined Hezbollah’s ranks eight months ago. My youngest, who is 20, joined the party six weeks ago. They both believe that Hezbollah will return victorious from Syria.”

Ahmad fully supports Hezbollah’s ideology and agendas even though it may cost the lives of his sons. “In addition, my daughter was engaged to a fighter who died as a martyr six months ago. I promised God I will not marry her or let her be engaged before Hezbollah returns victorious from Syria.”

Ahmad’s feelings about Hezbollah’s recruitment of young men from the Bekaa is not unique. In fact, a majority of Lebanese Shiites in the Bekaa share his opinions. Fighting in Syria is not as popular among Amal Movement supporters or other Shiites who consider themselves independent. “Only one of my kids joined the Shiite army,” said Fatima, who has three sons. “He went despite the fact that his father and I tried to stop him. He is my son; he is too precious. I never imagined I would lose him like this. I pray every minute for God to bring him back home safe. He was brainwashed by his friends and young men in town. He is only 21.”

In November 2014, An-Nahar reported that Hezbollah is also recruiting non-Shiite fighters from the Bekaa region, even Christians. But with tensions raised again in the country over renewed fighting in Qalamoun and Nasrallah’s latest speech, Christians in the Bekaa no longer seem to be taking Hezbollah’s bait. “Some Christian families sent their kids to fight ISIS before. Now, they are not doing it anymore,” said Abu Charbel (known affectionately as Al-Hakim; the wise). Abu Charbel is in his early 70s and lives in a small Christian village near Riyak. “The danger is bigger now, and this is not our war anymore. We thought at first we were defending our borders from terrorists, but it turned out that the political agenda is very different. We will not send our children to die in order to fight in somebody else’s war.”

Monetary incentives

Hezbollah realizes its ideology is not a substantial enough motivator to keep up its rank and file: paying fighters is essential. “A thousand dollars is a fortune for all of us, and it is definitely a dream come true for a 21-year-old young man who can’t find a job,” said Fatima. Fatima and her family live in a town near Bar Elias called Deir Zannoun. “Our town is somehow neglected by the government. We face a daily struggle to survive; sometimes we do not have electricity or water. The situation here is bad and our young men hardly find jobs. Paying money to recruit them to fight in Syria was one of the smartest things [the party] did. Nobody would say no to 1,000 or 1,200 dollars a month.”

Several Bekaa residents NOW spoke to from both Shiite and non-Shiite towns confirmed that a lot of young men who have joined Hezbollah’s military did so specifically for the money. The amounts quoted to NOW ranged between $500 and $2,000. “The youngest are the most vulnerable to money incentives,” said Abu Charbel. “When you give a 17 or 18-year-old boy a big amount of money, and you encourage him to go fight and convince him that he is fighting the ‘bad guys,’ he is more likely to walk towards death barefoot, and he will happily do it without measuring its consequences.”

Bekaa has changed

In some towns, the streets were empty this week, even during the day. A few residents told NOW that armed men wander the streets day and night here and there, guarding the alleys. Even in crowded Chtaura, people seemed very cautious. “We don’t know what will happen next. We try to stay home at night, not to go out a lot,” said a shop owner in Chtaura square. “Lately, I feel that it’s more crowded here. There are definitely large numbers of Syrian refugees living here, but I also know that a lot of Lebanese families have been trying to move away from towns on the border because the situation there is not so good.”

In fact, a night tour in a few towns in the Bekaa really revealed to what extent locals are restricting their movements out of fear. The few cars one sees at these times are 4x4s, the majority of which do not have license plates. “These are the people securing the area,” said Ahmad. “The situation needs high measures of caution and attention. We can’t act like we did before because, from one side, the threats are bigger and, from the other side, there are fewer men in the towns because a lot of them joined Hezbollah’s ranks.”

“I will not send my children to die”

“No matter how much they pay, I will not send my children to die,” said Rahifa, a Druze woman who married a Shiite. She lives with her husband and her two sons on the outskirts of Anjar, a key border town mere minutes from Syria. It seemed that Rahifa’s family is not in a real need of money—they can afford to turn down Hezbollah offers. “Don’t get me wrong, we do support Hezbollah. For us, the party is the only resistance that exists against Israel in Lebanon. It is also defending the nearby borders from armed groups and terrorists who are regularly trying to invade our country. Unfortunately, the situation now is not the same as it was back in 2006. In 2006, we were certain that Hezbollah was able to defeat Israel. Now, with all the losses in Syria, we are not equally sure anymore.”

In Rahifa’s opinion, Hassan Nasrallah’s speech prior to the launching of the Qalamoun campaign was not as reassuring as before. “This time, Nasrallah did not promise us any victory. I trust that Nasrallah would never lie to his supporters. If he is not so sure he will win, I will not take the risk of sending my kids to Syria. After years of fighting in Syria, Hezbollah, just like any other army that could have been in its place, definitely lost a lot of men and a lot of resources and is much weaker than it was before. Therefore, I will not send my children to die,” said Rahifa.

“Unfortunately, not all people think like I do. We all know that when the party needs something, they will make sure to get it, by all means.”

https://mobile.mmedia.me/(...)ruiting-in-the-bekaa

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 01:57 schreef Atak het volgende:

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Azerbeidzjan zal veel land krijgen van Iran wanneer het voorbij is.

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Op dinsdag 12 mei 2015 02:09 schreef Aloulu het volgende:
Hizbullah gaat de langdurige oorlog in Syrie langzaamaan voelen en doet flinke pogingen meer nieuwe leden te recruiten omdat er veel sneuvelen en de oorlog in Syrie nog lang niet aan het einde is.... vietnam2 in making voor de sjitische as in Syrie blijf maar geld en manschappen pompen, die oorlog win je toch niet