‘American-Zionist plot’ behind Jihadists’ Syria offensive. Russian Aistrikes Killed 400 Terrorists
The US and Israel are responsible for the resurgence of Salafist terrorism in Syria, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has claimed, adding that Tehran will support the efforts by the government in Damascus aimed to to halt the ongoing jihadist offensive.
Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham (HTS), the terrorist group formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, attacked government-controlled territory in northern Syria on Wednesday alongside a collection of allied militias, breaking a fragile truce brokered by Russia and Türkiye in 2020. By Friday, HTS fighters had entered Aleppo, which had been under Syrian government control since 2016.
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In a phone call with his Syrian counterpart, Bassam al-Sabbagh, on Friday, Araghchi called the offensive “an American-Zionist” plot. According to Iran’s PressTV, Araghchi noted that the attack took place immediately after Israel struck a ceasefire deal with Hezbollah in Lebanon, suggesting that Washington and West Jerusalem were using HTS as proxies to strike a blow against Syria’s government, which supports the Palestinian cause.
Araghchi told al-Sabbagh that Iran continues to support the “Syrian government, nation, and army towards fighting terrorism and protecting regional security and stability,” PressTV paraphrased.
Before adopting its current name in 2017, Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham was known as Jabhat al-Nusra. Indirectly armed by the US and allegedly backed by Türkiye, the terrorist group was one of the main factions opposing Bashar Assad’s government during the Syrian Civil War. Russia intervened in the conflict in 2015, helping Damascus retake much of the country from Jabhat al-Nusra, Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS), and dozens of US-supported armed groups deemed “moderate rebels” by Washington.
Iran also played a key role in helping the Syrian government hold back the jihadists, with the country’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps providing weapons and training to the Syrian Army and sending thousands of military advisers and volunteers to assist Assad’s forces on the battlefield.
While the US waged war against IS fighters in Syria, it overtly supported other anti-Assad militias and covertly backed jihadist groups. Despite Washington placing a $10 million bounty on the head of Al-Qaeda’s commander in Syria in 2013, current US National Security Adviser and then-State Department staffer Jake Sullivan had written to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton several months earlier, explaining that “AQ [Al Qaeda] is on our side in Syria.”
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Al-Qaeda’s Syrian commander, Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, broke ties with the organization in 2016 and went on to lead HTS. In an interview in 2021, Former US Special Representative for Syria Engagement James Jeffrey described HTS as “an asset” to American strategy in Syria, saying that supporting the jihadist commander was “the least bad option” for keeping Idlib out of Syrian government control.
While the US officially considers al-Jolani a ‘Specially Designated Global Terrorist’ and has implicated his group in a litany of human rights abuses, al-Jolani insists that HTS “does not represent a threat” to Western interests.
Originally published by RT (former Russia Today)
Jihadists claim to re-enter Syria’s Aleppo
Jihadist Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham (HTS) fighters have entered the Syrian city of Aleppo, the terrorist group claimed on Friday, two days after it launched a surprise offensive against Syrian government forces.
In a statement to Al Jazeera, HTS said that its militants had begun to press into several neighborhoods in the northern Syrian city, which has been controlled by government forces since 2016.
According to Türkiye’s Anadolu news agency, the jihadists have clashed with the Syrian Army inside Aleppo.
Video footage shared on social media purportedly showed HTS gunmen marauding through the city on foot and in armored vehicles. Earlier on Friday, the jihadists claimed to have seized some 400 square kilometers of territory in Aleppo and Idlib provinces, and to have captured heavy weaponry and other military hardware from the Syrian Army.
Russian jets strike jihadists near Aleppo and Idlib in Syria
Syrian and Russian forces have killed more than 400 jihadists in a series of airstrikes near the cities of Aleppo and Idlib, the Russian military has announced. The terrorists had launched a surprise counteroffensive against government troops on Wednesday.
The body count was announced on Friday by Colonel Oleg Ignatiuk, the deputy head of the Russian Reconciliation Center for Syria. Ignatiuk’s announcement came after Syrian media claimed that Russian and Syrian warplanes had bombed terrorist targets in dozens of locations throughout Idlib and Aleppo provinces.
The Syrian Arab Army claimed that the strikes have inflicted devastating losses on the jihadists.
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The Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham (HTS) terrorist group – formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra – and a collection of allied militias, attacked government-controlled territory in northern Syria on Wednesday, breaking a fragile truce established by Russia and Türkiye in 2020.
Escalation in Syria: Islamists Loyal to Turkey Launch Attack on Kurdish Areas
Statement by Kurdistan National Congress (KNK) – Press Office
Following the outbreak of the heaviest fighting in Syria in several years, Kurdish areas are now under acute threat from attacks by jihadist groups cooperating with Turkey. While the Islamist group Haiat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda formerly known as al-Nusra Front, has been advancing on Aleppo since Wednesday and fighting with the Assad regime’s forces, the Turkish-loyal mercenaries of the so-called Syrian National Army (SNA) are currently preparing a major attack on the Kurdish region of Tal Rifaat in northwestern Syria.
The Turkish army is already bombing the region from the air and on the ground. Attacks on the Kurdish town of Ain Issa have also been reported. According to local sources, Turkey has also opened the border to northwestern Syria, allowing more jihadist fighters to enter Syria.
Tal Rifaat is home to several hundred thousand Kurdish refugees who were forced to flee in 2018 following Turkey’s war of aggression on Efrîn (Afrin) in violation of international law. Since then, the SNA, an alliance of various Islamist organizations and former IS fighters, and the Turkish army have controlled the region. Human rights organizations fear that the SNA’s attacks could once again drive refugees out of Efrîn. Ethnic cleansing of the Kurdish population took place in Efrin during the Turkish occupation.
Since then, Turkey has expelled the majority of Kurds in the region and settled people of Arab origin, leaving the Kurdish population as a minority in the region. Systematic human rights violations such as abductions, expulsions, torture and sexual violence under the rule of Islamist militias have been reported from the region. Now the people of Tal Rifaat face a similar fate. Aleppo’s Kurdish population, which lives mainly in the neighborhoods of Shasmeqsûd and Eşrefiyê, is also threatened by the advance of Haiat Tahrir Al-Sham, an offshoot of al-Qaeda. This group has repeatedly attacked areas of Kurdish self-rule in the past during the Syrian civil war.
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Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is a jihadist alliance that has controlled Idlib province in northwestern Syria since 2017, formed by the merger of several Islamist groups, including the al-Qaeda affiliate Nusra, which rebranded as Fateh al-Sham in 2016. Listed as a “terrorist” organization by the UN Security Council, HTS has expanded its influence into SNA-held northern Syria, often with the tacit approval of Turkey.
HTS seeks to project an image of respectability and governance reliability, despite reports of an increasingly totalitarian regime and Islamist theocracy in Idlib. The international community should be wary of HTS’s expansion into Turkish-occupied territory, as it has been linked to anti-Semitic propaganda and has ties to al-Qaeda, despite efforts to distance itself from its jihadist roots. Notably, a perpetrator involved in a foiled terrorist attack in Munich expressed sympathy for HTS, highlighting the group’s continued relevance in the broader landscape of extremist threats.
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